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Sydney, Australia -- Indie developer Membraine Studios is proud to announce that its sci-fi turn-based strategy wargame Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire is now on Steam Greenlight. And for those keen to actively support the game’s development, Fractured Empire is also available to play right now via pre-order in an alphafunding campaign hosted on Desura, or direct via Membraine’s own FractureEmpire.net website.
Fractured Empire puts gamers in control at a Brigade level, manoeuvring Infantry and Armoured companies, as well as massive super-vehicles, upon the futuristic battlefields of the Exodus Wars sci-fi universe. It tells the story of a brutal civil war fought between the Guild and the Royal Empire of Man. For the Guild, the fight is to remain free and independent of the ruthless Imperial regime. For the Empire, it is to crush a dangerous rebellion that could well be the catalyst to its demise.
FEATURES AVAILABLE IN THE CURRENT ALPHA BUILD
- An engaging and fully realised sci-fi universe set in a period of interstellar civil war -- play your part in the Exodus Wars.
- The Royal Empire of Man against the Guild Legions -- each faction has an extensive roster of units, from infantry and medium armour up to the Empire's Baron small behemoth and the Guild’s Elektra and Enforcer heavy tanks, and with more units being added all the time.
- Deep strategy via army building -- what you bring to the battle is every bit as important as the tactics you employ.
- Manoeuvre warfare -- gameplay that rewards solid tactics.
- Easy-to-learn, difficult to master -- the intuitive user interface enhances the game's depth and balance.
- Interleaving activations-based play enables quick play -- give your formations orders and see these executed on the battlefield; no long waits like you find in typical "You Go, I Go" games.
- Cover -- use cover to reduce your opponent's effectiveness.
- Overwatch -- achieve superior positioning and control the battlefield.
- First campaign scenario -- take command of a Guild strike force tasked with taking an enemy-held position.
- Pitched-battle scenario -- a balanced skirmish-style map featuring multiple victory conditions each side seeks to achieve.
- Single-player or challenge a friend -- hot-seat multiplayer today, online real-time and asynchronous multi-player in the near future.
- High replayability -- given the large array of units and near-unlimited combinations possible via the Army Builder interface, not to mention the multiple tactical options available for inflicting your will upon your opponent, every battle offers new challenges and experiences.
One of the game’s designers Mark Sheppard said, “As a parallel for the American War of Independence, I think Exodus Wars tells a fantastic story. It’s a sci-fi universe that gamers will immediately recognise and resonate with, given its inclusion of sci-fi staples like your Starship Troopers-esque space marines and your various alien races, but it’s a far more grounded reality than most genre universes. There are alien races, sure, and there are powerful units on all sides, but there no god-like beings here -- the Exodus Wars universe is a story about men and women fighting and dying for what they believe in, fighting for their freedom. It’s tragic and compelling stuff, and we can’t wait to tell stories within this incredible universe.”
Gamers may remember Fractured Empire from its Indiegogo crowd funding campaign back in June and July last year. During the Indiegogo campaign, prominent entertainment website Cinema Blend wrote “I love the look and art-design”, while IndieGameMagazine wrote about “the extremely impressive sense of scale that Exodus Wars clearly champions, not to mention its marvellously hand-crafted art style”.
The team has now embarked on a pre-order alphafunding campaign as a means of extending the game’s funding and potentially even speeding up development if enough pre-orders are received.
Gamers can also play the Alpha in multi-player; currently hot-seat only, but with online and asynchronous multi-player support targeted for release in a near-future update.
During the Alphafunding campaign, gamers can support the team by pre-ordering on Desura for just US$9.99 -- more than 66% off the final release price of US$29.99. Pre-order customers also get to play the current Alpha build of Fractured Empire immediately and have the ability to contribute to the game’s design via the developer’s forums.
Membraine Studios has not yet secured a publisher for Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire, but the team hopes to garner the attention of a strategy-friendly publisher that will help them make the game the best it can be.
Screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/YdLlK
Trailer Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hv_SfbdO7jw
About Membraine Studios
Membraine Studios is a three-man team based in Sydney, Australia. Membraine Studios released its first game, "Orbital Defence", in 2009 when it was still a hobby business. Membraine Studios has recently returned to the indie games scene with a vengeance, releasing its new free-to-play mobile title "RUSHD", as well as its two other titles in development -- the futuristic turn-based strategy wargame "Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire" and an as-yet-unannounced physics-based action puzzle game for mobile devices.
You can follow Membraine Studios on Facebook at http://facebook.com/membraine or on Twitter at http://twitter.com/membraine_ftw
To learn more about Membraine, please visit http://membrainestudios.com/
SYDNEY – October 31, 2012 – Get ready for a high-octane survival experience in Membraine Studios’ newest casual game, the free-to-play “RUSHD”, now available on the App Store.
Can you escape the city? Collect cones and dodge traffic while travelling as far as you can. Use bullet-time to pull incredible moves and beat your friends on the leaderboards. Use the cones you collect to purchase upgrades in the store to help you collect all of the achievements.
“RUSHD” is the endless-running genre in its purest form -- duck and weave through traffic, collect sweet powerups, and try to get on top of the leaderboards. It's also completely free to play -- gamers don't need to purchase anything to give the leaderboards a solid run, but Membraine is hoping gamers will support them by in-app purchasing cones to fast-track an upgrade or two.
Membraine’s Josh Anderson said "‘RUSHD’ is our unique spin on the endless-running genre. A gangster on a sweet hog has to get out of the city as fast as possible. With bullet-time. Because it's awesome.”
“The idea for ‘RUSHD’ came, strangely enough, from the idea of a ‘Death Star’ trench run,” Josh said. “We had this idea of buildings falling down and enemies chasing you while you use bullet-time to pull off incredible moves.”
