Double FineĀ have had a rough time with their World War 1 era, customisable mech, tower-defence game. Trenched was supposed to launch in Europe at the same time as the rest of the world, but the date came by and went with nary an explanation as to why. Several weeks later it was discovered that a Portuguese board-game designer had complained against the games release in Europe as he owned the trademark for a board game named Trench. Double Fine then assured that the game would release in September under the alternative name Iron Brigade and yet the game is still unavailable in Europe.
Well yesterday Double Fine announced that they would be changing the name of the game to Iron Brigade in all territories and detailed some sweet-sounding DLC to boot, although they were conspicuously quiet on the European release.
In the new DLC, titled Rise of the Martian Bear the games antagonist Vlad has been defeated, but not before projecting his conciousness into Boris, his pet bear. Vlad/Boris the Man/Bear proceeds to flee to Mars in order to build his defences before you inevitably track him down and corner him. What follows is four new missions and a new boss fight.
The DLC has not yet been priced or dated.
Iron Brigade has had some very positive feedback from critics and looks like an interesting, solid premise for an XBLA title. Throw in Double Fine’s trademark humour and it’s a game I’m excited to play but can’t because of this sorry legal dispute. Hopefully Microsoft and Double Fine get this issue sorted as soon as possible so I can get in on the custom-mech-walker action.