Over the past weeks, many questions have emerged regarding MENACE's features, our development progress, and our plans for Early Access.
This week's Dev Diary will feature a selection of the most frequently asked questions and our corresponding answers. Bear in mind that we have an iterative design process, and sometimes, it is very difficult for us to give definitive answers to certain questions—we just don’t know yet! This is especially true regarding nice-to-have features.
In addition, we don’t see the Early Access phase of the game as pure polishing. It’s actual live development incorporating the community's feedback, so you can expect quite a few changes.
RELEASE & PLATFORMS
Q: When can I play it?!
A: MENACE is scheduled to release on Steam Early Access in the Fall of 2025. We are not planning to do any open betas before that, so we’re afraid you’ll have to wait just a little bit more! We are tinkering with the idea of a combat demo, but we will announce when we have more concrete info on that.
Q: What will MENACE's overall price be for Early Access, and when can we expect a release date?
A: It’s still too early to discuss what the price of the game will be. It might make sense to look at games with comparable size and production value to get a rough idea. As for the release date of the release date… stay tuned, Fall is coming!
Q: What percentage of planned features does Overhype hope to have implemented before launching into Early Access?
A: Regarding actual features and not content I would say 80%. Although it’s very hard to estimate, because if we feel something is missing during EA we will simply sit down, design a new feature and implement it.
Q: Will MENACE be available on GOG?
A: Our publisher Hooded Horse will take that call.
Q: Is MENACE planned to be Steam Deck compatible or Verified?
A: Our publisher Hooded Horse will take that call.
Q: Will MENACE be playable offline?
A: MENACE is a single-player game without online features, so yes.
CAMPAIGN STRUCTURE & REPLAYABILITY
Q: Will there be an "end" to the campaign or an overarching plot, as opposed to Battle Brothers’ indefinite sandbox?
A: Yes, MENACE has an overarching plot. You are the commander of a strike force tasked with bringing an isolated frontier system, the Wayback, into the fold of the Republic. When you get there you realize there is a bigger threat that might put the entire system at risk, and then spill over to the rest of the Republic. You have to find a way to neutralize this new foe (the titular MENACE) before it gets out of control. Thus, unlike in Battle Brothers, you need to beat the MENACE or you will eventually lose the game.
A piece of trivia: Battle Brothers was originally designed to end after defeating a late game crisis. The open end style of the game was not planned in its original concept.
Q: Will there be different types of crises like in BB?
A: There aren’t crises (as they appear in Battle Brothers) per se. There is a looming threat that you have to beat, the MENACE, and operations – series of 3 to 5 missions (tactical battles), connected with loose story arcs, where losses carry over from one mission to the next. You can read more about operations in this dev diary.
Q: Will there be an endless mode?
A: Right now we do not have an endless mode planned.
Q: How long is one campaign supposed to last?
A: Over 30 hours.
Q: How long does it take to beat the game?
A: It can vary a lot, because although the MENACE will spread and grow stronger as time goes by (so you cannot just ignore it or weather it, as you could with late game crises in BB), and you lose the game if you don’t take action, we want to give players the ability to take their time and play at their own pace. Thus, you can “speedrun” the game or take it slowly, so the length of a single playthrough is hard to estimate.
STORY & NARRATIVE DESIGN
Q: Obviously, I know you can’t spare spoilers, but how will campaigns progress and conclude?
A: The starting point is already known: you are the commander of a strike force sent to a frontier system, cut off from the Core Worlds, to pacify it and bring it back to the fold.
The story will be carried by a few fixed points (comparable to the XCOM story missions), but apart from that everything is procedurally generated.
We don’t want to spoil anything about the main storyline itself, so we cannot discuss much about its conclusion. Let’s just say that either you beat the MENACE or you don’t…
Q: Will there be multiple origins to pick from when starting a new campaign?
A: Not in the same way as in Battle Brothers. The origin is the same, you are always the commander of the strike cruiser TCRN Impetus, a republic Marine Corps strike force sent to the Wayback System. But you will get to select your starting squad leaders and pilots from a pool of characters, making every playthrough unique.
More ways of putting a twist on a new playthrough might be added eventually.
