Steel Hunters broke into Early Access recently, and Wargmaing’s new IP has its cannons aimed squarely at the competition. Bringing a pedigree of mechanized warfare to an extraction shooter arena that’s been largely dominated by hero characters and gun-totting personalities, Steel Hunters is an enticing idea. Get in the big stompy robot, blow stuff up, and do it at scale.
The Age of the Tank is Dead
Logging into Wargaming’s newest adventure for the first time, it’s obvious that this isn’t a brawler based on land, air, and sea domination. Instead, it’s about getting in hulking big robots and blowing the cogs out of your opponents. Revealed back in March 2025, it allows pilots to choose from a range of weapon platforms, pick from available upgrades, and stomp out into a near future battlefield to secure their extraction and victory. It’s clear that Wargaming wants to make this experience as simple to get into as possible. Drawing more than a little inspiration from the likes of Apex Legends, the opening screens present an array of carefully crafted machines. Bipedal tanks with massive munitions to sleek chrome-plated tigers are aligned along the screen. They’re all distinct and designed to be instantly recognizable as the scout, the tank, the generalist, and so on. They’re all rendered in a grounded aesthetic, scuffed and polished in the power of Unreal Engine 5 leaning it away from Gundam Breaker and more towards Mechwarrior.
A functional aesthetic continues things with a set of design and control systems that lean heavily on other market leading arena shooters. There’s a familiarity to the opening tutorials, menus, and game controls that make it easy to navigate, and that’s no bad thing. Early Access offers up training and PvP (last bot standing). While those modes aren’t exactly inventive, the maps are expansive. Green hills and abandoned industrial sites stretch out across a small selection of environments. Greenfield land and abandoned desert spaceports welcome destruction. In all cases, there’s a mix of verticality, detritus, and camouflage that provides an opportunity to move around and pick different avenues of attack. Given another context, these aren’t that far from a World of Tanks arena, but we are still piloting big metal war machines.
A selection of 7 different mechs come to the fight right now, with one more on the way. As you’d expect these all come with their own archetypal approach and loadout that marks them as distinct. Each mech comes with a base weapon, a melee attack, and a special attack or utility, all wrapped up in a metal shell and an energy shield. Carting it around the battlefield isn’t difficult thanks to the direct WASD controls and options to dash up and over obstacles.
Not Your Everyday Arena Shooter
Despite the consistent control structure, Wargaming makes a good stab at building unique mechs, from the Razorside’s balance of run and gun right to the long-range sniper options and an intimidating multi legged war machine that slowly lumbers towards your own execution. Of course, each comes with its own progression line, modifications, and unlocks to further distinguish their play style. Progressions is somewhat limited and modifications really aren’t all that flexible yet, but there’s room for these to expand.
Thankfully, the mechs all do still feel distinct, aside from a little overlap in utility. The most interesting options to strap on are the animal-inspired bots. Jump inside the Trenchwalker, a massive, armored soldier, and you’ll swagger ominously across the savannah. The thing is, it feels far more Mechanical than most anime interpretations. Despite the option to turn into a hulking colossus and decimate all that stand before you, the weight of realism still burdens some of these selections. Even when the game allows for a little sci-fantasy, adding missile barrages, shields, and unique utilities to cut down enemy mechs, it’s just no fun trudging across the map in some of these picks. Compare the Trenchwalker to something like the Ursus, and a nasty-looking feline missile platform, and you’ll uncover Steel Hunter’s biggest problem right now.
Is It Fun?
The big draw for anybody looking to try out Steel Hunters will be the mechs. Meta aside, the divide between uninspired lumbering mech warriors that play like reskinned tanks, and the more outlandish creations is clear. I’m sure that the development of all the designs is methodical and considered. I’m certain every bot plays to certain strengths at a high level, but they’re not all fun. Titannfall understood this assignment and balanced the fluid movement of stupid stompy robots with the weight and gravitas that their arrival on the battlefield deserved. Whether Wargaming leans into that approach or gives the more mundane options some silly energy weapons, that would go a long way to making Steel Hunters feel like they didn’t have to grind out and unlock other mechs immediately. There’s an engagement, or at least fun, curve when Steel Hunters introduces itself to new players that could really use some work.
That said, if you persevere, then you’ll get to start enjoying the game. Acquire a few mechs with in game currency, try out the other options, and start unlocking the technical tree to ensure that you’ve got at least a little power, and suddenly the game changes. Players dropping into an arena will find themselves paired with another player or friend, and splashing down against a range or other duos. Pick a mech that’s a little more than sword and board, and you’ll be able to work around the map picking of PvE drones with ease, securing supply zones, and loading up on buffs in preparation to take on enemy units.
Potential For The Future
None of this gameplay loop feels particularly new, which is what makes some of the mechs feel fantastic and others feel underwhelming. Bump into an enemy pairing and that’s evident too. Sure good co-ordination, use of terrain, and utilities can win out, but not always. That is, again, evident once extraction is announced. The only completely unavoidable reason to actively engage players is to fight your way to the extraction zone and win out, yet the game has its best moments when scurrying around the outer edges of the terrain trying to pick off the competition ahead of time. It all adds to the impression that Wargaming’s new IP gets it, but isn’t quite there yet.
Steel Hunters has the potential to be an absolute blast and Wargaming do a lot right. This oversized adventure is incredibly easy to just pick up and play, there’s definite diversity, and the maps are well put together. Early Access does expose the way the game quite obviously needs more prominent ways to modify the combat capabilities of specific mechs. That might be sorted with the new mechs coming to the game and subsequent updates that will hopefully make this as fun as it can be.
Steel Hunters is in very Early Access now and you can pick it up and play for free over on Steam and via the official website now.
