Pioneers is a concept for an aerial multiplayer team-based sandbox game, in the same vein as physics-based simulations such as Garry's Mod but with a stronger competitive focus. The objective of the game would be to blend physics-based freeform construction with flight sim elements in an online arena. The basic setup is two teams fighting over a square map one to three miles to each side, with each team's base in opposite corners and a variety of neutral points around the map. The game would use a day/night cycle. During the night, darkness would make it impossible to fly, so the players would use the time to construct aircraft from a large number of modular parts- fuselage components, engines, wings, weapons, and so on. These would range from small one-man fighters to multiple-crew heavy bombers, all player-designed. This would be a communal effort, with players collaborating on more advanced designs, and able to save finalized designs, allowing quick respawning without needing to rebuild the entire plane. During the day, the players would then take off and use these aircraft to fight.

Killing other players would not be the primary objective- the primary goal would be to destroy the other team's base (most likely a central structure such as a radar tower), accomplished with bombing. Capturing neutral bases around the map, by occupying the area for a set amount of time with no enemies nearby, would provide various assets to the team (such as observation balloons, ground defenses, or forward airbases). Each player would also have a score, increased by shooting down enemy planes and completing objectives, and decreased by suicide. Score would be used in a cosmetic fashion, allowing comparison between players, with higher-score players being able to use ace paintjobs and having reduced respawn times. The game would use a simple physics engine to calculate flight performance of the aircraft, without having the extreme complexity of a realistic flight simulation.

Each player would be able to design and store two aircraft for the day phase. These could be engineered from scratch, or copied from a teammate. The limit of two aircraft encourages players to choose useful planes that can perform multiple roles, forcing them to react to the aircraft designs of the enemy team. Parts available for construction would include fuselage components (roughly determining the size of the aircraft), wings (determining lift and maneuverability and affecting drag), engines (which could be built into the fuselage or mounted on the wings), and tails (affecting maneuverability, stability, and drag). Weapons then could be integrated into the fuselage or wings, with additional underwing hardpoints available for munitions like additional fuel, bombs, and rockets. Variations in fuel, armor, ammunition, turrets, and other such considerations, plus cosmetic modifications like paintjobs and decals, would allow for a high degree of customization in the aircraft. Heavy weapon-laden aircraft would require larger wing surfaces and more engines to fly, making them unmaneuverable and easy targets, so if statted appropriately the designed aircraft would all be balanced.

The gameplay itself would be a light flight sim, encouraging accessibility and not requiring players to be experienced with other games in the genre, but with more physical realism than arcade-type games like HAWX. Stalling, minimum airspeed, varying climb/dive efficiencies, and realistic control surfaces would all be present. Airspeed would be very low and weapon distances short, to make it easier to keep track of aircraft, and allowing the maps to be fairly small. The emphasis is not on realism, but on a reasonable appearance of realism, with the flight model given enough physical fidelity to seem like a depiction of real aircraft rather than vectors. Weapons would be mostly limited to direct-fire machineguns and cannons, with AI-controlled turrets available for larger aircraft. The use of modular components would lend itself to a damage model that would permit the aerodynamics of another plane to be damaged through weapons fire, allowing damage to a plane to naturally and believably destroy it (for example, by removing a wing) without obliterating every single component. With this foundation of player design and relatively simple gameplay, additional game modes and map ideas could be added to flesh it out and create sufficient content for a full game.