ICBM: Escalation News

Hi everyone!

As you probably know, ICBM: Escalation is all about conquering and/or destroying the world. Usually these dev diaries talk about all the tools you’ll have at your disposal to do that or the mechanics of how they work, but we’ve never talked too much about the world itself. Since we’re going to be destroying it on a regular basis, let’s talk about the work we’ve done to make the world detailed, dynamic and immersive, while it’s being covered in radioactive craters.

Home Sweet Home.

Similarly to ICBM 1, where the map was split 8 ways, the map in ICBM: Escalation is now split into 10 factions, based on political and cultural similarities and boundaries, but with gameplay balance at the forefront. With the advent of territory capturing, we had to take things a step further and split each faction into 15 distinct territories, so that players can invade and annex new land, one region at a time. Each region has its own unique GDP split with certain strengths and weaknesses, and not every territory is created equally, so players will be able to be selective in how they pick their targets. For example, in Europe, Germany is the industrial heart that provides most of its military production power, but the British Isles has a stronger research and espionage base, so if a player wanted to cripple their production capacity or annex some land to boost their R&D budget, it’s more nuanced than just invading Greenland because it’s undefended. Since every territory needs to be adequately represented by its population centers, the map also features a whopping 520 cities, more than double the 200 featured in ICBM 1. Better learn some geography…

The new regional menu gives you an overview of the region’s population, its cities and economic outputs, and also any invasion progress, plus a visual representation of how much damage it’s taken. Mind the placeholder.

The world in ICBM: Escalation is also more alive in terms of the ways you can interact with other factions. Before, your options boiled down to forming alliances with some basic mutual agreements, or nuking everyone into oblivion. Now, ICBM wouldn’t be ICBM without the second option, but the diplomacy and espionage system has gotten a massive rework. Players now have the option to cut deals with factions individually, rather than just forming coalitions, and the breadth and scope of what you can do has expanded considerably. You can share individual technologies, hand off spare military hardware and warheads, support each other’s industry, provide economic aid, and even give up intel on what other factions are doing. Just like in the original, you can form multi-faction alliances if you want a more team-based approach as well, and can even choose to build on each other’s territory, if you’re not expecting to get stabbed in the back.
The new diplomacy and faction overview menu, where you can cut deals with another faction and also see what intel you have on them. You also get to put a face to who you’re dealing with now too!

The espionage menu has also been reworked for clarity, and is also a little more nuanced and less luck-based than before. Espionage was often overlooked in ICBM 1, but a skilled player that can leverage it effectively can work out what their enemies are up to, which makes things much, much easier…

It’s worth talking about the global community as well. As much as ICBM players love to joke about breaking it, ICBM: Escalation now features its own take on international law: The Geneva Convention. With the Geneva Convention, it’s easier to control the flow of the game and enforce certain ‘gentlemanly agreements’ and in a way, sort of change the rules on the fly. Factions can vote on issues like banning specific weapon systems or technologies, issuing a (temporary) nuclear ban to deescalate the situation if things get out of hand, declare a global ceasefire altogether, or to nullify all of the above if they’re out for blood.

The global forum, unanimously deciding chemical weapons should be allowed. Brings a tear to your eye, doesn’t it.

And, also worth mentioning, since it’s in the screenshot and people are going to ask about it, we’ve also implemented a DEFCON system, which allows players to evaluate how much danger they’re in and make trade-offs between their economic outputs, and a suite of bonuses to improve their performance in a conventional or nuclear war. Starting at DEFCON 5, which doesn’t change anything, each level progressively drains more of the faction’s GDP but provides bonuses to protect against increasingly dangerous threats. So for example, DEFCON 4 will make it easier to fend off a conventional military invasion and put a slight dent in the economy, while DEFCON 1 will minimize your losses during a full-blown nuclear exchange, at the cost of grinding everything to a halt. There’s also something darkly satisfying about going to DEFCON 1 before launching dozens of nuclear missiles…

And that’s it for our latest dev diary! Let us know what you think and what’s got you the most excited. The beta test is still in progress and we’re looking into expanding the tester pool shortly, so keep your eyes on your inbox and your spam folder, because you might have that email coming your way. Thanks again!

Hi everyone!

You might remember that our last update was announcing that we’ve started beta testing. Now that we’ve had some time to let the beta run, we think it’s worth sharing how it’s been going!

As expected, there’s been a lot of bug-stomping going on as the first builds hit the ground, and we’ve been hard at work getting the game running more smoothly. With our small group of testers, we’ve gotten some great feedback on the balance of the game and have been taking steps to make it even better, from control improvements, bug fixes, AI tweaks and new features. So, let’s take a peek.

