Recent reviews by Kaya

Free demo for an upcoming, surprisingly interesting climbing simulation game. I´m not a climber irl, but I feel like they nailed it. The graphics remind me of Moebius, the comic artist.
It takes a bit to get into the controls, but after a bit they become very intuitive (playing on keyboard).

Definitely recommend giving it a try!

(You can cycle through limbs by clicking lmb, since I´ve seen some people complain that it wasn´t possible)

A lot of people call this game 3D Rimworld, and even though it does take a lot of "inspiration" from it, it´s no where near the depth, complexity and replayablilty. It´s obvious why people draw the comparison, since Stranded: Alien Dawn copies a lot of mechanics, that just aren´t really a thing irl or in other game, like for example your colonists getting upset, when they have to eat without a table, the way you setup and manage your colony or weed being called smokeleaf etc.

All that said, it is still a good colony sim, and it does have mechanics that are not just taken from Rimworld, like exploring the world in a balloon (which unfortunately happens off screen apart from the start and landing), flying attackers, multi story building, having to study plants/animals to be able to plant/tame them, orbital communication etc. Plus it looks really beautiful, especially in fall.

EDIT: I just saw there´s currently a negative review, that got a lot of upvotes, which claims, you need to be online to be able to play. So I tried it with my wifi turned off and the game still works without any issue. No idea why that reviewer claims it wasn´t possible, but their review should not be a reason for anyone to not buy this game.

Edit 01/2025
After the failed update in summer 2024 that was followed by almost half a year of complete silence from the studio and rumors of layoffs, they finally came out with this post:
https://steamproxy.net/groups/mightanddelight/announcements/detail/528706478197965653
So even though they´re a much smaller team now, and they failed to deliver on BoT so far, they´re additionally starting to work on a new project too now...

Just save yourself the trouble and play something else.
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TL;DR: too slow, too grindy, latest update made it worse, would wait until full release

I had initially given Book of Travels a positive review, but due to a recent update that completely overhauled the inventory system, I have to reverse it now unfortunately. I still want this game to become good, and while it´s in EA there´s a chance to implement changes/ reverse decisions, so I´m hoping my and other´s recent reviews could achieve that.

The good:
It´s a very unique game, the artwork (everything is hand painted), and the way the map reveals itself while you´re walking through this world is really outstanding, as is the music. The `story´, though not that long- it´s ok for EA- is engaging and was interesting to work my way through, solving riddles like where to find a person from a vague description you get somewhere. There are some unrelated quests you can take too, those are repeatable. In addition, there are hidden parts of the map and other surprises you can find, which are quite enjoyable. You´ll probably get around 20-30 hrs. of gameplay solving those for the first time and the initial story line, so if you really like the art style, the game could still be worth a buy. I also enjoy the multiplayer aspect, teaming up with others, it becomes easier to solve tasks, because your skills get added on top of each other´s. Personally I´m not too into the fighting aspect of this game, but the way it´s setup is also something I had not seen before, and a lot of people are into it. Another big part of the game is trading, which I liked a lot, before the latest update.

The bad:
The game is slow, really slow, inventory management takes up maybe even the majority of playtime and there are a lot of bugs, some of them have been around for ages, but it´s still in EA, so that´s to be expected. After you´re done with the story line available so far, you can start grinding for better gear, and oh what a grind that is… Your abilities and fighting skills are gear based and to be able to buy better gear from “the best” vendor the intended way, you´re going to need knots, that you get by doing tasks, but there are very few of them, and so to actually be able to buy any of that gear you´re going to have to finish the same tasks over and over again, literally hundreds of times. Only one of the available tasks yields some more knots, but it can only be done once a day. Currently there´s a much easier way to buy things from that vendor, which is most likely just another bug though and will be patched out (otherwise it completely throws off the balance). There´s also decent gear and other loot to be acquired by fighting or finding treasure. To maximize the outcome of that, people, including myself use “server hopping”, which is obviously not a game mechanic, or fun, but something you will most likely and up doing.

