First off, HIGHLY recommend giving it a try!!
After having played for quite a good while, and having read many other reviews (and spent a lot of time in the Discord), I feel like I can really give a detailed opinion on the game.
All in all, I'd say this is a 7/10 game with a 10/10 team behind it.
If you're not willing to give the game a try just yet and prefer to wait until they add more in terms of replayability or whatever else you might feel is lacking, sure! But I promise you, it's worth giving the game a try at the very least, you will NOT regret it.
Now, to get more in-depth on things:
Focusing on gameplay first, I'd like to address the fact that most reviews complain about the 'lack of replayability' because the game gets boring after some time. Although I can agree to some extent, I feel like some people are overexaggerating this.
Once you unlock multiple evolutions, and especially with the new 'Contrarian' gene (which drastically increases the likelihood of lesser-picked evolutions, which brings a ton of replayability to the scene because you'll have to improvise by making builds you've likely never tried before!), the game becomes a lot more fun to keep playing. Unlocking Endless mode also adds quite a bit. Plus, there's the Challenges, some which are honestly quite a fun and refreshing experience! Some totally change the game, forcing you to adapt in unique ways.
I personally feel like the only unfortunate part is that every beginning can feel the same. Until you have enough to start a fun build, it can be a bit tedious to have every run start out the same way; run and eat whatever food is left behind, or go on a killing spree against Blobfish and Beewares. But, I've also seen a lot of people compare this game to Vampire Survivors specifically, so no offense but... there's not much of a difference in this regard? Instead of picking a character with a certain weapon to start with, you pick a genetic that'll make a difference throughout the whole run.
Some genetics will shape your entire build!
"Vegan" won't allow you to eat meat or fish, but gives a LOT more progress to lvl up when eating fruits or mushrooms. In other words, becoming "Prey" (high dodge, mobility, and mostly defensive evolutions) might be your best option.
"Highborn" halves your 'Ability' and 'Physical' damage, but boosts ALL other damage sources in a radius around you (that can be greatly increased, by the way!) by 50%. Meaning, any damage that doesn't require Ability or Physical (such as damage dealt by enemies, or thorns damage dealt by 'Spines') becomes SO much stronger, giving a "why are you hitting yourself"-type build a lot of potential.
There's also multiple genetics that allow you a lot more freedom in your choices of evolutions, meaning you can create whatever build you desire by letting you skip evolutions which increases the rarity of the next batch, or letting you reroll cheaper. There's even a gene that'll give you 200 Mutagen points to start with (the "currency" for upgrading/rerolling evolutions), but only gives you 1 evolution option whenever you level up. You'll practically get random evolutions, which you can reroll if they're not to your taste. Forces you to be creative! :)
Aside from that, there's also quite a few easter eggs and special interactions to be found during runs, some of which are very rare! For example, did you know the HatBirb can charm other enemies to gain allies, the same way you (the player) can? And did you know Pilferrets can throw something a lot more interesting than stones? The possible interactions (especially the rare ones) make a run much more unique and memorable, so in my opinion, that also adds a tiny bit to replayability.
But regardless of all that, sure, maybe the game is not for everyone.
A less fun part of the gameplay is the fact that sometimes, you die a lot more easily than you might expect, which can lead to a lot of frustration. Sometimes poison ticks a whole lot faster than you'd expect, you get surrounded by a few too many enemies, or something faster than you catches up to end your run... no end but victory is generally fun, of course. And although you can learn a lot from failure, when it repeats it gets rather annoying. The good news though, the devs are hard at work to make these things a little less frustrating to deal with, and they listen to every bit of community feedback to actually shape the game to be something the majority will be able to thoroughly enjoy!
On the bright side though- every loss is merely a skill issue, the game is genuinely well polished when it comes to bugs in enemy behavior. Every fail means room for improvement :3
Now, gameplay aside, I feel it's also very important to highlight the amount of effort and attention to detail that was put into this game.
Every evolution has an actually very interesting animal fact behind it, some of which really stuck with me. The Codex (the bestiary, especially) also has a lot of fun-to-read entries. And yeah, the game is obviously not 'Codex Simulator', but I feel like people tend to gloss over the amount of genuinely enjoyable details this game offers!
Beside that, it's also genuinely amazing how much the devs involve the community in everything they do for this game. They ask, they listen, they change and add things, all based on community feedback.
I've seen a lot of negative reviews purely because a paid dlc has been announced, but here's some interesting things about that:
Did you know, they only continued those plans after discussing it with the community for half a year? And unlike every big game company, they chose to be upfront about that rather than hiding it until release?
And did you know that the reason there's a supporter pack with ONLY cosmetics, which is PURELY optional to purchase, only exists because the devs wanted to make the game more affordable for the general public? It's in the name, it's a SUPPORTER pack. To support the devs and their hard work, only for those who can and want to purchase that.
I am someone who generally doesn't spend money easily, and still I can safely say I don't regret this purchase whatsoever. Whether you play for only a couple hours, or keep coming back day after day, the game is actually worth it and fun to experience. So if you have a few bucks to spare, just give the game a try! Worst case scenario, you refund it, no harm no foul. But if you end up enjoying it enough to stick around for a couple hours too many to refund, don't blame me ;)
So, if you're into cute pixel art style roguelikes (cause yes, it IS a roguelike, every run is a completely fresh start stat-wise), go ahead and give it a try! If you've read this far into things, I hope the review gave you a bit more insight on things, and hopefully a bit more appreciation for the team behind it. They really deserve it! ♥
And if you really read all the way to the end, thank you 💖 it's rare to encounter ppl willing to read this much nowadays, I want you to know you're appreciated :)
