A newly announced deckbuilder by the name of Fogpiercer caught my attention last night during one of my trawls of the Interwebs, and given how much I’ve enjoyed writing about roguelike deckbuilders lately, I wanted to dig a little deeper today.
Fogpiercer is a grim-looking post apocalyptic roguelite from Mad Cookies Studio (the studio’s previous credit is an action-RPG called Cardbob) about building a battle train. Using your train as effectively as possible, you must fight off raiders while you move between safe havens, with the action taking place on rails and in-between stations.
It sounds like your train will be a physical manifestation of your deck. Players are challenged to build and upgrade their train using “unique carriage cards” that synergise to create powerful attacking options.
As you can see in the screenshot, the combat will take place via a turn-based grid system. Therein, players will need to carefully position themselves in relation to their enemies in order to make the most of each situation.
The listing implies that trickery is afoot, and mentions that you can use the space to get your “enemies to attack each other, push them out of the way or even place them right into your path and crush them underneath your wheels!”
Fogpiercer is hoping to blend a roguish gameplay loop with a love of trains and I’m intrigued to see how it turns. It vaguely reminds me of a game I played many years ago called Convoy. I seem to remember that being a fun spin on Mad Max and FTL, so you can see the post-apocalyptic parallels.
Anyway, getting back on track. There’s an official gameplay trailer for Fogpiercer below. Check it out if you want to see it in action ahead of its release next year, although we’re not exactly sure when in 2025 it will arrive, but that’s trains for you…
