Recent reviews by VolOpt

OK where to start, this game might have been fun and maybe it will be if I go back to it at some point in the future HOWEVER....

The whole reason I got into this game was the Archipelago of Blue Steel promotion (which was apparently a rerun of a previous Archipelago promo) and IMHO they bungled the hell out of this promotion. The first event apparently having 30 days to grind out all of the ships where this event gives you all of 12(?) days to grind out five ships, four of which are functionally identical but have a different texture. Where the unique ships are largely relegated to the cash shop but from what I gathered where something you could grind out in the first event. Which again was 30 days not 12.....

Compounded by the fact that you have to unlock them in a sequential order and each unlock cycle has in itself a set of sequential tasks.... So while you're playing if you don't manage to get anything done that checks off some part of the individual sub task you are currently working on ..... feels like a complete waste of time and amounts to little more than a hill of frustration. It just ended up making the bulk of my games feel worse (in the enjoyment category) than they probably where.

Dear Developers, when you add an event to your game with such a limited timeframe where it is very VERY possible to go many games without being able to make >>ANY<< progress towards said goal(s)..... that is a recipe for burnout. Great way to introduce new players to your game BTW.

General errors and issues,

Matches will sometimes abruptly end for no apparent reason as none of the victory parameters seem to have been met. There will still be multiple enemies spread across the map, neither team is anywhere near the point cap, there is plenty of time left on the clock and in the event of "capture the base" neither base is remotely in danger of being capped . Which is particularly frustrating when you are trying to do any number of mutually exclusive tasks and get nothing done because whelp the game decided it was just over~ for..... reasons~

I also can't for the life of me figure out why it is that they where able to get the torpedo refresh timer conveniently placed as a giant yellow countdown timer on the weapon selection icon for Destroyers but for Cruisers there is no indication on the torpedo icon. Instead you have to kinda squint as a super tiny bar above the tiny munitions bars, above the weapon icons themselves. That is grayed out into the background of the UI unless the torpedoes are actively selected.

For whatever reason the game has recently started showing a "Hall of Fame" prompt at the end of matches.... that needs to be interacted with before it will allow you to actually go to the end of mission screen to exit back to the main UI and start another mission. Which really doesn't seem like much and it probably shouldn't be but with how much I've not been enjoying my time in this game little UI inconveniences like that become far more evident and as someone who already dislikes needless player interacts... that's just that much more sand in the gears for a mission that I probably made zero event progress in so I'm already having a bad time.

I don't particularly mind slow games but it got to a point where the only way I could keep hammering myself against the event grind wall was to banish warships to my 2nd screen. Which is a vertical layout and I have to give the devs this much, for the most part World of Warships was able to rescale most of the UI to work on that screen with almost no issue. Unfortunately it was on my second screen because I was playing >>>TWO<<< other games while I waited for my ship(s) to slow crawl to a point where I could actually engage with the enemy.

Honestly I don't think most of these things would be so much an issue if again, it hasn't been for how poorly implemented this event was both with the way they structured the grind and the time it was to be run. The combination of which took a game that I think I could have enjoyed and managed to suck the fun clean out of it.

I look up and Steam tells me I've played for 87(ish hours) at the time of this review and all of that has been spent either prepping to a point where I could engage with the event or hammering my face against the wall for the event and I'm not even done..... and I'm really not sure if I have it in me to finish because it just stopped being fun. In large part because of how the event was structured.

Again not sure if I'm going to finish the event but at this point it feels almost like an obligation. I know either way I'll likely be taking a decent break from the game and maybe when/if I come back I can do so without a IMHO unrealistic event schedule and I realize that for seasoned players it probably isn't "that bad" but a good part of the reason you have cross over events like this is to bring new players in.

Either way as it stands I can't find myself recommending this game at present.

Addendum:
The penalty system is super irritating, especially when you're already frustrated with the game. I get that they don't want people to teamkill or troll but they really need to make some improvements to how it detects what is or isn't "intentional"

Oh hey you have a task that requires you to get torpedo hits, no one is around so you target/fire your torpedos at an enemy that is a fair distance away but well within striking range only to have a friendly unit change course, jetting in from off screen and expertly slam into your torpedos that have been traveling for the last 15-30 seconds.... GG enjoy your penalty.

And I don't even know how it determines who slammed in to who when there are collisions because there have been times I've been going in a strait line since the start of the mission only to have someone Tbone into me...... and I get the warning? OK game GG, I'm sorry you didn't see the slow as hecc battleship that has been moving slowly in a strait line for the last 3minutes to an objective.

