Offworld Trading Company Revealed

Stardock today revealed the first details for new studio Mohawk Games’ flagship title, Offworld Trading Company, a market-based real-time strategy game where corporations struggle for dominance of the astronomical profits that lie in the Martian market.

Pre-orders are available now at www.offworldtrading.com in two tiers: a standard discounted pre-order at $34.99, and a special edition that comes with access to the prototype version (due out this fall), an extra game key, and other bonuses at $79.99.

Offworld Trading Company’s competitive matches pit up to 8 players against each other on randomly generated maps. Players must quickly determine the best path toward building a self-sufficient colony that can extract the abundant Martian resources while maintaining profitability – and surviving the “talents” of shady black-market characters who are all too happy to raid any player’s shipments or smuggle a paralyzing EMP device into any colony for the right price.

Unlike traditional RTS games, there are no military units and what you need to win can change at a moment’s notice because on Mars, there are no rules in the free market. None of the 13 resources is more powerful than any other, and everything is for sale. Players gain cash by selling excess resources like carbon, fuel, and silicon on the open market, and spend it buying the resources they’re short on. Prices fluctuate in real time forcing players to adapt their strategy; dump a bunch of iron on the market and its price will crater, making other players’ stockpiles worth much less in the near term.

The game is won when the ultimate cutthroat capitalist completes buys out the stock of all their rivals, thereby seizing control of the entire planet’s economy.