Endless Legend 2's early access launch is fast approaching, but Amplitude still has some reveals hiding up its sleeve. Today we've got the news that the first game's Broken Lords faction will be showing up in the sequel, playable once more, but now known as the Last Lords.
These aristos fled their homeworld of Auriga and have now arrived in Saiadha to start fresh. But they've still got this big ol' curse to deal with. You see, the Last Lords were once a feudal society of knights and nobles, but they became afflicted with a curse that turned them into spectral vampires trapped inside suits of armour.
As in the first game, this curse presents itself as a fundamental mechanic. The Last Lords don't consume food or procreate like other factions. Instead they need dust, the series' primary currency, to survive and expand.
Since there are only a few members of this faction awake at the start of the game, you'll need to harvest dust to wake up more of them, or assimilate minor factions, using other species to work in your cities.
The way the Last Lords interact with minor factions is particularly intriguing, as they can set up estates in their villages that generate tax income or force their denizens to work in the Last Lords' cities. Minor factions can even be treated like food—their life force drained to resurrect more Last Lords.
In fights, the Last Lords are a tough bunch, and with every unit that falls near a Last Lord, the Last Lord is healed. But Amplitude warns that, despite their resilience, the faction is going to be weak in the early game: "it's only when the oceans start receding and more opportunities emerge to awaken those who still slumber will they be able to dominate Saiadha".
The Broken Lords was my go-to faction in the original Endless Legend, so this is gonna be an easy pick for me. But there's still one more faction due to be revealed before the early access launch. While Amplitude had initially settled on four launch factions, it's since expanded that to five.
I'm hoping for something weird and new. So far, only one of the early access factions is properly brand new: the techno-organic Aspects. The Necrophage and Last Lords are from the first Endless Legend, and the Kin of Sheredyn are based on an Endless Space 2 faction. Given Amplitude's best-in-class faction design, I'm keen to see what it's holding onto for the final reveal.
Endless Legend 2 is hitting early access on August 7.
