Ahead of its Early Access exit this October, developer Offworld Industries has released a new Developer Diary for Starship Troopers: Extermination, as well as a new trailer exclusive to Gamescom. The trailer showcases the terrifying Tanker Bug in action, while the Developer Diary gives us an inside look at General Rico (played once again by Casper Van Dien) and his Special Operations Group (S.O.G.).
In the Dev Diary, key members of the Starship Troopers: Extermination development team share more information about the new features coming with the game’s launch onto consoles and PC on October 11th. The Tanker bug is a new enemy variant that is as deadly as it is massive, appearing just as it did in the classic 1997 Paul Verhoeven film, requiring careful strategy and teamwork to take it down. As seen in the film, this massive bug breathes fire and will appear randomly during matches as a formidable challenge to players.
The Dev Dairy also revealed Boreas, a new ice planet that has become infected by a bug meteor. Set to debut alongside the 1.0 launch, this environment presents a new battleground where players will face mutated bugs that have adapted to the frosty environment, creating brand-new enemy variants such as the Frost Drone and Frost Warrior.
Project Lead Peter Maurice also revealed new details regarding the game’s single-player mode, which features Casper Van Dien as Johnny Rico. Code-named Special Operations Group (S.O.G.), this new mode sees the player undertake a multitude of missions dispatched by Rico himself, as he forms the Spec Ops division within the UCF to bring together the best of the best for top-secret assignments. Varying in scope and objectives, these missions are designed to prepare soldiers for the more challenging 16-person multiplayer missions; more missions will be added in subsequent post-launch content updates.
Starship Troopers: Extermination is currently in Early Access on Steam, with the full launch expanding to PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series.