Townsmen VR (PC) Preview

Literally stepping into this world, even at this early stage of development, brings one abiding thought of: "Why has this not been done before?" It is truly so obvious with this genre. There is naturally a dissonance in perspective with any RTS or town strategy game; that the camera is nearly always fixed above the action. The lack of direct immersion can never be rectified. In the majority of cases, developers simply employ the technique of accepting this fact and positioning the player in the role of a commander or a high positioned 'god-like' figure.

This does work, but imagine if it didn't need to be accepted. Imagine, instead, if the camera could swoop down to a settler level, right into the heart of the town as citizens went about their daily lives... or indeed if the perspective could soar up into the clouds where the settlement and sea all around the island was in view, in lookout for enemies on the horizon.

Townsmen VR is already excellent at providing this in such a simple but awe-inspiring way. Right now, the game is very early in its public development, so anyone buying into it is getting some of the bare-bone features. However, the initial impression is hard to overcome. One of the fears that could be put in front of such a way of playing in such a genre famed for micromanagement is that controlling the action is too complex and intricate. Thankfully, already Townsmen VR has everything mapped out so efficiently. A swipe of the thumb stick brings up context menus, like buildings or resources, and everything is laid out in an economical way.

That is only the beginning, though, for very soon after the tutorial, in which a friendly knight guides the protagonist through the art of resource gathering and defending the small introductory settlement, all the reins are removed and the sandbox begins (albeit one with a very limited selection of buildings). As the town gathers, the perspective that VR lends is unique. The feeling of being an all-powerful god who can literally move the clouds or trees is wonderful. Indeed, this has actual mechanical impacts. Using the omnipotent powers granted allows interaction with windmills to make grain - a swift rotation of the hand simulates a wind that the player is in control of. Similarly, why wait for the towns' citizens to walk back with their collected stone when they can be picked up like little figurines in the palm of the protagonist's hand and dropped down at their destination. The feeling of indescribable power in the RTS genre has never felt so real.

Where the development can take place is definitely in the fine tuning of rotation of the map and the adjustment of scale. More than once, rotating the map had the adverse effect of altering the scale of the world, with ant-like settlers and the same citizens suddenly being human sized. This is jarring. Despite the sedate pace compared to more action-oriented titles, the swift movements of the camera more than once produced motion sickness nausea, although this was generally manageable. Additionally, combat looks to be rather barebones at the moment. How much strategy the developer can introduce in a VR town simulation is debatable, as clearly it would be hard to expect massive conflict. However, with combat having such a focus, hopefully there is more work going into fleshing this out.