Recent reviews by StarlightSovereign

Good game if you like mmos and dnd.

Further Update: Some of the complaints I had below have actually been fixed by stuff I hadn't gotten to yet. The tedium of various actions are mitigated quickly by the level up system and gaining skill in various aspects of forging weapons, mining, etc. I love this as it feels like my smith really is learning.

==Updated Review==
I tried this a long while back and after a time, one of the devs contacted me saying it had been updated and I should try it again. I did receive a free copy for review, but I'm a totally impartial reviewer, so here ya go.
I'm probably going to add more to this review as I go since I'm playing more this time than I did last time. But for starters, man, they have improved this game hugely since I first tried it.
MOST of the things I complained about in my original review are fixed. You don't swap tools as you did before. Thank goodness the Devs realized Unity physics hate small objects and it was not fun having tools go flying into the void or shooting ME into the void because I dropped them too close to a wall.

Now you just press a hotkey, pull out your tool. Is it a little less immersive? Yeah. Is it better for a game? Yes. Yes. Yes. Sorry, but trying to pluck your tongs from the rack is a lot easier in real life with hands than with a mouse and a buggy physics engine. This is a way better way to do it. My only suggestion there? Put the tools on a rack on the wall when you get them or something just for the ambiance. It's nice to see that I OWN a hammer, pair of tongs, etc. even if I don't pick them up from there.

Graphics were not bad before, now they're honestly GREAT. This looks so cool and the lighting is perfect. I feel like I'm in a blacksmith's humble dungeon shop. The added graphics for customers is cute, but the anime style kinda doesn't fit the tone of the game otherwise. I like putting a face to the customers, but I'd go for something that feels more in line with the art direction of the rest of the game. Also, calling me master is a little weird. They should probably not do that. It's not that kind of dungeon.
I mean it could be.

Maybe "Good Smith," or something? Idk.

I like that people come ask you to sharpen their weapons. That's a great touch. Blacksmiths do a lot more than make swords. Repairing is a big thing. I would love to see them add a function where you can take a ruined ingot (over cooked, hammered to "bad") and melt it down into an ingot again, making some inferior form that you could use to make things like horseshoes and simple tools to recoup some of the costs. That would really be fun honestly.
✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

Pros:
✰ HUGE graphics update.
✰ HUGE upgrade in how tools are handled.
✰ SO MUCH EASIER TO HAMMER OUT A SWORD
✰ Many added features I haven't even had the chance to play with yet (will update when I do).
✰ Serious show of progress and improvement from a small dev team. Great job guys!
✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

Cons:
✰ No custom Keybinds
✰ Hard to navigate the stairs. Please make a straight set to a half landing, then turn and up the back wall (start in the far right corner instead of where the stars are now so you end up near the door when you get on top floor.) instead of a spiral. Also easier on those of us with motion sickness.
✰ Sometimes get stuck on screens like forging screen or if I look at my character menu. (At least quit to menu takes me right back to where I was after tho. Good autosave.)
✰ Documentation could use a little work. A little clarification on how to use the thermostat would be great. Like that you have to point it more toward the back of the furnace than the ingot itself in most cases. That you reheat the blade before tempering, quench the blade after tempering. Those are important things to know that aren't really stated. Just completion of tutorial information here really.
✰ Hammering out the sword takes a bit too long. It's just that it gets a little tedious. Heat ingot, move to anvil, hammer, move to furnace, thermostat, move to anvil, hammer, repeat. It's sensible but after 3-4 swords I was feeling impatient. You have too many hits to a section and too many sections for it to stay fun with as fast as the metal cools down to unworkable temps again. Reduce a little in a few directions (cools a little slower, 1-2 hits fewer per section, maybe?) to make it more fun.
✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

Requested Features:
✰ Melt ruined (overheated, hammered to bad) ingots into inferior ingots you can then use to make horseshoes and simple tools to recoup part of the costs.
✰ Scrap handles (at a loss) and re-handle to avoid ruining an otherwise awesome sword.
✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

Conclusion:

✰ Is it worth it?
YES. I now consider the $10 price to be fair and worthy. The current sale price is a steel. (Showing myself out.)

