Developer: Star Drifters
Publisher: Star Drifters, 4Divinity
Platform: PC
Tested on: PC
First Dwarf – Preview
Whether it’s a stone-cold classic like Dwarf Fortress or a modern-day title like Return to Moria, video games and Dwarves go together like bread and butter, perhaps more so than any other fantasy race. The next big Dwarven video game adventure is First Dwarf from Polish indie studio Star Drifters. A little while ago, First Dwarf made its way onto Steam Early Access. Although the game’s full 1.0 release date isn’t carved in stone yet, we couldn’t wait to see what First Dwarf already has to offer.
It is of course still early days for First Dwarf, but as any good Dwarven craftsman can tell you, the foundations are the most important part of any construction. The current build of the game gives us a good look at those foundations. First Dwarf combines base building with tower defense elements and open world RPG exploration. Players take control of the titular First Dwarf, Rue, as he attempts to colonize a group of islands floating in the sky. Together with his trusty dragon companion Ragna, Rue paves the way for his people as their original home was destroyed in the Mage Wars. It’s as good of a premise as any, and it ties all of the separate game elements together nicely and in a way that makes sense. There is more to First Dwarf’s narrative than just colonization, as there is also a storyline present that involves our hero finding out the truth about his father’s past, but at the time of writing, this is an element that hasn’t been fully fleshed out as far as we could tell.
What has been fully fleshed out, on the other hand, are the game’s core mechanics. The gameplay loop doesn’t cover any new ground, but it does its best to make players feel right at home from the get-go. You start by building a base from the remains of your crashed airship, then climb into your mech suit and start exploring your surroundings. Your aim is to gather resources -wood, stone, and mana- and use these to expand your base. Wood and stone speak for themselves of course, but mana is a more unusual resource. It is perhaps the most important one too, as it allows you to automate certain processes, making life on your island a lot easier. Individual buildings need to be connected through a mana grid so that they can tap into your mana well. Eventually, you’ll start construction on defensive structures such as walls, gates, and turrets. You’ll need these to defend your new homestead against an incoming wave of monstrous enemies. Successfully repelling these is one thing, but in order to drive them back completely, you’ll need to go out there, find their nest, and destroy it.
There isn’t a whole lot beyond First Dwarf to what we’ve described above just yet, although the game does have an ambitious roadmap with plenty of interesting ideas ahead. And what’s present here shows promise: building your base is a smooth process, and controlling Rue, both in his mech suit and out of it is a breeze. Combat in particular is satisfying. There is some real heft to the punches the mech suit can deal and the game’s combat mechanics are neither too complicated nor oversimplified. In terms of presentation, First Dwarf impresses as well, with the hand-drawn opening cutscene in particular being a highlight. In-game visuals can be a bit difficult to ‘read’ at times, so hopefully future updates bring more visual clarity, as occasionally things blend into the background or look muddy. That last one might just be tied to our hardware though.
The core gameplay loop of building a base, defending it against waves of enemies, and destroying monster nests is augmented with side quests and advances in technology. The current Early Access build limits the different technologies available, but this is of course something that will resolve itself over time. Likewise, skill trees for Rue, Ragna, and Rue’s trusty mech suit are poised to unlock over time. As it stands, First Dwarf’s current Early Access build gives a great first impression of what the core experience will be like, although there definitely is room to flesh out some of the game’s more frivolous aspects. That’s something that we feel is absolutely necessary too, as right now, the biggest challenge the game faces is avoiding falling into the trap of becoming a repetitive grindfest. Fortunately, it seems like developer Star Drifters still has a couple of tricks left up their sleeve, at least in terms of storytelling. We should also note that the game already has a co-op mode implemented, but we were not able to test this one out for ourselves.
Conclusion
For as ambitious of an undertaking First Dwarf is, it also shows a lot of promise. The core gameplay loop is solid already, even if there is still a lot of room left to expand on the in-game technologies. We see a lot of potential here, although our main motivation to return to First Dwarf is narrative-based first and foremost. Seeing Rue’s personal story unfold against the backdrop of the Dwarves colonizing the island may just provide the hook that First Dwarf needs to set itself apart. As it stands, First Dwarf is already worth checking out, and we are hopeful towards the expanded content the game will see in the near future.
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