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Impressions: Len’s Island
I try to keep tabs on every survival game that comes out as, despite first appearances, there ain’t actually that many. So, when I got notice several weeks ago that not only has Len’s Island came out of Early Access but was also free to play over the weekend, I quickly jumped aboard.
Unfortunately, after playing about 6 hours or so, the game is a bust.
The problem with Len’s Island is that it feels like an A game. As in, one less A than AA. Maybe BB would work better? This is the game’s own description on Steam:
An open-world survival crafting game for 1–8 players, blending intense dungeon crawling and ARPG combat with peaceful farming and creative building. Take on quests and explore a vast, procedurally-generated world full of danger and discovery.
Yeah, no, almost all of that is misleading as fuck. Imagine my surprise when I figured out that in this “open-world survival crafting game” you… can’t actually craft armor. Armor drops from the end chest in dungeons, but not in an ARPG, Diablo-ish way either – it’s a singular, set piece. The only other way to get armor is to purchase some from vendors, who also tie into your general tech/decoration progression. There are like four weapons in the game and you just upgrade them with identical sets of resources for each tier. Quests do exist, but they are achievement/milestone style quests rather than any kind of coherent narrative. Perhaps things get spicy later on, I dunno, but I very much doubt it.
I’m not really sure there is much else to say. The general gameplay is not fun, the survival elements are nonexistent, and crafting itself is perfunctory. I haven’t been this disappointed since Farworld Pioneers.
Impressions: Stoneshard
I’ve played almost 40 hours of Stoneshard in the last two weeks. My opinions are… mixed, but hopeful.
Stoneshard is a brutal, turn-based fantasy/mercenary game where death is always around the next corner. It’s one of those “you’re not the hero” kind of stories, although in practice that just means you can run into super high-level enemies early on if you aren’t careful. The general gameplay consists of taking contracts to do X inside dungeon Y within 3 days, and then returning for your reward. Eventually, the contracts dry up at your original location, so you have to trek to another town and start the process again, hitting harder and harder dungeons. The most recent update (0.9.1.0 – Rags to Riches) includes a caravan feature that makes moving through the world much easier.
The brutality of the game comes in two flavors: cascading failure, and time disrespect.
Let’s start with time disrespect first. The world is broken up into tiles that you move through, just the same as you would move through a dungeon. While you can click on a distant spot to have your character “hop” square to square quickly (outside of combat), the fact remains you still have to walk. If the dungeon is six tiles away, that’s six full screens you have to get through. There are a bunch of herbs, mushrooms, berry bushes and the like to occupy yourself with – you need to craft a lot of fodder to fuel your caravan – and there is always the risk of an ambush from bandits or hostile wildlife as well. So, it’s not always boring to travel long distances. Plus, sometimes it’s fun to kind of vibe with the very excellent music and ambient noises.
Here’s the thing though: you can only save the game when resting. If you travel for those six tiles, survive a few ambushes, clear an entire dungeon (including the boss), and then get bit by a hidden snake and die a tile away from town… you lose all progress since the last time you rested.
Technically, there are ways to mitigate this sort of disaster. You can buy/purchase bedrolls, which take an enormous amount of limited bag space, to create a one-time use resting spot outside of the dungeon. This will prevent you from having to re-walk to the dungeon, but of course do nothing about the dungeon itself or the walk back. Or perhaps you can bring two bedrolls, use one, stash the other outside the dungeon, and then use the second once you complete the dungeon. The latest update introduces the caravan, which you can technically park close to the dungeon and mitigate the worst of it, if you’re willing to burn a bunch of time (there’s a cooldown after parking the caravan). Of course, the existence of the caravan “workaround” calls into question why there’s no Quicksave, or a smaller Meditation Mat, or whatever.
[Note: there is a Save & Quit feature, allowing you to exit the game. This save is deleted after loading.]
It’s important to know about this sort of thing because Stoneshard has a lot of cascading failure opportunities. You have Hunger and Thirst, which necessitates bringing a waterskin and snacks. When you are hit, damage is dealt to specific limbs, which can develop wounds or even Bleeds; make sure to pack Splints for the former and Bandages for the latter. Oh, and limbs have a Condition meter that reduces your maximum HP until they are healed, which is another consumable. Even if you heal the damage away, you have an overall Pain meter that accumulates unless reduced by beer/drugs. Enemy abilities can Stun, Stagger, Daze, Confuse, Immobilize, Ignite, and/or Poison you. Fatigue, Intoxication, Morale, and Sanity are also things. And all of these typically compound on one another, like how Pain gives you a debuff at certain thresholds that constantly drains Morale.
