Recent reviews by ⸸ Gobbo ⸸

TLDR; was surprised to be reminded that this game is out of early access. It shouldn't be. Extremely unbalanced 4/10

The Good
[ + ] great sound track
[ + ] decent graphics, game looks (mostly) nice
[ + ] base building system that allows you to bring your build to another world, instead saving them to the character rather than the world/save
[ + ] building system is fun and (mostly) not a pain to use
[ + ] gear isn't dropped upon death


Worth Mentioning
[ -/+ ] That (mostly) fun building system is unfortunately coupled to a foundation system that can be a real headache, and likes to ignore the existence of pillars
[ -/+ ] Bad weather damages buildings that aren't covered by a roof, and said rooves like to be extremely finicky on what they are and aren't covering despite the roof beside them providing 100% coverage (doors were the biggest offender)
[ -/+ ] No voice acting


The Bad
[ - ] Combat & its animations feel very stiff and clunky in a very inconsistent/unreliable attack + parry system that can't seem to figure out where it wants hit boxes to be. Added bonus of a plethora of bugs including teleporting/falling through the floor enemies & the ever wonderful "I can hit you but you can't hit me"
[ - ] The entirety of the bug pet/tame system is gamebreaking levels of imbalanced, even at level 1. Smalland feels comfortably difficult when you start, before plummeting to an absolute breeze the moment you unlock the ability to tame bugs. I.E: The scorpion starts with 2k health and has base damage of 50-60 for its fast melee + 60-70 w/ a 30-40 poison heavy attack. At level 1. For context, my level 70ish character with 100 STR & Legendary weapons was doing far less than it was.
[ - ] Pets can and will consistently yeet you off of Great Tree elevators (the only way to get up or down them) thanks to the endless clipping issues this game suffers from
[ - ] Pets can and will decide their defense post on top of the Great Tree is actually along its sides, and not go back to their original location even when they slide all the way down to the base of the tree.
[ - ] The option to turn off Pets permanently kicking the bucket and not attacking each other/turning off Friendly Fire is Multiplayer only. Unfortunately, this also means stopping Pets from permanently dying every time they waddle into or fall off something into a river, is Multiplayer only.
[ - ] A bug where pets can still permanently die despite every setting to prevent it being on both exists, and is not uncommon.
[ - ] Pets will always be infinitely better than you no matter how much you sink into damage stats/gear.
[ - ] Pets will damage near-by buildings even with Friendly Fire off, as well as damaging & eventually destroying any traps they stand on top of (without taking any personal damage, at least). They will also hit each other and randomly begin fighting amongst both themselves & other players pets during combat.
[ - ] Game doesn't like to explain its own mechanics, and relies on third-party websites to do that instead.
[ - ] you NEED Intelligence to make (and repair, for even the smallest sliver of a repair) better gear, but you also don't need that gear. The % increase is nowhere near enough to make a difference when being compared to the wildly overpowered pets at your disposal. This only changes with the last weapon in the game, but that's solely because it's a 225-550ish (350-500ish Legendary) vs the 32-37 ballpark of its competitors.
[ - ] Player attributes do not scale equally to the rest of the game, making Constitution worthless and Dexterity a dump stat.
[ - ] Game disrespects your time overall; crafting takes too long, building takes too long, you need far too much wood (that also takes too long to gather) simply to exist, bad weather/winter forces you inside for far too long, repairing both buildings and equipment takes too many mats, events take too long for far too little reward, Great Tree lift takes too long, certain quests force you down very unnecessarily long paths... everything to do with time is bloated.
[ - ] Despite not having an overall lifeless world, exploration is boring and unrewarding. Points of interest are nothing more than reskins and barely unique arrangements of standard assets, every piece of lore is abandoned as quickly as its presented. Really doesn't help that you start paying attention to the copy+pasta assets everywhere, as there's not much to distract you from noticing.
[ - ] World settings are pretty bare bones, giving very limited control to the host over their experience, while also making the monster damage/health scale also apply to player pets.
[ - ] Cooking remains an entirely wasted mechanic that has no real benefits, outside of "woo I fufilled my survival game nom nom quota"
[ - ] There's very little to no guide on quests, to the extent of where it wouldn't be uncommon or even a difficult ask to completely miss the fact that there's a main story quest line. While I'm certainly not saying to add something over the top like a golden path, being unaware you're even on a quest to begin with is a testament to how weak the UI overall is. My group thought it was just part of the tutorial.

