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No one has rated this review as helpful yet

Not Recommended

36.3 hrs last two weeks / 303.6 hrs on record (187.5 hrs at review time)

Posted: 26 Jul @ 6:28pm

This is a really good 20-30 hour game.
Take the above, then compare it with my on-record playtime, and you might have an idea where the problem is.

Half of this game wants to be something like Dorfromantik; a laid-back affair where you're supposed to be able to play it for hundreds of hours, presumably in some kind of semi-flow state.
The other half of this game is an RNG nightmare: a Hex-tile puzzle version of The Binding of Isaac but for people who hate themselves.

For the sake of the easy-going puzzle game, the kinds of mechanics try-hards like me would normally want to expedite things have been left out: things like a way to highlight the path you're about to create, a preview of your upcoming tiles, highlights for closed loops or paths that will lead you into a wall... All of it would (presumably) get in the way of the anarchic spirit of the game. The one tool you do get is the ability to discard tiles, which also means that you're actively reducing how many you can still place.

Which would be fine, except the game also includes walls that kill you if you path into them, visual clutter that makes tracing out pathways tedious and annoying, and, most egregiously, exactingly high level quotas (several of which you cannot meet if you form any closed loops) that do not under any circumstances make sense against all of the design decisions that actively work against planning ahead.

The intended result seems to be to play the levels over and over and over and over and over and over and over again, until you hit the targets by a combination of skill and luck. And for about half of the levels it's just about workable, but for about half of them it really isn't, and for those the game ends up winding up tedious and annoying without providing much satisfaction when RNGesus finally does bless you.

If you like the idea of finishing your games, look elsewhere.
If you want an easy-going hex-based puzzle, Dorfromantik is a far better option.

This is a really good 20-30 hour game.
Take the above, then compare it with my on-record playtime, and you might have an idea where the problem is.

Half of this game wants to be something like Dorfromantik; a laid-back affair where you're supposed to be able to play it for hundreds of hours, presumably in some kind of semi-flow state.  
The other half of this game is an RNG nightmare: a Hex-tile puzzle version of The Binding of Isaac but for people who hate themselves.

For the sake of the easy-going puzzle game, the kinds of mechanics try-hards like me would normally want to expedite things have been left out: things like a way to highlight the path you're about to create, a preview of your upcoming tiles, highlights for closed loops or paths that will lead you into a wall...  All of it would (presumably) get in the way of the anarchic spirit of the game.  The one tool you [b]do[/b] get is the ability to discard tiles, which also means that you're actively reducing how many you can still place.

Which would be fine, except the game also includes walls that kill you if you path into them, visual clutter that makes tracing out pathways tedious and annoying, and, most egregiously, exactingly high level quotas (several of which you cannot meet if you form any closed loops) that do not under any circumstances make sense against all of the design decisions that actively work against planning ahead.

The intended result seems to be to play the levels over and over and over and over and over and over and over again, until you hit the targets by a combination of skill and luck.  And for about half of the levels it's just about workable, but for about half of them it [b]really[/b] isn't, and for those the game ends up winding up tedious and annoying without providing much satisfaction when RNGesus finally does bless you.

If you like the idea of finishing your games, look elsewhere.
If you want an easy-going hex-based puzzle, Dorfromantik is a far better option.

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2 Comments

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Camkitsune 10 Aug @ 5:24pm

@Uzjel the cat
I walked away from the discord because the responses I received made it clear that I was not actually being listened to - the reply you've given here has confirmed that.

Your game, as designed, forces restarts in order to get optimal RNG on several levels, arbitrarily punishes people for playing the game in a way other than one that actively makes it less fun, and has challenges that require an absurdly large amount of luck to actually achieve.

Your game is too hard. Making it even marginally less hard would make it substantially more enjoyable.

I say this as someone who has spent 200 hours playing your game, and has 43 of the 48 gold medals. If your goal was to have a game that lasts 20-30 hours, then having challenges that require 100+ hours of attempts actively works against that goal.

If this game is 'exactly what it was supposed to be', then 'what it was supposed to be' was ill-conceived, and not something I would recommend to other people.

Uzjel [developer] 10 Aug @ 9:27am

The game is exactly what it was supposed to be. You are absolutely right that it is a game for 20-30 hours because that is how it was designed. I am even more impressed by the amount of time you have spent on my game. Adding the features you are talking about would make the game too easy, which I have already written about many times in many places in the community. It is a shame that you ran away from Discord when we were calmly talking about new strategies that you could apply to your playthroughs. If a sequel is made, I will definitely pay more attention to the things you have written here. Thanks a lot for the time spent with Oxytone, the review and your assessment are 100% correct. RNG can often kick the player, and the more you want it, the more it does not work. Peace!

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