There are moments when the game is legit fun but they have just been totally overshadowed.

Backed this game on Kickstarter and really was liking how it was shaping up but then the developer was apparently bought out by a larger publisher who allowed them to continue some work on the game to some extent. However that plug was pulled and a lot of the kickstarter milestones just never materialized.

As such It is a cute game that just feels very unfinished, because it really wasn't even tho it was eventually labeled as such.

If I could give this a neutral I would but steam doesn't give that option and I really can't give it a "yes" as it stands.

This game seems really simple at first glance, so much so that when it was initially gifted to me by a friend my initial reaction was that of silent dread. Now sitting at over 100hrs or just messing around I have to admit that it's pretty darn solid. To the point that when I had no issue paying that gift forward when the time came.

The one thing I will say is that this game does have some noticeable loading times particularly loading into the Plaza. Tho you don't need to load into the Plaza to get to most of the games. While loading into the Plaza is not unbearable I would highly recommend installing Tower Unite on an SSD. The difference is night and day when it comes to the Plaza, thankfully a reasonably sized SSD for ones more demanding games isn't all that expensive these days and you're probably going to have a few games that you'll want an SSD for anyhow.

Really looking forward to the upcoming Arcade, specifically the Claw machine.

Summary:
Got gifted by a friend, I had no problem gifting it forward.
Don't let a first glance fool you, it's a solid game with lots of little stuff.
If you don't have an SSD yet get one, will greatly improve the loading times.

If you have a hardon for RNG this is the game for you.

Things will be going fine, going fine, going fine and then the game BOSHIES you into a sun. Now your whole ship is on fire and "lol you died, lol lol you died". I really want to like this game and maybe if I switched it over to easy there would be enough scrap to not be constantly not have enough scrap to upgrade anything at a pace that means the next encounter won't faceroll you.

My stents with this game always go about the same, for some reason I decide to pick it up again and then about fifty billion restarts later I remember why I stopped playing it in the first place. When/if I ever beat the game I doubt it is going to feel so much like an accomplishement and more like I won at space Bingo.

Aesthetically the game is very pleasing and there are some interesting mechanics but overall it's just way too dependant on RNG.

While I would theoretically give this game 3/5 maybe even a begrudging 4/5, steam simply has a boolean "Do you recommend" and I would not.

I guess this game is ...... OKish

I dunno it just didn't feel right somehow. I'm not sure if it was the low gravity shtick or if it was the writing? I know the bouncy physics irritated me and the whole Oxygen thing felt kinda tacked on and other than a few gotcha moments really didn't add anything because there is an Oxygen geizer like ever 5ft. The writing felt like it was just trying too hard to the point that it stopped being cringy good and moved into just straight up cringy, it has some moments.

I started playing this because It has been sitting in my steam library for quite some time and I realized I'd never played it and so far I've really enjoyed Borderlands. By the end of the Tutorial I was pretty interested in seeing what happend but about half way through the game I'd lost all interest in actually playing the game and not because it was outright frustraiting tho some aspects where but mostly because it was dissapointing. Ultimately I just watched the cutscenes on youtube.... and even those where kinda eh.

I also wish this game would have stopped sitting there for 5-15 seconds checking for downloadable content every time I started the game..... all I wanted to do was just play the game.....

This game really makes me wish that Steam had a neutral review option because I don't think it was expressly "bad" and if you can pick it up on a deep discount it's an OK buy I guess but at the end of the day it's "Do I recommend this game?" and I can't say that I would recommend it to a friend.

YMMV

I have yet to finish this game 12hrs in but so far I have to say I'm really enjoying it.

The concept is nice, the characters are interesting and the references are pretty great.
That said depending on that types of genera you enjoy some segments can certainly overstay their welcome. For me it was the Shmup segment, after the first boss I was ready for it to be done, after the second boss I was really ready for it to be done and by the third boss I was rolling my eyes. Even then it isn't too punishing and in the places where it can get a little dicey they tend to give you fairly frequent save/check points.

And if I had played this before the Steam Awards I would have definitely voted this "Best Game within a Game". Cause Game of Cards is pretty addicting.

As it stands (Early Access) I can't bring myself to recomend this game.

Not because it isn't an interesting card game but because it is so unstable. The game seems to crash or get stuck far too often. Especially annoying when it comes to multiplayer, which is the primary reason I decided to get it.

