Offworld Industries has released the official trailer for the film Star Trek: Annihilation inspired the 1997 cult classic film Star Troopers. Almost 20 years have passed since the last first-person shooter Star Troopers a game released in 2005; the year it was also released Starship: a game in miniatures as well as Starfighter: role-playing game.
Until Star Troopers was originally a novel, all game adaptations Star Troopersincluding Annihilation, based on the film. The original novel received mixed reviews from critics, winning the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1960, while others criticized its glorification of war and the military, as well as possible fascist undertones. However, in the 1997 film, these themes were used as a satire on fascism and authoritarian rule. Whereas in 2005 Star Troopers was met with mostly negative reviews, a newer strategy game, Starship Troopers: Terran Commandhas maintained a “very positive” rating on Steam since launch, indicating interest in the franchise.
In 2022 Offworld Industries revealed Star Trek: Annihilation with a short teaser that matches the recruitment propaganda videos as seen in the 1997 film. Now, Offworld Industries has shown fans more with the same extraordinary propaganda theme. The trailer highlights some of the playable classes in the game, such as the assault unit, heavy infantry, and medic. The trailer also hints that the game could be quite challenging, saying that “the infection will be relentless,” before encouraging players to work together to accumulate resources.
The trailer ends with a prompt to wishlist the game on Steam, with a 2023 release without any specific date. Offworld Industries has previously been successful in tactical FPS Detachment. Recently, fans have been critical of Offworld Industries’ choices regarding Detachment, stating that the game is falling prey to microtransactions. Fans blamed Tencent.
Tencent continues to buy more and more shares in the gaming industry, for example huge investment in Ubisoft. Many fans see the purchases as a stingy attempt at monopoly and fear that the conglomerate will shift its focus away from developing solid games to a more money-oriented development scheme. That being said, many studios that Tencent has acquired significant stakes in, such as From Software, or studios that Tencent has bought outright, continue to produce high-quality games with little interference. As well as Wanted: Dead, Star Troopers is likely to portray large companies and authoritative governments in a negative light; in stark contrast to what many players think of Tencent.
Star Trek: Annihilation is currently in development and will enter early access in 2023 on PC.