The Brimwar remembered fire and learned from it. That was the brief: history made them wary. Which is why I was sent. To speak first, to know the symbols, to make the approach slow and visible. We have considered ourselves stewards of these and other lands since the First Bloom. But its inhabitants disagreed.
All around the beauty of Antera is on full display. Spores drifting down from towering frond-palms in a slow, golden snowfall coating the ground in fine dust. Each step sank just enough to steal momentum. My unit moved with trained patience, armor imbued blue, weapons slung low but ready.
Yet the first ward went missing without sound.
No report. No impact. One moment a presence at my periphery, the next a vacancy the mind kept trying to fill. So we halted. Heightened sensors washed over the area and came back confused; heat broken by fungal glow, motion lost among shifting flora and fauna alike.
I keyed the diplomatic channels immediately. Artificial pheromones set to disperse, using standard phrasing. Old phrases and gestures in the mud. No answer.
Something crossed the air then, not fast, not loud. It took the ward two positions forward, punched through a seam the fabricators have argued about for years. The body didn't fall so much as stop and slump. The spear kept it almost upright, still quivering. Then the ground reached up.
A ward behind me vanished in a spray of wet ash, dragged down by nothing I could see, leaving only a widening depression and a sound like breath forced out of lungs that no longer needed it. We fired into the brush, into the hills, into the idea of an enemy. The hills absorbed everything.
The OWL, our eyes in orbit, broke in then — calm, layered and far away.
Pattern deviation confirmed. You are being shaped.
Shaped. A tendency of my species. As if this were a matter of practical geometry. As if the uneven terrain and situation on the ground could be solved not survived.
We adjusted course toward higher ground, exactly where the brief said we should go. Exactly where the land narrowed and the brush dispersed. I tried again to communicate with them but slower this time, a different mix of chemicals stripping the compound down to pure intention. We were here to see. To correct mistakes.
A ward to my left was lifted off the ground and pinned against a dead trunk, almost split in half by a single dark chord embedded too deep to remove. Another broke rank and deployed their wings for rapid air reconnaissance, before being pulled from mid-air by a roped harpoon. That's when I saw one of them.
A figure pacing us through the brush, just off-angle, covered in mud and mold. A silhouette that never quite repeated itself. One of the wards noticed before I did. I saw it in the way their steps shortened, how their weapon came up a fraction too late.
The lowlands gave way to rocks and spare shrubs along the base of Stone Hill where we arrived within view of our target.
A rusted dome made of scavenged metal, protected by uneven walls. I patched into a live feed of the complex beamed from above. Showing the complex's true shape and defenses; trenches disguised as erosion, pits masked as puddle, an absence weaponized. By then we were few.
I marked the coordinates with hands unsteady and requested escalation. There was no where to go but forward and that would be walking further into a trap. The OWL took longer than usual to respond.
And then above us, engines churned, came and went.
The sky spoke precisely about expected casualties and rendezvous while the hillside tore itself apart in a loud, awful cascade. Fire folded into earth. Stone became weather.
But those who had hunted us did not stand and die.
They slipped away into ravines and flooded cuts as we moved to secure the perimeter. Awaiting relief while the structure collapsed into ruin. A clear message that did not require translation.
We hold the ground now. The OWL says our objective is complete.
But I am filing this record because the brief was wrong, and because we were not ignored, we were answered. If we return, it should not be with the language we brought today.
Developer Notes
To be honest I don't play many shooters and enjoy lots of PvE with my RPGs. Thoroughly limiting my options when looking for something with both. That combination in particular being more prevalent in immersive sims and that's slim pickings on quality beyond the classics.
It's a genre I obsessed over for months last year. Gorging on every piece of media on the genre like a meaty LLM – humans did it first and developers do it often. How else could you properly design games?
The past few weeks have been busy, folks. I found myself finally getting a grip on the graphics update that was voted into being, unanimously, by the community. And lately I have been doing a lot of thinking about how players will be able to interact with the game world.
This was originally one big huge blog but I remembered how people blow most of their time on the Generic Social Media™ and thought better. But if you made it this far I think you're my kind of person.
The following brief FAQ addresses the Brimwar faction. You can look forward to similar posts for the others over the next few weeks and as we move into Spring.
Who They Are
Ants of the Ember Throne are an honor-bound, ritualistic faction of larger red ants bred for dominance and fury. Once worker drones in an isolated colony, these ants were altered after The First Bloom, splintering off to form an elite warrior caste before becoming Brimwar proper. They are big, strong, and nearly immune to pain.
How They Move
If you're looking for a fast and loose playstyle I might interest you in the Brimwar as they allow movement on two feet, four feet and on walls. The latter of which, granted, is a non-exclusive feature that has existed since grayboxing. Also great for situations calling for asymmetric warfare.
Although what stands out is the speed at which you can move while on four, being an advantage, albeit restricted to unarmed combat for now. This will be interesting to see play out on different types of terrain as I always did feel like this class was OP in general. Balancing is still a thing at this stage after all! So your feedback will be invaluable.
What They See
Well you won't have the same scanners you might see with factions like the Void Swarm or Guardians but there are other ways to present the same information. Which, in the case of the Brimwar is more instinctual. So think pheromone trails and stuff instead of silhouettes in night vision.
New Website
If you have been following this project you probably understand that ISO has been largely a solo independent project by an unemployed (for 3 years!) dev dude. Which means it's in my interest to keep working on this - while still looking for a job of course.
So if you want to know why the servers I had up are down, well..ask Patreon! Who shut me out in October last year saying that this is an "adult game".
Regardless, starting today I will be properly crowdfunding this project. With all donations being taken one-time and directly on the newly-launched website.
It's been a learning experience, even after almost two decades of making games I still get pumped to see things come to life on screen. If it excites you too, please consider backing.
If things go well enough you can expect some form of public testing this year. And with the graphics update coming to a head recently, it's probably the best time to at least get some help in the art department. I have been talking to some very talented people. Do you know how good this thing could look?
If you can't back the project you can help in other ways by following us:
For All Ants!