Occasionally a game will come along that seems almost tailor made specifically for my niche tastes. Iron Harvest is exactly that kind of game. This game is set in Jakub Różalski's 1920+ universe, which showcases a fascinating alt-history post-WW1 Europe where we see enormous, powerful mechs and cultures dealing with dangerous dieselpunk technology. The 1920+ setting had previously been utilized in a popular board game called Scythe, where the various empires, kingdoms and republics of this universe were established. Iron Harvest plucks only a few of the civilizations that were featured in Scythe and presents them in the context of a real-time strategy game. This was a brilliant move and a smart adaptation of the mechanics shown in Scythe, with the focus on resource gathering and mech battles in both games. Between the incredible art design, intriguing story and world, and the fantastic RTS gameplay, the diesel engine of Iron Harvest is roaring and firing on all cylinders.
I really enjoyed the plot of Iron Harvest. Three civilizations from Scythe were picked to build the game's story around, each with their own campaigns. Polania (Poland), Rusviet (Russia) and Saxony (Germany) are each grappling with the reconstruction of their nations after the Great War. Rusviet, like its real life counterpart, has fallen to the bloodthirsty communists. The borders of various European empires and kingdoms changed drastically following the end of the war. Polania, for example, has been handed to the Rusviet army as part of a peace treaty with Saxony. The intense rivalry between Polania and Rusviet is what kicks off a new conflict and fuels a majority of the plot for Iron Harvest. The Polanian resistance is in danger of being fully stamped out by the Rusviets, who are secretly serving a mysterious and powerful shadow faction known as Fenris. The chief of security of Rusviet, and a loyalist to Tsar Nicholas, Olga, discovers the existence of Fenris and learns that the organization seeks to reignite the war. She departs Rusviet to Saxony to warn the Kaiser about Fenris and arrives just as the Kaiser is assassinated, while Gunter, a Saxonian war hero, is blamed for the assassination. Olga recruits Gunter and his loyalists, and they join forces with the Polanian resistance to overthrow the Rusviets.
While World War 1 serves as the most direct comparison point for Iron Harvest's plot and setting, there's that wonderful dose of alt-history weirdness that gets added in to really enhance this entire story. Each faction has various mech units that can be used in battle. The dieselpunk aesthetic for the mechs is perfect for the time period, as it feels like this is a new, inelegant and extremely utilitarian approach to machine design, as if these nations just learned how to make these giant walking weapons. They're ugly, awkward, cumbersome and ridiculously cool looking all at the same time. Polania has one of my favorite mech units, it's actually the one featured on the key art for the game. The PZM-7 "Śmiały" is a bipedal, almost humanoid mech that can run and wields a giant rifle with an affixed bayonet. It's such a phenomenal design. The mechs are very diverse in design though. Saxony has access to one that is giant, clumsy, rotating seed-pod looking machine that upon getting close to its target, begins dropping automated seeker bombs. If you like mechs, you're sure to find something that speaks to your interest in Iron Harvest.
My experience with RTS games is somewhat limited; not necessarily in total time spent, rather in the number of real-time strategy titles that I've played. I'm mostly familiar with the Age of Empires franchise, and the Warcraft games, as well as The Lord of the Rings: the Battle for Middle-Earth. Iron Harvest has some shared DNA with those titles, but it's lacking some features that I tend to enjoy more in my RTS fare. For instance, I enjoy base building; starting with a handful of villagers and over time building some massive city with streets and tons of property and land. This game doesn't have that. I also like when RTS games have where you can upgrade units with new abilities and bonuses through your production structures. Like where you could upgrade the range of this type of unit, or enhance the firepower of that unit type.
I don't think Iron Harvest necessarily needed it though, nor does it fit the style or tone of what is happening in this universe. You're not building a civilization in this game, you're scrounging together the scattered, sparse resources that you can and putting together small skirmishing parties to whittle away at your enemy. Where in something like Age of Empires, you're quite literally supposed to be wiping out an entire civilization over the course of a match, Iron Harvest instead shrinks everything down to much smaller, more resource-choked battles. These are also supposed to be nations who have just come out of an incredibly deadly war that wiped out millions of men, so it's fitting that your armies and settlements are not grand in size or scope.
A small complaint that I had was that each campaign seemed to have a random mission with a major difficulty spike that required a good deal of save scumming to get through. The Rusviet campaign specifically had a mission that made me quit Iron Harvest for several months before coming back to complete the game. I don't want to spoil the story, but I'll offer this piece of advice if you find yourself stuck on the mission Tesla's City. Use bunkers. Build lots and lots of bunkers. You can build automated bunkers that can be placed facing the direction that you need covered, and it will fire at any enemies that enter into the proximity of the structure. Once I realized how helpful the bunkers were, I utilized them in many missions throughout the remainder of the game.
I can wholeheartedly recommend Iron Harvest. While the gameplay and unique aesthetic of the in-game universe were the main draws for me, I found myself enthralled by the tense story and curious how it would develop. I feel like the game tested my strategical skills and made me try new methods and army combinations to overcome some of its tougher challenges. When none of my strategies worked, it was always fun to just produce a horde of awesome looking mechs and bowl over the enemy's defenses. I'd love to see what King Art Games could do with a sequel, though I assume it'd be awhile before they could get around to it, as they're the studio behind the highly anticipated Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War IV.
VERDICT: Recommended
Reviewed on PC
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