A long time ago a war between mages broke an entire planet, with its lands turned into floating islands held loosely in place by a web of magic. While not ideal it was at least functional, in that “try not to think too hard about how it works” way, making for a nice setting for a city-builder strategy game in the form of Driftland: The Magic Revival. You can never go wrong with floating sky-islands and it’s just about time for a return to Driftland in the form of a very different game, First Dwarf.
A new home on a broken land
First Dwarf is a third-person adventure with a touch of city building and automation, where you play as the dwarf Tru looking to build new settlements in unclaimed lands. After his airship takes a lightning strike it goes down in a place that seems as good as any other to build a new colony, and after scavenging parts from the wreckage and patching up his mech suit, Tru sets off to explore the island that will be his starting base. There’s a slight problem of corruption and monsters, but the mech suit’s got an axe that’s as happy to beat on creature nests as it is trees and rocks, so a perfect solution for all major issues facing a dwarf in a hostile land.
Base-Building RPG First Dwarf Gets First Trailer
Once the initial monster nest is cleared out Tru gets to work making a proper settlement before night falls, starting off by manually gathering wood and stone before building a quarry and lumber mill near the appropriate resources. A nearby mana spring needs a well dumped on it to power everything, plus pipes run to any building requiring power, and once done clearing out the trees and rocks is more about making space for the settlement than gathering resources. There’s still defensive towers needed to repel night attacks and a fence to slow the enemies down while the towers blast away, but construction is quick and nighttime just far enough off to complete the fortifications. With the settlement secured, it’s time for Tru to start exploring the island that holds his first base.
First Dwarf has been in the works for a while now and is currently going through a round of openplaytests on Steam. It’s a good first look at the game that shows off a number of its systems, including the different play modes for the different characters. Most of the time is spent stomping around in the mech suit, but Tru can leave it to do things that require a more personal touch, like petting a wolf, but there’s also the dragon Ragna who is always tagging along. Ragna is mostly used to scout the area from the sky, but she can also fly to smaller islands to pick up needed items that got stranded there.
It’s a relatively short playtest, about two hours or so from start to finish, but build, fight and explore are all in there plus a single mech upgrade for its jumping ability. While it would be nice if there was more, the First Dwarf playtest is a good introduction to the game, and anyone who wants to give it a play-through is welcome to get a taste of the adventure to come.
