Recent reviews by Wood_[OBC]

Ark is incredibly immersive in it's gameplay - with a seemingly bottomless "todo" list. While other games "end goal" can be reached with relative ease within a few hours - Ark's "end game" will take a hundreds hours. I have 525 hrs in game - and am nowhere near "end game" (I do not leave myself logged in when not actively playing the game).
The community of players are diverse as well - some are helpful and others are offended you asked trivial questions about essential survival.
The singular reason I cannot recommend the game, is due solely to the manner Wildcard Studios has chosen to address potential griefing on official servers. There is no entity cap - and players can spam areas with foundations or small structures, making it impossible to build anywhere. There is a reporting system - but multiple reports about pillars, gets them removed, then replaced, then removed again - only to be replaced with dozens of 2x3 structures instead of pillars - and Wildcard does not remove structures. Nor do they remove the entitled child who is "land claiming" the entire map.
At the end of the day, it matters very little, how awesome a game is - when you cannot play it. This is an incredibly immersive game and is really fun to play - you just can't build a base anywhere (decent/desirable) on official servers.

Not much to say. It's not intuitive as far as "never played before" goes. Other games require crafting SOMETHING to harvest ore/wood etc - but here, you're expected to know to "punch" the grass to collect plant fibers? Right - just don't punch a tree to collect wood. Place a frame - ok, where/how? Upgrade it - sure - how? The game is full of little idiosyncrasies that don't make a whole lot of sense. Helpful community? Not so much - place is full of toxic folks, who forgot there was a time they were new to a game. Want to know which server/discord to avoid? Message me - I have screenshots of some stellar folks who LOVE helping others LOL!

A game is just a game - right? But what if the developers were actually accessible to the users? What if the developers actually gave a rats ass about the end user experience? Satisfactory isn't just a factory building game - with miles of glorious conveyor belt spaghetti - it's a fully immersive gaming experience where the developers are accessible and listening to end user input, making frequent changes/patches for the game during its multi-year "Early Access" edition. Sandbox building factories (roads, vehicles, trains, nuclear power plants, etc), occasional enemies to combat, no "wipes", locally stored files, multiplayer optional, AND accessible developers..... Awesome!! The games complexity is as scalable as you want it to be - it can be spaghetti simple - all the way to hundreds (perhaps a thousand!!??) of buildables for a SINGLE factory

Decay. It's all around us. We are not immune to it - so why do so many games pretend it doesn't happen? Rust is refreshing - it plays very well.. better if you have a good memory. Admittedly, there is a bit of a learning curve - but even that is assuaged by countless YouTube videos... Peace

meh. the "shiny" of this DLC wears off REAL FAST. got all excited, crafted a pool, boogie boards, etc. Crickets. No party. LOL!