Recensioni recenti di GrimFandango

My review is not an unconditional yes, it's a YES, BUT.

Would I recommend the game (preferably with a 20-30% discount)? Yes. But! Before buying it, you should be aware that:

1. The game is effectively an early access title (even if it's officially not), because it's evolving and expanding a lot as the solo developer work on it (naval mode, edge of the world, etc.).
2. Some of the mechanics are not polished, and there is some clear lack of balancing (e.g. splinters generation and collecting/managing units).
3. The controls are not very intuitive (how to build and move between nodes and city/vehicle mode), nor are some of the mechanics (resources reach per node). They seem designed with a controller in mind.
4. The game is purely sandbox mode, with no levels nor missions as such, just varying starting points in the world and kinda of an overall open objective for each faction.
5. The RTS mechanics are basic, so you'll win most fights just by brute force superiority.

However, it is enjoyable? Yes. So prioritise the game if you value:

1. Eye candy graphics and captivating atmosphere.
2. Experimenting with creative base building, without harsh resource constraints and by figuring out a lot on your own.
3. Re-playability as new, sometimes radical, features are added by the developer.

Speaking of which: the dev is an absolute chad who does this because he likes it and he can. So don't expect a clear roadmap nor a strong marketing department - the game evolves in part based on players' feedback, and as long as the guy enjoys working on it and it's economically feasible to do so (his words), which also explains the relatively pricey cosmetic DLCs. But he cares about the title and it's his work of passion, so this should be taken into account when deciding whether to buy it.

Summing up:
- Do you enjoy a sandbox, atmospheric, creative building and exploration game without hand-holding? Buy
- Do you like complex base building titles with advanced logistics or proper 4X mechanics, and hate early access? Buy not

Unless you have a lot of time and patience to spend on it, avoid. Cultist Simulator runs are extremely long and can be killed by RNG events that you have no way to counter aside from pure chance.

There is also zero tutorial (which the devs make you aware of), but that means COMPLETELY ZERO - you will most certaintly not figure out a lot of stuff on your own, so be prepare for A LOT of trial and error, with subsequent game overs and restarts.

In my opinion it's just frustrating gameplay, poorly balanced and too time consuming to allow you to make any meaningful progress that gives any sense of satisfaction.

Prepare for the worst UI you've ever seen. No idea how so many people rated this game positively - I didn't last 15 minutes before asking for a refund.

It's a game with heavily unbalanced mechanics, unpolished and with missing QoL fixes. I really couldn't decide whether to recommend it or not, but the latest frustration during one of the missions (failing an objective without understanding why, after holding for so long) swayed me towards no.

The studio was shut by the publisher, so expect no changes nor improvements. If you're really interested in what the game looks like, just buy it with a heavy discount. But I warn you - after a few hours of play you may end up frustrated like me.

Do you think this is just another base management game? THINK AGAIN. In The Colonists, transport bottlenecks are real - this is probably the best traffic simulator I've ever played! Alright, ok, I'll explain more clearly.

If you've ever played a base building game, you know that roads have an infinite capacity: it's impossible to have traffic jams and resources will always be delivered. So you only care about production ratios and supply chains integrity. Well, not in this game. Here you can imagine roads as small segments connected to each others by nodes, and resources have to flow between those. Which means that when a bot moves your crate of bricks across one segment, from one node to the next, said crate of bricks will take physical space in the node. And what happens when all space on a node is taken? Traffic jams! That is, an angry bot and a shameful player, whose supply chains will grind to a halt.

The Colonist will force you to reimagine your road network and plan it A LOT more carefully than any other base management game. This slows down expansion and complicates management - a healthy challenge and a turn on the typical mechanics of the genre. Speaking about expansion, you need to first place a watchtower to expand your domain, then you can build - that's extra challenge and more planning required.

Similar mechanics were unseen from the time of The Settlers, so it's wonderful to see them again in a modern game. The campaign appears long enough to keep you busy for a while (currently at mission 3 out of 14), then when you're done you'll also have challenges. And random maps. And community maps. And a map editor. And native support for the workshop with a bunch of mods available. So duration and replayability are not much of an issue. Combat and trains are also present, but I haven't experienced them yet at the time of this review (will edit once encountered - probably).