✰ Expected entertainment value?
I actually feel like you could get a lot of hours out of this now. If you have enough patience to work your way through the lower ranks of the blacksmith world, then you'll probably have more than plenty to keep yourself busy. If not, join me in hoping the devs reduce the non-literal grind a little. Or allow some kind of configuration on that.

I'm still going to play and see how the rest of the features work. Hoping I'll enjoy them too.
So this is a total turn around on my recommendation. And it's honest.
Give this one a try if you like sims and the idea of being a fantasy blacksmith excites you.



==Original Review==

Woo. I really wanted to like this. It's a game type I love and I was excited by the idea of it. But it's just not there yet. I'm not saying it WON'T be there. I think it will. It just needs more time. I refunded it but will try it again in the future, no doubt, as long as the devs keep working on it.

My major complaints right now:
I repeatedly ran into a bug where my hammer would suddenly get stuck in front of me, out of my hand, and I'd be flying backwards and up. No kidding. It happened several times.

Tool swapping is honestly a pain. You should hold the tongs in left hand and hammer in right, and it should just be a thing where you hit a button and pull them out, hit another button to pull out your thermometer, etc. Having to stumble around for my tools on the floor all over the place was frustrating and frantic. And with the game's poor hitbox detection (what a thing to have to say about a game about forging swords) I couldn't reliably grab a pair of tongs and put my ingot on the anvil again before it was too cold to hammer.

The therm would actually be better just built onto the forge itself. Having to try to point it at the tiny sliver of sword in the forge seems silly. Or just make the glowing color system more readable and forget the tool. It doesn't work too well as is.

I despised the minigames. Trying to click right when it hits the right area for handling was... really dumb. It goes so fast I can't even gauge it. It's completely luck. Please give a better system for grinding and handling than really simplistic and stupid, totally immersion breaking minigames?

So reason I quit: I ordered parts and when they got in, I put the handle together on the handling table, then went to forge the blade. When I got the thing ready, all the parts had vanished from the table. Sigh.
So I went to order more handle parts... can't. You have to make a whole new sword to order more parts. What?? Neither of these things should have happened.
Also, you start with so little money, ONE messed up sword means you don't have enough money to get more. So there should be some odd jobs. Fix horseshoes, mend swords and stuff. Make pots. Idk. Smithy stuff.
Use that to make some money back to go on making new swords.

I want to love this game. I hope the devs will make it lovable in the future. For now, I can't recommend it because it's just... not finished enough to even really be more than an alpha demo.

Good luck devs.

Absolutely hands-down recommended.

Brief version: I play a lot of this type of game and this is one of the best I've played. Fun, challenging, deep, and exceptional storytelling, art, and sound design make Frostpunk one of the greats of the genre. 11 bit studios has outdone themselves and deserve an award or three. Don't hesitate to get this one. It will not disappoint if you are a fan of the genre. If not, maybe it'll make you into one.
=============================================================

Thorough version: Colony building, infrastructure, and social planing are some of my favorite game genre elements. I play everything from Rimworld to Crusader Kings II to Cities Skylines, etc. These are some of my top games. And I can easily say this is one of my favorite of the genre ever, the first in a long damn time to even come close to rivaling my love of Rimworld. Frostpunk is a unique story in a really creative setting. Steampunk in the frozen North with temperatures that will have you shivering in your seat. Only The Long Night has ever made me feel this cold wrapped up in a blanket. With the wind whipping by bringing flares of snow and frosting the screen and moaning woefully in your ears, it's hard not to feel a little chill just sitting there on pause. When the game is running and progressing and people are getting cold and you're looking at your temperature overlay and wondering how you'll keep your people from freezing when that drop comes tomorrow... It's positively frigid.

