Foursaken Media has been giving us one fun game after the other, with Heroes & Castles 2, Bug Heroes 2, and Block Fortress among the best of them, and today the developer has released another very ambitious game called Noblemen: 1896 [Free]. We've been keeping a very close eye on the game from early on in its development because the concept behind it sounds great: an alternate history, third person, cover-based shooter with a strategic top-down layer. In other words, another game where Foursaken Media gets various genres, puts them in a blender, and out comes a game. Noblemen has you playing as a late 19th-century soldier, but the technology and the world around you are a mix of WWI, American Civil War, and steampunk. I'm a sucker for alternate histories, and this one looks like it will be a blast to experience.
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In terms of gameplay, you build your armies in the strategic part of the game, and then move them across the map to capture your enemies' lands. That requires bombardments, sieges, and all the other good stuff of the period. Once two armies collide, the game switches to 3rd person, and you play as a hero, fighting along with the rest of your troops as you try to complete your missions. And you can switch to the map view at will and order flanking maneuvers or focus fire. The game is free to play, so we'll see how that part plays out, but I have faith in Foursaken Media giving us a fair monetization system. I ...