On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
On September 02 2025 18:31 qwerty4w wrote: Stormgate is a lot less aesthetically cohesive than Tempest Rising or Iron Harvest, which is fairly important for selling a game. Battle Aces can't find a viable monetization model and it's a micro arena game with bland unit designs and only one map.
Not just less cohesive but even whole gameplay aside when you look at Tempest Rising or Iron Harvest it just looks cool. I bet quite a lot of their sales were not because of people with competitive mindset but just people who thought it might be cool and got it with the intention of playing the campaign alone.
Which of the 3 gameplay pictures looks the most generic to you? Which of those would you not pick up?
Same with the cover/poster art for those games.
Which one of them looks the most boring to you?
Pretty much the same principles apply here as with website design. 75% of users will leave your website after 3 seconds and never go past the header section if your presentation is bad. You have to capture them within those 3 seconds and with your opening presentation. StormGate just fails to build any form of curiosity to find out more about it when you look at the screenshots and cover (at least for me).
Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
It's steampunk WW1 mech with a bear, can't say I agree at all. Based on this alone the game already is intriguing.
Also Spartak with the endless excuse about not complete/ beta etc strikes again.
The effort and money spent in Stormgate's recent gameplay and art overhauls could have been used to do other things. Ideally a developer with limited resource should work like when Relic was developing Homeworld 1, back then Relic had no budget for iterating so they had to treat the first pass of anything as the final pass.
Stormgate made the game they wanted to make, no one liked it, spent 1.5 years changing everything people didn't like and the game still couldn't keep players interested, such huge waste of resources
Not even joking, but I actually prefer Stormgate's art to those two other screenshots -_-:
Both of the other games are too dark and it's hard for me to see the actual units. Although that gun ship in the Iron Harvest looks pretty cool.
I assume Tempest Rising/Iron Harvest is more rooted in "realism" (even if there's sci-fi elements in it), which means a bigger emphasis on slowness, big machines, small infantry and tactics and (probably) less base building/simcity/macro, potentially more complex resource system. This is my feeling on Command & Conquer type games. I know I'm not being fully accurate here.
I feel a "Blizzard RTS" is faster-paced with an emphasis on (simple) resource gathering, simple base building/sim city, easier to understand tech trees and fewer systems to learn (usually). Units usually retain their value throughout the game (Zergling, Marine, Zealot etc.). The art "style" is unrealistic, with the scale of buildings to infantry to capital ships being completely off.
Stormgate clearly isn't capturing anyone's attention - a serious lack of dopamine at many parts in the game could be a big reason. The unit interactions can occasionally look pretty cool, but there's not a lot of units like: banelings, stimmed marines, cracklings, storm, reavers, lurkers, mines, siege tanks etc. that make for exciting gameplay (IMO).
Flame imps (banelings) are neat enough, but too costly (need to sacrifice workers...). When a lot crash into an opposing army it can feel underwhelming.
Stutter step Exos (stimmed marines) can be cool if you use them to dart in and pick off high value targets (like hellbourne) but in general, aren't as fun as marines
Fiends (zerglings) are a bit weird - really strong, but really brittle. They do good damage if left alone, otherwise they die really fast. I miss zergling surrounds.
Dark prophecy (storm) is neat, but you almost never see it. Miasma is also strong but the graphic looks underwhelming (uThermal brought this up in his building).
What's a reaver in Stormgate? A saber? Somewhat cool - I do like seeing them. Definitely not as good as a reaver (also maybe not the most accurate comparison)
no lurker equivalent at all
forsaken traps/sky mines (mines) - forsaken traps could be cool, but aren't. slow to cast, behind an upgrade, easy to avoid them, and the damage isn't that significant. Hexen also cost a lot of gas when you need to spend it elsewhere early on.
sky mines i really enjoy - it's fun to see vanguard vs. infernal, van using air/atlas drops and infernal chasing them down with shadowflyers, using skymines to block them. currently we rarely see them. this was more prevalent in earlier SG versions.
atlases (siege tanks) - they're actually pretty fun to watch. but they're often countered easily, or 1-2 atlases don't make a difference in a fight. tier 2.5 tech level, expensive, slow to build, 6 supply. I get some dopamine seeing them used well and using them in my own games.
