I have a denial problem, I don't know why I kept playing this game. It looked really cool and promising, from the trailer and description it really seemed interesting. So I gave it a go, but as it turns out it is really unfinished.
You may be wondering what the gameplay actually consists of. Well, there is the main town hub, and there is going into cave levels. The hub has two main floors, of note the first floor has your house where you mainly just sleep, and this science building where you craft like four work stations (crafting table, refill health and energy, and some other one) and later on also there's one or two bits of useful tech upgrading. Second floor notably has some grocery place which you can also sell stuff at, but most importantly the second floor has this casino place, I'll get on to why it's important later. There's is also extra little bits but they are not substantial in the slightest (if they are then that function has not been put across to me).
As for the actual levels, well.. they are actually numbered levels like some conventional cheap flash game or something. Every three or so there's a boss, bosses are actually neat enough. But those levels are really basic and annoying. Everything is kind of really finnicky, nondescript, sharp edge maze, and that's how all the levels go. Later on you go in a rocketship, but it's still similar maze stuff.
Oh yeah, here are some things this game is definitely not. It is not a metroidvania, like no way hosey I've played tons of metroidvanias even of experimental forms and this is not it by any stretch. Also probably not fit to call it a collectathon. There are these jigsaw puzzle pieces found in a chest in some of the levels, but the kicker is that if you place the pieces early in this one place you're supposed to put them then it won't actually save and you lose those pieces you put down since you didn't complete it all at once. But there's inventory so you can't really carry them around either without it being a hassle. Oh and these individual unique pieces stack for some reason too. And also this game is not open world, just the hub and going into basic levels.
So here's a thing with that casino I mentioned earlier. It's got this wheel you can spin to get lucky right? You can win some multiplier of the money you paid, or your money can stay the same, or you lose what you paid. But the chances of winning are higher than losing, so overall you make money. So by far the fastest and least laborious option for making money in the game is just gambling, because here the house always loses. This way you can get as much money as you want, and without this I would have stopped much earlier.
Now all should be good, you can actually buy almost everything you like through money. BUT. There's one thing in particular that you can't, and I really really don't feel like grinding the same level for 75 times just to make some necessary boot upgrade. It's these spider silk things and I need like 300 of them. I've beaten the game levels all the way to the third boss of some eyeballs, but after that I need these boots. At this point, it's too much. So I think I've had enough.
Some other problems (though there's tons I don't mention) incude:
-you can easily softlock in some levels, not fun, have to reload day or wait until night when you pass out stardew style.
-story has cool potential, but it really does not go anywhere beyond being weirdly simplistic, whereby even with the poor localization it makes me think this game was made by a kid (no offense kid, great first try but seriously needs polishing).
I think most other people played for a couple of hours at best and came away thinking it was pretty neat, but I've actually gotten into playing this game proper, and it is not enjoyable. I think what would significantly improve this game is if at the very least material requirements were like 5x less, puzzle pieces wouldn't disappear, and the softlock situations were sorted out. It would still be a very janky game, but at least I could get through it without the pain in my butt.
This review is bad I know, but I'm tired, and um, uh, it's like the game see! So it is a great review after all.