A game with a top-down distant view rarely immerses me this much. But with Frostpunk, I'm right there in the story. With the stellar artwork splashes accompanying interesting story points like a 2D cutscene with choices that matter, I'm deeply invested and I know when I make a choice, there's no going back, and some routes will be closed to me forever, while others are opened. The landscape is gorgeous. The art is gorgeous. The UI is gorgeous. The Sound Design is Unreal. And the music is fkin epic. As the story reaches end game, the music starts subtly building until it is rioting your tension into just the level of suspense and desperation you need to really feel the brutal events at the end of the story.

Difficulty is such an annoying slider in most games. It's too easy, it's too hard, and rarely just right. When you go up in difficulty, most games use the annoying "artificial difficulty" where enemies get more hp and do more damage, or controls get harder, or you need more materials to craft the same thing, etc. This game's difficulty was incredible. It was intense, hard, and challenging without ever being annoying or feeling unfair. The game punishes you for your mistakes and wrong decisions, but it does so justly and you're not fighting controls or bad design choices. If you screw up, you will pay to fix it. But it's a matter of decisions and missed opportunities. The choices are deep, intuitive, and critically important. You will never feel like your decisions didn't matter. And when I say intuitive, I mean it. If you have an idea that choosing a law might result in a real-world natural result... it likely does. A pleasant surprise when I chose to dump bodies in the snow rather than burial due to the info on the law which said "for potential future use." The use turned out to be exactly what I thought it would be, rather than the fantasy tropes that one might expect from a game, and I was severely pleased.

Another aspect of difficulty is in your own hands. What kind of ruler do you want to be? Will you sacrifice everything to succeed, or do you attempt to keep your people's dignity and health at the heart of your choices? You can find the easier way will succeed, maybe easier, but the harder choices may challenge you more. Yet the reward for success is your own sense of fulfilling a challenge. This was a delightful change from most similar games in which winning is a set goal. There is a set goal to end this game in campaign mode, but winning is about more than surviving until the end screen. At least, it can be.

The skill trees are super fun. The tech upgrades feel worthwhile and interesting, and the law trees give the game an enormous sense of personal choice. Your playthrough can be different from the last several times over by picking different combinations of options. There is also a major fork in the road at a point where you pick between two law books moving forward for even more combinations.

The scouting and outposts aspect was really fun too! Sending your scouts around to reveal more of the story (and bring back precious resources and survivors) is a joy. Finding out more and more about the world around you is fascinating. Plus there's no way you can explore *everything* that first go, so I'm looking forward to the places I missed. Outposts add an extra touch of reward to the exploration as you can send a team to send resources from discovered locations like mines or forests or fishing villages.

The game plays fluidly and I didn't encounter a single bug or obstacle to fun play. The only hitch up I had was due to me overlooking an obvious ui element, and I never fought the controls to do what I wanted the game to do.

Is there any way this game could be improved?

- Certainly! I would like to see DLC with other maps or scenarios.
- A worker overview in which I can directly select building types and change their worker allotments from there since finding each building type on the map can get difficult at points. I have an astigmatism and the buildings can blur together when it gets snowwy. Devs, if you're reading this, please add a ui element like this. :)
- Maybe the option to add heaters to homes. Expensive as that would be in coal, it would be a nice option.
Possibly a way to go back and change laws for a cost. (Okay, we are better established now. No more child labor!... maybe takes several days to implement?)
- Brighter/more distinct radius overlays. Again, visual impairment.

That's about all I can think of and it's more of a wishlist than a need. Though the help with visual impairment would certainly be appreciated!

Ultimately, Frostpunk jumps up to the top 10 of my list of favorite games. I imagine I'll get a lot of hours out of it as of now, and hopefully more maps and scenarios will come in the future to add to the enjoyment even more! Thank you 11 bit for one of the best games of the genre, if not the best! Your attention to detail and the obvious passion you've put into this game make it a true gem. Bravo.