Stormgate also suffers heavily from a lack of developed lore. I understand the story/theme/lore feels underwhelming. It's not executed well and it's missing a lot of details. I think it could be good in time (unlikely we'll get more time anyway!)
I thought this van vs van series was fun to watch: + Show Spoiler +
It's the current best player on ladder (Refresh) vs. hyy, probably a top 3 vanguard.
I understand criticisms like: why watch this when I can watch BW/SC2 TvT. It's boring to watch vulcans shoot at a stormgate. Dog/hog vs. dog/hog, while clearly requiring lots of micro/skill, is kind of boring. The caster is trying but definitely not a professional. Some of the army blobs may be hard to read. Why is there a floating c'thulu type monster dropping vanguard units, etc.
I do understand the lack of cohesion in regards to theme and art.
I do appreciate the back and forth, the atlas usage, the air usage, the varied unit compositions.
The finals in this tournament was also pretty good:
Overall: I still like Stormgate, but it feels too safe and not different/new enough for most people. The gameplay needs more interesting units/abilities blowing shit up. Campaign was decent, but clearly rushed and had a serious lack of polish (especially with the pacing of some missions and the voice acting).
Also Spartak with the endless excuse about not complete/ beta etc strikes again.
It is not an excuse. It is the reality. Frost Giant revealed their game earlier than games usually are revealed, they revealed gameplay earlier than gameplay videos are usually revealed. They made the game playable earlier than games are usually made playable and they launched earlier than games usually launch. That all goes back to their scope being too high for their capabilities. You can say they should have known better but I am not gonna be a hypocrite and criticise them for it. That's the sort of game I wanted and I was happy they went for it. Turns out it wasn't possible. C'est la vie.
Visuals were important during the EA launch a year ago, because good visuals could attract/retain more people. That's why old visuals are relevant. New visuals are irrelevant, because they won't change anything. It won't get even 500 CCU ever again, even if SG had the best visuals in the world RN.
That's why old graphics and visual style are more important to the discussion, and more fitting than the new ones.
On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
Iron Harvest poster is just confusing.
There's a tin can with legs and for some reason an enormous bayonetted rifle as its weapon. Why does the tin can have a bayonetted 20 foot long rifle? Is there a person in the tin can? What's the banner about? Most of the things it seems to be fighting are humans in pointy helmets, why does it need a telephone pole for a gun?
There's a guy with a bear. Bears are cool, and a bear seems like a better weapon than a telephone pole or a tin can when fighting the bad pointy-helmet people... but the bear isn't interested in the pointy hat people, it's yelling at the sky. It hates the sky.
There's a small wire fence. This small wire fence has seemed to confound the pointy hat people, who look at each other and around as if to say "Shit, where'd this fence come from?". They cannot seem to get past it, and have not yet seemed to realize that their guns could shoot past this fence, at the enemies ten feet away from them. Fortunately, those enemies have not yet seemed to notice them, and are still fighting the sky.
There's a broken wagon wheel, which makes sense given all the wheels there are on the tin can and the bear. Perhaps it was a wheel from a wheeled cannon, and after it fell off an the rest of it vanished into oblivion, the man sat down with the remains of the cannon and thought "Fuck it, I can use this myself!"
The pointy hat people, still confused by the fence, are even more confused by the cannon eight feet from them being fired at the sky.
---
Stormgate's design might be bad, but I find "There's a demon threat looming over humans" has more clarity compositionally than whatever the fuck is going on in that iron harvest poster. Don't get me wrong, Stormgate's design in that poster is pretty shit, it's just wholly unambitious and that serves it well enough.
On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
Iron Harvest poster is just confusing.
There's a tin can with legs and for some reason an enormous bayonetted rifle as its weapon. Why does the tin can have a bayonetted 20 foot long rifle? Is there a person in the tin can? What's the banner about? Most of the things it seems to be fighting are humans in pointy helmets, why does it need a telephone pole for a gun?
There's a guy with a bear. Bears are cool, and a bear seems like a better weapon than a telephone pole or a tin can when fighting the bad pointy-helmet people... but the bear isn't interested in the pointy hat people, it's yelling at the sky. It hates the sky.
