Rimworld is fun for a playthrough or two, before I begin to notice issues. As a farming game, it lacks a lot in animal husbandry and agriculture. As a combat simulator, it lacks in impact and tactics. As a management game, it lacks clear goals and usable interfaces. As a story simulator, it lacks empathetic characters and social interactions. These accumulate as you play, and persist as you continue.

It seems like Ludeon Studios was committed to creating a large spectrum of features that ultimately ended-up shallow. The most obvious example is the distribution of content. The majority of the game will take place in an industrial technology level: it's where the bulk of your structures, weapons, armor, resources, trade goods, and enemies will stem from. However, this is preceded by a bare-bones 'neolithic' technology level which exists to be left behind as it has no engaging content to justify spending any more time there than you have to. Next is a slim medieval tech level which similarly has gaps in content. After industrial is the 'Spacer' tech level which seems to exist almost exclusively for surviving the poor difficulty curve which will steadily throw more and more threats at you as you succeed until you crumble.

There's also a large inflation of how much different features actually impact the game. Do you have a surgeon from an advanced world and a herbalist from a medieval world? The herbalist is more capable of installing a bionic arm that they've never seen before because of statistical boosts tied to the backstory, and being from a culture that only recently invented the thermometer has no impact on their ability to build a rocketship. The 'relationship system' is a bunch of minor dice rolls you're likely to miss that will incrementally lead colonists to either trying to murder or marry each other with no room for player influence.

The community has seen these issues, and have made mods to answer them. The modding scene is honestly the best feature of the game, as they add quality of life that's been missing for half a decade, expand content in the barebones tech trees, add much-needed variety to combat beyond suicidal pirates with revolvers, and ways to enjoy your stay on the titular Rimworld as opposed to forcing the player to leave it as fast as possible. This modding community has been devoted for years, which makes the developer's decision not to add more content that reflects these vastly-popular solutions to gaping holes in the game simply peculiar.

I would recommend watching a dryer, less edited review of the game prior to purchasing it. Hours at a time of waiting for anything that breaks monotony are often edited-out, and the amount of mods to make the game enjoyable vary per player from as little as ten, to upwards of one hundred for people like myself.

Could probably do with fewer descriptions of incestuous child grooming which were added into the game after having to pass a review by studio staff who decided it was still fine and dandy, while still lacking on or half-assing features from a 2016 kickstarter/ 10