❤ Audience ❤
☐ Beginner
☐ Casual Gamer
☑ Normal Gamer
☑ Genre Veterans
☑ Expert Gamer

☼ Graphics/Art Design ☼
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☑ Beautiful
☑ Fantastic

♬ Music/Sound Design ♬
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☐ Beautiful
☑ Fantastic

☠ Difficulty ☠
☐ Easy
☐ Average
☑ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☑ Hard
☐ Unfair

§ Bugs §
☐ Bugs destroy the game
☐ Lots of bugs
☐ Few Bugs
☐ You can use them for speedrun
☑ Nothing encountered

☯ Story ☯
☐ There is none
☐ Bad
☐ Alright
☐ Good
☑ Fantastic

⚔ Gameplay ⚔
☐ Frustrating
☐ Sleepy
☐ Boring
☑ Fun
☑ Challenging

۞ Game time / Length ۞
☐ Really short (0 - 3 hours)
☐ Short (4 - 8 hours)
☑ Few hours (10 - 20 hours) [if you focus on the main story]
☐ Long (40-60 hours) [if you complete everything]
☐ Very Long (61-100 hours)
☐ Extremely Long (101+ hours)

༜ Replayability ༜
☐ One and done
☐ Value in repeating campaign
☑ Multiple Story runs + other modes
☑ Endless replayability

$ Price / Quality $
☑ Full price
☐ Wait for Sale
☐ Don't buy
☐ Refund it if you can

✦ Others ✦
Multiplayer: No
Singleplayer: Yes

IF YOU LIKE PUZZLE GAMES: GET IT! :)
IF YOU DON'T LIKE PUZZLE GAMES: BEWAAARE! HERE THERE BE PUZZLES!

Got this game as part of a bundle and was excited about the mechanics.
I'm sadly disappointed.
The game has some cool mechanics but rather than letting you progress through those and have fun with them, it quickly becomes about beating extremely hard puzzles to get the new powers.
Okay, so the game has every right to be this way and some people love that.
I don't love that. So this game is not for me.
If you don't love puzzle games, you won't love this. This is not just a little reverse tower defense game with fun abilities. It's a puzzle game and pretty hard at that. I got bored with it after a couple hours because beating my head against a puzzle isn't my idea of fun.

I'm sure many people love this. They would also be people who love puzzles though.

I'd give this a neutral rating if I could, but I can't. So for me, I have to say I don't recommend.
But if you like puzzles, I do.
So I'll say yes, I recommend just because that fault isn't the game's. It's just not a game for me. And I won't punish a game for not being in my genre.

Honestly, when I first got this game, I loaded it up, poked around through Ruins a bit and went welp, this is too early and I'll come back. But honestly? It felt like basically just The Long Dark with sled dogs.
Now it feels like it's own game. A totally different game than any other I've seen.
I like this.
I will warn that it IS still VERY early access, and supporting at this point is still just supporting an early access. However, given it's price, I think it's worth it.
I wish there were more help files, and some more finish in a few areas, and gosh I hate the "wait" mechanics (fishing, welding etc. Just... waiting isn't a fun gameplay.) But I think this game is on it's way to being really good.
Past this, with all the Devs must be going through with the humanitarian crisis in their country, I can forgive the rest.
Thanks for a very unique gaming experience. I hope it will only get better and better and I wish the devs safety and peace.

Recommended: Kinda.
I want to give this game the benefit of a doubt. It's... got so much potential. And the work the devs have put into it is undeniable. I really hope that continues until this game is truly release worthy. Because I love so many of the systems involved. I feel there's some truly unique twists on the genre here.
It's just... not there yet.
I got this game for free in a trade. I think it's been $5 before. A sale price: Give it a try if you want. Full price... well... It's not there yet. So if you want to support the devs, yes. But otherwise... not yet.
The controls are a little clunky, but the world is beautiful, and for a game with only one pre-customization male model... he's pretty darn cute. I prefer having a female character (which devs have said is coming) but I can live with him because his face actually has PERSONALITY instead of the standard effortless variety we get in so many EA titles.