There's a small wire fence. This small wire fence has seemed to confound the pointy hat people, who look at each other and around as if to say "Shit, where'd this fence come from?". They cannot seem to get past it, and have not yet seemed to realize that their guns could shoot past this fence, at the enemies ten feet away from them. Fortunately, those enemies have not yet seemed to notice them, and are still fighting the sky.
There's a broken wagon wheel, which makes sense given all the wheels there are on the tin can and the bear. Perhaps it was a wheel from a wheeled cannon, and after it fell off an the rest of it vanished into oblivion, the man sat down with the remains of the cannon and thought "Fuck it, I can use this myself!"
The pointy hat people, still confused by the fence, are even more confused by the cannon eight feet from them being fired at the sky.
---
Stormgate's design might be bad, but I find "There's a demon threat looming over humans" has more clarity compositionally than whatever the fuck is going on in that iron harvest poster. Don't get me wrong, Stormgate's design in that poster is pretty shit, it's just wholly unambitious and that serves it well enough.
It just means Iron Harvest is not for you since you're probably not really interested in more historical stuff. To me it immediately evokes last stand Poland vs Germany (more Prussia in this case, considering the pointy helmets). The flag with the eagle and colors of Poland and the bear only strengthen that.
On September 02 2025 10:00 Jeremy Reimer wrote: Well, it's now one week down since Tim Morten said that he would hopefully reveal the results of his "encouraging conversations" with "potential partners" in the "weeks ahead".
Is there any news? Well, Tim has gone into a full reflective mode:
Why do games fail in the market? At the most basic level, it's because they are not good enough. Part of my job is to make sure Frost Giant's games are good enough, so I'm putting a lot of thought into how I missed.
Seems like he's internalizing Stormgate's failure.
On a game-by-game basis, we blame particular aspects of each game, and to a great extent, that's fair. I certainly plan to share thoughts on specific hurdles for Stormgate in the future. But zooming out, I believe there's a broader market trend in play that deserves attention.
But wait... perhaps it's not his fault? Maybe there are larger market forces at work here...
Part of my job is to recognize trends like this and adapt, so Stormgate's underperformance is absolutely my responsibility. How does a studio adapt to oversaturation?
He's still taking responsibility, which is nice. But instead of Stormgate not being good enough because it didn't hit a quality bar, now it's because it there were too many other games.
Which is true, I guess. But it might be missing the point.
So any news about the "partners"? About saving Frost Giant? What about Stormgate? It's been nearly a month after launch without any updates from the team.
I'm continuing to pursue a path forward for Frost Giant, with these current market challenges in mind. More thoughts and updates to come.
No. No news.
Yes, there are more games than ever. Yes, the quality bar is higher. This is because software tools to make games are better than ever. Furthermore, those tools are more accessible than ever.
In this environment the consumer wins. Most people have far more great games to play than spare time in which to play them.
Tim selected a poor set of tools to make his game. As bad as things have gone for Morten I'd say things have gone worse for another high profile Blizzard alum , one Rob Pardo. 11 years post Blizzard and zero games made.
I'm not WW1 or WW2 asthetics fan either. I like the Napoleonic Wars much more. Every army had its stupid and stylish colorful uniform :D But saying Iron Harvest is looking most boring from looking at the poster is wild to me. Like there's no universe in which I'd choose generic post-apocalyptic fantasy with mobile look in it over alternative WW1 with robots and bears. And I'm not a fan of the dieselpunk either.
Also Spartak with the endless excuse about not complete/ beta etc strikes again.
It is not an excuse. It is the reality. Frost Giant revealed their game earlier than games usually are revealed, they revealed gameplay earlier than gameplay videos are usually revealed. They made the game playable earlier than games are usually made playable and they launched earlier than games usually launch. That all goes back to their scope being too high for their capabilities. You can say they should have known better but I am not gonna be a hypocrite and criticise them for it. That's the sort of game I wanted and I was happy they went for it. Turns out it wasn't possible. C'est la vie.
Forever winter launched into alpha build, the visual design alone gave it all the hype it needed. (Fyi it even started as an artbook)
Since when did the feedback about SG generic look start to pour in? Changing up design alone isn't enough, the entire look is generic. more polish and time would have turned it into a passable game I suppose, but halve of wol numbers?
