Foxhole is one of my favourite games to read about, even if I don’t play it. It’s a massively multiplayer World War 2 game, viewed from above, where battlefield logistics matters as much as aiming and flanking. Its developers have just announced a major new update coming next summer, Foxhole: Airborne, which adds planes to the game for the first time.
Planes, in a topdown MMO? It makes a little more sense if you watch the trailer.
Dropping bombs on the world below? I get it. Delivering paratroopers behind enemy lines? I love it. I’m less clear on how air-to-air combat works. There’s a shot in the trailer of two nimble fighter planes diving and shooting down some bombers operating at a lower height, but I’m struggling to work out how that actually functions as a player action.
Otherwise air combat plugs into Foxhole’s vast battlefield is obvious ways. It expands the logistical side of the game, as players will need to work to support aircraft production and supply, and “every pilot is a player”, as the trailer says, with players also able to play a gunner role onboard.
Foxhole Airborne follows on from Foxhole: Naval Warfare, which added ship-to-ship combat and beach landings in October last year. It means that the game will now feature land, sea and air combat all on the same persistent battlefield.
Lest foot soldiers feel they’re being neglected, an infantry update will arrive later this month on November 18th. It aims to revamp combat, with new anti-tank weaponry, close quarters combat, medic changes, and a stamina and suppression overhaul, among others. It sounds like a robust set of changes. You’ll find screenshots of that, and of more planes, in a developer news post over on Steam.