Sieging Castles with Janky Physics in Besiege

Going back in time, there was a lot of enjoyment to be had from besiege.

The game features a planet and a sandbox mode. The intention is that you jump into the campaign (which is limited to one continent right now which is about 15 levels) and build a siege weapon to destroy whatever it is you’re asked to destroy. For example, the first level is a small Southern Cottage with little to no defence apart from a few sheep that blow into a bloody mess at the poke of a metal spike. The intention is that you’ll build a small chassis with four powered wheels, and drive it in a straight line into the cottage to destroy it. Typically this is what people do. For the second level you have to destroy a windmill, which requires something stronger, more stable, steering and possibly a weapon. Personally, I modified the design from the cottage level and made it taller with steering and a flamethrower…. Of course being more practical. I drove to the windmill, activated the flamethrower, burned it down and watched my chassis go with it.

The third level was a battlefield littered with mines. The goal was to reach the other side. This is where people typically attempt flying and realise it’s nearly impossible to master it so early. The fourth level includes a castle wall with towers on each end, a row of archers, a cottage and a windmill. This is where people go over the top with their creations. They use the same chassis and litter it with a number of weapons until they realise, a stiff breeze will make the chassis snap. The game doesn’t really have a tutorial and certainly doesn’t hold your hand. It tells you how to use the camera, how to build and tells you to add braces….. don’t add too much though or your creation will snap like a wishbone.

This is part of the game’s charm, the distortion of the original goal to complete the levels. People add all kinds of parts to their machine and take to the sandbox mode to build their lean, mean, sieging machine. Adding spikes, fiddling with flight, creating machines that look like they’ve been ripped straight from Wolfenstein if it were based in medieval times. But this is also the time you realise….there isn’t much to toy with. For one there is only one type of building block and it’s wood, of course you can reinforce it but that’s it. You have the long piece and the short piece. The only long range weapon are cannons, of course you can craft a catapult or trebuchet but it takes an extreme amount of ingenuity. What I’m saying is…. Besiege suffers from early access disease. It has potential… but it’s not quite there, or lacks features.

This is made up by it’s low price of €6.99. For the retail price, it’s well worth it but if you’re tight with your money, wait for a sale. All that said, it took me around 3 and a half hours to even take note of it and as I write this article, I want to play more. I have 5 hours in it and I clocked that in a short period of time. I won’t rate the game because it’s unfinished and I personally don’t agree with rating games but as a final verdict, is it worth the money? Yes. Just about, so don’t expect to get more than 7 euro worth of a game.