I dunno if I’d criticise Stormgate for being generic looking as such, at least within the genre it’s quite atypical. Indeed, in response to criticism I think they made it less distinctive than they’d originally gone for.
I mean I don’t think the execution is great to say the least, but I’m down for a more cartoony vibe if it’s done well.
I mean I’ve seen enough feedback on the sub to notice that many people actively want it to look more generic, and more like other RTS games they like. Which is totally a fine preference to have by all means.
As I’ve said before I think that art style can work, but the tone is all over the place and super muddied.
On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
Iron Harvest poster is just confusing.
There's a tin can with legs and for some reason an enormous bayonetted rifle as its weapon. Why does the tin can have a bayonetted 20 foot long rifle? Is there a person in the tin can? What's the banner about? Most of the things it seems to be fighting are humans in pointy helmets, why does it need a telephone pole for a gun?
There's a guy with a bear. Bears are cool, and a bear seems like a better weapon than a telephone pole or a tin can when fighting the bad pointy-helmet people... but the bear isn't interested in the pointy hat people, it's yelling at the sky. It hates the sky.
There's a small wire fence. This small wire fence has seemed to confound the pointy hat people, who look at each other and around as if to say "Shit, where'd this fence come from?". They cannot seem to get past it, and have not yet seemed to realize that their guns could shoot past this fence, at the enemies ten feet away from them. Fortunately, those enemies have not yet seemed to notice them, and are still fighting the sky.
There's a broken wagon wheel, which makes sense given all the wheels there are on the tin can and the bear. Perhaps it was a wheel from a wheeled cannon, and after it fell off an the rest of it vanished into oblivion, the man sat down with the remains of the cannon and thought "Fuck it, I can use this myself!"
The pointy hat people, still confused by the fence, are even more confused by the cannon eight feet from them being fired at the sky.
---
Stormgate's design might be bad, but I find "There's a demon threat looming over humans" has more clarity compositionally than whatever the fuck is going on in that iron harvest poster. Don't get me wrong, Stormgate's design in that poster is pretty shit, it's just wholly unambitious and that serves it well enough.
It just means Iron Harvest is not for you since you're probably not really interested in more historical stuff. To me it immediately evokes last stand Poland vs Germany (more Prussia in this case, considering the pointy helmets). The flag with the eagle and colors of Poland and the bear only strengthen that.
Base building, macro, micro, can do bio, mech, air. It's almost like playing Terran in SC2.
Entirely fair, and I don't mean to press this with much seriousness. Compositionally that Iron Harvest poster is a mess, in no small part because it's an awkward cropping of the whole piece, which isn't that strong compositionally to begin with.
My background and interest is definitely art, visual design, and composition. Even from the (beautiful) art you posted, you can feel the compositions driving a different atmosphere and feel than the Iron Harvest cropped poster - very much more akin to the vibe that This War of Mine cultivates. All of those compositions feel like moments that could actually happen, depicting the long quiet between battles. Much different, much less ambitious compositionally, much more engaging imo.
On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
Iron Harvest poster is just confusing.
There's a tin can with legs and for some reason an enormous bayonetted rifle as its weapon. Why does the tin can have a bayonetted 20 foot long rifle? Is there a person in the tin can? What's the banner about? Most of the things it seems to be fighting are humans in pointy helmets, why does it need a telephone pole for a gun?
There's a guy with a bear. Bears are cool, and a bear seems like a better weapon than a telephone pole or a tin can when fighting the bad pointy-helmet people... but the bear isn't interested in the pointy hat people, it's yelling at the sky. It hates the sky.
There's a small wire fence. This small wire fence has seemed to confound the pointy hat people, who look at each other and around as if to say "Shit, where'd this fence come from?". They cannot seem to get past it, and have not yet seemed to realize that their guns could shoot past this fence, at the enemies ten feet away from them. Fortunately, those enemies have not yet seemed to notice them, and are still fighting the sky.
There's a broken wagon wheel, which makes sense given all the wheels there are on the tin can and the bear. Perhaps it was a wheel from a wheeled cannon, and after it fell off an the rest of it vanished into oblivion, the man sat down with the remains of the cannon and thought "Fuck it, I can use this myself!"
