==UPDATED January 13, 2015==
Check below original review for the update

I bought this game on Feb.04.2013, way before it hit Steam and before the engine switch from Ogre to Unity and have followed it closely eversince. Unfortunately I really cannot recommend this game anymore to anyone. It's promise after promise; only to be followed by excuse after excuse.

Back in 2013, when they were switching engines (wich took 6 months without updates) we were told that after the engine change they could dish out content faster, unfortunately that didn't happen. Then the game went to Steam, and again it was promised that more updates would arrive faster. Again it didn't happen. And that's just 2 examples, to be honest I can't count anymore how many times we were promised something (be it an update, more content etc.) only to be followed by an excuse as to why they didn't deliver.

That's what you can expect from Sandswept Studios, promises, promises, promises followed by an inevitable excuse. I feel bad having to give this game a negative review and honestly I WANT the game to succeed, I really do! But at this point all I have seen is excuses and very, very little progress on the game.

I understand it's a small team and that's why I gave them the benefit of the doubt eversince I bought the game in Feb. 2013. However at it's current state, there isn't much gameplay at all, the performance is horrible and the bugs and crashes are even worse. That would be alright for an early access game if issues actually got fixed and content and gameplay was being added. But the updates are too few and too far between to have any meaning and nothing substantial gets fixed/added. At the rate it has been going, The Dead Linger will be finished in 2025.

If you are on the fence about buying The Dead Linger, I'd recommend to keep your money for now and wait a couple of months. You will see exactly what I mean about promises and excuses. If, by then, you are still interested, then by all means buy it. But if you ask me there are far better things to spend your money on.


UPDATE January 13, 2015
A lot has happened in the world of The Dead Linger since my initial review, alas not for the better. The reason for updating my review is that I like to caution people before buying The Dead Linger, even more so now then in my original review. If you browse the official and the Steam forums for The Dead Linger, looking for info, please keep the following in mind:

1: The game at this time is not like what you see on the steam store, the pictures and videos are no longer correct, neither is the list of features/roadmap.

2: There appears to be overzealous moderation of critical posts (not pure hate posts, just critical ones) which get locked or deleted. There is a multitude of examples of this on the official, as well as the Steam forums but most get deleted quickly. So if you're considering to buy, be aware that it's not all sunshine and rainbows and there are a lot of people with genuine concerns about The Dead Linger. I don't agree with this kind of practice, therefore I feel that my opinion is much better stated here, as an update to my review.

So, what's all the fuss about?
-Major promised feature dropped and 3rd rewrite of the code in new engine.
The development team of The Dead Linger has announced that it's development is starting over on a new engine, the Unreal Engine. This is the third time that The Dead Linger is starting from scratch in it's almost 3 years of existence. With this engine change come some nasty surprises, not only will they start from scratch, major features that have been promised since the original Kickstarter campaign have been scrapped. Amongst those is the loved by many "procedurally generated planet-sized world", a selling point for the kickstarter and Steam Early access sales, which is now reduced from 32000x32000 Kilometers to a static map of 18x20 Kilometers. This single map is surrounded by impassable mountains and invisible walls.

No more unique huge worlds, just a small pre-made static map. Scrapping a major feature of the game, which was for many one of the biggest reasons to buy the game instead of another game, has made a lot of backers upset. Some backers want a refund, others just don't care anymore but many have lost their faith in the entire project. And this is not only just because of this recent change, there's more to it then that. The way the entire project has been handled so far for example, and the constant stream of empty promises. (Read on for more on that) With these features scrapped The Dead Linger has lost it's uniqueness and now has to compete with other games in the genre that have not only a much better track record in actually keeping promises, delivering more enjoyable content and gameplay but overal manage their project a lot better.

When asked by someone on the forum what this change will do to gameplay features like for example: how will loot be placed now that it's no longer a procedurally generated map? Will it respawn or be gone forever once picked up? The development team simply answered that they had yet to figure that out. Please let that sink in for a second: they have yet to figure out major gameplay after they have begun changing to another engine. When asked if this engine change will take as long as the previous one we are reassured that "it will not take that long". However, how much longer will 'not that long' be in this context, when they have yet to figure out the major gameplay features?

A little context for those who haven't been following development that long:
Players have been through this exact same process when The Dead Linger switched from the Ogre to the Unity engine, including the same promises. That process took multiple months to complete and left backers with literally nothing to play during that period. When the engine change was finally completed the game hadn't noticeably changed and the playability was actually worse for a lot of people, despite the promise that it would be a "huge improvement". This was then quickly followed by the developers reassuring the players that it would all be hotfixed and polished quickly. Some hotfixes came out but solved next to nothing. Some updates came out, which added next to nothing. Shortly thereafter, the game came to Steam Early access, more promises came and went and the game had progressed little beyond it's Ogre engine state. Fast forward to the end of October 2014, build 15 is released, updates were promised to be faster and have more content, build 15 was to be the " framework" for faster updates. Also: build 15 was originally supposed to contain content that was later divided up in 3 other builds (that never came). Reality is that build 15 came out, had almost nothing new and is to this day unplayable for a lot of people. But guess what? A hotfix (build15c) was promised to fix the problems so people could actually play. I guess you can feel it coming by now, the hotfix never arrived.

And now, the developers announce yet another start over of the project on yet another engine and promise that it will not take that long, updates will be faster and have more content if we just trust them. I can't speak for others but after going through all I described above, I think it's pretty reasonable that people have lost trust in the project and that their patience is coming to an end. If they couldn't do it on the Ogre engine and the Unity engine, why have any faith that they will be able to deliver on the third (Unreal) engine? Because they promised?

You might not feel the same as I do, that's your right and I respect that. I just felt that people deserved to know what they are getting into when spending their hard earned money on The Dead Linger.