Publisher Focus Home Interactive has released the very first in-game footage from Tindalos Interactive’s 40K naval combat game Battlefleet Gothic: Armada, and it’s looking pretty damned good.
An Unreal Engine 4-powered RTS, Armada hands you control of various lovingly-detailed Imperial, Chaos, Eldar and Ork battleships, and lets you duke it out amongst the stars.
Each ship carries a different complement of weapons, and a commander with unique skills. To make the most of your devastating weapons, you’ll need to consider facing, sub-system targeting - each part of a ship can be individually damaged - and the environment around you. You can hide your vessels in gas clouds, use destroyed ship parts as cover, and so on.
Here’s a cool touch; chaos warships, which are faster and able to engage at longer range than their heavily-armoured Imperial foes, can also be customised - visually and presumably mechanically - with a Mark of Chaos. Like skulls? Choose everyone’s favourite angry red blood-god, Khorne. Prefer to look like a giant space-tumor? Plague lord Nurgle might be for you.
Battlefleet Gothic: Armada features a full singleplayer campaign that pits you against the forces of major 40K bad guy Abaddon the Despoiler, with ”choices that will affect the story along the way.” It’s out sometime next year.