The pointy hat people, still confused by the fence, are even more confused by the cannon eight feet from them being fired at the sky.
---
Stormgate's design might be bad, but I find "There's a demon threat looming over humans" has more clarity compositionally than whatever the fuck is going on in that iron harvest poster. Don't get me wrong, Stormgate's design in that poster is pretty shit, it's just wholly unambitious and that serves it well enough.
It just means Iron Harvest is not for you since you're probably not really interested in more historical stuff. To me it immediately evokes last stand Poland vs Germany (more Prussia in this case, considering the pointy helmets). The flag with the eagle and colors of Poland and the bear only strengthen that.
Base building, macro, micro, can do bio, mech, air. It's almost like playing Terran in SC2.
Entirely fair, and I don't mean to press this with much seriousness. Compositionally that Iron Harvest poster is a mess, in no small part because it's an awkward cropping of the whole piece, which isn't that strong compositionally to begin with.
My background and interest is definitely art, visual design, and composition. Even from the (beautiful) art you posted, you can feel the compositions driving a different atmosphere and feel than the Iron Harvest cropped poster - very much more akin to the vibe that This War of Mine cultivates. All of those compositions feel like moments that could actually happen, depicting the long quiet between battles. Much different, much less ambitious compositionally, much more engaging imo.
Composition-wise, having a demon hugging the characters, flying demons flying towards different directions and behind/above the characters are better? Thats like they are all on the same side.
Flying demons are exactly how its done when they want fighter jets flying off from the main protagonist to form leading lines.
On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
Iron Harvest poster is just confusing.
There's a tin can with legs and for some reason an enormous bayonetted rifle as its weapon. Why does the tin can have a bayonetted 20 foot long rifle? Is there a person in the tin can? What's the banner about? Most of the things it seems to be fighting are humans in pointy helmets, why does it need a telephone pole for a gun?
There's a guy with a bear. Bears are cool, and a bear seems like a better weapon than a telephone pole or a tin can when fighting the bad pointy-helmet people... but the bear isn't interested in the pointy hat people, it's yelling at the sky. It hates the sky.
There's a small wire fence. This small wire fence has seemed to confound the pointy hat people, who look at each other and around as if to say "Shit, where'd this fence come from?". They cannot seem to get past it, and have not yet seemed to realize that their guns could shoot past this fence, at the enemies ten feet away from them. Fortunately, those enemies have not yet seemed to notice them, and are still fighting the sky.
There's a broken wagon wheel, which makes sense given all the wheels there are on the tin can and the bear. Perhaps it was a wheel from a wheeled cannon, and after it fell off an the rest of it vanished into oblivion, the man sat down with the remains of the cannon and thought "Fuck it, I can use this myself!"
The pointy hat people, still confused by the fence, are even more confused by the cannon eight feet from them being fired at the sky.
---
Stormgate's design might be bad, but I find "There's a demon threat looming over humans" has more clarity compositionally than whatever the fuck is going on in that iron harvest poster. Don't get me wrong, Stormgate's design in that poster is pretty shit, it's just wholly unambitious and that serves it well enough.
It just means Iron Harvest is not for you since you're probably not really interested in more historical stuff. To me it immediately evokes last stand Poland vs Germany (more Prussia in this case, considering the pointy helmets). The flag with the eagle and colors of Poland and the bear only strengthen that.
Base building, macro, micro, can do bio, mech, air. It's almost like playing Terran in SC2.
Entirely fair, and I don't mean to press this with much seriousness. Compositionally that Iron Harvest poster is a mess, in no small part because it's an awkward cropping of the whole piece, which isn't that strong compositionally to begin with.
My background and interest is definitely art, visual design, and composition. Even from the (beautiful) art you posted, you can feel the compositions driving a different atmosphere and feel than the Iron Harvest cropped poster - very much more akin to the vibe that This War of Mine cultivates. All of those compositions feel like moments that could actually happen, depicting the long quiet between battles. Much different, much less ambitious compositionally, much more engaging imo.
Composition-wise, having a demon hugging the characters, flying demons flying towards different directions and behind/above the characters are better? Thats like they are all on the same side.
Flying demons are exactly how its done when they want fighter jets flying off from the main protagonist to form leading lines.