The game braking:
Every rollout of a content update for the game I experienced so far came with game breaking bugs, like losing access to all your inventory. To their credit, the devs took the effort to fix that for afaik every player every time so far, and they´re a small team, but it still meant the game was unplayable for weeks for many players.
The last update that completely changed the inventory system by adding volume, to me is really game breaking. I can no longer play as a travelling merchant the way I did before, because I can only carry a tiny fraction from what I used to. You were able to have a lot of containers like other bags in your backpack that could hold items and thereby increase your inventory size, which obviously led to spending a lot of time sorting through it, but I enjoyed it. The items´ icons are beautifully painted and come with descriptions that feel like a part of a bigger story, and I had it all setup in a nice way for my playstyle. Now you have to spend even more time in the inventory, calculating volumes, which is really not want I want to do, especially in a game, that´s supposed to be serene and relaxing.

Even worse, as a new player, which I tried to give the update a chance, you start out with so little volume/space in your inventory that I had to discard items after a few minutes of playtime already. There had always been storage on the map you could use for things you don´t want to carry around all the time, which was limited before the update, but is now infinite. To be able to get a backpack that upgrades the inventory volume you either need to buy it from the vendor I mentioned earlier (really expensive and extremely lengthy to get), or find the good loot spawners and trade these items for a bag at another vendor´s. But with the volume system added, it´s going take many trips back and forth between the loot places and the storage, only picking up the items with the best value/volume, probably trading those into some with even better ratio to finally be able to carry enough value to buy a backpack that upgrades your inventory volume. And even then, you won´t be able to loot like before, it´s always gonna take a lot of walking back and forth between loot and storage now. In addition a lot of items´ volumes are very unbalanced, I suppose a lot of that is going to have to have to get reworked.

They´re planning to add cooking, which seems really redundant in a game that already has a lot of vendors selling cheap food for health and tea cooking and magic spells for buffs. I suppose those are all going to get nerfed, once cooking is added.

Overall I cannot recommend this game any more in its current stage, the balance is way off, it´s way too grindy, and I the latest update made it all so much worse, which is really sad cause it´s such a beautiful and unique game. I haven´t completely given up on it, it´s still in EA and I really hope they´re going rework some of the mechanics added and rethink the direction they want to take Book of Travels.

Really well done city builder, a bit of a hidden gem really. It´s EA, but very well playable and definitely worth its price (currently it´s 20% even), I did not come across any bugs yet.

It combines the best elements of similar games like Banished (good and customiseable storage management, overall look, but improved), Anno (houses will upgrade, when all their needs are fullfilled, but no insta-build, which I prefer), Civilisation (you expand by buying new pieces of land, play against or cooperate with AI or in MP, trade with city states), Farthest Frontier (land values like fertility and desirebilty) and even a bit of Rimworld (I ran out of food and got the option to resort to cannibalism).

You can currently chose between 3 themes that have their unique build styles, advantages and difficulties, maps are procedurally generated and show a whole globe. You can found outpost colonies on your own continent or overseas and trade with them too. A feature I have not seen in any other game is you have to buy cards for production or leisure buildings, which I thought I wasn´t gonna like, but I do. It makes the start a bit harder and adds an element of randomness. There are special cards you get to upgrade your townhall for bonuses and others to upgrade production buildings´ output, reduce input etc.

The tech tree is very tall, you go from stone age up until industrial age, and there´s an upgrades tree to research as well. The models and the maps look really nice too, if you want to hide the hud for screenshots it´s ctrl+shift+P. I could not find this information anywhere, but a developer just replied to me, another good sign for an EA title.

Overall, very enjoyable and addictive game, a must have for anyone who likes city building games.

I initially had given this game a positive review during EA, but coming back to it after some time, everything has changed for the worse.

First of all the graphics, this game used to look gorgeous back then. I suppose they optimized it for performance and even on the highest settings it looks bland and washed out now, it was such a vibrant and glowing world and now it´s just meh.

