The controls are simple; positioning is the game
Drive around the map and consume soldiers, animals, villages, and smaller fortresses to collect resources and grow. The fortress carries mounted weapons, so the direction of your castle determines which weapons can face a target.
Most weapons fire automatically. Your active work is steering, dodging attacks, managing boost, choosing a sensible target, and timing active abilities while the fortress moves through a crowded battlefield.
A first-run route that keeps you growing
- Start with smaller troops, animals, and villages; treat them as the early food and resources that make the fortress stronger.
- Take the upgrades offered during the run and let them reinforce a coherent module and weapon plan instead of unrelated partial ideas.
- Turn before contact so the mounted weapons that matter for your setup point toward the intended enemy.
- Challenge stronger enemy castles after you have grown; defeating them lets the fortress expand and increases its health.
- Repeat the weaker-target, resource, upgrade, and larger-enemy cycle until the run ends, then use between-run unlocks to broaden the next build.
Threats that end beginner runs
- A larger enemy fortress can completely destroy you, so compare target size before committing to a collision or close pass.
- Slow turning becomes dangerous when arrows, enemy armies, and several larger castles fill the screen; begin each turn earlier than a light vehicle would.
- Keep steering and dodging while you manage boost and active abilities; automatic weapon fire does not remove those survival decisions.
- Use the health pickups added to Grassland 1 when recovery is needed during that stage.
- Leave time between boosts because hotfix 0.9.8 starts nitro regeneration half a second after boost use.
A ram captain can trade steering quality for higher damage, while other captain effects can heal on consumption or make the whole game run twice as fast. Match the effect to the amount of control and recovery you can handle.