Game's art style and vibe are fantastic but I've not being enjoying my time sadly due to a couple of issues;

1) The devs really need to take a step back and think about what the factions are actually doing and accomplishing on the field when a raid starts. Are various squads converging and making a push to assault one of the bunkers that's being held by an opposing faction? Are they sweeping for useable junk in the nearby shanty town? What units does the squad need to do this? (you probably don't need two giant mechs and a 'flying' tank to wipe out a few groups of unarmed cyber-zombies). The better laid out the grand stage of battle is, the more immersive and interested the players will be because at the moment it feels like I'm just getting dropped in the level and the game master haphazardly opens the pick and mix bag of various janky enemies and hastily pours them over the map. It's boring at best and extremely frustrating at worst.
I hope that a system for 'scav intel' gets added to the region screens where intel and lore you grab can tip you off regards what the factions are doing or planning in a given map on your next raid. Are they looking for a fugitive? Expect lots of flying drones on high alert. Area crawling with cyber-zombies and the other faction is on orders to neutralise them? Expect troops with flamethrowers and shotguns on mop-up duty. Faction mechs on-site? The other factions troops might have grenade or rocket launchers and send their own heavy weapons in.
Cook up a 'world state' system which affects what spawns where and what's going on, that's be my suggestion.

2) They've made changes to the water system (an in-game system that causes you to lose most of your items and upgrades if you don't farm the water currency, which ticks down in IRL time) for the better but it still needs more work if not straight up removing. It's mobile-game levels of retention strategy, but can be farmed to the point that it doesn't become an issue, so why include it in the first place? Have the water function as a type of Base XP to access rarer vendors or unique upgrades etc.

3) The performance sucks ass, i'm on a 3070 and an i9-11900K and the game barely hits 35-40 fps at medium settings with most of the bells and whistles turned off. I've got no idea how they can improve this but it definitely needs optimisation sweeps.

4) The game is extremely buggy in places but I can forgive that due to the Early Access state it's in. Enemy aggro is all over the place and the enemy AI and animations are just not up to standard yet, you can accidentally get out of bounds and lose all your stuff because you can't get back into the level and have to abort the raid, tanks and mechs suddenly start floating around out of nowhere, gunships spawning in walls, the list goes on. Expect jank if you pick this up, like un-patched S.T.A.L.K.E.R levels of jank.

I'll be back in a year or two to change my review to positive if the project doesn't get canned before then, but for now; 'Forever Winter' is going to be 'Forever Shelved'.

Game's art style and vibe are fantastic but I've not being enjoying my time sadly due to a couple of issues; 1) The devs really need to take a step back and think about what the factions are actually doing and accomplishing on the field when a raid starts. Are various squads converging and making a push to assault one of the bunkers that's being held by an opposing faction? Are they sweeping for useable junk in the nearby shanty town? What units does the squad need to do this? (you probably don't need two giant mechs and a 'flying' tank to wipe out a few groups of unarmed cyber-zombies). The better laid out the grand stage of battle is, the more immersive and interested the players will be because at the moment it feels like I'm just getting dropped in the level and the game master haphazardly opens the pick and mix bag of various janky enemies and hastily pours them over the map. It's boring at best and extremely frustrating at worst. I hope that a system for 'scav intel' gets added to the region screens where intel and lore you grab can tip you off regards what the factions are doing or planning in a given map on your next raid. Are they looking for a fugitive? Expect lots of flying drones on high alert. Area crawling with cyber-zombies and the other faction is on orders to neutralise them? Expect troops with flamethrowers and shotguns on mop-up duty. Faction mechs on-site? The other factions troops might have grenade or rocket launchers and send their own heavy weapons in. Cook up a 'world state' system which affects what spawns where and what's going on, that's be my suggestion. 2) They've made changes to the water system (an in-game system that causes you to lose most of your items and upgrades if you don't farm the water currency, which ticks down in IRL time) for the better but it still needs more work if not straight up removing. It's mobile-game levels of retention strategy, but can be farmed to the point that it doesn't become an issue, so why include it in the first place? Have the water function as a type of Base XP to access rarer vendors or unique upgrades etc. 3) The performance sucks ass, i'm on a 3070 and an i9-11900K and the game barely hits 35-40 fps at medium settings with most of the bells and whistles turned off. I've got no idea how they can improve this but it definitely needs optimisation sweeps. 4) The game is extremely buggy in places but I can forgive that due to the Early Access state it's in. Enemy aggro is all over the place and the enemy AI and animations are just not up to standard yet, you can accidentally get out of bounds and lose all your stuff because you can't get back into the level and have to abort the raid, tanks and mechs suddenly start floating around out of nowhere, gunships spawning in walls, the list goes on. Expect jank if you pick this up, like un-patched S.T.A.L.K.E.R levels of jank. I'll be back in a year or two to change my review to positive if the project doesn't get canned before then, but for now; 'Forever Winter' is going to be 'Forever Shelved'.