All Will Fall Preview

City-Builders are a unique breed of fun. The genre is very big and expansive, with many subgenres that transform traditional city-building into something else entirely. Some are very laid back and let you enjoy an almost godlike status where you essentially are playing a simulation game. Others delve very deep into the survival aspects of things and turn a seemingly relaxed genre into a grindfest.

Regardless of what may attract one to it, the City-building genre contains many games that are released every year. However, only some have the spark and charm that makes City-builders that stand out. So, have you ever thought of what it’d be like surviving on ruins in the ocean? Well, there’s just the game in development for that very specific scenario.

All Will Fall is a very physics-heavy post-apocalyptic city-building game where you have to scavenge for resources, deal with events, and keep up your influence to expand. The game has a lot of verticality and, in general, deals more with vertical expansion.

The demo provided only had one scenario available; however, there are two more that are locked, and the names definitely seem interesting. The scenario available had a small ship of survivors shipwrecked into the ruins of a city. There are some buildings and foundations left, but most are inaccessible as well; you can’t just get into the water to get to them.

Instead, you have to build to those points. As I first began, All Will Fall pretty much guided me through the first few hoops, explaining things along the way. So I collected some wood, junk, and water from the island where I found my people. To get to some of these piles of resources, I had to build foundations, stairs, and platforms of wood.

Now, I couldn’t just free-build my way into the largest resource pile. This is because All Will Fall  has a pretty robust- if not a little confusing physics system where each structure has a certain degree of stability. Fall too far below said stability threshold, and the entire thing breaks. However, the game does let you undo to a certain degree, letting you mend your mistakes.

It is unclear if that’ll remain a feature or is merely a stopgap for the preview. Regardless, I forged on with my collection of resources, and at this point, I noticed all the other resources in the game, namely, metal, electricity, fuel, and goods. That gave me an idea of what was to come, but in the meantime, I focused on building some small houses for the people.

All Will Fall naturally unlocked structures for me to build as I completed quests, so there was nothing that could overwhelm me with information, which was very neat. By the time I finished building the last of my houses, it was late at night, and all the people I had were asleep. 

At this stage, I should mention that you have three types of survivors/citizens under you. They are the sailors, workers, and engineers. They make up the three factions in the game as well, but more on that later.

So far, I have had no means of production, so I have had to survive by scavenging. Since that is very limited, I have had to build into other structures nearby, including a building and some concrete ruins.

This was a race against time, as my people were consuming the food and water we collected, so I always needed to get more. Thankfully, low tide came in and gave me the ability to go further down the structures I was in to collect more resources. 

The game marked when low and high tides came and went, so it was easy to prepare for them. While low tide revealed structures, I had to be careful as when high tide came in, the survivors on the lower levels may die if they can’t get back up in time.

All Will Fall has a very neat verticality to it. You constantly build stairs and ladders to get to lower and higher levels, and with the lack of building space, you need to plan them out to ensure you don’t run out of space.

There were points where I had overdone it in building platforms, and I had no more wood to access the scavenging areas. However, All Will Fall  comes with a nifty demolish function that gives you all of your resources back from that building—at least, that was the case for paths and platforms. This allowed me to get to the other wood sources and get a surplus again.

The other important resource in the early game was junk, which is fundamental in constructing many important structures. Eventually, I got to unlock the research lab. This structure basically unlocked the tech tree for All Will Fall and let me research much-needed tech and new structures.

This also gave me my first event, the first of many, where I had to make a decision based on a random event. These decisions gave me certain resources or let me attract even more people to my growing haven in the endless seas.

Some of these events are hilarious, and others are surprisingly dark. Tied to these events are the three factions, their loyalty, and my own influence. Influence was the measure that attracted new survivors, while loyalty helped with each faction’s happiness.

Higher happiness unlocked buffs for those survivors, so that was incredibly incentivized. Going back to the tech tree, however, I assigned two engineers to the research building, letting me see the tech tree. The tech tree has quite a few categories, including Production, Water, Food, Gathering, Housing, Energy, and social. I quickly started researching the Wood Catcher so that I always have some passive increase in wood.

Starting the research prompted my engineers to gather the required resources, in this case, 9 junk and 10 wood. While this was happening, high tide had finally set in, so I had to abandon the remaining resources left in the lower areas. They would remain there, so I focused on the areas that were still over water.

I was eventually prompted to deconstruct the crashed boat and use the resources to build a new one. Sometimes, random resources would float nearby, and if they were right next to land, I could collect them. Most were in the middle of the water, so I really had to get that boat built. To do that, I needed a dock.

The dock is another workplace building where Sailors can work and collect resources from ships. When it was done, it was yet another way for me to collect resources. By this time, I had amassed over 15 residents in my tiny survivor island, and food was running low. Luckily, the low tide came again, and this time, it came to an even larger degree, giving me access to much-needed wood to quickly research the first food and water structures.

I also unlocked decorations, which generally made people happy, unlocking the first tier of perks. These perks are specific to the factions and just basically make them more efficient at their specialization. 

There came a point where sea level dropped, meaning that some areas were now permanently unlocked. This was basically the cycle for a few days. There were moments when I took too many people in and thus was starved of food and water, but thankfully, some events came around to save me.

I continued this, facing numerous events where people demanded more and more until I had very little leeway over them. Influence became a very valuable commodity, and sometimes, it felt like I expanded way too fast. There’s a lot more to the game than meets the eye, with many advanced resources and the aforementioned mysterious structure, which I haven’t even been able to get to yet.

Again, All Will Fall gets surprisingly dark, and all the decisions you make are really reminiscent of games like Frostpunk 2. All the moral dilemmas aside, the game also gets very tough as you have to deal with a struggle for resource collection. The physics-based and 3D aspects with all the verticality also reminded me of Timberborn, which is a good thing.

The faction mechanics are awesome, and so far, they are very well made. All Will Fall leaves little room for relaxation. There are naturally bugs here and there, but most of it is understandable, given the very early build that I got access to. The game also lacks some touches to its music, but that, too, is understandable.

Now, if you think you’re up for it, you have a chance to check it out, as there is an open playtest available right now on Steam. It’ll last until the 31st of January, so go right ahead and take a look yourself.

Ultimately, All Will Fall  feels really good, and while there’s a long way to go, it certainly has the potential to become a great city-builder. The developers have expressed their excitement in revealing the game and also shining some light on the game development scene of Lithuania, where they are based. For lovers of extreme management and physics-based city-builders, this one is definitely something to keep under your radar.