Pune-based developer SuperGaming has dropped the gameplay trailer for its upcoming battle-royale title Indus, right in time for Republic Day. Pre-registrations are now live on Android, with signups on iOS and iPadOS to “follow soon.” The timing couldn’t be more appropriate since the company wears its “Made-in-India” tag with pride, incorporating a touch of Indian culture in the game via general architecture, nomenclature, and the lore surrounding the long-dormant titular planet, whose legends echo across the galaxy. The trailer sheds light on some gunplay, loot system, and key locations within the Virlok, the floating island map.
The footage in the Indus trailer is based on a pre-alpha build, so don’t be surprised to see some imperfections and an unpopulated arena. In it, you play as a Mythwalker, a hired gun working for the COVEN, an intergalactic syndicate, seeking to extract Cosmium — a rare, natural-born mineral that can alter space and time. Reminds me of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi epic Dune, a little bit. This lore aspect ties into the gameplay as well, where despite being a battle royale, one could even emerge victorious by simply claiming it when the time calls for it. The primary objective here is to collect Cosmium, which only spawns once during a play session. Skilled players can still go on a hunting spree to become the last man standing.
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One thing to note from the Indus trailer is that while the characters have eccentric art design, no special skills are put on display. A SuperGaming spokesperson suggested that Indus isn’t a class-based hero shooter like Overwatch or Valorant, promising some changes in the future. “–players will definitely get to see our own interesting take on augmenting players with some special abilities on the plains of Virlok, sometime after the launch,” they stated. That said, I can see characters like Sir-Taj being a favourite pick, thanks to his slender hitbox and interesting character design — the character literally has the Taj Mahal’s dome for a head. For those who aren’t well-versed in Hindi, “sir” translates to head — a clever wordplay for the name. Then there’s Big Gaj, which as the name suggests, is fashioned after an elephant, sporting an imposing presence on-field.
As seen in the trailer, Indus will let you play in both first and third-person perspectives at launch, with the latter switching to an FPS mode briefly when aiming down sights. Players can expect a wall closing in on them akin to most battle royale games, and skill-based matchmaking and a ranking system are part of later development plans. And of course, bots/ AI enemies will be added in case Indus fails to populate servers in time. During the launch period, Indus will only offer solo queues, with team-based options to come later.
Indus will be free-to-play from launch day and feature in-game monetisation methods similar to other titles in the category, where one could purchase cosmetics and other in-game items from the store. Progression mechanics such as a battle pass system hasn’t been confirmed yet.
Indus runs on Unity as the base engine with an in-house “sandbox shooter tech stack” called the Indus Engine. The download size is estimated at around 500MB, though this might balloon as more content gets added. As for the required specs, SuperGaming claims the game will run fine on mobile devices with 4GB of RAM or more, and as long as your Android version is 6.0 and above.
Pre-registration for Indus is now live on the Google Play Store. PC and console versions are expected in the future.