Insect RTS Empires Of The Undergrowth leaves early access in June, adding savannahs, termites and stink ants

rockpapershotgun.com:

Even as Nic spent this morning writing lovingly about frogs, I was watching trailers of frogs disintegrating beneath an unstoppable ant tsunami. The game in question is Empires Of The Undergrowth, an RTS from developers Slug Disco and Manor Lords publisher Hooded Horse. The 1.0 version launches on June 7th, after almost eight years in early access during which Empires Of The Undergrowth has accumulated positive user reviews with truly antlike meticulousness. Here's the release date trailer, which you should not watch if you dislike seeing various larger insects and small animals getting eaten alive by ants.

Speaking of frogs, this game puts me in mind of Bullfrog's creations and especially Dungeon Keeper, if only because ant nests, much like dungeons, tend to be constructed underground (a more obvious precedent is Maxis's SimAnt). You'll start by digging out hexagons of earth to create a network of store rooms and nurseries surrounding your Queen, the Dungeon Heart, who must naturally be protected at all costs.

From there, you'll scour the world above for various food sources, using pheromones to group and direct your ickle all-devouring ant squads, and dealing with predators and competitor species who come and go at the behest of a day-night cycle. You can birth a bunch of evolving ant species, from hit-and-run trap-jaw ants through tanky leafcutters that draw aggro and wood ants who can be upgraded to shoot formic acid.

Chunkier threats such as scorpions, praying mantids and hermit crabs aside, you'll have to worry about rival ant colonies and pesky humans. As Fraser Brown - formerly of this parish, nowadays a resident of feisty RPS spin-off production PCGamer - wrote in our 2017 early access review, the game's campaign takes the form of a lab experiment, with gloved hands periodically reaching down to squish your inf-ant-ry and deposit terrible genetically engineered species such as scorpion-crabs. If the campaign doesn't end with at least one full-sized human