SHOVEL BRIGADE

Dig in. Hold the line. Then go over the top.

Shovel Brigade is a multiplayer game about life at the front. Two camps sit out of sight of each other and spend the time between attacks doing what soldiers really do: digging trenches, stacking sandbags, stringing wire and keeping everyone supplied, rested and ready. Then the order comes from HQ, and someone has to cross the open ground.

BUILD YOUR POSITION

• Dig trenches, one shovel stroke at a time.

• Build from your supply crates: sandbag cover, barbed wire, camo nets, watchtowers, sleeping tents, searchlights and a team mortar.

• Lay anti-tank mines that only your own side can see.

WAIT FOR THE ORDER

• 60 minutes, two days, two nights. That's one match.

• Every five minutes HQ orders one camp to attack. Nobody knows which one.

• Two minutes to leave camp. Stay behind and you're a deserter. Wander off without orders and you're one too.

• Take their flag. Haul it down in the middle of the enemy's town during your attack, and the match is yours.

KEEP YOUR SOLDIERS GOING

• Sleep is the only rest. Stamina comes back only in a sleeping tent you built.

• Paid every minute. Spend it at your camp's command center on supply crates, ammo, medic and grenade boxes, mortar shells, jerry cans and vehicles.

• The truck brings what you order. Getting it to where it's needed is up to you.

• Nights are dark. There's no night vision, only your flashlight, headlights and the searchlights you put up yourself.

WEAPONS AND VEHICLES

• Small arms: AK-12, AKM, RPK-74, PKM, SVD with its scope, Mosin-Nagant, RPG-7 and grenades, each with its own recoil and spread. Binoculars come in every kit.

• The shovel: it digs your trench and it wins a fight. Two blows kill.

• Vehicles: van, supply truck, BRDM-2, BTR-80A and T-72. Anyone can take any vehicle, even the enemy's.

• TOS-1 "Buratino": thermobaric rockets that cost a fortune and leave the ground burning.

• Ramming: drive fast enough and you go straight through a brick wall. Wire and tents go under your wheels.

• Destruction: houses come apart under grenades and rockets. Shoot a jerry can and the fire spreads to tents and nets.

TALK LIKE YOU'RE THERE

• Proximity voice: you're heard only as far as your voice would carry.

• Walkie-talkie: reaches your whole team.

• Watch what you say on it. Each camp has a radio set that plays the enemy's walkie-talkie chatter out loud to anyone standing near it.

PLAY TOGETHER

• Host a match and invite friends through Steam, or pick one from the match list.

• Drop in and out at any time. The sides stay even, up to 8 against 8.

• Private matches with a password.

Free to play. The shop sells only looks for your soldier, never an advantage.