Bethesda sounds its Battlecry with new multiplayer brawler

32 player, online battles in a world where gunpowder has been outlawed and the best warriors go up against each other in national teams instead of fighting wars.

Oddly enough developed by BattleCry Studios, BattleCry (the game) is the latest original IP from Bethesda, who’s making some big waves here in 2014 with new properties. The title centers on multiplayer and allows up to 32 player games of all-out warfare.

As you can see above in the trailer though, the kick is that you can’t use guns. And that results in a series of mano-a-mano, close combat, steampunk-flavored battles between the likes of Russian Cossacks and Royal Marines. Different and original, the formula was thought up by none other than Viktor Antonov, who you may know from some little games called Half-Life 2 and Dishonored. If that’s not a great pedigree for BattleCry, I don’t know what would be.

As you play, you’ll unlock abilities and effects (all based on rank) in Warzones that are “designed to combine positioning, spacing and verticality to redefine your core combat experience.” BattleCry is promising swords that turn into shields, specially powered arrows, and “electro-static” blades.

This is one to watch in the multiplayer-only wing of the industry and looks to be another feather in the publisher’s cap. Much more on BattleCry coming up at E3.