Q: Will any story content be added in conjunction with or instead of the planned main story?
A: There will be a lot of story content, especially focusing on the squad leaders and pilots. That’s why they are handwritten and named, as opposed to the procedurally generated characters that are at the core of Battle Brothers. This allows us to create unique, meaningful dialogs, persistent relations, developing characters and their personalities… Having this group of wildly different personalities interact with each other and try to get along is one of the main points of the game’s storytelling. On top of that, operations and missions are procedurally generated, so there is still a lot of emergent narrative in MENACE.
Q: If DLC expansions are a possibility, would they be more narratively focused given the squad leader emphasis?
A: We’re still developing the base game, it’s way too early to start thinking about DLC expansions. Although we will most probably add more Squadleaders no matter what kind of DLC we come up with.
Q: Will Overhype post about cut or unimplemented features during development?
A: We started our dev diaries months ago; you can read them to learn more about the development of the game, some design challenges that we have encountered along the way… but we prefer to focus on what we are doing and what you will find in the game rather than what was left at the design table.
Q: Will the word “bro” appear as a nod to Battle Brothers?
A: Looking for Easter eggs is fun. That’s all we want to say for now!
SANDBOX, MODDING, AND COMMUNITY TOOLS
Q: How open is the game planned to be? Will there be options for a sandbox-style mode?
A: The player will have a decent amount of agency over the speed of progression through the game, but there won't be an endless sandbox mode. At least it’s not planned right now.
Q: Is the game planned to have modding tools released with it?
A: Yes, we plan to add Steam Workshop Support.
Q: Is there any chance of Workshop support?
A: See above.
TACTICAL MECHANICS & COMBAT SYSTEMS
Q: Why legs?
A: So you have more things to blow up, of course!
Q: Do characters have permadeath? How crippling is it?
A: Yes, there’s permadeath: If a character dies, they are gone for good, comparable to Jagged Alliance 2, which also had written characters that could permanently die. Other characters will react to these deaths in different ways; we want it to be meaningful and leave a footprint in your playthrough. However, for a squad leader falling during a mission doesn’t necessarily mean dying, and players will have tools to mitigate the chances of death.
Q: I'm wondering about the “fail a mission, lose the operation” system. Is there room for partial failure or strategic recovery within an operation?
A: At the moment that is not planned, although you can save between missions and try a different approach when you load.
Q: Can players draw or place markers down on the prep map to assist in planning?
A: Not yet planned, but it sounds fun. It especially might make sense for streamers illustrating their strategy for their audience.
Q: Do you plan to implement modern-ish combined arms elements into tactical gameplay, such as electronic warfare, drones, or ISR?
A: Most types of indirect combat support will be implemented through so-called “off map abilities”. Area scans, smoke drops, electronic warfare, EMP strikes, close air support, etc. On top of that squad leaders might bring drones, mines, motion scanners or other equipment as “accessories”.
Q: Will there be drones or robots players can deploy, similar to how Battle Brothers used attack dogs?
A: Yes, most likely in the form of “accessories” that squad leaders bring into the combat zone as part of their loadout.
RECRUITMENT, FACTIONS, AND CUSTOMIZATION
Q: Will we be able to recruit from other factions or just use their gear?
A: Squadleaders have a very wide variety of backgrounds. There are former pirates, mercenaries, hit-men, royal bodyguards, and more. Rules wise they are mainly falling into two categories: Marines and Non-Marines.
Q: Will there be different factions or starts the player can pick from?
A: The player can choose a number of marine squad leaders at the beginning of the game, but the initial roster will always be composed of marines. You are commanding a Marine strike force, after all. As the playthrough progresses you’ll meet other factions and have the opportunity to recruit from different backgrounds.
Q: Are dropships or strike ships customizable or persistent, or are they just abilities?
A: All upgrades are done on the strike cruiser, but some of them get delivered by the drop ships. So by customizing your strike cruiser, you indirectly customize your drop ships. Offmap abilities delivered by the strike cruiser or the dropships will work in slightly different ways.
Q: Will squad leaders be 100% fixed in stats/traits, or is there campaign-to-campaign variability?