Yeah! The posture of the demon literally looming behind them, the visual tension created by its claws not quite touching the subjects... It's an extremely basic composition and not executed particularly well, but there it is.
You wanna talk shit about the stormgate one I'm all game. The fuck is with the complete perfect mirroring on the demon? Why are there little V shaped bats in addition to the Ahriman dudes? Artistically it looks like college assignment stuff and not at all impressive, but that doesn't mean it's doing a worse job than the off-cropped Iron Harvest composition. You just can't see around your hateboner well enough to see it.
On September 03 2025 14:48 Fleetfeet wrote: Iron harvest 100% looks the most boring from the posters. Stormgate has problems with its design not being good, which is very much a problem, but Iron Harvest's design also looks like shit based on that picture. The screenshot is the best, the poster is the worst.
What? At least in this poster something is going on and you get a rather clear picture of what the game is about. You see WW1 style aesthetics and mechs. This pretty much immediately informs you that the game is about war and has alternate-history vibes.
Stormgate poster is just confusing. You have some sci-fi elements there, guns and a mech but the art style is cartoony. You have a serious looking girl but then you have those goofy-looking eyes with wings. There's sci-fi but also some fantasy demons or something?
It's just a random hodgepodge of elements that don't really make any sense and you have no idea why all of those elements are even together in the same picture.
For the Tempest Rising you also get a very clear vision. You immediately see it's about war and what looks like some invasion, the girl in the poster looks military but has some cyberpunk/sci-fi elements to it. Also, implies a slightly darker and more serious tone.
How can you market a game when even your poster doesn't convey what the game is about or doesn't hint at the atmosphere you should be expecting? Even if you manage to capture some audience who would just want to know what is this all about you then need a lengthy explanation. Both of the other titles just need to state they're RTS and you get the picture, Stormgate can't do that because things on the image do not really look like they belong together so even if you say it's an RTS people will be wondering "how?"
I think they really dropped the ball on marketing but also much earlier during the design phase. All it shows is a definitive lack of clear vision.
Iron Harvest poster is just confusing.
There's a tin can with legs and for some reason an enormous bayonetted rifle as its weapon. Why does the tin can have a bayonetted 20 foot long rifle? Is there a person in the tin can? What's the banner about? Most of the things it seems to be fighting are humans in pointy helmets, why does it need a telephone pole for a gun?
There's a guy with a bear. Bears are cool, and a bear seems like a better weapon than a telephone pole or a tin can when fighting the bad pointy-helmet people... but the bear isn't interested in the pointy hat people, it's yelling at the sky. It hates the sky.
There's a small wire fence. This small wire fence has seemed to confound the pointy hat people, who look at each other and around as if to say "Shit, where'd this fence come from?". They cannot seem to get past it, and have not yet seemed to realize that their guns could shoot past this fence, at the enemies ten feet away from them. Fortunately, those enemies have not yet seemed to notice them, and are still fighting the sky.
There's a broken wagon wheel, which makes sense given all the wheels there are on the tin can and the bear. Perhaps it was a wheel from a wheeled cannon, and after it fell off an the rest of it vanished into oblivion, the man sat down with the remains of the cannon and thought "Fuck it, I can use this myself!"
The pointy hat people, still confused by the fence, are even more confused by the cannon eight feet from them being fired at the sky.
---
Stormgate's design might be bad, but I find "There's a demon threat looming over humans" has more clarity compositionally than whatever the fuck is going on in that iron harvest poster. Don't get me wrong, Stormgate's design in that poster is pretty shit, it's just wholly unambitious and that serves it well enough.
It just means Iron Harvest is not for you since you're probably not really interested in more historical stuff. To me it immediately evokes last stand Poland vs Germany (more Prussia in this case, considering the pointy helmets). The flag with the eagle and colors of Poland and the bear only strengthen that.
Base building, macro, micro, can do bio, mech, air. It's almost like playing Terran in SC2.
Entirely fair, and I don't mean to press this with much seriousness. Compositionally that Iron Harvest poster is a mess, in no small part because it's an awkward cropping of the whole piece, which isn't that strong compositionally to begin with.
