Frostpunk is an amazing post-apocalypse real-time strategy game that focuses on building up a giant generator and keeping your thriving town warm in the middle of a brand new ice age. It is definitely very steampunk focused, which is why so much of the game ends up being about digging up coal and lighting it on fire in your generators so you can keep your citizens warm.
There are a lot of gears and moving pieces too. It’s like what would happen if the apocalypse kicked off in the middle of the Victorian era, and also if the Victorians were way more technically advanced then they actually were. All things told the game is really awesome. The latest DLC to the game, The Last Autumn, actually takes place before the big freeze. It follows people around as they try to collect enough resources to survive the coming storm.
But the final fight in that DLC might surprise a lot of gamers if you don’t know a lot about history or steampunk stuff. That’s because the final questline is actually a sort of labor dispute within the game, which is totally crazy if you think about it.
The entire story for the DLC revolves around trying to build a bunch of really big generators that the future people will be able to use to survive the ice age that is coming down so fast. The generator runs on coal and heats these sort of pathway things that go through the town. It is also the sole power source in the game.
What is crazy is that the generator construction is just as difficult as trying to survive in the icy world after the ice age kicks off and things start going south. You need to get it built before the whole thing starts and everyone has to struggle to survive.
Anyway, there is a whole new tech tree and buildings. The thing is you have to build this generator while also managing the needs of the workers that surround the generator. So to do that you need to build harbors to get fishing and to receive resources from back home, but there is a really fine balance that the player has to achieve if they want to try to max out everything in the game.
There are tons of ways to upgrade the docks too. You can build roads and things to help you unload and man the docks faster. And one big upgrade includes a telegraph station. You can use this telegraph station to request shipments that include more workers, engineers, and generator construction materials like the steam cores. It is absolutely wild and just a great time.
