Recent reviews by ThaElf

A little added bonus for a free game, to give appreciation for the creator of the base game. I and my friends enjoyed it enough for me to give something in return.

Heck a game can take you so little time and yet to really appreciate it takes damn long time.

I was brought to the game by my darn little brother who ain't into this genre. He had seen some memes and ♥♥♥♥ and played it like a boss... coming back to me crumbling asking 'Did I finish it yet...' So he could actually TALK about it. I didn't for the longest time it waited in my darn library. I might regret a little, but 'time is a valuable thing' like LP tells us `In the End´.

When I got into playing this... I braced myself to see what the fuss is about... Left hanging, Just Monika etc... and then I just literally threw them out to enjoy the game. Focusing on what the game had to offer. Dialogue, choices, a minigame... a little something to pass time.

It was engaging and I enjoyed it. Tried to replay for different outcomes and came up with more interesting dialogue and hints to here and there. Then finally resolved to cheating... how to get the rumoured happy ending? Well.. it took me a good chunk of day to get to there even with the rough guide that didn't fully spoil it all. But it felt... satisfying to get there. Sure I had hit End few times, but it does not feel as much when you hit the End.

I was hit five times with the feelings of ending the game and feeling more hollow inside each time. Sixth for testing something ( but having mouse macroed to 500 cps... things just flur by. :D ). But each time I DID read the texts and found something new, they told a story, bit different but same. But each had their own flavours added. They weren't salami batches on the pizza, but small pineapples, bacons, jalopenos etc sprinkled. They filled the already told story. I was happy with it.

But the kicker started after getting engaged in the ongoing war of theories... how much did people juice out of this game and how much thought was put into incorporating them into. I for one know about the eye and it makes a such an impact on emotional level while it was sprinkled here and there and layed out with theorists. It is quite rare to be so engaged... but I did. And I'm still trotting around reading things people have to bring to the table.

This games was simple, yet engaging and then it gave afterthoughts. I'm waiting for the nightmares, I'm not exactly prone to them, but they creep up while not watching.

Clearing your own mind to play this game... it quite the key. Even with prior knowledge you should find things to engage with. But this last is just my opinion... and not everyone can remove near everything to tabula rasa.

This game had really much into it. It was a time sink and it made me happy with all of its content that it had, were added and that were going to be added.

I did hate the DLC before official launch, but I bought it after the initial meltdown, because I was still able to pour more time into the game, but the reason was more lack of communication... I have still yet to play SE content, I'm still happy with The Island and The Center intrusions. So it tells just how much of time can be put into this game.

800h on solo/own dedi rest on a unofficial dedicated with luckily good community. With nearing 3k hours of gaming in a year... I've played more than I have worked. It is just that damned good game to sink time. Still after all this time of enjoyment I cannot recommend the game anymore. The devs have slapped their players in the face many times and I still did not like how they did their things, but their lack of communication as developers is nearing the end of my patience.

I just like the game, but I cannot endorse bying it anymore. I lack motivation to bring more players to this game and I brought plenty to begin with. For to not recommend a game after such a long time of playing is hypocrisy, but it is honest opinion to the way this game has been going. I keep playing it as it is good, just that good to come back.

But recent changes to the game ignoring thousands of player inputs which are much more down to gameplay than developers are just awful to watch. There is edge where different sides of communities collide, but they say their opinions more or less in constructive way, but they are all stumped by the arrogance of the devs not knowing their own game and how to deal with it. Developers implement things and have to patch it up for months so it works as intended and without breaking the core game after the update.

There is huge gap between developers and gamers, something that only shouting can fix up. I cannot understand why did they take this route... If they worked with the community even a tiny bit more their game would be the best of two worlds, the way developers want it to go and how gamers see it best implemented for their enjoyment.

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This game offers survival with dinosaurs and a really good gameplay even with the bugs still haunting it. If one is persistent enough one will learn what to avoid, sure a tedious thing to ask for someone without experience, but at the core the game is a balance between gathering, taming and surviving. You can tweak it the way you like it and to your own amusement. That is how well thought out the game is supposed to be, each to their own vision of that perfect gameplay.

But with the amount of absolutes in this game... one cannot dodge things or have counters to things that should have, so the survival part becomes quite a daily chore. Had the devs even thought about the special abilities given in the past few months they'd see how frustrating the game has become. But to know about them first hand is something that startless the beginners a seasoned player has more chances to survive a surprise and recover, but even for them when most dangerous things are not the towering monsters around them something is awry...

Every MMORPG player knows how lethal a stun and inability to retaliate is, but this game is more unforviging than worst of those I've played or seen played by others. There seems to be only one timer the devs think of... 10s. That is how long you are still and doing nothing when ♥♥♥♥ hits the fan. Given the strenghts and weaknesses of different dinosaurs that is death sentence to some while others shrug it as nothing. Being on foot in this game is not something you do with pleasure, but are forced to by mechanics that are supposed to make the game harder. But while it makes the game harder it takes larger portion of enjoyment out of equation. Having annoyance is one thing, I'd shrug it off, but I've been overwhelmed by the amount of, or lack of, thought in these mechanics which are unavoidable.

So what I did to counter these annoyances? I took more time in the skies I loved even before. But for now i have been taken that ability away, to enjoy third of travel means... Sure I can fly, but I don't enjoy it. On the same time traveling by waterways is even more tedious and while it adds a challenge it boils down to same annoyance as walking above ground, 10s stuns and inablity to retaliate... Sure it boils down to avoid anything you know is dangerous, but it is not survival, it is artificial difficulty.

To make end game players mortal while they should have atleast a fighting chance is challenge which I'd accept. But this game is detoriating from that, going more and more to the route that everything you do is death if done wrong. With the experience ( and gear! ) this far I can shrug off most of these with clever mechanics and knowing how things work, but they are not survival tactics... they are cowardly ways to bypass developers intentions of making the world difficult, but if their difficult is artificial, we, the players, will answer that challenge with all we can muster. And at worst... we stop playing the way we enjoy and just ignore content created for us.

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That is the bottomline of this negative review. For each 'challenge' we get, the enjoyment of the game goes south. If a game is not enjoyably challenging, it is just Cat Mario Evolved ( or games alike ). Something I don't recommend for a price of this game and hours needed to pour into it to even begin to enjoying it. This game is grindfest even when you get accelerated servers with all sort of mods to alleviate the grinding. But after you have grinded 'enough' the content given to you is just bunch of screw you thrown at from a point of view that has never played the game as 'just another player'.

I most likely keep playing this game, but I'm just not up to recommend it anymore. From April 2016 to December 2016 I would had... but now I cannot even if I'd like the company of friends to gather around. And this game is still evolving forward, something I hope will see mistakes from the past and change them. Potential is enormous, but attraction is waning fast if the aforementioned communication does not connect.