TLDR; There's a lot of good ideas here, but it's a buggy mess that isn't worth the time in its current state. Lukewarm 4.5/10.

The Good
[ + ] graphics are on point (albeit the lighting can be pretty bled out on high settings)
[ + ] dual monitor friendly, allows Windows' built in shift+window+arrow
[ + ] game settings can be edited on the fly while still being in game
[ + ] automatic Unstuck function (with an easy manual Unstuck button)
[ + ] Squadron/companion system is mostly functional & fun to use (though the AI...)
[ + ] (mostly) enjoyable combat system with basic directional swings
[ + ] responsive & fluid directional block system that allows you to turn off Fluid Blocking & Block Assist

Worth Mentioning
[ -/+ ] Fur does not look good/exposes the fabric underneath to instead look like hair that grew out your characters shoulders, and most armor/gear clips (cape+quiver = forever clipping)
[ -/+ ] No swimming; you just get auto-warped out if you end up in too high of water. While this in itself isn't an issue, even knee high water will auto-warp you and can become problematic in the swamp areas against enemies who have no such problems.
[ -/+ ] Bandit patrols walk Land of the Dead style at the bottom of rivers while patrolling/heading to their destination/heading to you (don't bother trying to fight them there, they turn into teleporting wizards near rivers)
[ -/+ ] Housing tents/Houses have storage that you cannot stop villagers from infinitely taking stuff out of, as they want absolutely nothing (outside of weapons/armor, it seems) stored in there at any point in time unless you make every single other storage container in the entirety of your save not accept that specific item type. And they will BEELINE to them to clear them out when you build a new storage & don't have the option checked for a couple seconds (every single villager that had the action queued up will still take an inventory full of whatever it is to the new storage, too). Drove my group nuts
[ -/+ ] Pretty non-existent character customisation that shares assets with NPCs
[ -/+ ] No in-game gamma control
[ -/+ ] Auto-run is actually auto-walk seeing as hitting shift/starting to run cancels it & running while starting it automatically drops you to a walk

