Recent reviews by t r e e f o r t

This Water 3.0 update has me changing my review to Recommend.

This game no longer punishes you for not playing it enough with a real-time timer. The devs listened to community feedback and completely re-engineered the water system that was keeping so many people from picking up this game. It's now a MUCH more interesting system that ties in with gameplay a lot better. This change re-invigorated my faith in this dev team, and I believe that this is going to be a stellar game eventually.

As it stands: Game is still janky in tons of ways, as it's very early access. If you're patient with jank and if you like the vision and the vibes, it's actually worth playing now. If not, it's still worth paying for now, as this dev team has demonstrated their commitment to taking feedback and making drastic changes if necessary, in order to make a sick game.

I love how this game looks and sounds - Many will hate it, as it's quite polarizing. It's uncompromising in its vision and have big respect for that. (The game literally looks and feels how the screenshots and trailer on the store page feel. If you hate it - you will hate it.)

I love that there's no forced tutorial that patronizes you like you've never played a video game before. It's a real "just figure it out dude" type of game. What you're even supposed to be doing and what your UI means are both very opaque when you first dive in. You don't really start learning until you start dying.

There is HEAPS OF POTENTIAL here but it's very janky right now. Selecting units feels like a chore - UI elements often just don't even register when you click on them. Units just have a mind of their own and you can "make suggestions" to them but they can and will just get stuck at the edge of the map shooting at nothing, and there's nothing you can do about it.

I think I really like this game, but it feels like things are just not working as intended right now. I hope it gets sorted out. Right now this is a "put it on your wishlist and wait a bit" type of game. Or if you wanna just be immersed in the awesome vibes, grab it now and enjoy yourself until you don't.

I promise this game is way cooler than the store page makes it look. Give it a try, then you can tell me if it's good or not.

If Tarkov were a nice steak dinner with friends, Zero Sievert is swinging by your favorite drive-in to grab a delicious burger. You get much of the same great flavors in a bite-sized on-the-go package.

As a new dad and busy homeowner, I have a tiny fraction of the gaming time that I used to, and can't dedicate myself to several hours of raids. I can, however, spin up Zero Sievert for 30 minutes and get 3-4 little hunts in, with the ability to pause, and so much less out-of-raid time setting up my kit.

Adding co-op would make this game perfect.

I don't often write reviews for games I haven't finished or sunk a large amount of time into. However - Moss was one of the first VR games I picked up while I'm waiting for a GPU upgrade for more graphically intense games. I picked up Moss in the Wonder of VR collection with other fun puzzle games to tinker around in while I wait. From the first few minutes, however, I found that this game is much better than I anticipated.

One of the important talking points for VR is "sense of scale" - It's often in the context of grand landscapes and huge impressive monoliths that make you feel small. You may be looking at this game and thinking a 3D platformer where you control a mouse wouldn't be a game that really highlights this. However in Moss, I believe it's just as important and just as impressive. You're floating above incredibly intricate and detailed miniature environments that make you feel like you're watching actual little animals running around. It's remarkable, and most importantly, adorable. Seriously, I can't get over how cute this game is.

I may be biased - I love miniature things in real life, such as model railroads or tabletop war games - This game is that same thing, but full of life and motion. I also loved Redwall books as a kid, and this game really taps into that type of world.

The gameplay is a classic puzzle platformer - It's mildly challenging and never frustrating. Controls are simple and solid. The gameplay itself isn't particularly innovative, but it's polished and enjoyable.

Don't judge a book by its cover - If you're looking at the screenshots and think "Meh, it just looks like an average 3D platformer", just wait into you see that little mouse for the first time with your headset on. You get sucked into the world almost instantly. Highly highly recommended for both seasoned gamers and curious people experiencing VR for the first time.

Barring few exceptions, I only ever find surival/crafting games fun when played with others. This is not an exception - it's a lot of fun... with others.

The core gameplay loop is rather unvaried:
80% - Collect trash with your hook, use trash to upgrade your raft of craft items. Collect fish with your fishing pole, cook&eat the fish.
15% - Sail to an island, anchor, loot the island. Put shark bait in the water and give yourself a couple minutes to dive underwater and grab different, more exclusive, trash.
5% - Attack the shark when he attacks your boat every few minutes. Eventually he dies, gives you meat, then a new shark comes.

There's sort of more than this. For instance, you can plant crops and such and chase seagulls away from them, but fishing seems to outclass farming rather handedly. Maybe my farm just wasn't at a big enough scale.

You can get pretty creative with your raft designs, but it can take a while to collect all those precious precious planks. As of January 2020, there's barely any variation in the islands or derelict rafts you can encounter. The seas can get stormy, which is exciting at first as you're bobbing around all over, but there's actually no effect on gameplay when the water gets choppy.

As with many early access games, there's a real glimmer of potential here. I'd love to see a lot more variation in the gameplay rather than solely the 3 items I listed above. As is, like stated previously, the game is quite fun with friends. Worth grabbing on a sale if your group likes this type of game.

Inevitably every review you read for this game will probably mention Factorio. It can't be helped.

I think this game is pretty great - It's not better than Factorio, but here are the reasons why I would choose to play it instead of Factorio.