You can´t share your tree base with friends, as there is no clan system still, even though that used to be part of their roadmap, but it got removed apparently. I read some comments where one of their moderators suggested building a team base on the ground, which would get rid of one of the best parts of the game, the "moveable" tree base, that you could just take from one great tree to another, close to where you want to do soemthing. Plus living on the ground makes the glider much less useful obviously, and there are no other methods of fast travelling and on a public server you have no way of protecting your things.

They changed the spawn location, not a great idea either imo, as it used to be in a really beautiful (and safe) place, now you just spawn in a random spot where you can get attacked instantly. Idk if that´s a bug, but we also had the problem, that it turned winter pretty much instantly, we were still at spawn, with no time to prepare for it what so ever and had to start over and change the season settings from default to max lenght.

During the EA phase they had been teasing steam workshop support, that might get added once the game was fully released, and even now I couldn´t get a clear answer to this, only a "not at this stage, but maybe later". This game is never going to get mod support, I´m sure, and they should have just stated that clearly from the beginning.

Overall big disappointment, glad I did play during EA, when it looked good and was more balanced and fun.

My new favorite game, get it right away, it is amazing!

Usually I don´t recommend any games with that few hours in, but with this one I can already say, it is definitely worth its price.

Beautiful procedurally generated map, looks georgeous in game and in motion, the lighting the shaders, the particles flowing in the air, very immersive. Enjoing the soundtrack that changes with the biome you´re in a lot too. Everything even the floor can be interacted with, if you´re using the right tool. Intuitive and easy to understand crafting system, quite a lot of building options, and just a lot of details that makes it all feel very alive, like the room filling with smoke from a fireplace for example, if you don´t build a chimney .

Quite the variety of wildlife, mobs and bosses, spawners, caves, etc.
I also like the "tutorial bird" that lets you know what to do with a new ressource once you gathered one.

Especially love that you´re able to build ships.

You can switch to another map using an existing character and keep all the stats and your inventory. It´s totally playable in singleplayer and runs smootly in multiplayer.

Overall a really enjoyable game, it´s probably gonna be my favorite one this year, or at least really hard to top.

Edit: Was right about it, this is my game of the year :)
Edit 2: 3 years later, labor of love, still one of my favorite games and it keeps getting better with every update

PRoS:

• antagonists are nicely hateable
  
• cars can be used for deforestation when driving straight through the woods
  
• amazing horse and bunny heads

CoN:

• logical flaws in the story
  

Had a lot of fun playing this, I recommend getting it on sale, 60€ is just too much for any game for me personally (it´s 80% off currently)

Works as intended: playing this made me wanna buy and play the actual game even more!

Surprising mechanics, good humor, nice graphics and music, I strongly recommend this (and it´s for free too).

Very nice city builder with interesting and pretty different mechanics. I read some complaints about the AI being bad, but having played the northern scenario to the end, I can say, the only times the villagers starved or froze to death, was when I sent them too far away during the winter. There is no prioritizing tasks, apart from setting a higher priority to workstations, and you cannot assign specific villagers to a task (like in Rimworld for example), apart from hunting. Instead you have to keep the overall workload at a level that doesn´t exhaust your people, and everything will work fine then.

I rly like the prehistorical theme, which is done quite accurately and the ability to follow your villagers in 3rd person zoomed in view and watch them go about their daily lives. There are several scenarios in vanilla and a lot more in the workshop. The UI is very well done imo, always very important to me in these types of games, since you look at your panels a lot. In this case they look nice and are self-explanatory, plus you can adjust which toolbars you want to be visible, a very nice touch.

Depending on the scenario you will have a chilled or more challenging experience, graphics look nice and I even left the music on all the time while playing, since it´s very fitting and non-intrusive.

The only thing I´d wish for, was that the game would continue on further in history, maybe in a part 2, or a dlc?

If you just came out of the hospital yourself and you are still a bit out of order brain-wise from the narcosis and what not, and you just want to play something that doesn´t require you to rly think, it´s perfect (if it´s also 50% off currently).

But if you´re looking for a good simulation/management game, don´t go for this one.