When they get the bugs worked out and it is both more stable and well just more stable, I would be more than happy to recommend the game.

I've played this game for ~2 years on and off. It's a game that strikes a good balance between card and board game. Needless to say I enjoy it.

It is also one of the few F2P games that I have thrown money at because I was enjoying it. Their F2P structure is quite fair. Most of it revolves around cosmetics which are really only for the cool factor. There is a subscription option that you can take for as much as 30+ days or as little as a week. Which really only gets you a piece of bonus loot at the end of a quest. Most of the times that bonus loot is OK but not mindblowing, so it isn't as if they are trying to bait loot you into subscribing. There are also Treasure Hunt maps that have a guarenteed one time drop when you first complete them. That one time drop will also show up as RNG loot throughout the game (quest level permitting) as well as cycling through the merchant shops for in game gold. I've also personally never been huge on most of the Treasure Hunt loot, I have personally fount it to be mostly OK but I seldom if ever use it. The Treasure Hunts for me are mostly for the fun of the quest.

tl;dr, the F2p aspects of this game are in no way pay to win and don't feel forced.

The PvP is even fairly fun, assuming you dont run into the flavor of the month team or have built a deck to counter said build. Ususally seems to be three dward wizards. I've found myself physically kringing when I load into a PvP match against them but there is something especially satisfying when you emerge victorious or better yet make them rage quit because your deck is set up to be viable vs other builds but almost completely shut them down. PvP also has a pretty good reward chain. At least for the first 6 chests after which it really depends on if you are still having a good day or not.

I will start out by saying I really don't enjoy point and clicks (mechanically speaking) and this game does nothing to change that. Most of the time I'm OK but Inevitably I will get stuck at some point rubbing random inventory items together and on random things in the hopes of forcing some progress. Eventually breaking down to read a guide because I can't figure out what one combination of 50 things will MAKE GAME GO!

That said I have really been enjoying this game :D
Still have about half(?) of act 2 and all of act 3 to go at the time of writing.

The characters are interesting the world is beautiful (for a junk heap) the voice acting is great. I even enjoy the little Ah-Ha moments when I actually manage to tackle a challenging chain of events/puzzle out without needing to resort to a guide. Bottom line, if you don't enjoy the mechanics of point and clicks then this game isn't going to do anything to change that but it is a really interesting experience none the less. If you do like point and clicks then this is your bread and butter.

Platypus-bataka!

Edit: Just finished the game and without wanting to spoil anything for anyone who wants to be surprised I found the ending to be less than expected. Actually the last game was sorta hit and miss Tho the ending really felt like the cliffhanger for a 4th game that is never going to come since the Devs have apparently stated that this is the ending they always intended. Still an interesting ride, I just wish it has gone out with more of a bang instead of a whimper.

I picked this game up a some time ago during a sale and it was really interesting for about three weeks then it just got boring. My issues with the game where twofold starting with the afformetnioned boring that seemed to creep into the game somewhere in my final week before I would have had to throw down for a full sub, mind you for those first three weeks I was completely glued to this game. Coupled with the depressing reality that nothing I did in game really mattered as far as character progression. Since everything is queued and gains points regardless of if you are even logged in, which was sorta cool I guess but the downside was when you where logged in what you did in game didn't matter because it continued to look strictly at the queue.

Admittedly that might have changed since I last played but if it hasn't that means if you had say (insert ship skill) queued and went hunting pirates or mining asteroids you got no increase in your weapons or mining skills because they weren't queued. Nor did you appear to get any extra points twards something that you were currently undertaking and had queued. So say you are doing a lot of fighting and had some weapons system or targeting skill queued you didn't get any bonus as far as I saw for actually doing something related to what you had queued. Which injected a certain sense of futility in doing much of anything. I mean there was always grinding for loot to grind for better weapons/ships which you can't used until you queue to train up the requisite skills and log out to let the game train while you are not playing the game.

There was also the ever present dread of being pvp fodder in much of anything you do. If that is your thing then you should probably check this out but I don't really get anything out of planning how I'm going to ruin someones day or constantly looking over my shoulder to see who is coming to brighten their day by ruining mine. Tho I will admit that there have been some interesting and entertaining stories that have come out of EVE.

That said this game does look to have a bunch of potential that I didn't get to fully explore but ultimately I couldn't really justify the subscription based on my experience.