We’ve still got time before Clockwork Revolution, the steampunk FPS RPG from InXile Entertainment, is here. Following a quiet few years since its announcement in 2023, it resurfaced during the summer Xbox Games Showcase. It’s no Bioshock Infinite clone, but a full-on RPG in the style of Fallout 4 with a character creator, dialogue trees, and weapon customization.
Just like the original trailer, the new one ended without a concrete release date.
But comparing the two trailers shows signs of Clockwork Revolution coming a long way over the last few years. It’s starting to look like a real playable videogame that will hopefully channel the choice-driven depth of InXile’s past work on the Wasteland series and Torment: Tides of Numenera.
Here are all the details we know about Clockwork Revolution so far.
Clockwork Revolution release details
Clockwork Revolution doesn’t currently have a release date, but we know it’ll eventually come out on PC and Xbox Series X|S. We first heard about it during the 2023 Xbox Games Showcase with a trailer teasing its steampunk setting and overall tone. At this year’s Xbox Games Showcase, we got a trailer more than twice as long with actual gameplay footage, suggesting that it won’t be super far off. Microsoft’s refusal to even put a release window on it makes me think the earliest we could see it is in the latter half of 2026, though.
Clockwork Revolution trailers and gameplay footage
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The most recent trailer for Clockwork Revolution is stuffed with aspects of the game we’ve never seen before. Notable characters—one of whom is an irate talking doll—take the spotlight as the insufferable aristocracy who will presumably be our primary targets as our character tries to overthrow the city of Avalon’s monarchy. Character creation happens as one of them describes your character’s features to a robot cop, showing off the variety of backgrounds, builds, and mustaches you can choose from.
Like any good RPG, there are dialogue options and pivotal decisions, like choosing whether or not to spare the life of a character, that will shape how the story plays out. The trailer shows how your choices affect the combat too: Weapon crafting will let you swap out gun barrels, stocks, and other parts to specialize your approach to its first-person combat. And on top of that you’ll have a glove that can manipulate time, giving you the ability to freeze enemies in place, rewind, and suck the bullets back into your gun after firing them—not even Bioshock Infinite had that.
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The original reveal trailer for Clockwork Revolution is kind of like a mood piece for what would eventually be in the 2025 trailer. We get an early look at the cobbled streets of Avalon and some teasers on the time-manipulating powers we’ll be able to play with. Street signs and newspapers shift to reveal different outcomes for our choices as we try to end the tyrannical rule of Lady Ironwood.
Clockwork Revolution story and setting details
The title makes it pretty obvious what your goal will be in the story, but the most recent trailer starts to fill in how we’ll become revolutionaries (or maybe time bandits?). Your character is from the slums of Avalon and is part of the Rotten Row Hooligans. Somehow they got their hands on a glove that can manipulate time, a technology previously reserved for the city’s ruler, Lady Ironwood. Although the game takes place in 1895, there are several hints that we’ll be jumping forward and backward in time as the story progresses. In the trailer we can see entire districts in Avalon change to reflect your choices and I’m going to bet they’re not all for the better.
Snippets of scenes also hint at different factions in the game that you’ll run into as well as quests that deal with bigger issues, like the position of the robot people in Avalon’s society. InXile isn’t in the business of telling straightforward stories and the trailer heavily suggests there are multiple ways things can play out.
Clockwork Revolution gameplay features
Everything in the summer Xbox Games Showcase trailer for Clockwork Revolution makes it seem like it could be a steampunk alternative to games like Avowed and Fallout 4. Its first-person combat has a mix of shooting and time-bending abilities that can manipulate the environment and enemies around you. At one point, the main character tosses a stopwatch at an enemy’s feet, sending them flying into the air for a follow-up shot that pops them like a bloody firework.
In the brief peek at character customization, we can see that there will be RPG attributes, like agility and social, that will influence your character’s strengths and weaknesses in both combat and non-combat scenarios. While there were no obvious dialogue checks that involved them, I think we can safely assume they’ll come into play eventually. There are also traits with names like “Street Stalker” and “Scrap Savvy,” which sound similar to Fallout’s perks.
Weapon customization and crafting seems to be a big deal as well. Every weapon has a number of stats that dictate things like damage output, rate of fire, and accuracy. Using crafting materials to craft barrels and stocks, you can tailor your guns to your playstyle. One of the rifles we see shoots explosive bullets that sets enemies on fire. The trailer also shows a grenade that shocks enemies, which might mean you’ll have to utilize the weapon crafting to exploit elemental weaknesses on tougher foes.
Clockwork Revolution took more inspiration from a 2001 RPG than Bioshock Infinite
Project director Chad Moore made it explicit in a post on X around the game’s announcement: “I’ve always described [Clockwork Revolution] as the love child of [Arcanum] and [Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines].”
Moore used to work at now-defunct developer Troika Games and worked on cult hit RPG Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. Arcanum was an isometric RPG set in a fantasy world of elves and magic that also mixed in elements of steampunk. It came out not that long after Fallout 2 and offered an even bigger world to explore and make decisions in. Arcanum never took off like Fallout did (we named it an underrated RPG still worth playing years later), but Clockwork Revolution carries its spirit forward.
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