No matter who you play as, you’re tasked with a fight for total control of the map, by destroying everybody else’s watchtowers-but there’s little to drive you towards that goal, other than ‘this is how you win the game.’ Much like the incohesive style and narrative, the game’s own systems are sparse and disconnected. The Atompunks, morally detached and apparently intent on mass experimentation, ultimately share the same goal of mass extermination as everyone else. The Steampunks similarly evoke early British imperialism, but leave it at some snobby dialogue. I’d struggle to argue that the game would be better for committing to the Dieselpunk’s nazi-inspired imagery, but each faction suffers from the same lack of follow through. Still, the language of rival corporations remains, as if you’re meant to be Steelpunk Inc.Įven within the factions, there’s a disinterest in who-or why-they are. The concept of business parks is explicitly referred to as where “once people moved imaginary things from one place to another, for some reason,” making it clear that this new world has little time for such abstract concepts-lost, along with art and history. For instance, the dieselpunk faction are initially depicted in art with a symbol reminiscent of an iron cross-which is a powerful image to even imply-only for their introductory cutscene to immediately flavor them as only seeking financial dominance, making violent euphemism about red ledgers.Īcross every faction, there’s this odd dissonance where loading screen lore facts will drop in tidbits about “corporate fixers,” but the in-game dialogue only refers to military domination. As a premise, it’s drenched in style and suggests tricky resource wars-but it doesn’t pull through.ĭespite pulling from heavily aesthetic genres, any sense of thematic cohesion falls apart as you begin a 4X-style campaign. In the face of its failure, four competing factions battle for dominance over a dusty and featureless wasteland, while taking inspiration from the sci-fi ‘punk’ genres-the retrofuturistic Atompunk, the interwar-inspired Dieselpunk, old-fashioned Steampunk and hardware-oriented Steelpunk. In Punk Wars, the world has ended after a war to end all wars that-needless to say-didn’t achieve its goal.
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