We found out about Vile Monarch’s Crush Your Enemies the other day, and the game was playable on the PAX South 2016 show floor. The game was publicly on PC but an iPad build was available, giving me the opportunity to see how this pixelated RTS would play. And it can prove to be quite brutal: the first few missions will ease you into the game and teach you how the systems work. You’ll learn how to multiply your units, switch between more powerful types, conquer territory, and more. Right now, the only issue is that you can choose between different amounts of units to send at once, and it could be a bit more intuitive to select between the three as you choose their path.

Otherwise, this should shape up to be a real brutally fun game. Emphasis on brutal: even by level 3 or 4, you won’t be trouncing through them the way you do the first two, such as a survival level where it is winnable, but you’re outnumbered from day one. The experience could certainly use some smoothing out for playability’s sake, but the core product is strong here. And there’s gonna be cross-platform online battles between desktop and mobile to boot. Keep an eye out for this.