I am not actually opposed to all these “crunchy” systems. Choosing how many healing items to bring to the dungeon is a meaningful decision, and rewards the collection of crafting components and otherwise planning ahead. What I am opposed to is how often and how quickly these interlocking systems go from irrelevant to run-ending in a way you can do nothing about. Bleeding out at the end of a fight because you didn’t bring any/ran out of bandages? Fair play. Getting Dazed (turns off all your abilities for a few turns), then Immobilized, and then chopped in half within two turns? Okay then. The slow descent into insanity works in, say, Darkest Dungeon because damage is usually spread amongst a party and you get worn down. Here, you often just get hit a few times and die.
Ironically, that scenario doesn’t play out that often because you are always, 100% of the time trying to lure enemies out one at a time. Which is super effective! And sometimes boring. I play an Electromage with a few finishing moves via Staff. Electromancy is all about low cooldown spells that can Knockback or possibly Immobilize enemies. I just cleared out a 3-skull dungeon full of bandits and only got hit once, by an enemy that had a charge+attack move. So, perhaps my experience is a bit more skewed than if I were straight melee, sword & board with heavy armor; perhaps there’s more survivable damage.
Anyway, that’s Stoneshard. It’s still in Early Access, has been for years, and the updates themselves do not come quickly. That said, this is a game that has good “bones” and I can see it meaningfully improving with some tweaks and enhancements. The latest “Rags to Riches” release apparently changed the game’s compiler, which destroyed all existing mods – if/when that gets fixed, I could see mods coming to the rescue too. I’m certainly looking forward to being able to Quicksave anywhere.
Impressions: Enshrouded
I actually purchased Enshrouded on a sale prior to Nightengale and a few other games, but had been waiting until I finished those, lest I be too enraptured by what was going to be the better game. You know, eating your peas and mashed potatoes before the pudding.
As it turns out, I needn’t have bothered: Enshrouded is not fun to play.
Believe me, I’m as surprised as anyone. Enshrouded has sold 3 million copies in Early Access, and is specifically called out by the Nightingale devs as one reason why they are reengineering their game.
Let’s get this big note out of the way: Enshrouded is not an open-world survival crafting game. I had to look at the Steam store page to double-check, but sure enough, it’s billed as a “co-op survival action RPG.” It’s an important distinction because the crafting, resource gathering, and survival elements are all perfunctory at best. Do you punch trees and collect fiber from bushes? Yes. Can you craft the cloth or metal scraps you need for practically everything? No. Those come from mob drops, or occasionally from destroying tents or other objects out in the world. After a while, you realize that you don’t really need much of anything from environment in comparison to mob drops, which is textbook Action RPG with “survival-lite” elements.
One thing Enshrouded is very good for is terrain deformation. Almost absurdly so. Nearly every inch of terrain can be dug into with a pick, and setting down base marker will allow rapid mining in almost any configuration. If you ever wanted a Hobbit-style house or Dwarven palace, this game is for you. Regular mansions are just fine as well. Build whatever you want! …provided it is within bounds of a Flame Altar.
This is important to know because general movement in Enshrouded is crap. Encounter a steep hill? Sometimes you can jump and land on individual pixels and sometimes not. If you aim your pick awkwardly upwards you can sometimes dig out a little ledge to help you climb. Double-Jump is a talent you can spec into as well. Things you can’t do? Build a box and stand on it. Or use the Grappling Hook – that’s exclusively designed to hook onto metal rings in specific places. Later on, you can unlock giant towers that you can fast travel to the top of and then jump off and use a “glider” to get around. But the glider handles more like a wingsuit weighed down with tungsten anchors than anything else.
The sad part is that all of this poor mobility is likely bad by design. See, the central conceit of the game is that a Shroud has billowed out of the low places of the earth, killing those trapped inside. Venturing into these low-laying placed causes one to be “Enshrouded” and will result in death after a ~5 min timer expires. Meanwhile, poking your head outside of the Shroud will rapidly add time back onto the meter. Thus, if it were easy to grapple up hills and/or build structures anywhere one pleases, it would trivialize (to an extent) the threat posed by the Shroud. So… I get it. But I also get that Nightingale feels so immensely better being able to climb/grapple any surface and glide for ages via umbrella.
As for combat itself… meh. There are a few different types of melee weapons, but no real “moves” per se. There are block/parry and dodge-roll mechanics, along with bows and magic. I have heard the latter was nerfed recently, but I’m not sure if the abysmal magic system currently in the game is the result of that or if they made it that way on purpose. You can craft wands and staves early-on, with wands having infinite “uses” (that consume item durability) but extremely limited range. I’m talking practically melee range, for some reason. Staves, on the other hand, consume both MP and “ammo” scrolls or whatever, which can only be crafted once you rescue the Alchemist NPC. Why can you craft a staff before you have the resources to use it in any capacity?
