Recent reviews by ZESPUD

very good. if you like subnautic you'll probably like this.

It didn't take long but the player base has thinned out enough that the only people left are try hards. If you're not very good at these types of games, I wouldn't bother. The matchmaking is horrible and will, after only a bit of play time, consistently pit you against people who seem to play this game like they need it to live.
If you like to play these games competitively, by all means go ahead.

It pains me so much to write a negative review for this game. The first few hours I played this game, I had an absolute blast. It had so many mechanics and interesting tidbits in the game that I absolutely adored. I thought I had found my new favorite game.

But then the problems started showing up. And they pile on fast, and the longer you play, the more evident and annoying they become. Let's go through the list of problems that I experienced.

-Health restoration is almost entirely tied to randomly spawning potions.
Technically there are other ways to restore health, but the main way is through potions. This wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that potions don't always spawn on a level. That's including mana potions, but that's a story for a different day. Health being as limited as it is means that you either need to stack as many shields as possible, or painstakingly try to avoid any and all damage.

-"Safe Spawns".
Whenever you enter a new level, it's entirely possible that there will be no relatively safe places to spawn. Because of how level progression works, this means you might have to either tank a ton of hits in the first turn (Very unadvisable), use up one of your artifacts, or just ignore the level altogether. This compounds with the first problem, because sometimes you might NEED to go to a level because you're out of mana or health pots. But uh oh, looks like there's no where safe to spawn in. Too bad!

-Damage immunity kinda sucks.
I get that it makes sense for some enemies. A living ball of fire is obviously going to be immune to fire. But the amount of enemies that spawn with absurd amounts of resistances and immunities to certain damage types is obscene, at least in my opinion. And the worst part is that this compounds AGAIN with the first problem! Sometimes you have to ignore a level you might need to go to just because the enemies are immune or resistant to the damage types you have! Realistically, it's incredibly hard to get decent damage for every elemental type. Especially in the first few stages. Are you starting to see why I said the problems start piling on fast?

-Enemy swarms force you into a certain playstyle.
EVERY level has gates. Gates constantly spawn enemies every few turns. This means that 9/10 times, you're going to need to focus on getting a decent AoE spell, or sometimes AoE build. It means that often times, certain spells or abilities are basically worthless because they can't deal with the massive swarms of enemies. Maybe it's just me, but it feels like the only viable way to play is to summon TONS of creatures to act as meatshields. I don't know if this is intentional, but it makes it feel like a LOT of the spells or skills are just entirely worthless.

-At the end of the day, there's simply just too much going on.
This is probably my biggest gripe with the game, and it's from a functional standpoint. There's simply too much going on at once to have fun. Even by the midgame I always feel stuck at an impasse. My choice is to either PAINSTAKINGLY pay attention to every enemy on screen (which, there's always going to be a lot because of the gates) to make sure that I have the right elemental damage, to make sure that none of their abilities will kill me or do anything nasty, to make sure MY summons are in a decent position, and a whole laundry list of other things, OR to just go in gun's blazing and eventually die because I neglected to read one enemy's ability.

To put it simply, all of these problems compound into a game that feels like playing 10 games of chess at once. There's just too much to focus on every turn, and if I do focus on everything, I get incredibly bored. If I don't focus on everything, I lose. And besides that, there's a lot of core mechanics to the game that just feel very unfair and unfun.

I don't regret buying this game, but I seriously can't recommend it. You'll get drawn in with some of the fun and interesting mechanics, and after a few hours you'll be exponentially more and more frustrated with the annoying mechanics.
If you enjoy meticulously going over every turn, and are some kind of perfectionist, maybe you'll enjoy this game though.

I literally can't even play the game anymore. I'm just putting this negative review here so maybe 2k will do something about their actively detrimental launcher. I can't even start a game anymore, it just crashes to desktop before the game even loads.

Edit: I think they got rid of the launcher. Cool.

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iut guod

I am a ruined man.

it's alright

i hate this game so much

trust me, i'm well acquainted with paradox's shenanigans. this one's pretty damn worth it. relics and stuff are cool as hell