Naturally, one of the hardest challenges has been striking a balance between conventional warfare and nuclear weapons. Needless to say, nukes can be a bit overpowering, so it’s been an ongoing process, but the new addition of CBRN defence tools, a refined ‘accuracy’ system for ballistic missiles and a complete overhaul of the chemical weapon system should help swing the balance back to where it needs to be, and also add a bit of historical flair and realism to the game.

By popular demand, chemical weapons have been rerolled as a way to quickly dispatch and slow down enemy armies, at the cost of being indiscriminate, causing collateral damage and also turning you into a bad person.

We’ve also introduced multi-selection for units! Fans of the first ICBM might have noticed that you could originally only select one unit at a time. While this was good enough for the original and fit well with the style and tactics of the game (it’s not exactly good form to order every single one of your silos to attack the same target, one nuke will usually do it, for example) the sequel demands a little more finesse, with the increased scope of units, and especially with the advent of mobile land units and conventional warfare. To that end, we’ve implemented unit multi-selection, and there’s plenty of ways to use it! You can click and drag a box around the units you want, or select all of a particular unit type, add or subtract units to a group, and even assign groups or individual units to hotkeys. This can be handy if, for example, you want to move a few army groups and their supporting elements at once, or if you want a silo with a 25 megaton ICBM on speed-dial if the enemy tries anything funny.

Multi-select in action. Take note of all the units attached to the unit menu. You can quickly select individual units within the group and issue specific orders to them on a whim.

On top of that, there’s also been plenty of smaller, less dramatic tweaks and fixes. We could talk about how a line in the 4th tutorial was slightly reworded to be clearer, or how the engine handles complex modifiers is slightly different, and a dozen other things that are utterly uninteresting, but just know that we’ve been keeping busy making the game better.

I fixed a typo. Whoop-de-doo.

So, where do we go from here? After our latest patch drops, we’ll be able to get more feedback and fix any major issues that arise, and once things are more stable, we should be able to expand our pool of testers and start poking around at the multiplayer side of the game and make sure everything’s running smoothly. And while our testers are doing that, we’ll be dipping our toes into the campaign…

So, that’s it for this update. We’ve had our hands full keeping up with all the feedback we’ve been getting, and the game is getting all the better for it. We’ll see you again when it’s even better!

Hi everyone!

In this dev diary, we’re going to be talking about our first beta! It’s just landed on Steam and we’re super excited to show off what we’ve been working on!

To start, we’re going to be working with a relatively small group of testers so we can dig in deep and get some really detailed feedback. The response we’ve gotten from the beta sign-up has been overwhelming and was much, MUCH bigger than we expected, so we’re grateful for all the support we’ve gotten so far. Unfortunately, this comes with the caveat that we can’t take everybody. But, don’t worry, because this is just the first beta test and as we make progress, they’ll get bigger and bigger with more and more participants. As of the time of writing, we haven’t named any names yet, but if you don’t get accepted early on, it might just be a matter of time. You’ll know if you’ve made it if you get an email from Slitherine with instructions on how to join, so keep an eye on your spam folder. Most of the administration for the actual testing is going to be on the official ICBM Discord, so make sure to drop in!

So! On to the beta itself! In our first round of testing, we’re going to be getting a feel for the pace of the game, the way the AI behaves, some of the strategies and how effective they are, and overall, just get some first impressions.

Our testers will have access to the original game modes from ICBM 1, including the original multiplayer experience, single-player skirmish matches, and a freshly redone tutorial explaining all the new mechanics. With 5 times as many technologies as the original, even more units, and a much, much more complex overall strategy and gameplay loop, the ICBM: Escalation experience should feel much different from its predecessor, so establishing how it feels early on is important. Our testers will also get a glimpse of the graphical facelift that the units, menus and map have received.

The AI is now capable of effectively leveraging land assets like special forces, armies and mobile launchers. Instead of just bases and installations, the war on the ground is going to get a lot more dynamic!

One of the crowning achievements of ICBM: Escalation is the introduction of conventional ground warfare, which adds an entirely new dimension to the game. Although players will have the choice of if they want to engage with it and attempt to invade other factions, they’ll have to be on guard, because the AI is now capable of using armies, and they’re ready and willing to invade anyone who’s not prepared! The new mechanic of escalation, from conventional warfare, to tactical nuclear warfare, and eventually total nuclear annihilation is the biggest step forward we’ve made, and also the focal point of the beta test.

ICBM may be focused around nuclear war, but that doesn’t mean that armies can’t pose a threat to you either!