So, yeah. Enshrouded. I have played for about ~7 hours thus far and every play experience goes the same way: sprint on a road for several minutes to some location, complete a micro-dungeon, fast-travel back to base. Repeat. Or in my case, Quit to Desktop because the play experience is exhausting. The world is gorgeous but devoid of anything interesting, combat is dull, magic is pointless, and going from place to place is skibidi Ohio no cap, as the kids say. Honestly, I should have expected something once I saw “Athleticism” as its own branch in the Path of Exile-style talent tree. Oh, and the devs are extremely miserly with the talent points and level-ups in the general.
Oh well. At least these are solvable problems that will hopefully be ironed out during Early Access.
Impressions: Nightingale
I had low expectations rolling into Nightingale – a Mixed review score on Steam and its own game directors professing disappointment will do it – but the game was surprisingly good. To be fair, I only started playing until after the Realms Rebuilt reengineering, so perhaps I would have been less surprised with the original rollout.
What I do want to note for posterity is my current giddiness and wonder surrounding the principle conceit of the game: portals to fae realms. I have played a lot of survival crafting games in my time, and it’s not particularly often that the world itself (or the potential thereof) excites me. But this initial Abeyance realm? Very excellent first impression. And as I was exploring the island, I kept thinking about how many problems realm-walking solves. Usually, carving up the world into disjointed instances is more of a programmer shortcut than artistic design, but it simply synergizes perfectly here. The only other games that achieved this level of environmental design brilliance for me was Starbound and No Man’s Sky. Getting that same feeling in a non-sci-fi setting is practically unheard of.
Now, it’s important to understand I haven’t actually made it off of this tutorial island yet. All this potentiality in my mind is exactly that: a superposition of imagination not yet intersected with reality. I have no doubt the waveform will eventually collapse and we’ll see, yet again, that the cat died in the box. But regardless of what ends up happening with Nightingale, I do want to see more things like this. I think having a more fae and/or eldritch angle on the genre is an otherwise untapped vein of novelty.
As far as general gameplay, Nightingale again surprised me in several ways. Chopping trees breaks off chunks, mining ore chips away rock where you hit it; little details like that go a long way with me. I remember reading people complaining about combat and the AI, but so far it appears serviceable, if not robust. The pseudo-zombie Bound mobs run, crawl, lurch towards you from multiple angles. Your character can block, get knocked around from attacks, and have a dedicated dodge button. Non-standard traversal is also supported, with a Mary Poppins-style umbrella glide and rock-climbing picks that you can also throw at surfaces to grappling hook yourself up. Again, all on the tutorial island.
One huge innovation that I hardly ever see in any game is the fact that multiple different resources can be used in recipes. For example, one cooking recipe calls for two Raw Edible Plants – this can be satisfied with mushrooms, blueberries, barberries, etc, or mixed and matched. This may not seem like a big deal, but think about all the times you’ve had wolf meat in a game but couldn’t craft something because it required boar meat or whatever. Additionally, all these resources have specific bonuses associated with them. Gloves need Hide to craft? Okay, well, you can use Hide (Prey), Hide (Predator), or Hide (Bug), and they will confer +Stamina, +HP, or +StaminaRegen respectively.
Having said that, there are definitely some… let’s say opportunities for quality of life improvements.
I was able to recruit a follower NPC who helpfully assists me in combat and also picks up resources automatically. That’s great! Their inventory is not weight-based like mine though, it’s item-based. While this works out in my favor if I’m loading them down with heavy resources like wood or stone, they are just as likely to fill their pockets with leaves and twine, necessitating some awkward inventory management. Furthermore, while I greatly appreciate being able to craft from storage, could we craft from NPC inventory too?
Also, while I love the idea of “decorative” objects conferring a bonus to crafting stations and items created, it feels real dumb to have no control over which bonuses take precedent. Maybe this is a “problem” that gets solved later on with higher-tier crafting stations (that have more than two enhancement slots), but once I realized I had to move the Hunting Trophy across the house in order for the Training Dummy to grant my crafted Knife +Critical Damage, I wanted to throw the entire system in the trash. Like, what’s the design intention, folks? Am I supposed to have two separate Crafting Tables set up, one surrounded by objects that grant me 20% ammo per craft and +Damage on ranged weapons, and the other near objects with +Melee modifiers? Or is my “pick it up and place it in another room” workaround the design goal? Just… let us toggle which ones are active.
——
Having made it to the 2nd island, things are getting a bit more abrasive. The enemies are much harder, presumably tuned to be a challenge for players in Tier 2 equipment. But the only real way to get Tier 2 equipment is to gather Tier 2 essence to unlock the upgraded crafting stations. Meanwhile, surprise, the realm has a negative modifier that reduces your HP regeneration. The whole situation was a bit brutal. But now I’ve unlocked a bow that literally deals 100 more damage per arrow than I deal currently, using materials I can gather from my Abeyance realm. Which… is not the way that is typically supposed to work. Anyway, once that gets crafted, I’ll continue onwards to farm mobs for essence to unlock more crafting stations so I can craft the gear that will allow me to be actually successful in exploring the area.
