Empire of the Ants, a real-time strategy game of insect warfare, is set to release across multiple platforms in November 2024. Not to be confused with the 1977 movie of the same name, Empire of the Ants will see you embroiled in a microscopic battle for the fate of all of Ant-dom. The game is loosely based on the book, Les Fourmis, by Bernard Werber – but that’s enough trivia for one day. Let’s take a look at the game.
In Empire of the Ants, the players takes on the role of 103,683rd, the saviour of Ant-dom. The mission is to “lead your colony, rebuild a home, protect it, make it prosper, and conquer new territories throughout different seasons.” The gameplay involves managing and expanding the ant colony in a photo-realistic world, with a focus on resource management, territorial control and combat. Contrary to traditional real-time strategy games where players are offered a top-down overview of the battlefield, your ant army is controlled from the perspective of 103,683 with the camera sticking close to the ground in a third person view. That word “immersion” is often bandied about by developers wanting your money, but everything I have seen from Empire of the Ants shows that it has mastered creating an engaging and realistic experience that truly makes you feel like part of the ant colony.
There is really nothing quite like it in the realm of real-time strategy. There is no scrolling around or zooming in and out. To direct your Ant-fantry you need to be able to see an objective. You can direct your ant legion to attack an ant hill to gain control over it. Once under your control you can use that hill’s resource to expand your empire, but managing each hill requires you to stand on it which causes a radial UI to appear on the ground. Its a tricky balancing act between directing troops on the frontline and managing your hills back home.
Being an ant, you gain an ants perspective and movement abilities. Trees can be climbed and you can stick, precariously to the underside of leaves giving an awesome view of the miniature world at your mandible-tips. Its so easy to get distracted exploring the beautiful photo-realism of the forest that you might forget you have a war to fight and win. You’ll meet and interact with other forest-dwellers. Alongside the Red Ant’s allies of Aphids and Dor Beetles, you’ll also meet enemy insects such as your eternal rivals the Termites, Firebugs and titan-esque Praying Mantises – whose size makes them particularly terrible adversaries.
Narr-ant-ive Campaign
The game’s narrative and premise are both loosely based on Bernard Werber’s best-selling sci-fi novel, Les Fourmis. What we know so far is that the game starts in the spring when the Red Ants emerge from their winter hibernation to find that other insect species – it’ll be them pesky Termites, no doubt – have encroached on their territory.
The narrative aligns with the changing seasons with each having unique effects on the denizens of the forest. Various features including speed, resistance to attack and special abilities are influenced by the changing seasons. Additionally, the maps in the game will change dependent upon the time of day.
When the game was first announced back in April, Microids teased us with:
…another pivotal question arises: what narrative direction should the game take? Should it faithfully retell the entire story of the novel, or should it veer off into new territories? In the case of ‘Empire of the Ants,’ Microids and Tower Five opted to preserve the fundamental elements of the book while granting the game the freedom to articulate its own narrative. “For Bernard Werber, it was imperative that we incorporate protagonists like 103683rd, settings such as the Bel-o-kan anthill, or pivotal events like the battle of the poppies.”
To truly explore the narrative of Empire of the Ants you’ll have to wait until its November release, yet Microids have gone on record to say:
“…the whole campaign will revolve around the story from the book, our team is directly working with Bernard Werber to narrate it the best possible way.”
Excellent!
For All of Ant-kind
Empire of the Ants is poised to crawl across PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S on November 7th 2024. Click here to add it to your Steam Wishlist, and check out the awesome folks at Microids on their Discord Server. Tell them I said “Hi”.
“THE WORLD OF THE INFINITELY SMALL IS PREPARING TO FIGHT ITS GREATEST BATTLE”
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