My background and interest is definitely art, visual design, and composition. Even from the (beautiful) art you posted, you can feel the compositions driving a different atmosphere and feel than the Iron Harvest cropped poster - very much more akin to the vibe that This War of Mine cultivates. All of those compositions feel like moments that could actually happen, depicting the long quiet between battles. Much different, much less ambitious compositionally, much more engaging imo.
Composition-wise, having a demon hugging the characters, flying demons flying towards different directions and behind/above the characters are better? Thats like they are all on the same side.
Flying demons are exactly how its done when they want fighter jets flying off from the main protagonist to form leading lines.
Yeah! The posture of the demon literally looming behind them, the visual tension created by its claws not quite touching the subjects... It's an extremely basic composition and not executed particularly well, but there it is.
You wanna talk shit about the stormgate one I'm all game. The fuck is with the complete perfect mirroring on the demon? Why are there little V shaped bats in addition to the Ahriman dudes? Artistically it looks like college assignment stuff and not at all impressive, but that doesn't mean it's doing a worse job than the off-cropped Iron Harvest composition. You just can't see around your hateboner well enough to see it.
I like iron harvest aesthetic, that alone is better for me.
Composition-wise at least they are facing the enemies, that should be end of debate on which has better composition but I guess it's not the case here? It's not even clear whether demons are the bad guys if they composit the flying demons that way. How would your remarks about the wheel or fence be worse than that.
It's literal WW1 mech, infantry, bear facing against enemies against bunched up demons and humans and dog. Composition wise how's stormgate better?
The longer I look at Stormgate poster the worse it gets. And once you notice the perfect symmetry of the demon it's all over. Exactly the same hand positions, same tears in the membrane of the wings etc. etc. It just screams "lazy" at the top of its lungs.
I think it's supposed to be some ominous demon looming over the humans but it's smiling and then there's the demon dog running along human characters and facing in the same direction which seems like they're working together?
On September 04 2025 23:06 Manit0u wrote: The longer I look at Stormgate poster the worse it gets. And once you notice the perfect symmetry of the demon it's all over. Exactly the same hand positions, same tears in the membrane of the wings etc. etc. It just screams "lazy" at the top of its lungs.
I think it's supposed to be some ominous demon looming over the humans but it's smiling and then there's the demon dog running along human characters and facing in the same direction which seems like they're working together?
Well if they were gonna copy blizzard writing I'm sure that will happen eventually.
The more I think about it, the more I feel stormgate missed a big opportunity. Instead of just trying to copy StarCraft with a lower budget I wish they leaned more into custom game modes (but as official modes) look at how autochess blossomed into the massively popular TFT in league of legends. SC2 has popular mods as well like auto chess.
Anyone remember Squadron Tower defense? This is basically that. That's all it is. But with more polish. It gets 1000+ concurrents regularly. https://steamcharts.com/app/469600
Anyone remember direct strike? Lots of people still play this in SC2 and WC3. Mechabellum took that and made it an official game and it is pretty successful as well. Even Mike Morhaime's company got production rights. https://steamcharts.com/app/669330
These games were successful because they didn't try to improve upon a 100m dollar model. They improved 1 man projects. They took mods and did them better.
I don't think it's too late. I don't know if stormgate will be able to capture the 1v1 audiences from SC2, WC3, AOE, but I think if they officially developed these custom games and innovated, it could have a real shot at picking up an audience. And I know these will probably exist eventually through the Map Editor as a mod, but I don't want another mod. A mod will always follow a subsidiary playerbase to the base game. I want official dev support. Make an official Direct Strike or TD and don't just leave it up to a community mod.
EPT![[image loading]](https://insider-gaming.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Stormgate-Base.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://www.noypigeeks.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Tempest-Rising.jpg)
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![[image loading]](https://cdn.oneesports.gg/cdn-data/2024/01/Gaming_Stormgate_KeyImage_1-1536x864.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://assets-prd.ignimgs.com/2022/08/13/tempest-rising-button-01-1660358697242.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://www.mobygames.com/images/covers/l/747211-iron-harvest-windows-apps-front-cover.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/09/Wojtek_and_soldier.jpg)
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![[image loading]](https://rare-gallery.com/uploads/posts/980714-digital-art-army-soldier-women-children-horse.jpg)
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