Anyway, if I had to sum up the things I would like addressed over Early Access thus far, it would be:
- Toggle active Augmentations on crafting stations
- Craft from NPC inventory
- Sort by Weight option when viewing NPC inventory
- Remove or reengineer Hunger Meter (Food buffs mean you’re always full anyway)
- Reimagine the Magick/spells system entirely (it’s barely supported and boring to boot)
- Tighten up traversal mechanics, e.g. what can be climbed, grappled, etc
- Allow us to build bridges
Other than that, so far, I’m very impressed.
Impressions: Abiotic Factor
Short version: Highly impressive survival crafting game in Early Access.
The overall vibe Abiotic Factor has going for it is the original Half-Life (complete with polygon counts from 1998) from the perspective of the scientists. You play as a new recruit to a secret Australian (?) underground laboratory doing SCIENCE… on things from another dimension. Something happens literally during your first day of orientation, the base goes on lockdown, and you are basically on your own to escape.
One thing I loved immediately was the novelty of the survival experience. Playing this game reminded me of playing Subnautica for the first time when none of my “punch trees” experience applied. Sure, the wooden crates give wood, but you’re mostly in an office setting at first, and wood isn’t even really what you need to craft the basic items. You might not think slinking through cubicles, snatching keyboards and breaking monitors for their sweet, sweet coils while hiding from alien monsters would be fun… or maybe you would. Because it is. There was some primal pillow fort energy when I set up my base in the gym area, hiding in terror from the rampaging night bots, and then making forays into the break rooms for literal supplies – including buying food from the vending machines to tide me over! – while getting my in-game bearings.
Are there some rough edges? Sure. One of those edges is, in fact, somewhat systemic: being a survival crafting game at all in a relatively linear, plot-driven narrative. While you can possibly spend in-game weeks in the first area, the fact of the matter is that you need to specifically craft X using resources from Y to open the next area Z. Once in that new area, you will encounter new obstacles, new crafting material, and new things to take into account, which is good. What wasn’t immediately clear to me though is that I should have packed up everything I built in the first zone and carted it with me rather than starting from scratch in the new zone. It certainly feels lame leaving an upgraded workbench that can auto-heal and warm you by proximity and going somewhere with a dearth of the more basic building materials. It especially felt super lame when I got locked into an extended journey sequence that resulted in my entire plant farm dying from lack of water while I was gone. So much for utilizing the more advanced cooking options, eh?
Aside from those sour grapes though, Abiotic Factor nevertheless gets high marks from me. While most workbenches require power and thus need to be located near power outlets, everything else can be placed just about anywhere. Which includes literal ramps and platforms that allow you to skip certain areas entirely. Now, whether you actually want to skip any opportunity to hoard bundles of pens, deconstructed file cabinets, and other debris is up to you. Personally, I tend to steal everything not nailed down and sometimes even that stuff too. You just never know what may come in handy.
What I do know is that I liked Abiotic Factor enough to stop playing, so the devs can finish cooking.
7 Days to More Money
In a completely unexpected turn of events, 7 Days to Die is actually coming out of Early Access. Soon!
The Fun Pimps are happy to announce 7 Days is leaving Early Access! With the launch of the next update, we’re moving officially to 1.0 for 7 Days to Die.
TFP Co-Founder Richard Huenink details the move in this Video. He’ll talk about our decision to leave early access, the tentative launch dates for PC and Console Alpha 22 (Now 1.0), the roadmap of planned future updates and features ahead for all platforms, and the games new pricing.
I say “completely unexpected” because, well, it is. The game has indeed been in Early Access for 12 years already, with Alpha 22 (now “1.0”) slated to come out in a few months. However, the Early Access period has been so long due to the dev team having no project manager – each major release has radically redesigned the scope of the game, changing progression mechanics, and otherwise putzed around art assets without actually making forward progress on systems or endgame.
But now they are, so… why aren’t I happy? Take a gander at the roadmap:
I don’t think you really even need to know anything about the base game to intuit that the stuff in the 2025 columns would, in fact, be a more appropriate 1.0 experience. In particular, Bandits have been promised for literal ages, and are still nowhere to be found. Do I believe we will get a UI/Main Menu Overhaul? Yes I do. Will there also be Bandits? Not falling for it this time, Lucy.
What is really going on with this 1.0 release is the increase in base pricing.
Q: Why increase the cost?
