Mainframe Industries Announces Medieval Mythology-Inspired Social Sandbox MMO Pax Dei

Today, developer Mainframe Industries revealed its next project, a “player-driven, social sandbox MMO inspired by “the mythologies of the medieval era”. Titled Pax Dei, the game is built with a focus on community and around the genre’s origins while taking advantage of the technology available to create “stunning visuals”. It’s an open-world sandbox that is intended to cater to a wide variety of players and allow them to define what their gameplay should be like. Different playstyles are allowed and intended to complement each other.

That said, they’re not just dumping players into an empty sandbox. The tools are there. Players will be able to cooperate on things like village building, choosing a plot in the Heartlands, and building their homes. This is done using the built-in modular housing systems as well as player skill. Everything is produced through the players’ work and they can all contribute. Whether this is killing and skinning a creature or picking flowers – or just about anything else. There’s something for everyone to do to contribute.

It’s not all sunshine though. Once players leave their village, they’ll still need to engage in combat – sometimes with each other. Defeating enemy clans will earn a variety of rewards for a player’s own clan, so it’s probably worth it. Of course, there are various creatures to fight as well as areas to explore.

As mentioned, the game is designed to be pretty. Mainframe Industries used Unreal Engine 5 to get that done. You can see a bit of the game in the video below. Playtest signups are already open. Information on how to do this is available on the game’s official site.

EDITOR'S NOTE: After you sign up, you'll get an emailed link (check spam!) to set up your other account details, link your Steam account, actually opt-in for testing, and take a personal survey from the game's partner Solsten, a company specializing in AI and assiting companies with "finding and introducing a player to the game, offers user retention, facilitates sustainable monetization, develops entirely new games, and reaches untapped audiences." Understandably, taking this survey may turn off some potential alpha testers.

We've reached out to Pax Dei to see if this survey is actually REQUIRED to sign up for alpha testing as the page's "Percent Complete" seems to indicate it is required, but it doesn't expressly say that anywhere.

UPDATE 3/3/2023: We've heard back from the team and the survey portion of the alpha opt-in is a required opt-in step and must be completed.