Membraine’s current flagship title in development is “Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire”, but the team has taken time out from that project to make a few casual titles in an effort to shore up revenue, of which “RUSHD” is the first. “We managed to raise enough capital from our (sadly failed) crowd funding campaign for us to push ‘Fractured Empire’ toward a playable prototype, but not quite enough to see us through to a Final state. ‘RUSHD’ represents an alternative approach -- creating mass appeal casual games in order to fund further development of our more epic projects.”
You can download “RUSHD” completely free now on the App Store here https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/rushd/id562792483?mt=8
Screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/M0P7y
About Membraine Studios
Membraine Studios is a three-man team based in Sydney, Australia. Membraine Studios released its first game, "Orbital Defence", in 2009 when it was still a hobby business. Membraine Studios has recently returned to the indie games scene with a vengeance, releasing its new free-to-play casual title "RUSHD", as well as its two other titles in development (the 3D turn-based strategy wargame "Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire" and an as-yet-unannounced physics-based action puzzle game).
You can follow Membraine Studios on Facebook at http://facebook.com/membraine or on Twitter at http://twitter.com/membraine_ftw
To learn more about Membraine, please visit http://membrainestudios.com/
Membraine Studios has announced Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire for PC and Mac to the market and issued a call to arms to wargaming fans worldwide by launching a crowd funding campaign.
Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire is a 3D turn-based strategy game that captures the core gameplay of miniatures wargaming. It puts players at a Brigade level—allowing them to control and maneouver infantry, armour companies, and massive super-vehicles such as the mighty Marcovian Behemoth on the futuristic battlefields of the Exodus Wars universe. The game will also include an online mode for players who wish to challenge their friends or top strategists in the Exodus Wars community. Individual battles will contribute to the larger conflict, bringing tabletop dynamics to life on a massive scale.
While we can't yet know how our crowd funding campaign will fare in terms of funds receive it still has more than 30 days to run at this early stage, we can already declare it a great success in terms of profile-raising, as we were featured by sites like Cinema Blend, PlaySF, Nine Over 10 and The Shell Case on the same day our press release went out, all saying glowing things about what we've shown them of Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire so far.
Here's a complete list at time of writing:
- Cinema Blend
- PlaySF Magazine
- Wargamer
- Indie Game Magazine
- The Shell Case
- Nine Over Ten
You can view our crowd funding video pitch and read more about Exodus Wars:Fractured Empire at http://www.indiegogo.com/EWFracturedEmpire
LONDON, Jun 14, 2012 -- Steel Crown Productions and Membraine Studios are issuing a "call to arms" to wargaming fans worldwide to help complete Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire for PC and Mac. Hosted on Indiegogo, the crowd funding campaign makes it easy for the gaming community to support the franchise's first foray into computer games. To date, Membraine has invested $47,000 into the game, with 40 percent of the development work completed on the "minimum spec" build.
Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire is a 3D turn-based strategy game that captures the core gameplay of miniatures wargaming. It puts players at a Brigade level--allowing them to control and maneuver infantry, armor companies, and massive super-vehicles such as the mighty Marcovian Behemoth on the futuristic battlefields of the Exodus Wars universe. The game will also include an online mode for players who wish to challenge their friends or top strategists in the Exodus Wars community. Individual battles will contribute to the larger conflict, bringing tabletop dynamics to life on a massive scale.
“It's incredibly hard to make a game that captures the essence of miniatures wargaming: what units to bring to a battle and the tactics that best serve an overarching strategy,” says Mark Sheppard, producer at Membraine Studios. “That's where Indiegogo comes in. Crowd funding will allow us to make Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire into the computer game wargamers have always wanted to play.”
The studio's previous game was 2009's Orbital Defence for the iPhone, a retro shoot 'em up with a unique "flick" control mechanic.
You can view the video pitch, read about the game, and contribute to the campaign at http://www.indiegogo.com/EWFracturedEmpire
ASSETS
Videos http://www.youtube.com/user/FracturedEmpire?feature=watch
Download link (.FLV) https://dl.dropbox.com/u/9186800/Fractured_Empire_videos_FLV.zip
Screenshots http://imgur.com/a/0qszD
Download link (high resolution) https://dl.dropbox.com/u/9186800/Fractured_Empire_screenshots_highres.zip
Logos https://dl.dropbox.com/u/9186800/Fractured_Empire_logos.zip
About Membraine Studios and Steel Crown Productions
Membraine Studios is a three-man team based in Sydney, Australia. The company was founded by Mark Sheppard, Joshua Anderson and Glenn Osmond-McLeod. Mark Sheppard is a veteran of the IT industry with more than 17 years of experience in software production. Coding since the age of 11, Joshua Anderson cut his teeth modding Quake 2 and 3 during his mid-teens; since then, he's been addicted to code--with extensive experience as a software engineer on leading-edge biomedical and telecommunications devices. After spending six years working as a professional architect, Glenn Osmond-McLeod realized his true calling as a game artist. Working with animation for more than 10 years, Glenn brings extensive experience in music and sound effects production.
You can follow Membraine Studios on Facebook at facebook.com/membraine or on Twitter at http://twitter.com/membraine_ftw
Steel Crown Productions is a miniatures design company founded in 2005 with the creation of the Exodus Wars universe. The company specializes in fine-detail models, and is renowned for being among the first indie miniatures producers to use the latest 3D printing technologies for its 6mm and 28mm products
You’ll find Steel Crown Productions on Facebook at facebook.com/exoduswars
Friends, meet the Enforcer Battle Tank. Treadheads: enjoy!