A: We feel as though the quality standard of the game has gone up significantly from when the initial price was set over 8 years ago along with over a decade of content and improvements. We’ve looked at how others have handled leaving early access, and this is a common practice. We in particular want the price of the PC version to have parity with the Console version. We do not wish to force any current users to spend more money to play the game they’ve always supported. However, new users should see the value the game offers reflected in the cost, and we hope that continued support might fund future endeavors in expanding the 7 Days to Die game even further – DLCs, Expansions, and continued free updates (including everything listed in the Road Map)!
Look, my intent is not necessarily to paint The Fun Pimps as capitalistic assholes. I bought the game 7 (!) years ago for $10, and even now you can still purchase it this week for $5.99 ahead of the $44.99 (!!) price increase. In those years, I have played for over 327 hours. And regardless of any price increases, my copy will be upgraded for free, I’ll get all the updates for free, and so on.
It’s just that this “release” is clearly a business decision first.
This is especially true in terms of the console re-release. The history is that the game was released on consoles back in 2017 but had been stuck in Alpha 15 ever since then because porting company went bankrupt. We’re in Alpha 21 on PC, for reference. The Fun Pimps reacquired the rights a few years ago, but financially it never made sense for them to hire out another porting team. Until now.
Q: What about the old Console version?
A: Due to the significant technical differences between old and current console hardware, we will not be upgrading the legacy version. Legacy owners will have to buy the new title. However, we are working closely with Sony and Microsoft to provide a discount to digital legacy owners on their purchase of the new console edition.We made the decision early on to focus on a ‘new’ version of the game that is unified with our PC version, and our efforts to update the game post-launch will be entirely focused on that version.
Again, good on them for trying to get console fans a discount, assuming such a thing materializes. It also makes sense that you may have to cut your losses and start fresh with a new version given all the difficulties up to this point.
I just… I dunno. It’s complicated. As I mentioned last year, each Alpha has included a seemingly pointless overhaul of the progression system, although each iteration has taken it further and further away from zombie MineCraft and more towards something generic. Once upon a time, you would come across a small town and break into houses to scavenge for supplies and hope a big wandering mob of zombies didn’t stroll in after you. Now, 100% of the Points of Interest are mini-dungeons with traps, blocked corridors, zombies popping into existence when you cross thresholds, and a loot chest at the end. Which is cute the first time you come across the PoI, but later you just stack wooden frames and hack your way through the roof to get the loot chest and skip the mini-dungeon part.
Assuming you aren’t just spam-completing quests from the Traders, since that is actually the best way to get gear; crafting shit with resources you gather is sooooo 2017. Oh, and base-building? Yawn. Despite the fact the entire game is premised on a wave of zombies attacking you every 7 days, the devs have decided that the zombies are omniscient structural engineers who know both the shortest distance to your brains and which specific wall cubes in the way have the least amount of HP. Which, of course, means “traditional” structures like bunkers or buildings with a bunch of traps surrounding it are pointless. Instead, you need to construct Ninja Warrior obstacle courses for zombies to tight-rope walk towards you single-file for anything you build to have meaning.
Or just sit on top of a roof for a couple of weeks before moving to a different building. Whichever.
In fairness, all of this nonsense was introduced in patches, and it’s entirely possible to remove it in the same way. Given the consistency in which the devs have moved backwards though, I don’t have much faith in them spontaneously understanding why their game was popular to begin with and to stop undermining it. So while the business decisions they are making with 1.0 are rational and the last-chance deals magnanimous, I still don’t like it.
About the only bright side to all this is that, perhaps, having a firmer foundational codebase will encourage more modders to fix all the bullshit. Darkness Falls is already a transformational mod that improves the game in about every way, and I know of others (Undead Legacy). That last Q4 2025 slide does says “Steam Workshop Support” so that may be the golden ticket. We’ll just have to see.
Reinvestment
Palworld, as we’ve established, is having a moment. A sensation, if you will. The latest figures is it selling 25 million copies across Steam and Xbox in a single month. It also breached the 2.1 million concurrent players milestone on Steam, which puts it at #2 of all time, above even Counter-Strike. Palworld has not sustained that concurrency, but it’s nevertheless in exclusive company.
That’s not really what I wanted to talk about today though.
I want to talk about the Japanese blog post by the Palworld game director that was released three days before the official launch. It details the 5+ miracles that he credits with even being able to get Palworld released at all. For example, the gunplay was all designed by a 20-year old convenience store clerk they found on Twitter, who created 3D renders of weapon reload animations in his free time. There are other bits of interesting serendipity, so let Google auto-translate for you and take the ride.
One element that struck me in particular though: funding.
So I thought the other way around. What is the maximum budget? The most obvious upper limit would be the limit at which the company would go bankrupt. Of course, you can borrow money, but let’s think about that when the balance in your bank account becomes zero. The budget limit is initially until the balance in your bank account reaches zero. When it reaches zero, you can borrow money.
