Steel Hunters Preview: Wargaming's multiplayer action game is World of inspired but otherwise vastly different

Wargaming tends to offer a very particular style of video game. The developer has long been known for the World of (Tanks/Warships) games, titles that combine strategic multiplayer warfare with a broad, live, games as a service approach. Whether that's your cup of tea or not, it seems to work for Wargaming and its fans, which is why it's not really a surprise that it's next title will follow suit. Granted, that's not coming in the form of a World of game or even a more historically accurate project either. Instead, Wargaming has tasked its new Guildford-based team to cook up a tighter multiplayer action title that revolves around mech warfare. It's known as Steel Hunters, and it's a game that I have had the chance to play a good portion of following a visit to Wargaming's Guildford studio.

From a gameplay perspective, Steel Hunters couldn't feel less like a Wargaming title. You select one of several different Hunters - which are mechs piloted by a human character that has been grafted into the suit itself - and then you're dropped into a battlefield with an ally and tasked with facing off against five other pairs. Yep, in many ways it's a battle royale, but there are no shrinking zones and only limited looting, as instead you improve in power by defeating computer-controlled enemies, gathering experience and minor loot from them to enhance your mech's strength and potential. When you finally come across an enemy duo, all hell breaks loose and you find yourself in a Titanfall-like battle where you have to shoot and use abilities to whittle down the opposing mech's shielding and then health bar to eliminate them. The catch at this point is that you can respawn assuming your teammate is alive and well. If you both are defeated, then it's game over, meaning it's slightly less punishing than a traditional battle royale, but equally demanding in a teamplay and cooperation sense.

This gameplay setup actually functions quite well and has a very streamlined and intuitive structure. We're not talking about a game with tons of progression or buildcrafting depth here. Each mech has a certain archetype and set of abilities that you define before even matchmaking, and when you get into a game, all you improve is your shielding, damage, or unlock access to more powerful abilities. This is done by levelling up by acquiring experience dropped from pretty much all sources you can imagine, and by finding and slotting colour-coded tiered-items into your build. None of this requires much thought thankfully, as you can pretty much just grab anything that the game allows you to pick up to improve your mech, ultimately switching the focus entirely onto the action.

For the PvE side of the game, this is pretty straightforward. It's perhaps the most important element of the action as it defines how quickly your mech improves in strength, but it's also the least mechanically complex as the computer-controlled foes tend to be a minor problem at the best of times. There are a multitude of different kinds of enemies, of varying strength, that each offer various rewards, and this is on top of a few challenges that could pop up, be it discovering a key to open a vault or a really powerful enemy appearing somewhere in the world. This part of the gameplay means you always have something to do, but it's the PvP where Steel Hunters thrives.

Mech versus mech warfare can be absolutely chaotic. Wargaming has built Steel Hunters in a similar way to World of Tanks, which means the maps are highly destructive. Considering this game also trades hefty tanks for colossal mech suits that stand metres and meters in height, the destruction has been cranked up even further to enable most buildings to be easily toppled as well. When you take this into account and imagine anywhere between four and 12 mechs battling it out, you can get an idea of just how crazy the action can be. There might be explosive artillery raining down from the sky, bullets, rockets, and railgun shells tearing through the air, and the sounds of weighty footsteps thundering from afar. The scale is something that Wargaming has managed quite well, and this is in part down to the intricate Hunter designs that feel vastly unique and fresh.

At the moment, there are around seven Hunters to choose from and none of them fit a particular design philosophy. There are humanoid warriors that represent marines or snipers, multi-legged crustacean-like suits, and even a beastly bear or big cat variants too. None of the Hunters share the same abilities or weapons or attack methods, they all play differently, be it at range, up close and personal, as a tanky frontliner, or a nimble high damage threat, and they each stand out in appearance too. Wargaming has clearly gone above and beyond in the Hunter design philosophy and that creeps into the gameplay too as it enables the player to have plenty of variety in how they tackle each match.

What I will say is that after several hours of Steel Hunters, the gameplay loop did start to lose its wonder to me. Matches tend to last around 10-15 minutes and the loop in each match is incredibly similar and doesn't tend to have much deviation due to its very rigid structure. It's refined, without a doubt, but it also comes across as a bit of a one-trick pony. Also, since character archetypes are so paramount to the design philosophy of Steel Hunters, the typical progression, upgrading, customisation nature of the World of games is lacking here, or rather feels less crucial. There are tech trees for each Hunter where you can spend earnt resources to improve each character, but at the same time, it doesn't feel as impactful in this current version. Essentially, imagine a hero shooter where you can improve each hero by a minor amount through a skill tree. While there's an idea there, the very defined nature of each hero tends to mean that this is less vital than say World of Tanks where an upgrade might make your vehicle feel brand new thanks to improved damage, range, accuracy, armour, and penetration factors.

Also, and yes I realise that this game is coming to Early Access to start with, but there is work to be done with the presentation, as the HUD in particular is not a beauty in any sense of the word... And the general colour palette and artistic theme does feel a bit like a typical post-apocalyptic setup. It's all a little bland in that respect.

I do really appreciate the streamlined gameplay approach though, and the fact that the gameplay plays a bit slower and strategical will no doubt be a breath of fresh air for the many out there who find Apex Legends and Fortnite's pacing to be too much today. Wargaming had an idea and demographic in mind for this game and they've stuck to that concept to an admirable depth. Whether that will be enough for Steel Hunters to stand out and thrive in a live-service, GaaS market that is more hostile than ever remains to be seen. Wargaming does have a few tricks up its sleeves to overcome that however, and that includes a complete lack of monetisation for this free-to-play game for its first month or so, enabling fans to hop into the action, get a taste, and determine if Steel Hunters is for them during its initial, community-driven Early Access phase. With a meaty live plan coming as part of that and beyond, including seasons that add new Hunters, maps, modes, and the typical array of cosmetics and such, Wargaming has grand ambitions for Steel Hunters, and while it definitely seems to serve its purpose as quick and tactile multiplayer action, whether it can be more than that remains to be seen. We'll just have to see come April 2 when the title debuts into Early Access on PC.