Don’t forget “Farthest Frontier”.
“Cliffsides”. I just don’t see much gameplay in that outside of puzzle aspects.
Thanks for posting that; maybe I have heard of Infection Free Zone but I think that’s it.
1.0 is out.
Playing Voxel Tycoon - kind of mix between Open TTD and Factorio.
Reading through Steam Forums on Voxel Tycoon - the only negative reviews I see are that the signals are broken.
I’m following these two released last week. The price for both is a bit high considering they are early access and no roadmap it’s been announced.
But! If anyone can convince me that they are worthy of my backlog I’m willing to buy one of them.
Stranded Deep it’s more appealing to me, it looks like a 3D Rimworld and I enjoy more colony sims with low numbers of colonists.
Every single one of these games seems to be EA nowadays and they stay like that for 3 years or more. And then 3/4 of them are forgotten or released after a few bug updates. Do city builders have the same audience as survival games or what?
I have my eyes on Stranded as well, but, well as most people right now probably, have a strict no purchasing anything these days policy - So, I was actually hoping someone here would purchase the game and tell me if its good :-)
Signals work AFAICT. I’m just terrible at laying out transport routes. There’s no tutorial for signals in game but a 5 min YT clip sorted it all out for me.
The game overall feels polished. The economic model and gameplay loop works well. And being able to set the world to use names of towns from my country is a lot more engaging than I thought it would be.
I got Stranded: Alien Dawn for free thanks for working for the publisher (not on anything related to this game).
I don’t usually play early access games (even when I get them for free), but I was short of a game so I thought I’d give it a go. I’ve been playing it pretty compulsively all weekend.
The early access part of it seems to mostly be a lack of features that are clearly intended (such as a hygiene system) and a lack of balance in a few areas. It’s fairly polished in UI terms, has working tutorials and the simulation in general works pretty well.
There’s plenty to research so I’ve not hit any sort of endgame yet, and it’s not clear how much of an endgame there actually is. It’s also seems likely there’s not a vast amount of replayability just yet.
Still, if you enjoy playing titles in early access and you enjoy this sort of game, I reckon there’s a lot to like here. I don’t think this is the sort of game that will end up in early access hell: it’s by a respected developer (Haemimont) and now has a publisher to curb any excesses.
Personally, I plan to put it down fairly soon and wait for the full release, but as I say I’m not much of one for early access.
Thanks! I will probably give it a try eventually.
Thanks for the write-up @rho21 - Much appriciated.
I really enjoy games like these, and noticed it had full controller support as well, which is kinda awesome. I enjoy the kind of the chill games that always gives you something to do, without really rushing you.
How free form is the building part? Can you build houses and structures as you wish, or are they predetemined?
There’s definitely no great rush, though you do need to make some progress to survive your first winter and there will be occasional animal attacks. There’s very little actually ordering survivors around (though you can do this). Rather you mark tasks that need doing (chop these trees, hunt this animal, build a fence here, craft this much stuff etc) and let them get on with it. They will do mundane tasks (refuel the fire, harvest crops etc) without being prompted. You can give each survivor a priority for each task type so they work to their strengths.
It actually feels as though it channels The Sims a fair bit in places, though obviously the focus is different so it doesn’t have the same level of interactions.
Small shelters are a predetermined 2x3 (though they will link together), but once you’re making real buildings, you’re only tied to using a square grid. You build foundations, walls and roofs separately and freely (well, you need the foundation in place under the walls, obviously, but it doesn’t have to match the shape of the walls).
Within the buildings, the game detects the primary purpose of each room and gives you minor bonuses if you provide your survivors with a pleasant living space. For example, putting down flooring and making separate bedrooms (and making them bigger than necessary).
There are mechanics for heat transfer within (and out of) buildings but they feel a bit underbaked at the moment.
Ixiom just oozes atmosphere. I can’t wait for it along with most of the others. I have a bad feeling they’re all being released as EA though?
Against the Storm is planning 6 more months in EA. Not sure about the others. The article really should specify.
Stranded is good and playable. It very much is “3D Rimworld”, but it lacks the depth and polish of Rimworld. You can absolutely play through it, and it is fun, but some of the systems are unbalanced, there are things which seem like they aren’t implemented at all yet, and it feels a little thin.
If the devs just polish up what they have, it’d probably be worth it. I am hoping they add a little more to it. Rimworld itself can be kind of insanely long and deep – having a slightly lighter version of it with 3D graphics seems like a win to me.
Thank you! I’ll follow up and see what they focus on for the following updates.
On the other hand, I’m weak, and probably I’ll buy it when it comes with a discount.
Are there any city builders coming out this year, like for real? 1.0 releases and not EA?
I feel ya, man. Like 80% of my Steam wish list is city builders, and they’re all EA.