In that case, do you need to manage your budget?
No, all you have to do is borrow money or release money just before the company goes bankrupt and your account balance drops to zero.Well, we’ll probably be able to develop it for about two more years. For the time being, I decided to keep making it without worrying about the budget. We want to complete it as soon as possible, so let’s hire a lot of people.
So that was Miracle #5, in that they basically built Palworld without setting a budget at all. It’s actually a bit more interesting than even that, because they didn’t originally want to spend a lot of time making the game at all. But, due to the positive feedback from the initial trailers, they decided to go for broke.
What really gets me though is this last part:
Almost all of the company’s money was gone.
It’s as calculated!
Well, maybe it’s as calculated…?
No matter how you look at it, it’s just a miracle.
It is not known how much money it cost. I don’t even want to see it.Judging from Craftopia’s sales, it’s probably around 1 billion yen…
Because all those sales are gone.
In case you were unaware, before Palworld this company released Craftopia. Which is also still in Early Access. The game isn’t bad, actually, and shows a lot of promise under the jank. Or showed. Because although it is clear that Craftopia’s measured success bankrolled Palworld, it’s not so clear whether any of those millions of Palworld dollars will make their way back back to Craftopia. And that’s just sad.
I get it – this is how most things work pretty much everywhere, especially in the game industry. Release game, collect revenue, use money to continue employing people to create new game, repeat. Indeed, if a particular release falls flat on its face, not only is that series’ future imperiled, sometimes the company itself is at risk. But in this case, the original game (Craftopia) isn’t even done yet. The creators of ARK infamously released a DLC to their Early Access game, but it was arguably necessary because they were running out of cash ($40 million lawsuit settlement will do that to you). I get no sense that Pocket Pair were in similar straits. Rather, it was likely a cold calculation that the Craftopia well was drying up and it was time to move on to other milkshakes, to mix metaphors.
Obviously, the move worked out for Pocket Pair. And, yeah, for millions of players too. I am happy for these devs’ success, as their willingness to try random shit and just go for it is (hopefully) an inspiration to other studios. I just hope some of that Palworld money comes back to Craftopia in a meaningful way, and not just a “we’ll keep these five original dudes employed in a broom closet” way. They don’t have to and economically it would probably be a mistake. But I think they owe it to themselves.
And that’s because without Craftopia there literally wouldn’t be a Palworld. Not just in the funding aspect either. Craftopia actually has capture spheres, riding creatures, and even the ability to capture human NPCs. This is a “Yo dawg, I put Early Access in your Early Access” situation – Palworld is probably 25% of what Craftopia already delivered years ago. Is it the best 25%? Well, it’s hard to argue against a literal pile of free speech cash.
I suppose we’ll have to see how Pocket Pair proceeds. There is technically still a roadmap for Craftopia (circa December 2023) and there have been a few bug patches released since then. I seriously doubt that any amount of reinvestment will have Craftopia achieve a comparable level of success as Palworld – clearly even AAA games have been blown aside – but I do hope that they at least replenish the coffers and allow Craftopia to reach release with the vision and funds it originally earned.
Impressions: Palworld
In case you haven’t heard the news, Palworld is doing gangbusters: 2 million copies sold in the first 24 hours. And now 4 million within three days. It even hit a peak concurrent player rate of 1.2 million players on Steam, which leapfrogged it past Cyberpunk 2077 and into the top 5 of all time.
That is insanely impressive considering it’s also on Game Pass and Epic Game Store, so that’s just a fraction of its total reach.
Palworld’s tagline is “Pokemon with guns,” which is basically just S-Tier marketing and nothing else. The reality is that it’s “ARK with Pokemon”… like completely. Each time you level up, you get Engram Technology points which you spend to unlock specific recipes on specific tiers. You also get Attribute points to level up one of your base stats like carry weight, attack damage, Stamina, etc. Even the building mechanism via the menu wheel feels identical. Which isn’t to say it’s all bad, just that “Pokemon with guns” is exploiting an information gap in the promotional materials that becomes apparent right away in the gameplay.
Having said that, Palworld does indeed make some good innovations in the general ARK formula. The biggest thing you notice right away is that Pals can be set to work in your camp. The work that Pals can complete differs based on their type – Lamballs hang around Ranches to self-groom their wool, Cattivas will work in your Quarries – but most of them can do basic stuff like wandering around and moving supplies to chests. The fact that they do anything at all beyond staying stock-still waiting for an mistaken Follow-All whistle makes Pals miles better than the dinosaurs of ARK.