The Bad
[ - ] There are a LOT of bugs. Game crashing, game breaking, save nuking bugs.
[ - ] Multiplayer players will be kicked almost every single time you disassemble a Dirt Road
[ - ] Sensitivity settings are bleh; Controller gets full control of its sensitivity with # specifics (camera, combat camera + ranged aiming camera) but KB+M is limited to ONLY a generic camera sensitivity %
[ - ] The UI is awful. You have no control of its resolution scaling, words barely fit their containers in 1920x1080, there's no use of color differentiation, you can't zoom in close enough to map to actually see all the symbols in a large settlement, herb symbols are both too small and too similar to the map colors, the crafting box for villagers makes you scroll through giant craft menus instead of the few tasks you have on that bench, etc etc etc
[ - ] Lots of armor/weapons, but the difference between them is nonexistant to minuscule (or just plain worse, like 1 to 2 armor increase for 2 to 5% across the board speed decrease) and it ends up becoming inventory/crafting menu bloat that is a pain to navigate through
[ - ] The game forces you to initiate your first liberation while still in Tier 1 to reach Tier 2, and opponents you now must face in large numbers are Brigands wearing full armor/using Tier 3 weapons. You do not have any defensive buildings made available to you and they will one shot you and your companions, two at most in full armor, while most of your attacks bounce off them for little to no damage. Once you liberate your first town, you're now forced to deal with Brigands on the constant (as they have their own raid timer & always come in full force) and this difficulty spike discomfort persists all throughout Tier 2 (though I did have a couple good laughs at the militia being swatted around like flies every time I tried to use them to help with reclamation parties).
[ - ] Raids are extremely underwhelming, especially in comparison to reclamation parties, and quickly become nuisances rather than actual threats
[ - ] You cannot stop villagers from taking materials off of stations, including when you've got a giant crafting queue (for both yourself and the villagers) on the same bench that's actively being worked on.
[ - ] You cannot stop villagers from taking (or eating) materials put on the research bench
[ - ] Majority of things are either villager specific (i.e forester & the consistent ability to hunt birds) or they do it miles more efficiently in half the time/durability/risk/headache. While I do understand that this game is a Sim, being so heavily discouraged from doing everything except controlling building/resource placement & very basic trading/fetch quests means I'm watching the game play and/or going AFK for far longer than I am actually playing the game.
[ - ] Winter in its entirety. It's not an engaging mechanic that changes how anything functions in the game; all it does is give artificial time bloat to the games length because a variety of important resources are now frozen for the 2 to 10 in game days it stays around. I didn't even notice a cold debuff existed until being over 60 days into the game, and even then I promptly forgot about it as being cold does nothing seeing as you're already forced to keep food buffs rolling 24/7 to manage stamina to begin with. Warm clothes are not a thing, frozen farms do nothing to dent the insane stockpiles you'll have going before they come around, and you don't have to manage cold at the camp nor do they impact patrols/villages/trade. I never once had winter last less than 3 in game days.
[ - ] Building in most aspects. I was originally pretty happy with clicking to build each part, similar to The Forest, but the carpal tunnel simulator that is the Bloomery alone completely changed this opinion. Then you get into Tier 2 buildings that require you to use a Construction Hammer: each little node is no longer just 1 click done, it's now a 3 to 10 seconds smack it with a hammer animation. And each building has easily over 60 individual nodes to build, while you cannot queue up building clicks or make your character automatically build the nodes on the building you're standing in
[ - ] Unfortunately, they didn't make the moving system any better. Not only do you have to repeat the process in reverse (including every single one of those 3 to 10 second smack it with a hammer animations), you also have to repeat the process AGAIN to rebuild it in the new area.
[ - ] Doing ANY mining as the player is very punishing. It's basically a ratio of Get 10 Rough Stones, Get 1 of the Ore you want (or 20 to 2/30 to 3, depending on gathering level). And you have to hold the mouse down for the entire time, without the ability to tab out
[ - ] While Fast Travel is nice to have, your companions + militia do not travel with you & have to walk across the map to join you. ANYTHING hostile being anywhere near them will also X that travel spot out and make them unusable, forcing you to make one every so many meters to ensure you can actually use the travel function.
[ - ] No dopamine hits to be found here, unless you consider being given endless piles of Renown upon Renown in an already endless sea of Renown to be a reward. The best you'll get is some Cauldron-cooked stews and nails as there's no gear drops, no item rarities, no actual rewards for clearing bandit camps, and nothing of interest in a single chest.

The only way I could adequately describe Phasmophobia is "wasted potential". Even the scares are lacklustre. There's plenty of great ideas to be found here, but they instead prioritise new shaders/flashy ID cards over fully fleshing out/expanding on said ideas. Something as simple as the core gameplay loop still hasn't been given enough meat to be enjoyable outside of co-op experiences that are a credit to ones company rather than the game itself. Heck, many games that are clones/seek to emulate it out-do Phasmo at its own methodology, yet they remain stagnant.

Insult to injury, in-game events got boiled down into boring slogs while also taking a hard pivot into community events (instead of personal progression) where those who actually participate are rewarded the same as those who only went as far as logging on.

TLDR; a difficult rogue-like worth supporting despite its slow updates, solid 8/10.

There's two must know things about Stoneshard that being unaware of seems to cause the most negative reception.
1. The developers are a small team that are active within their community but put out updates for the game at a relatively slow pace. Development started in earnest 2018, early access launched in 2020, and we're not yet close to the finish line. Progress is there, potential is absolutely there, but it's still something to be aware of.
2. The rogue-like is so true to form here that it's borderline to full-blown masocore ("a focus on intense difficulty, often featuring complex or unfair mechanics" definitely describes it well). Difficulty is the goal, challenge is the constant, death is the expected, and it won't be everyone's cup of tea.

