Betrayal. Survival. Two words that resonate perfectly with Exoborne‘s woeful world. Following an apocalyptic disaster that has leveled Colton County, a small town in the American southeast, you play one of a few Exo-Rig masters, who are attempting to protect the population from the ever-increasing forces of nature. Be it tempests or tornadoes, you’ll have to survive nature’s fury – or dive in head-on to score the best loot you can.
Sharkmob’s upcoming PC game has undertones of The Division, which makes sense when you consider several members of the Exoborne team worked on it. You squad up, shoot, and loot; all the good stuff that The Division has. However, the Fallout-esque sci-fi setting, coupled with the inclusion of the omnipresent tornadoes and storms gives Exoborne’s world a more dramatically end-of-the-world energy than The Division’s plague-ridden New York City streets.
Described as “easy to get into, but hard to master,” creative director Petter Mannerfelt tells me that Exoborne “isn’t just about survival; it’s about thriving in this broken world. It’s about you getting stronger. And you are quite strong with this Exo-Rig – you’re not really, really weak as [you are] in some other survival games.”
He tells me that there’s a “rich world-building” to Exoborne, mentioning the aforementioned “betrayal” by Rebirth, an entity that has installed mysterious cables around the globe but, using Mannerfelt’s words, “didn’t really care about the people.” He promises that we’ll find out more in the game’s overarching narrative, and I can’t wait to uncover those secrets – especially because the trailer shown at the TGAs looks amazing.
In terms of combat, you and your squad will be thrust into various mission-based levels, with Mannerfelt confirming that there are multiple different biomes and, of course, various forces of nature to contend with.
While you’ll be able to build out your Exo-Rig to suit your needs, he reassures me there is no Diablo-style min-maxing and number games here. “If I talk about combat as a series of interesting choices, then depending on what choices you like to make, that’s how you pick your build.”
There’s no specific classes either, unlike games like Overwatch. “I don’t think the ‘Holy Trinity’ ever holds up well in PvP games,” he tells me, citing the Blizzard FPS game as one of the few exceptions. Instead, the team wants you to create a build that’s perfect for you – not pigeonhole yourself into a specific role.
But, amidst all of this, there are flavorings of The Division in Exoborne, and when I ask him about it, Mannerfelt agrees. Given he was the game director on the original Division, he tells PCGamesN that “you’ll probably see some of [The Division] because all of the games that you work on continue to live within you, and I think that’s natural.
“But there are a bunch of things that are very different in this game. Let’s say it like this: in [The Division] we wanted to destroy a city, but in this game we destroy the world.” And that’s exactly what Exoborne does.
If the game’s trailer has piqued your interest, we have a list of the best apocalypse games if you’re looking to harden yourself to the tempest and nature’s fury. Alternatively, we have a rundown of some other great multiplayer games, too.
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