Unfortunately, I cannot comment much further impression-wise because Palworld started to crash to desktop in 5-minute increments for me. Some Early Access releases are basically soft-launches of fully playable games (Against the Storm, etc), but Palworld is very Early Access in… let’s say, the more traditional sense. It’s been a while since I played something that lacked the ability to Exit the game. Like, you literally have to Alt-F4 to turn the game off.
…unless you are playing the Steam (or non-Game Pass) version. There has already been a patch v0.1.2 release to address various bugs, including some that cause crashes and also a bug that causes ambient sounds to not play. Which is a big deal, as the silence when running around is a bit conspicuous. Also, Steam players get an Exit button on the menu. For the Game Pass plebs like myself, such a patch has to go through Microsoft’s certification process, and who knows when that will go live. For how much Microsoft pays to have Day 1 releases on Game Pass, it’s a pretty big limiting factor for these Early Access titles.
Honestly, it almost makes me want to just buy the game on Steam. Almost.
As it stands, I’m pretty conflicted about playing Palworld further at the moment. The crashes to desktop notwithstanding, there are other elements to the game that are very early Early Access. Your base can be raided by AI, for example, but the two times I got the notification, the enemies spawned down a hill and never moved even when I started attacking them. One of the v0.1.2 patch notes mentions how the arrows recipe went from 1:1 to 3:1, which is significant reduction in terms of resources you have to grind – I have not yet found a Pal that cuts trees, so I’m still manually doing that. While the EA dilemma is something you always have to consider, it’s been a while since I had to weigh it against really basic functionality like this.
Of course, the fact that the scales had to come out at all is indicative that Palworld is on to something. Is it ground-breaking innovation? Nope. I described it as “ARK with Pokemon” before and it still really feels that way. But ARK peaked at less than 250k concurrent players on Steam, ever. Sometimes the derivatives end up being better than the original. Or maybe devs should be selling their games for $30.
The Waiting Place: December 2023
A non-exhaustive list of things I am waiting on for one reason or another.
Waiting on Sales
- My Time at Sandrock
- Dave the Diver
- Zero Sievert
- Vintage Story
- Dead Island 2
- Dying Light 2
I’ve really been kicking myself over passing on Sandrock during the Thanksgiving sales. I was busy playing other games at the time, but I got the itch really bad after playing Coral Island and now anything else I play feels like, well, that I’m trying to distract myself from itching. Aside from that, Dead Island 2 was almost good enough of a deal during Thanksgiving, but there was some kind of fuckery going on with the base game versus game + DLCs or something that made me pause.
Waiting on Updates/1.0 Releases
- Stardew Valley – v1.6 with major changes
- Kynseed – Out now, but needs updates/fixes
- Sons of the Forest – February 2024
- Smalland: Survive the Wilds – Q1 2024
- Once Human – Q3 2024
- The Planet Crafter – sometime 2024?
- Core Keeper – Summer 2024
- Valheim – sometime 2025?
I thought about booting up Stardew Valley again with some of the expanded mods to give that a whirl, but the looming 1.6 release gave me pause. Updates that big will probably impact the mods too, so that will take some time to sort out. I’ve had an eye on Kynseed for a while, and there is some developer drama I’m not keen on, but the lack of sales (and needed updates) make that easier to wait for. Just looked at the roadmap for Valheim and they are expecting 2 more years in Early Access so… yeah. Already been 2 years, what’s 2 more? There will be plenty of other games releasing into Early Access (and possibly out of) in the meantime.
Early Access Launches
- Enshrouded – January 2024
- Palworld – January 2024
- Nightingale – February 2024
- Light No Fire – TBD
- Rooted – TBD
- Under a Rock – TBD
I’m pretty excited about all of these, honestly. The release date trailer for Enshrouded was pretty great, and I’ve watched enough of the “demo” streams to feel pretty confident it will have an enjoyable Early Access experience. Palworld is Palworld. Nightingale is one where I’m worried about how the idea of it might end up better than the finished project. We shall see.
In An Age 
Running Out of (Fae) Road
Sep 27
Posted by Azuriel
I am done with Nightingale, (presumably) for now.
I stand by all of my prior reporting, including the original Impressions post. There is a lot of potential with the game and its central realm-walking conceit, the ability for it to introduce fantastical creatures, an absurdly complex crafting system, and how great it feels to move around and exist in these magic(k)al worlds. Overall there is a lot to like here, and Steam tells me I spent 39 hours playing Nightingale. That’s pretty good for any game, let alone an Early Access title.
That said… there is still a long way for Nightingale to go.
The first problem is the consistently uneven difficulty spikes. Right after completing the tutorial island, you are shuttled off to Sylvan’s Cradle, a realm suffering from corruption. This corruption impacts you as well, with a realm-wide massive debuff to passive healing. You are then confronted almost immediately with a new type of Bound enemy that is insanely aggressive and hard-hitting, along with all mobs in general being at “level” 20. Your own gear progression is dependent on collecting higher-tier Essence and spending it to unlock new recipes and crafting tables. And therein lies the rub: you must suffer through being wildly underpowered until you grind enough T2 Essence to spend to craft gear to get back you on par.