Having said that: it's still a fantastic game.

++ all the rogue-like bases are covered
++ stands on its own two feet as a unique take to the genre in a package that you'll be hard pressed to find elsewhere
++ the promise of a challenge is definitely delivered here, all without relying solely on RNG
++ almost every aspect of preparation matters (not just personal knowledge), and can be the difference between survival and another "You Are Dead" screen
++ lots of build variety that directly impacts how you play
++ fast travel system is a caravan that comes with portable shops + save & its own upgrade system
++ not getting any good loot? Pfffffch, we can make it! >:D
+ exploring the map, taking your time, and progressing slowly is both heavily rewarded and encouraged
+ very stylised, clean & well-done pixel art
+ simple UI that is easy to use and understand

+/- RNGesus has blessed us with its "balanced" presence, now get your chess goggles on and pray. I wouldn't hesitate to bring your Goats to this one; we ain't playin main characters with plot armor to protect them here.
+/- NPCs don't magically know when you've stolen goods, or what you've stole (guards, on the other hand, will still know about stolen goods from across the map & be able to identify exactly what was stolen from a glance @@)
+/- currently lacks any narrative depth (though developers have very clearly stated that it's among the last of their priorities)

- - a fast forward button is sorely missed when making long (and slow) treks on foot
- - the lack of a respec system is brutal; wherever the stat and/or skill points go, that's where they stay. This can completely cripple a build and force you to have to completely restart the character over from scratch when you get around level 12 and realise your build hits like a wet paper towel and/or gets yeeted into the sun from a casual breeze.
- no save/autosave system outside of manually doing so at a bed means each and every death comes with some form of back-tracking (caravan update mitigated this a decent amount, and bedrolls do exist, but the pain remains)
- has a very steep learning curve

Sure, it's worth 2$.
But treat it as a 2$ game led by developers with a bad track record, as overall it's just not worth your time and certainly not worth full price.
Though if you're here for the PVP mode, save your money.

- Game is over 6 years old, and has always been PVE exclusive, yet they decided to add a PVP mode this late into its life. While this in itself wouldn't be an issue, they adjusted the balance of the ENTIRE game to fit this new PVP mode. Don't be fooled into thinking this was in actual development for years, Fatshark themselves have stated they only started in Spring 2023 despite announcing and subsequently shelving it in 2019.
- A Versus style PVP mode being put into a PVE exclusive game that revolves around the brutal efficiency of a team immediately removing threats (and has always been balanced around a PVE exclusive playstyle, in every aspect) is not a good choice. This style of mode only works in places like L4D2 because they made the game with it in mind from the get go and there aren't a bunch of PVE skills/equipment around. Most specials don't even have strafing animations.
- said new PVP mode should have been left in the oven longer. Poorly designed, poorly executed, and packed to the brim with bugs instead of features. It even has no matchmaking criteria (an issue that cannot be fixed thanks to their releasing this system to a dwindling playerbase of primarily PVE preferring players that can't support an MMR system), leaving veterans who've clocked in thousands of hours of merciless efficiency mopping the floor with new players as a constant.
- said new PVP mode's queues are relatively inactive + there's no option for premade/private lobbies.
- Game now tries to force install Windows Edge Runtime every time the game is launched.
- EAC got shoved into the game, over 6 years past its original launch and all thanks to said new half-baked PVP mode.
- EAC's sudden inclusion into the game adds more performance and connectivity problems in a game already plagued by them. + Linux cannot naturally run EAC & the work-around does not work for every game (especially when the devs do not internally support Proton).
- EAC did absolutely nothing to stop the immediate downpour of cheats/hackers.
- connectivity/lag issues have only been getting worse over the years.
- AI competency mod is no longer supported & their replacement for it fixed a grand total of 0 AI issues.
- DLC keeps getting nerfed. They even nerfed the already nerfed to the ground memehammer.
- Balance changes to DLC classes/items have been demolished, all for the sake of their new PVP system.
- These changes also made the grind for PVE a LOT harder. Chests AND crafting have both gone from the old +10/-5 system at max to a range of 260-300. Getting 300s is now extremely rare, regardless of what level your characters are & multiple people have reported getting dud reds (potentially as low as a 210PL red, when they were all 300 before this PVP update).
- Devs claim the 260-300PL range & outlandish Trait priorities currently on Crafting is a bug, but is not prioritizing fixing it nor are they intending to reimburse people for the 100s of crafts they performed while these "bugs" were present.
- Devs have apparently developed amnesia; Veteran has been rolled back to a 200PL max. Moving from Veteran to Champion is back to being a massive difficulty hike that will become an inescapable wall for the average player. Introducing your friends to the game/playing with your lower level friends is, once again, back to being a pure time sink with 0 reward for experienced players.

