Recent reviews by Dizzy Ioeuy

So far this is much better for what I like to play than their last game (The Traders game...) because there's no doomsday clock ticking behind you to hurry up and make no mistakes or you LOSE in the game.

So far, so good in EA.

It's good. If you get it on sale you will not regret it, but even at full price, the devs deserve the pay for their effort.

The ship designer is terrible and basically as it was in GC3. Stardock seems to be playing a gme of "huh? whyzat? it better! it is! Ok we fix it better..." then they do nothing. Plenty of players have suggested innovative and streamlined approaches to make cosmetic and functional ship design cleaner and clearer to understand AND use. Designing custom fleets should not make my head hurt. But it does right now. Stardock is dropping this ball even though they promised back in November to spend a few months to turn this around: FAILED.

Bugs bugs bugs... omfg. Check out the discord for details if you want to know.

A weird focus on ChatGPT integration. Just... stop. A considered, actually intelligent curated approach to content is appreciated over this. One day, yes, AI will be advanced enough to do this task, but right now the resources of time and effort SD is pouring into this nonsense makes me very disappointed.

The ship combat is finally showing a "new" approach, but it just doesn't go far enough. Yet. This may improve. It's better than stellaris right now, but that is NOT saying much.

The bitter taste left by GC IV release... then- a month or so later.... "HEY! buy our BRAND NEW game! It's uh... "Galactic Civilizations IV: Galaxy Kablooie!" and "No, all updates and content from here on out won't work with GC IV, but only GC IV Galactic Kablooie edition!" LOL. Month or so later... "Okaaaaay... we'll sell it to previous owners for a sizeable discount. -sigh- A mini CA moment (reference Warhammer III).

Ok, game's not really feeling complete yet- like systems in the base game they are actively working on are still wonky but... BUY OUR DLC subscription. DLC coming out in a month! LOL! Yeah ok... cashflow and all that.

There's plenty of good things in the game- it's not dramatically different from GC3 (I mean this in a positive way), although Brad appears to truly baffled at how such an opinion can be possible (And he takes such an opinion in an apparently negative way). LOL. It seriously feels like Brad is padding out his retirement plans and just milking the cow at this point. I was a serious defender of GC III and thought they did a lot right, DLCs included, but just can't continue to wipe the dust out of my eyes at the rate their blowing it into them with GC4.

Maybe two years from now at -50% or more due to DLC bloat is when this game would be worth it. I sort of regret the purchase, as I just can't drag myself to play it.

The ship designer mess is truly painful.

I check in about every 3 months or so. See new broken promises, and scattered attention provided to the game (the upgrade of the ship designer being the biggest offender here, and evidently dropped from their attention). It's not uninstalled... yet. But SSD space is cheap, so....

Have been in EA with this game for a year or so. It's developed really well. The AI is solid, and the game mechanics are very reminiscent of Lords of the Realm II. Only the detailed castle assaults are missing, but still sort of there in the way you build your town and walls. So that's good.

The devs are pretty responsive to suggestions still after launch. Hopefully even left click map moving is coming very soon.

It's a solid game but be prepared to MANAGE your kingdom, and not just "solve the formula." You have to thinking a bit.

Oh and I like the art style a lot. I wish it had gone even further into that tapestry style than it did.

placeholder text for me: but yes. i bought this game on epic in early release, returned it thought it was crap.

word of mouth kept going. bought it on steam when it released. it was vastly improved. good at release. got my eggs handed to me by the ai and thought- damn this makes me angry, i have to actually THINK to win??

got distracted by other games. release update after update they hit like 100+ free updates! ok wtf, devs...!? i buy the dlcs and go into the game again...

three games alter i can't get to sleep except by 4am!

ok it's good.

i'll write something "more better" using actual syntax and grammar at some other point, but meanwhile here's a thumbs up.

Notes to myself:

It starts of great. Fun. Interesting. And then the gamey "rules" interfere- how out of fuel means just slow, how everything is so automated why bother even playing? How exploration is just about dirt and minerals, how the economy doesn't really feel like it reflects reality, just stuff to combine in recipes to get other stuff, how ship design isn't terribly interesting and feels on rails, how...

Well if you're reading this and wondering if you want to install again, remember, you'll spend about 12 hours straight thinking THIS IS GREAT, and then... feel betrayed when things just get busier but not more interesting or developmentally different. I told you so.

I keep trying to finish this game. Played all the others, loved them. Something about this one is just not engaging. Oh well, maybe it's just too much same same. Uninstalled again... about 30% through the story.

Despite some very silly moments in the story and how people interact with you in the game (the verisimilitude was lacking). It had a good gameplay loop. Pretty easy on normal settings.

Aloy's character not as deep as others suggest (I mean she barely mourned her guardian's passing)- and with how many people she kills, it felt a lot like arbitrarily one life in a story was worth so much more (like the vanguard guard's sister- I mean who cares!?) to her that I couldn't get a sense of her having any real morality or ethics that made sense.

But for $12? Ok.

Real quick review to state that the online registration for the game is removed and the single player campaigns are ALL intact for the PC version of this game. It's safe to buy and enjoy.

This game is criminally underrated. It's very good, with tons of lore, a decent AI, good combat system and overall game mechanics. I really enjoyed it.