My issues... well... a few systems are really, really not there yet.
But my biggest complaint so far is the freaking cooking.
Are. You. Kidding me?
I had 12 trout. I start a campfire on the first try. I cook a trou--oh wait, I need a mix of herbs and salt. I'm starving, but my demanding pallet will accept no less. Okay, so gather some herbs (BOTANIZE!) and I get some water and rock salt.
And I try to cook a fish.
Fail.
Fail.
Fail.
Fail: Fish destroyed.
Um... Okay, it's ... not that hard... I mean...
Fail. Fail. Fail. Fail. Fail. Herbs destroyed.
Sunofa... So I go gather more herbs (BOTANIZE! < this is my new favorite word)
More herb mixing. More attempts until all my fish are broken.
All of them.
Then I realize... I have a 5% chance to cook an edible fish.

Okay. Guys.
If I am STARVING.
And there is a fish in my hand.
I can cook... a mother effing fish.
It may not taste good.
It may taste AWFUL.
I may burn it.
BUT I WILL EAT IT.
I DO NOT Have to have herbs. I do NOT have to have salt.
I can eat the damn thing.

If anything, it won't take me a dozen fish to get it right.

30 fish later, I still haven't successfully cooked a SINGLE fish.
I think I've managed 2-3 roasts which I think are somehow ? easier?? than cooking fish? (has anyone tried to make a roast over a campfire vs a fish? You really haven't have you?)

I have... in all the time played so far (not much but a surprising amount devoted to trying to cook) I have moved my cooking skill from 1.0 to... 1.23?

Whaaat?

This is a little silly guys.
I have a 6% chance to cook a fish now! Do you realize that's 6 *edible* fish out of 100!?
That's, not a reasonable amount of trial and error for learning to cook a fish with the threat of starvation as a motivator!

There are SO many cool things in this game, but this one is absolutely ridiculous.

I understand needing a game mechanic for improving a skill.
But you're talking about cooking a fish to edibility.
You can make a lesser recipe that doesn't give as much nutrition or something.
Do that. Then let that be the trainer fish.
But I promise you I would figure out how to cook a fish before 30 fish were wasted.

Let's talk a second about fishing though. Mini-game is weird, maybe kinda cool. But every 1 fish I catch comes with a blueprint, an anomaly scroll, some bones or other resource, maybe some alga. And about 1 in 10 gets me an upgrade token.
DUDE. I'm catching. FISH. Does it swallow all those things and I manage to extract them even though I'm apparently so incompetent I'm not capable of cooking a single fish? Or does the fish come out of the water and graciously explain to me how to build a roof on my house and make a little rug for the door before succumbing to his wounds? I hope that's the canon, because then at least he gets some use before I fail to make him into an edible meal.

Despite all this, I really like this game.
I just... can't recommend it at this time.
Give it time. Wishlist it. Watch for a sale. Or trade for it.
But don't expect a finished game. It's not. Not yet.

Recommended if: You love Star Trek and want to be the star of your own Star Trek show in which you are the captain and you have your own custom crew, ship, and decisions. Design your own starships! You can even design the uniform! Come on!

You can fly your ship through enemy space, brush up against cameos of your favorite characters, boldy go where noone has gone before, bounce the graviton particle beam off the main deflector dish, and explore strange new worlds to your heart's content!

True, the game is dated, but the graphics are NOT bad for an 8 year old game. The character models are better than many games I've played and there's a decent amount of customization. I like playing really true-to-show experiences, but the "make your own alien" option was amazingly fun. Whether you want to make a race one could TOTALLY believe was in a Trek world somewhere, or create a hideous (or hilarious) abomination, the system is great fun. Worth fiddling with even if you won't play one, just to see what you can do with it.