And, spoilers, you will smash into the same wall again two realms later with T3 Essence.
By itself, uneven difficulty isn’t that big an issue, although the devs have gotten themselves in a bit of a pickle with the hard T1/T2/T3 Essence delineations. To me, the more relevant problem is a lack of consistent vision when it comes to crafting more generally. There are stats like Injury Resistance that sound important (damage reduction?!), but end up being worthless (prevent sprained ankle). Under Alchemy, they have things like a potion that fills your hunger meter. Literally, why? Food is everywhere and the importance of food buffs means you must be eating all the time. There are other potions to reduce being hot, which is also easily solved by equipping an umbrella, nevermind the fact that heatstroke or whatever simply limits your Stamina regeneration.
One aspect that is also utterly bizarre is the very thing Nightingale cannot afford to fuck up: realm-walking. Specifically, the absolutely nonsense direction they are heading with the Minor Realm cards. Shortly after completing Sylvan’s Cradle, you get the recipe to start building your own portals. Opening a portal means crafting and consuming a Major Realm card to one of the three available biomes (Forest, Swamp, Desert). Minor Realm cards can be used at a Realmic Transmuter within that realm to tweak “the rules” and usually the weather in the process. At first glance, there appears to be a lot of Minor Realm cards, but the more you look at them, the more questions you end up having.
The first group of Minor Realm cards are environmentally cosmetic, which is fine. Cleansing makes the realm turn back to default settings, Foresworn Skies makes it look like a black hole is overhead, Tempest makes it rain all the time, and so on. Then you have some pure upside cards like Feast/Tavern that boost food buffs, Angler makes fishing easier, Treasury lets you farm Essence. Then come the tradeoff ones like Dragon’s Hoard, that boost treasure chest contents but increases damage taken. Fine.
But then you see Blunderbuss that literally says:
What? The devs included realm cards for pistols and rifles, by the way, so don’t feel left out. Additionally, there are realm cards that improve the yield of refined building materials, of wood, of ore, of crops, of meat/hide. All separate, of course, and occur only after the realm visibly shatters into a new form from the use of said card.
I’m honestly struggling to identify the design goal here. Is it intended for players to radically remake the realm in order to craft extra shotgun shells, and then revert it to another form to increase the yield on Wheat? Or should this encourage players to turn their primary residence into the City of Doors with portals to themed realms and otherwise endure the loading screens for marginal gains? Why are there output-related cards at all? Tempest makes it rain all the time, which means your crops will always be growing without needing to be manually watered. That sort of thing is what I consider good design – it’s subtle, intuitive (after a fashion), and atmospheric (literally). But then you have Greenhouse/Farm card which just straight-up increases plant growing speed and yield “for reasons.” Are these placeholders? Please tell me these are placeholders. Although placeholders for what I have no idea.
By the way, realms can only have one Minor Realm card at a time. Again, WTF mate? When I first heard about this portal system, I imagined being able to mix and match cards to craft bizarre realms like a very mountainous swamp or whatever. No Man’s Sky this ain’t. Instead, it’s just three procedurally-generated biomes with different skyboxes and min-max bonuses. Granted, there is a Trickster card that lowers gravity and shuffles up resources sources – chopping down trees give meat, skinning creatures gives ore, etc – but most everything else is rote. Safe. Sanitized. Much like with Starfield, you also end up seeing the same POIs and ruins over and over again.
Technically, there’s still time to right the ship before Nightingale runs out of road, to mix metaphors. Well, maybe. I doubt the realm generation code is flexible enough to accept blended biomes. Or maybe the original three will stay as-is and we’ll see others like Snow, Volcanic, and maybe some kind of Chaotic realm. Actually, I just found a quote:
Well, there you go. I do think that if they keep the bizarre Blunderbuss-esque Minor Realm cards around, they need to have it as an augmentation to an environmental-style Minor Realm card. That may lead to clearly-optimized combinations like Tempest + Farm, but they should either lean all the way into the nonsense or throw away half the cards immediately. When I think “Victorian gaslamp-fantasy adventure,” what does not come to mind is rewriting the rules of fae realms to make just my pistols better. Now, opening a realm to where all the Bound are wielding pistols and/or there are giant enchanted pistol enemies? That sort of thing is interesting.
Getting devs to gamble on “interesting” is not easy. Especially not when they’re already on their heels.
Posted in Commentary
2 Comments
Tags: Armchair Game Development, Early Access, Game Design, Nightingale, WTF mate?