User blog comment:MiniDaggers/RWBY Volume 4 Commentary Summary/@comment-25936766-20170623001241/@comment-4010415-20170623033259

I still think Miles and Kerry were going for "steampunk in name only", as you put it. "Eastern meets steampunk" sounds like they were only talking about aesethetics, due to the "eastern" part of the context. They were talking about the aesthetics of eastern countries in our world such as China and Japan, which we have actually seen in volume 4. These days, not everyone adheres to "It has to have actual steam-powered machines to be steampunk", as some people just want the general aesthetic, often mixed with something else.

That said, there is slight possibility that Mistral could have some steam-powered or steam-Dust-powered stuff, considering... the trains...

As Hazel walks away, we see an inactive train engine with gray pipes on it. A little while later, a train passes across the screen, and we see glowing light blue pipes on the engine. We already know that it's possible that steam Dust is light blue colored, since Winter's sword has a light blue Dust crystal in it, and she hid in a cloud of steam while fighting Qrow, plus the light blue Dust crystals in the geyser biome in the tournament.