Final thoughts after clearing all the achievements

[Harris]

Now that I "finished" the game and am ready to put it to rest, I realized I never properly reviewed it, as my review is mostly a compilation of the takes of others. Don't get me wrong, those are very good takes and I fully endorse them, but still. With that out of the way...

The good

+ Music. It's really good and I agree with Acrivec how it's basically the only great thing it got in common with the first game.

+ Zeitgeists. Exploring them was fun. I particularly enjoyed how Equality is dev commentary on history of Soviet Union of the 1920s. Granted, the inspiration behind Reason or Tradition is pretty clear too. However, this might be lost on you unless you're a history buff.

+ Politics. Shocking, I know. But there's just something oddly satisfying to becoming the Captain and then watching how you get 100 votes for every law you want. So while I did not necessarily enjoy it as a system, I enjoyed it as an obstacle to overcome.

+ Events. I also include the entire narrative side related to your people here. It's fun to get rare (and even secret-ish) events in response to your actions and see how they affect your society. It is, of course, merely reparations for the game not giving us the same level of immersion we had at the micro level, but still.

The bad

- It's not Frostpunk. There was so much said on this topic already that I'm not even gonna elaborate. I know some Gatekeepers will disagree with me in the comments, thank you for keeping discussions spicy guys :)

- It's short. Really, the story took me 7 hours and that's with carefully exploring and learning the mechanics, much less on replay. The majority of my playtime is doing other things with the tab open, or leaving PC overnight. So whatever playtime you see is not indicative of what I actually spent with the game.

- It's rigid. The game is mostly on rails and our choices are limited. Civil war is entirely scripted and there's too few tools of dealing with factions outside of it.

- It's derivative. The game is strongly inspired by themes and mechanics in some way already present in season pass for the original (Last Autumn/On the Edge), and it kind of lacked novelty for me.

- Utopia mode is clearly an afterthought. There was very little attention given to adapting the story mode for extended, let alone endless playthrough, from resource deposits to civil war aftermath.

- Balance/polish is not there. Together with performance, the sequel gives me strong On the Edge vibes. It seems the devs saw they can get away with being sloppy and decided, why not do it again. I wonder how much of a disaster it would be if they released in Summer like they initially planned to.

Overall it's terrible as a sequel and pretty mid as a city builder or a 4x game. Since I did pay the Deluxe thingy I'm gonna keep an eye out for what DLC might look like, but honestly my expectations are low. The franchise took a serious blow and I don't think it's ever going to recover.

[idiot2]

You spent 188h playing this game and you are calling it short...

[Harris]

Originally posted by idiot2:

You spent 188h playing this game and you are calling it short...

Please do not reply to my threads unless you are actually going to read the post before putting your fingers to the keyboard.

Thank you! :-)

[SoloQ]

You know there's a review button right?

[idiot2]

Originally posted by Harris:

Originally posted by idiot2:

You spent 188h playing this game and you are calling it short...

Please do not reply to my threads unless you are actually going to read the post before putting your fingers to the keyboard.

Thank you! :-)

I read your claim and call it BS. Who leaves a game open for 181h to play 7?

[Harris]

You guys are seriously trolling at this point.

[romy]

dude did one fourth of the game in 200hours and calls the game short.

also :

Originally posted by Harris:

- It's not Frostpunk. There was so much said on this topic already that I'm not even gonna elaborate.

yeah sure, in other news gravity doesn't exist. it's such a well known fact that i'm not even gonna elaborate.

[lily40k]

Originally posted by idiot2:

You spent 188h playing this game and you are calling it short...

Exactly, i'm 9 hours in but i'm considering starting chapter 1 again because i learned from mistakes...

[lily40k]

So do you think they would be better off just makeing FP1 with slight better graphics and more story?

Would i want them to add more dlc to FP1 and more playable content yes.
But this is absolutely frostpunk, i get the same vibe same tension as the original. Surprised how divided people are on this.

[onlyforamicro]

you are the best harris

[TITAN]

The game is really terribly balanced. I played at maximum difficulty both times - passing from the outpost is many times easier. Endless deposits provide a ridiculous amount of resources.

[Baubau]

Originally posted by lily40k:

So do you think they would be better off just makeing FP1 with slight better graphics and more story?

I do think that. That's exactly what i wanted from the day i completed fp1. I just wanted more of the same, and i'm not the only one

[Baubau]

To the poster: Since you did all achiev, can you tell me if dead scouts from exploring dangerous or deadly terrain will prevent you from getting the "no unavoidable deaths" achievement?

[HardNRG]

Originally posted by Baubau:

To the poster: Since you did all achiev, can you tell me if dead scouts from exploring dangerous or deadly terrain will prevent you from getting the "no unavoidable deaths" achievement?

They should prevent, cause you can avoid those deaths. You need to reduce threat level so you can safely explore them.

[idiot2]

Here are some more detailed thoughts:

Originally posted by Harris:

- It's not Frostpunk.
- It's short.
- It's rigid.
- It's derivative.
- Utopia mode is clearly an afterthought.
- Balance/polish is not there.

Overall it's terrible as a sequel and pretty mid as a city builder or a 4x game. Since I did pay the Deluxe thingy I'm gonna keep an eye out for what DLC might look like, but honestly my expectations are low. The franchise took a serious blow and I don't think it's ever going to recover.

It's not frostpunk: This is a matter of taste i guess. For me it keeps the atmosphere and interesting exploration of political/philosophical topics so it is. But if you think roads or not having hexes or whatever is the essence of frostpunk that's for you to decide.

It's short: Sorry but that is Bs. I finished the campaign and played half of a utopia game and i am at 20h. The utopia mode can be played a lot more times to explore different setups in politics etc... You have 188h in this game and if even only 1/3rd or 1/4th of that is actual playtime, it is not short.

It's rigid: You mentioned yourself that you liked exploring the events, politics and zeitgeist. How could you explore anything if the game forced you to do the same thing each time? I really dont understand.

It's derivative: Huh? I thought it was so different that it is not even Frostpunk anymore? Can you please decide if you think the game is too different or too much the same?

Utopia mode is an afterthought: Whaaat? I am so enjoying my utopia game right now! Admittedly it may be because i switched to hardest difficulty and thus it feels way more thrilling. But also I am so interested in exploring the many many factions and several different starting locations posing different problems. Imho if you only played the campaign basically you miss 50%+ of the content.

Balance and polish is lacking: I agree.

Your conclusion is really weird, You played the game at least for dozens of hours, enjoyed at least parts of the game quite a bit. But suddenly it is "terrible as a sequel" and a blow that the brand will never recover from.

Even if i just agreed with every negative point you wrote i wouldn't understand how that supports such a negative final verdict.

[Steve10393]

Originally posted by Harris:

Originally posted by idiot2:

You spent 188h playing this game and you are calling it short...

Please do not reply to my threads unless you are actually going to read the post before putting your fingers to the keyboard.

Thank you! :-)

I read the whole thing. It seems really weird to play it 188 hours and call it short. You mean your perfected play through after restarting many times was 7 hours long without pausing much? We could have solved this data point after the first question if you didn't dodge criticism then..