Strategic robot carnage intensifies as autobattler Mechabellum hits its 1.0 release

Two laser beams narrowly miss a mech — (Image credit: Paradox Arc)

Strategy autobattler Mechabellum has hit its full release after 16 months in early access, with developers Game River declaring the PvP or PvE robot battling to be, finally, complete—though development will continue. With large-scale battles taking place over multiple rounds, Mechabellum has you draft, place, and refine your force of attackers to defeat your opponent's choices and claim final victory.

It's defined by how it places a deeper emphasis on real time strategy-style tactics and unit placement over the more hero-character RPG combat of autobattlers like Teamfight Tactics or Dota Underlords. Sometimes in Mechabellum the best choice is a swarm of hundreds of robotic infantry, other times it's a handful of extremely powerful, thoroughly-upgraded single units.

Early last year John "Beagle" Teasdale wrote a real ode to Mechabellum here on PC Gamer. Here's an excerpt from John's hands-on impressions:

"Feeling more like Total Annihilation than its autochess peers, each of Mechabellum's matches scale from a starting skirmish of a handful of cheap units, up to a huge battle of powerful titans and deadly swarms. You build this bigger army piece by piece, one deployment phase at a time, and just like other games in the genre, your units all respawn for a fresh attempt at combat at the start of each new round."

It's also just very fun to watch, with armies smashing into each other and rains of missiles annihilating entire formations of robotic war machines. The last year of development has seen exceptional progress made in balancing not just the multiplayer, but the single player versus AI modes as well.

The 1.0 update brings new specialist types, the lumbering fire badger flame tank and the two giant rotary guns on crab legs that is the typhoon. It also includes a rank system with separate leagues that will be divided into seasons. As you improve over the course of a season you'll be promoted into higher leagues to aim for the top spots. Each season is planned to be three months long and have its own tree of rewards to earn.

You can find Mechabellum on Steam for $15, though it's currently 30% off at $10.50 until October 3.

Jon Bolding is a games writer and critic with an extensive background in strategy games. When he's not on his PC, he can be found playing every tabletop game under the sun.