Ice Code Games, creator of Hard West 2 and last year’s Rogue Waters, has made a niche for itself in mashing up tactical combat design with supernaturally-infused historical settings. Hard West and its sequel take place in a 19th-century American West haunted by demonic creatures whereas Rogue Waters offers strategic pirate swashbuckling in monster-filled seas. Now, the studio is continuing in a similar vein with the announcement of its latest project, a blend of Hunt Showdown and XCOM 2 called Nightmare Frontier.
Nightmare Frontier looks, at first blush, like a spiritual successor to the Hard West games. It, too, is a kind of strategy game set in the American West, where players have to contend with bloodthirsty monsters. From this foundation on up, though, it takes a pretty different approach, adding a risk-reward focused style of design to Hard West’s formula.
In Nightmare Frontier, players control a group of desperate scavengers in a mission to find and collect loot in a town regularly attacked by creatures called Dreadweavers. As in extraction shooters like Hunt Showdown, the scavengers have to decide how long to fight off enemies, gathering increasing rewards as the danger grows, before it’s time to escape or risk losing what they’ve gained. When the player isn’t fighting, they’ll need to craft and upgrade their gear from the resources they’ve gathered and unlock new skills in preparation for their next round of combat.
Nightmare Frontier is set to launch in Early Access on Steam this summer. Wishlist it or find more information on its Steam page right here.
Otherwise, you can bide the time between now and Nightmare Frontier’s launch by taking a look at our picks for the best horror games and best action-adventure games already out on PC.
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