Together we stand, divided we fall
You don't rock and stone, you ain't comin' home
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TLDR; get a different Phasmophobia clone, one that actually respects your time & doesn't just want your money. 0/10

It's pretty.
Pretty makes for a decent atmosphere.
That's all it has going for it.

The bad, however?
[ - ] If you look too close, that "pretty" becomes a lazy pile of thrown together assets (they didn't even try to hide what AI pack they got what from & did a horrible job compressing the majority),
[ - ] It's almost ENTIRELY AI art. Shamelessly so,
[ - ] This game should not have come out of Early Access when it did. It still doesn't even have all of the promised maps, a TON of content was cut so they could call it finished, and there are multiple game breaking issues that have been around since early on into said Early Access,
[ - ] The "support" these developers offer is laughable at best,
[ - ] MASSIVE memory leak issue that has been around for over a year,
[ - ] Voice chat/commands do not work for the majority of players; when they DO work, it's incredibly inconsistent & it has been this way in a game that revolves around voice chat/commands for over a year (an issue that has been getting progressively worse over time),
[ - ] New player experience consists of relying on third-party websites,
[ - ] 0 Insurance is available (meaning death = crying wallet as you cough out your kidneys to pay for replacements), including if you're a new player,
[ - ] Equipment is overall way too expensive, making the trial & error process of learning the game with no tutorial needlessly punishing to the point of alienating solo players,
[ - ] Multiplayer lobbies are inconsistent & like to yeet you out of them,
[ - ] Game wants you to have your audio up to hear for footsteps, then blasts your ear drums into nonexistence with incredibly over-tuned noises/jumpscare sounds (I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it's at the range to cause hearing damage, they're that bad),
[ - ] Ghost noises are inconsistent, unreliable, and arguably random,
[ - ] Almost 100% of the scares are jumpscares, and boy oh boy are most of them cheap sensory overloads,
[ - ] The scares are NOT "random events"; they're house/map-dependant, and they repeat every single time you're on said map as you're forced to go through every maps linear progression style (sure, it's a decent experience the first time, but it's one of those things that becomes so stale that by game 3 on that map you're annoyed by their existence and go out of your way to avoid every event trigger you can). Every event can be seen, without fail, every time you're on that map,
[ - ] And the cherry on top: you have to replay those repetitive maps many, many times to get anywhere, thanks to the extremely grindy leveling system,
[ - ] The differing personalities and habits of each ghost are irrelevant,
[ - ] Wireless headsets like to not work and a lot of microphones are flat out rejected by the game, but the developers only answer to this is "buy a new one";
[ - ] Ghosts can STILL see & kill you through closet doors,
[ - ] Ghosts can STILL see & kill you through floors,
[ - ] Ghost rooms are STILL inconsistent enough to be bordering on a long forgotten myth (they interact with & provide evidence in multiple rooms at once, an issue that is astronomically amplified on maps with more than 1 floor),
[ - ] Ghosts are either "haha I can loop you for days" or "hello instant death"; there's no in between,
[ - ] Maps are either "I have a loop route" or "I am completely screwed"; there's no in between,
[ - ] Almost every map sorely needs more hiding places (not that, you know, they work, seeing as ghosts can see you in them),
[ - ] Your sanity is ALWAYS going down, regardless of where you are (or are not) on the map; anyone sitting in the tent watching cameras will drain at the same rate as the person inside slapping at the ghosts corporeal body,
[ - ] Devs couldn't even be bothered to line up the ghost names in their lazy journal UI x_x,
[ - ] Statues in safehouses have had messed up textures/shapes for so long that it's a joke,
[ - ] Be prepared to spend 90% of your time in matches trying to force a ghost to interact with the ESG/Canvas, even on the highest difficulty where they're supposedly the most active.