Seriously, the moment I stepped into the story and started flying my own ship around, I was living out my Trekkie fantasies of my own show with a captain just how I wanted her. I played a Trill after the nature of my favorite character ever (Jadzia Dax of course!) and the tutorial was barely over before I started reading the dialogue out loud and giving orders verbally, including whatever Trek-no-babble I could manage, just for the fun of it. Yes, I'm a giant geek, but I totally recommend you let yourself give into the urge to just ENJOY this game for what it does well: a wonderful story full of content that well and truly makes you feel like whatever character you chose to be.

Play it for the story. Your own Star Trek story.
Play this as a delightfully free story-driven action/adventure title and you will not be disappointed.


Not-recommended if: You want to play it for other reasons than the story. You want a thriving, living game with a solid, friendly community. You want to have the best stuff, the shiniest ships, and truly be able to compete in the end-game scene, and you don't have a ton of money to spend.

From the concept, I wanted to fall in love with this game. Spoilers: I DID!
The gameplay reminds me of a mix of Terraria, Oxygen Not Included, Factorio, and other great games I love to build up bases in on ruthless planets.
The soup-making mechanic is so ridiculously charming. I love it and enjoy it so much> Sure, I'm just seeing what each combo of ingredients makes, and at least so far, you can only do two ingredients per soup, but for some stupid reason, it's still so fun to find what combining a random mushroom and a bug made of corn will make!
Pros:
Souper fun soup creation gameplay.
Fun discovery and Exploration.
Base Building is easy, intuitive, and fun.
SO many planets and soups to explore!
I mean seriously, lots of gameplay hours here, to be sure!
Huge replayability.

Cons:
The controls are somewhat slippery.
The day/night cycle is a bit quick for my tastes.
Items disappearing overnight feels like a real punishment and I feel it should warn you of that before you punch down everything first go round and then find out the hard way.

Overall I enjoy it way more than I don't. That's really what it comes down to.

Gameplay: 9/10
Graphics: 8/10 (Great for the style. My only complaint is the astroworkers look dumb to me)
Customization: 7/10 (No character customization, but basebuilding is really customizable!)
Controls: 6/10 (I've played games with worse controls, but many many games with better!)
Platforming: 8/10 (I despise platforming and this has frustrated me less than most platformers.)
Length: 10/10 (HOLY CRAP HOW MANY PLANETS ARE THERE???)
Multiplayer: 10/10 (I couldn't say enough good things about how simple it is to play with friends. I am SO tired of buying games with co-op multiplayer only to find it's next to impossible to actually set up a game. This is SMOOTHER than a fresh jar of skippy!)

Overall: 8/10 Super fun, not perfect, but close enough for me to get hours of enjoyment out of it! I heartily recommend it.

Spent an evening playing this with my wifey and daughter and we had a blast. We can't wait to get through our work day so we can play again!
It's simple, fast-paced, panicky fun with shouting, teamwork, and loads of swearing as your kitchen catches on fire around you because you grabbed the chopped onions instead of the plate.
Highly recommended especially if you can grab it on sale. Full Price is worth it since you only need one copy to play with up to four people!
The graphics are cute, gameplay is fun, and there's replayability embedded in trying to get 3 stars per level and unlock all the chefs.

Played it and enjoyed, but wanted them to add female characters and make mining more playable. They said both were on the plan for soon. Waited for a long time for updates, still no female characters... heard they were working on mining but not implemented that change yet still.
This is a lot of disappointment for a game I bought to play with my wife and we can't play together as girls still after two years of waiting... :/
Come back and see that it's barely moved forward in months... Sigh.
Really wish this game had lived up to its potential. It had so much of that.

[Really tired of being harrassed over my review. No the female characters thing is not the only reason I don't recommend. Read the REST of the review? I will delete comments like that.]