I just recently heard about the game AirMech, the free-to-play competitive action RTS that allows players to pilot transforming mechs in online 6v6 battles, at first I thought there was just a trailer, but apparently I’m not too sharp because you can play the alpha version of the game right now. It looks like a steampunk-esque League of Legends, only with 1 more player on either team. I have to say, for an alpha, heck even for a beta, the game looks really polished, and they’re using their rapidly expanding community to help find the bugs and flesh out the details before its official release, which is hopefully very soon.
Even though you can play the game now, Carbon Games the creators of AirMech will also be showcasing the game at PAX East next week. Hopefully they will be giving the community a glimpse of their long term plans for the game, including an in-depth look as to what type of content will be monetized in order to keep the game running. If it is anything like LoL they will most likely have new mechs and skins available for players at fairly regular intervals. If that is the case the bar has been set really high; Riot Games releases content for LoL roughly every two weeks.
But so far AirMech looks as if it is different enough to set itself apart from the competition, if they can develop a large enough fan base. This is really the first action RTS to dabble with futuristic technology, as others are mostly based in fantasy and magic. It will be interesting to see if the community and the genre itself can support this type of theme.
Regardless, these are robots we’re talking about, and who doesn’t love robots, especially futuristic transforming robots? Now excuse me while I go and register, hopefully ‘XxOptimusPrim3xX’ isn’t taken yet.
