Skip to main content

PC gaming peripheral maker Roccat has a new game studio developing ‘Sick City’

roccat game studio launched sick city
Image used with permission by copyright holder
Roccat Studios is widely known as one of the major peripheral makers in the PC gaming market, with its portfolio of high-quality products spanning from gaming mice to mechanical keyboards to headphones and more. But like several of its competitors, Roccat wants to branch out into other PC gaming-related areas, and is doing so starting with Roccat Games Studio and its very first PC game called Sick City. Nope, we didn’t see that one coming.

Sick City is our interpretation of a modern real-time tactical combat game,” the company told Digital Trends. “It combines the strengths of tactical classics like Commandos‘ exciting espionage maneuvers and the direct action of Company of Heroes without time-consuming foundation construction, topped with a dose of Warcraft 3’s unique heroes and powerful abilities.”

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Serving as part of Roccat’s 10-year anniversary celebration, Sick City is described as a “post-apocalyptic battle” on the streets of Sick City. Players are thrown into a 4×4 squad-based fight to control the city and a mysterious crystalline energy source called Aimo. Unfortunately, Roccat doesn’t reveal any specifics about the game other than it will have two factions (“Kidz” shown below, “Legion” shown above), various game modes, characters, and maps.

Recommended Videos

“Recently with products like the Sova and the Modulok, Roccat has had very good experiences with product feedback and community involvement,” the company added. “Although we’ve always made a large effort to listen to our customers, we have really begun to bring our audience closer to our development process than ever before. This is what really inspired us as it’s something we felt was lacking in games today.”

Image used with permission by copyright holder

That said, PC gamers can directly impact the development of Sick City. Starting in a closed alpha this June, Roccat will call on “early development veterans” to provide feedback and help smash game-stopping bugs. After that, Sick City will move into Early Access mode so that all PC gamers can provide their input and help shape the game.

As for additional information about the new Roccat Games Studio arm, Roccat wouldn’t cough up any details other than that the new studio will operate independently. Roccat also wouldn’t say when the new studio came online and started developing Sick City. However, according to Roccat, development has been going on for quite a while now.

The exact date of when the closed alpha begins is unknown, but PC gamers can sign up now by heading over to the Sick City website and filling out the “Join Us Now” form. The Early Access version will also be distributed through the website “hopefully” during the Gamescom convention starting August 22. After that, the game will eventually land on Steam.

Kevin Parrish
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Kevin started taking PCs apart in the 90s when Quake was on the way and his PC lacked the required components. Since then…
Acer has 3 new OLED gaming monitors, including one with a 480Hz refresh rate
The Acer Predator X34 X5 monitor over a light blue background.

Acer just opened up its metaphorical bag of goodies at Computex 2024, and a whole lot of monitors fell right out. There's a lot to sink your teeth into, but we've got our eyes on the OLED models -- one of them more than the others.

The Predator X27 F3 combines a WQHD OLED display with a 480Hz refresh rate, coming close to the best of both worlds for gamers. You won't have to choose between crisp visuals and high refresh rates here. However, its price is high enough to make your eyes water just as much as the lightning-fast gameplay might.

Read more
This new GPU feature is ‘a whole new paradigm’ for PC gaming
RX 7900 XTX slotted into a test bench.

Microsoft has released its Agility SDK 1.613.0, which features some critical components that will be shown to developers at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco next week. The most interesting component is Work Graphs, which Microsoft describes as "a whole new paradigm" for graphics cards.

Work Graphs enable GPU-driven work. Normally when you're playing a PC game, there's a relationship between your GPU and CPU. Your CPU gets work ready and sends it to your GPU, and then your GPU executes that work. Work Graphs is an approach that allows your GPU to schedule and execute its own tasks, which has some massive implications for performance.

Read more
Frostpunk 2 will come to PC Game Pass when it launches this year
A city in Frostpunk 2.

11bit Studios confirmed that Frostpunk 2 will be released on PC sometime during the first half of 2024 and will be on Game Pass from day one alongside the first full gameplay reveal for the highly anticipated survival city-builder.

The new gameplay trailer for Frostpunk 2 is just over two minutes long and gives the public a first look at the game's city-managing mechanics. Frostpunk 2's gameplay significantly departs from its predecessor in some ways, as it's more focused on the macro management of a city that's survived an apocalypse rather than the micromanaging of resources for basic survival. After getting an extended hands-off look at Frostpunk 2 in action last year, I said it "scales its challenges and gameplay systems up while also holding on to the ethical dilemmas and emphasis on consequences that made the original so great (and depressing.)."

Read more