Summing up, if you're a fan of base management games and are looking for a higher-than-average challenge with respect to the genre, I highly recommend The Colonists, even at full price.

It's... just boring. The gameplay pace is all wrong. I thought it was going to be a mix between the legendary Black & White and Spore, but it manages to be the worst of both worlds somehow. Basically almost the whole gaming experience is queuing research to grow your civilisation, while placing the next building (unlocked by research) and solving the occasional quest (to unlock more research). There isn't really much that I can experiment with, as a god on that planet, that isn't somehow tied to unlocking more via research - that felt like a narrow obligated path. Now considering that at medieval age research steps are 6-10 minutes, I just ended up queuing a few of them, wait for one to finish, do the newly unlocked action, and repeat. There isn't much choice or variety to this evolution of the species.

The initial surprise of the autonomy showed by the little people to manage themselves was quickly replaced by a disappointing micromanagement of placing/upgrading buildings and intervening on individual nuggets when they had a request. The whole game dynamic just feels off after a few hours of gameplay, and the straw on the camel's back was an underground expedition (a tedious "minigame" if you want extra discovery point for some research steps) where I had to constantly assist the team, until they run out of food on the way back and rebelled, just to end up all dead losing the whole loot... 50 meters from the surface. I mean, really? So I can't even save them with a miracle? What kind of god powers are these?

Honestly, I had high hopes for this game and waited for 1.0 to purchase it, but unfortunately I cannot recommend it. It's possibly one of those games that suffered due to an excessively long gestation (10 years or so), leading to an unbalance and unenjoyable gameplay. It could've been a lot more, with extra autonomy of your people (e.g. you just direct the civilisation towards certain criteria like militarism, culture, etc. - no individual buildings placement aside from key ones) and a lot, A LOT more quests and things you could do as a god. Instead, it's nothing of sort and just ends up being quite flat. Summing up, only buy it at +50% discount, if you're curious at all.

Massively underrated base building / factory game with a fairly innovative gameplay, since you have to terraform the land first, then create colonies to claim the land, then build your factories inside those colonies. The devs already added a lot of new features in the recent updates, so it has a promising future.

Full release update: I played the game again from the start, now that it has all 7 tiers playable. Very enjoyable and challenging experience, which gave me hours of playtime with the potential of even more (you can change settings like population availability and production amounts to challenge yourself further). The gameplay is an interesting twist on the classic factory genre, with free production buildings but a big logistical challenge to move the goods around and a puzzle challenge to balance the buildings' positions to get production bonuses.

Scorchlands is definitely is a small gem at a great price, absolutely recommended.

P.S. It needs more reviews, so get your copy and show some love to the dev! <3

Good concept, but repetitive gameplay. After solving a puzzle to make a letter, there is no way to make a template for it, so it's just repeating the same steps all over. Also, some of the recipes for letters are inconsistent, which adds to the frustration.

Goodness, it's been a while since I found such draining gamplay. Move an object into the furnace, push the button to start the locomotive, release the steam, repeat. That's it, that's the whole thing.

You realise that something is wrong with the gameplay when using the sails to move the locomotive is actually a relief since it spares me from doing the whole furnace thing. Which is incredibly frustrating, since the train stops on its own every ten seconds if you don't keep doing it.

To add insult to injury, you have to stop the train anyway to pick up the fuel on the road. This loop was so bad that I couldn't even appreciate the atmosphere and the background scenarios. The puzzles are simple and just require you to push big red buttons to solve them.

There is no story, no text to read, no dialogues, no context, no explanation. Only gameplay, which is unfortunately bad. What a pity.

This is a "yes with caveats" recommendation.

It's overall a nice game, but:
1. The mouse controls are ugly and can't be changed (it's click to select, click to rotate, a click and hold to place - if only we had a second button on the mouse!). Using a controller kills some of the immersion since you can't move pieces as freely.
2. It's very short, I completed it in less than 2h. It doesn't have any replayability and you may not be interested in the creative mode.
3. Some puzzles can be obscure, and some mechanics could have been developed mode.
4. The price is very high for the content.

So why would I recommend it anyway? Because it's still a very nice game, with a sweet story and an overall wholesome experience. If you're a fan of Lego, like puzzles, and it's on sale (I bought my copy with 66% off), then I believe it is it. If not, you can give it a pass.