So, hopefully all goes well with the first round of testing, and we can forge ICBM: Escalation into a top-notch nuclear wargame. A quick thank-you to our testers in advance before we get started, and remember, if you’re disappointed about not making it into the beta, it might just be a matter of waiting! We’ll see you again in the next dev diary!

We are excited to announce the opening of sign-ups for the beta of ICBM: Escalation.

The beta is set to commence in March and will feature both single player sandbox gameplay and multiplayer up to ten players, along with a spectator mode. As we approach the launch date, we will provide additional details regarding the content of this beta.

Stay tuned and register here: BETA

Hi everyone!

Welcome to our first dev diary of the new year! This time we’re going to be taking a closer look at the game, in both a figurative and literal sense. We’re going to be talking about the operational scope of the game, as well as some of the visual elements, the new map, and the different zoom levels we have to tie everything together. So, let’s get started!

As you’ve probably gathered by now, ICBM: Escalation takes place all over the world. After all, Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles are pretty aptly named, they go between continents. But, that being said, ICBM: Escalation, does offer the potential to fight at a wide variety of ranges. At its core, you’ll be using strategic-level assets and weapons to accomplish your objectives, but that could mean anything as far reaching as heavy ICBM silos and spy satellites, to something as short-ranged as anti-aircraft batteries or even just a platoon of commandos. Being able to zoom in much more than before creates a variety of challenges when it comes to the UI and giving players relevant information at the right time. You need to know enough, but not too much either! So, let’s start zoomed in and work our way out.

Now, even though the zoom level is dynamic and you can seamlessly pick any zoom level you want, there’s 4 general levels we have with different visual features. The highest zoom level we have is something we like to call the Tactical View. This view offers the highest level of detail and lets you see everything up close.

The Tactical View

At this level, you can make out the 3D details in the terrain and the models of the units themselves. With the addition of ground warfare and territorial occupation, this can be useful if you need to fine-tune your unit’s movements, check the range of their weapons and sensors, get a feel for the situation on the ground, or simply get a good view of a ground war unfolding in front of you.

Another shot of the tactical view. The increased level of detail will come in handy for ground wars.

Or, naturally, so you can watch cities burn from up close.
We know you’re here to blow stuff up. It’s okay, you can admit it.

The next zoom level we have is the Regional View. The regional view is great when it comes to dealing with fighting in individual regions and seeing the front lines. The units are still discernible as 3D models, but it’s also zoomed out enough that you can review their orders, coverage zones and progression on the battlefield, and how much progress they’ve made in occupying the enemy territory.

The regional view. Perfect for orchestrating mass invasions or using theater-level weapons like SRBMs.

Next up is the Factional View. At the Factional level, the focus starts to shift away from ground occupation and tactical weapons, and begins to focus on the overarching strategic side of things. The 3D models switch to icons to reduce clutter and make things a little clearer, and there’s less ‘noise’ to distract you from the big picture. From the factional view, it’s easier to get a picture of your faction’s overall strategic position, how your defences are laid out and where they might be lacking, the positioning of your armies and nuclear forces, and any known enemy threats that might be closer than you might like. In essence, it’s good for looking at yourself (or a specific rival) in particular.

The factional view. Take note that when units are close together, they’re bundled together under a single icon to reduce clutter and make things clearer.

And lastly, we’ve got the Global View. From the global view, you can see most, if not all, of the entire planet. This is the best zoom level to review your long-range strike plans and to understand how everything is unfolding in the world as a whole, which is especially important now that factional boundaries can be changed with a well-executed invasion. It’s also great if you need to track long-range weapons like incoming ballistic missiles, which is definitely going to be important!

The global view. Take note of the dark abstract icons, which make units even more visible from a distance.

And, just like in ICBM 1, you can always switch between the Map view and the Globe view - the former lets you see more at once, but the latter gives you a better understanding of distances, as the flat map view inevitably gets distorted with latitude and makes things less clear when missiles start coming over the north pole.



Now, ICBM: Escalation is going to involve fighting at all sorts of levels, but all of it is going to be equally important. A special forces team taking out an over-horizon radar site can have a massive impact, just as a group of armies invading a province can, or how a good SAM network can put a hard stop on a bombing campaign, and of course, how ICBMs themselves can potentially level cities around the world. All of these things can have tremendous and equally significant strategic impacts, but they all happen at vastly different ranges. But, thanks to this new zoom system, you’ll be able to watch and direct the carnage from any distance! We hope you like what you see, and we’ll see you around for the next dev diary! Happy 2024!