World of Tanks devs’ Steel Hunters started off as World of Mechs, but the team wanted something more

Wargaming is known for World of Tanks and World of Warships, so much so that the announcement of the team’s upcoming free-to-play mech game Steel Hunters almost had me confused. After a visit to Guildford to play the early access launch version of the game for a preview, I got a chance to sit down with the creators of the game. My biggest question: why not World of Mechs?

At Wargaming, the team knew that creating a World of Mechs game was essentially an instant win. Following the same formula as Tanks and Warships with a realistic sci-fi game would’ve been an easy bet for the fanbase. (I would have been there in an instant.) But creating Steel Hunters was more than just a chance to do something knew, it was to create a unique universe.

For the game’s universe, Wargaming hired Ed Gentry, an ex-Wizards of the Coast writer, as lead narrative designer. Alongside creative director Surgey Titarenko, who worked on Far Cry, Assassin’s Creed and Splinter Cell, the studio made a bid to create a unique universe with its own lore, stories and characters.

“Of course, we are rooted in the foundations and the legacy of the ‘World of [games], right?” Titarenko said. “And we have a lot of respect to those games… some of our team members started and worked on those titles. But when we came to the desire to make a new game, we wanted to first, of course, capitalise on what we know.”

What started as World of Mechs turned into Steel Hunters. Continuing the studio’s love of “tactical shooter game experience[s]”, the team worked to create a game that has “depth for hundreds, if not thousands of battles”.

“Although we started prototyping and making conceptions of this game as a [standard] mecha game, gradually with prototypes, with player research, we walked away from this,” they continued. “One of the core reasons was we wanted to build a game where you really care and where you have emotional connection to what you see on screen is what you play. And in the space of a mecha game, you have a very strong presence of a human being within this mechanical shell. And we wanted to to change.”

Steel Hunter’s gameplay is very different to a traditional mech fighter. It’s faster, more agile, a mix of Evangelion and Transformers: Beast Wars. Every character is a unique hero and there’s stories to tell with the mechs themselves instead of just a person inside them.

While this is the game we’re getting, it was a battle. The team explained that there were some “very hot discussions” within the team for and against World of Mechs.

“Some people were really fighting for the mecha because they are very big fans of the genre and having also a human being in the game available [allowed] for a second layer of progression,” we were told. “But the school of thought when there’s one character and what you see is what you play really took over the second school.”

Steel Hunters launches on PC in early access on April 2^nd, 2025.