- It's simply care-free. There are no enemies trying to ruin your factory, your townspeople won't revolt, you're not under a time limit. The challenge lies in building a town that's pleasing to you and there are many routes to take to get there.
- It's not punishing. Did you place a building down in the wrong spot? No worries you can just pick it up and move it again. Run out of money or food? No worries, just take some time to re-prioritize your factory and you'll soon be profitable again.
- It's as shallow or deep as you want it to be. Do you simply want a town run entirely on apples? No one's stopping you! However, if you want to try to exploit the dozens and dozens of resources and craftables, you've got hours of work ahead of you.
- It's cute. The art style reflects the attitude of the game, it's fun and cute. Most importantly, it's easy to look at and easy to understand. It's not anything jaw-dropping, but it's simple and clear.

As you can see I didn't exactly pour hours into this game, but I wouldn't have any qualms picking it up again for a few hours here and there. If you liked the concept of Factorio but either found it too overwhelming or too much of a time-sink, you might enjoy a more leisurely stroll in Factory Town.

TL;DR: A beautiful and polished shooter with tight and satisfying gunplay may not present a sufficient challenge for veteran PC FPS players, and may wear out quickly for those not looking to grind.

When you first fire up Destiny 2, there's a lot of take in, especially if you haven't touched the series before like I hadn't. I was immediately captured by the music and art style, and soon thereafter the entire space-renaissance aesthetic that this world is home to. I made my cool cloaked Awoken Hunter and was then immediately lost on what to do next.

Thankfully I had a slew of friends to guide me, they told me to go find Amanda Holliday in the tower and pick up the 3 campaigns she has to offer, and to start playing the Red War. Full disclosure here though, I don't really like single player shooter experiences or campaigns - once you've hunted The Most Dangerous Game, shooting AI just feel like a carnival game. That being said, the world you're thrown into is jaw-dropping. The colors, the sounds, the enormous backdrops of monolithic scale are all a lot to take in and enjoy. The game looks gorgeous and it actually runs fantastic - I didn't need to adjust any settings and my RX 580 was able to keep up beautifully keeping me close to 144 fps.

I did continue having some trouble navigating the confusing and convoluted menus. Even though I was "tracking" a quest to go and talk to a certain NPC, I still had problems figuring out exactly where it was telling me to go. Again, I thankfully had friends to guide me past these hurdles, but if I didn't, I may have given up entirely out of frustration.

After doing a couple of campaign missions I decided to branch out and try out what other types of activities I could spend my time in... and boy is there a handful. There are Strikes, Lost Sectors, Public Events, Bounties, Quests, Adventures, Patrols, Raids, Crucible Matches, Gambit Matches. Sound like a lot? Yeah... A lot of these are story-type linear missions you can do solo or with a friend. Some of them are just running around the open world portion of the game shooting baddies until you've shot enough of them to get a prize. The Crucible is PvP stuff, Gambits are kinda like a PvEvP stuff. Enough to keep you busy for a long long time!

So I finished The Red War campaign, I tried a bit of almost everything else. Throughout everything you do you're constantly getting rewarded with money, guns, and strange tokens that you can use to get more guns. It's an addicting and enjoyable reward system.

So I dropped about 45 hours into the game to give it a fair shot. I had fun in those 45 hours and I had some good times with my friends. Why am I not recommending it?

• It's too easy. I died more to accidentally jumping off the world than dying to enemies. The difficulty felt tuned to controller players. I felt overpowered from the very start of the game. Granted, I never did a raid and I heard those present a decent challenge - but I'm an adult and I work full time and so do all my friends. I have no time to raid.
  
• It doesn't take long to become a grind. After you've explored all the different nooks and crannies of the game, you're left to... run around doing the same thing and fighting the same enemies over and over. The reward for this is stronger gear, which from the very start of the game, I didn't feel like I needed. I'm strong enough already.
  
• The PVP is unexceptional. The modes are bog standard, the maps are randomized, the queue takes a long time. The netcode in this game is Peer-to-Peer and the more matches I played, the more this was apparent. The tight and satisfying gunplay from the PVE content was replaced by a "floaty" and "vague" feeling experience. PVP is usually what keeps me coming back to a game, and I have no desire to queue up for any more crucible matches.

I can definitely see how people would love this game and throw hours and hours into it. I'm not that type of person though - my idea of an enjoyable grind is leveling up my own skill in a game, not the skill/power of the character I'm playing. So this game wasn't made for me and that's fine - it's an incredible game for the people that it's made for.

What I like:
- Big open world to mess around in: Lots to do, lots to explore
- Slick parkour movement mechanics and satisfying melee combat

What I don't like:
- Lots of reused assets: Not a huge variety of zombie models
- Weak voice acting and lots of reused voice actors

But let's face it, you don't play this game for the story or the great writing and voice acting, you play it cause it's fun to run around and kill zombies with weapons you've crafted. If you're looking for a fun and go-at-your-own-pace co-op experience, you'll have a ton of fun with this one. I'd probably skip it if I were playing alone as it can get kind of grindy at times, but with a friend it's a great time!

The game has continually gotten small updates and seasonal events and challenges (even as they're developing the sequel) and The Following expansion is like a whole new game.

Disclaimer: I refunded this game due to the game causing my graphics driver to crash - possibly just because of my older hardware, but nonetheless.

I think this game is on the right track - It feels good and it feels like mountain biking. I especially liked the levels in 1st person POV - the feeling of speed is immense and gave me a hint of the feeling of going "too fast" on my own mountain bike. The devs nailed it here and that's good because in a mountain biking game I think that's the most important thing.

What the game currently lacks will hopefully be remedied in the future. Currently it's lack of variety. It's early access so it could go either way, but I hope this game gets a lot of love. I'm definitely keeping my eye on it for a potential purchase again in the future.

Would love to see a track editor at some point!