A: Stats and traits are fixed for each squad leader, as it’s part of their personality and backstory. The perk tree should have enough flexibility to create a different build in each playthrough. You can read a bit more about the individual perk trees here, and more about squad leaders here:
Q: Will we have a limited number of replacements? Will we need to recruit from local populations?
A: As they are written characters, the number of squad leaders is finite. You will start out with a team of Marine squad leaders and move on to recruit from the Wayback population afterwards. However, we are aiming at having at least 16 squad leaders on the Early Access release, and more will be added further down the road. We currently aim for 26 at the Full Release, but we keep adding more all the time so it depends on our work load how many we manage to implement at the end of the day.
Q: Is there any chance for a customized squad leader, even alongside the written characters?
A: Not really. A random or custom-generated character would always be a second-class character without any personality or interaction with other squad leaders, which is an essential part of the game. We will have to see how everything plays out during the EA though.
Q: Will every marine have a fully written backstory, or will there be some procedurally generated/customizable soldiers, too?
A: They are all written characters. Otherwise it’s not possible to give them meaningful, persistent interactions. One of the things we missed a lot in Battle Brothers.
EQUIPMENT, GEAR, AND VISUAL PROGRESSION
Q: Will there be named-item equivalents in MENACE?
A: They are planned, but not in the game yet; although they will work a bit differently than named weapons in Battle Brothers (you’ll see).
You can read more about weapons here:
Q: Will there be legendary location equivalents, too?
A: Can't say yet.
Q: Will there be legendary equipment or locations?
A: Can't say yet.
Q: What kind of company or troop customization can we expect?
A: Regarding visual customization: Hard to say yet. It’s not ruled out, but time and resources are limited. When you choose to implement feature A, you will have to leave out feature B – and the core mechanics must come first. Having said that, having color choices for vehicles is a real possibility (although maybe added during EA). Of course this would need to be incorporated into the UI as well, which is always more work than it seems.
Q: Can we rename squads or their leaders? How customizable are loadouts? Can I equip all shotguns or change colors?
A: Renaming squad leaders doesn't make sense in this type of game, as they all are proper characters interacting with one another. A lot of lines for each character are also voiced by voice actors, which makes changing names impossible.
If we add cosmetic customization then most likely in the form of changing colors for your armor, vehicle etc. Loadouts are completely customizable, there is no fixed equipment.
Q: Will cybernetics be included, like a soldier returning with a prosthetic or implant?
A: We have some ideas for that, but nothing concrete yet.
Q: As units gain experience, will they display trophies or visual upgrades?
A: No. The look of a unit will be determined by their equipment.
SQUADS, LEADERS, AND INTERACTIONS
Q: Will there be unique events between squads, like Davkul cultists in BB?
A: We have all kinds of events planned/written. Anything is possible.
Q: How many squad leaders or heroes will there be?
A: The plan is to have at least 26 for the Full Release.
Q: How do squad leader relationships work mechanically? Do bonds or rivalries offer bonuses or penalties?
A: Their interactions are already mostly implemented, but the concrete gameplay consequences are still being discussed.
Q: Any chance for co-op or multiplayer campaigns?
A: Not planned right now. Creating a multiplayer game is something completely different from a single-player game, and our vision was always creating a single-player experience.
Q: What about hot-seat co-op?
A: Not planned, but who knows what the future brings.
AUDIO, ART, AND PRODUCTION
Q: Are the current voice lines final? Will there be improvements or more polish there?
A: We will add more lines for all characters. The whole voice line system is still under construction.
Q: Any news on who’s doing the soundtrack?
A: We will dedicate a Dev Diary to that topic.
Q: Will sound design continue the high standard set in Battle Brothers?
A: Absolutely. It’s a keystone element of Battle Brothers, essential for immersion, and we are going to keep the same high standard for MENACE.
Engage, Explore, and Stay Informed
That's it for now! We'll see you next Friday.
You can find us on Discord, BlueSky, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Reddit for discussions, updates, and feedback. You can also subscribe to our monthly MENACE newsletter on our website — just scroll to the bottom of the page to sign up.
View game pageAnd here are the recent prior Dev Diaries in case you've missed them: