The original Frostpunk is one of my favorite citybuilders ever made. It tasks players with resurrecting society during a frigid apocalypse, forcing them to make tough decisions in order to survive. It’s the rare city-builder where maximizing efficiency doesn’t always feel amazing; it’s often just a matter of survival. But even when the game isn’t making you feel great about yourself, it’s enthralling. Now, developer 11 bit Studios is trying to recapture that magic with Frostpunk 1886.
Set for release in 2027, Frostpunk 1886 is an Unreal Engine 5 remake. Shortly after its latest appearance at the 11 bit Studios Digital Showcase, I spoke to Game Director Maciej Sułecki about the project. Our conversation was enlightening, revealing just what it takes to remake a beloved game on Unreal Engine 5 and how this new release will be a “platform for future development and improvement” of the beloved 2018 original.
Why Frostpunk needed to be remade in Unreal Engine 5
It’ll look better and be more easy to update
The original Frostpunk was released in 2018 and was developed using 11 bit Studios’ proprietary Liquid Engine. While the game turned out great, Maciej Sułecki admits if the company tried to remake Frostpunk in the same engine, the studio “would have to put a lot of effort into bringing that engine to the current standards, and we have all of that in Unreal Engine 5.”
It also helps that Frostpunk 2 was developed with Unreal Engine 5, so the Polish developer has some experience working with it. 11 bit Studios can even reuse some of the visual technology they used in Frostpunk 2 for this remake of the original. Currently, Sułecki expects the Unreal Engine 5 remake to progress smoothly through development. He also believes it sets Frostpunk 1886 up for future success as a platform for new content
The decision was also so that we could have this Frostpunk remake as a platform for future development and improvement. We will start with the base game. We will for sure add some new content to it, as it will work as a long-lasting platform for future improvements, DLC scenarios, and so on. We couldn’t do that with the first Frostpunk as that would be really hard on our old engine.
While game development is still very complex, Unreal Engine 5 is a relatively malleable and approachable game engine. That’s why so many studios have been embracing it in recent years, even ones that make niche real-time strategy games like 11 bit Studios. While the developers have to rebuild an entire seven-year-old game from scratch, Sułecki seems confident that Unreal Engine 5 was the right engine for the job.
What Frostpunk 1886’s developers learned from Frostpunk 2
Sometimes, a smaller scale is better
While Frostpunk 1886 benefits from the new engine, it also benefits from 11 bit Studios having more games under its belt since the original’s release. In particular, Frostpunk 2 was quite influential, and not just because of its use of Unreal Engine 5. While it still received generally positive critical and user reviews, Frostpunk 2’s more macro-level city management proved divisive for those who liked the intimate nature of earlier 11 bit Studios games. Sułecki agreed as he broke down the game design struggles he’s faced with each new game increasing in scope.
This War of Mine was about a group of people trying to survive. The first Frostpunk was about a larger group of people who also are trying to survive. And finally, in the second Frostpunk, you have a city of thousands of people who are trying to survive. Looking at those games, we can see that with each scale change, it was really hard to maintain this bond between the player and those characters, the inhabitants of those cities.
As a result, a lot of the new features being introduced in Frostpunk 1886 have to do with players forming a more intimate view of their cities’ inhabitants. Sułecki stressed the importance of being able to see citizens’ actions and behaviors more like you can in This War of Mine. New camera functionality and improved animations for citizens will let players zoom into their city closer than before to see what’s going on.
There will also be a new Purpose Path with 11 new laws, five or six new buildings, and “tons of new consequences” for players to discover, Sułecki teased. He also told me the Frostpunk 1886 team plans to “write some events that will make players believe that those are real people.” The original Frostpunk was already one of the best city-builders out there because the positive and negative effects of your actions were palpable. Unlike Frostpunk 2, Frostpunk 1886 really seems like it’ll lean into that.
The road to Frostpunk 1886’s launch is clear
And its developers hope for that road to continue after launch
When I asked Sułecki how far along Frostpunk 1886 was in development, he admitted that he doesn’t think the team has “reached the halfway point” yet. That said, he’s still confident that 11 bit Studios will release game in 2027 as currently planned “because the assumption here is that it’s should be a really smooth process with the translation and content balancing.” 11 bit Studios isn’t trying to reinvent Frostpunk with this remake; it just wants to make the beloved original a game it can more easily update.
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Currently, Sułecki says that 11 bit Studios is “aiming right now to recreate all of the original four scenarios, endless mode, and all of those mechanics that players already know.” That means there’s still some post-launch content from the original Frostpunk that will need to be added to this remake after launch. Sułecki did reiterate multiple times in our conversation that Frostpunk 1886 will be much easier to update and mod than the original, so the hope is that all of that classic content will eventually come over to the remake.
Although the fact that the original Frostpunk isn’t that old might make you question the need for a remake, Sułecki made a compelling case for why it’s necessary to me. After Frostpunk 2, there’s a clear yearning for what the original had to offer, but it wouldn’t have been particularly easy for 11 bit Studios or its community to continue expanding upon the original. Instead, they can build this remake in Unreal Engine 5 and expand on the original Frostpunk concept people love from there.
Frostpunk 1886
Like
Strategy
City Builder
Survival
Systems
Released 2027
Developer(s) 11 Bit Studios
Publisher(s) 11 Bit Studios
Franchise Frostpunk
Where to play
Close
WHERE TO PLAY
DIGITAL
Genre(s) Strategy, City Builder, Survival
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