This is not the first time, and likely not the last time, that these developers have made a cash grab playing off of what's most popular at the time. My condolences to those they tricked into becoming part of the toxic posse for this game.

Oh how I miss the old developers...

The new DLC, regardless of if you have it or not, injected all of their changes into the base game. Not only do these changes completely throw the games balance out of the window, it has introduced a plethora of bugs that will ruin a run on top of that. The list of bugs is massive, including ones that destroy all of your save data, and with every "fix" we get more problems in return for those they fix.

The new DLC, regardless of if you have it or not, bashed console with PC code together with a heavy priority for console. Not only has this caused a ton of the bugs, every PC player now has to be beholden to console rules for updates.

And instead of rolling it back, everyone is expected to "enjoy" a 12+ months long road map for bug fixes.

Beyond overpriced when not on an extremely steep sale.
Armory packs ARE p2w & give you guns superior to what's available in base game. (+the arguably OP sentinels)
And even then, you're going to be waiting 7+ days just for SOME of the DLC to show up.
They'll just keep telling you "it's Item Server issues!", yet refuse to fix said issues.

Try to get support and all you're going to get is:
Steam = "Talk to Tripwire, we can't do anything."
Tripwire = "Talk to Steam, we can't do anything."

Wish I could say I was surprised, but this is incredibly typical behaviour for this company.

TLDR; Solid 7/10 that finds itself unfortunately heavily hindered by serious money scaling issues & too fast of a progression speed. If that alone was fixed, EASILY bumped to a 8.5/10.

A weird one, for sure.
Weird characters, weird + confused atmosphere, weird mechanics, weird story.
But don't let that discourage you if you're into a farming sim that comes with a kick; Kynseed is certainly still an enjoyable time with what's there, despite its flaws.

The last big update I played was Feb 12 2024 & hotfix on April 3 2024.

The Good
[ + ] extensive tutorial that makes sure you've got your balance before kicking you out the gate
[ + ] more than enough to do in a day (and a lifetime ;D) that you'll find yourself becoming part of the insomniac club to keep the enterprise going
[ + ] no set bed times; no passing out at a set time at night, no forced sleeping schedule (except for children), and no rifled through pockets upon waking
[ + ] camp fires and inns you can use to sleep/pass time are all over the place, removing the need to go back home
[ + ] more than 1 method to teleport around map
[ + ] skill trees & shop perks! (๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧
[ + ] decent selection of customization options & furniture
[ + ] long live the glory of the pig-steed
[ + ] game does not force you to do (almost) anything you don't want to; just throw some employees at it and get that passive income while you do stuff you're interested in
[ + ] don't want to get married? No problem! Adopt some kids and boom, problem solved.
[ + ] multiple mini-games for crafting (that come with bulk crafting options, and can also be skipped by having employees do it)
[ + ] slightly more simplistic Megaman Battle Network-style combat that ends up being an enjoyable challenge (or a difficult one, if you're feeling spicy)
[ + ] feels feature complete and not in need of mods outside of personal QOL choices
[ + ] builders rejoice, there's fine tune placement of objects
[ + ] pun-tastic humour & plenty of personality
[ + ] monster design is on point
[ + ] Fae (albeit less dark than lore accurate)

Worth Mentioning
[ +/- ] while there IS a "golden path" mechanic called thatterways, they only show you the map you need to be on (or what mailbox you're looking for, rather than leading you to the person).
[ +/- ] generally more demanding than something cozy like Stardew Valley; how much goes on, from festivals to auctions to sales to events to requests from multiple cities to goddess blessings to weather to multiple store management and etc, can get quickly overwhelming
[ +/- ] dark undertones that very clearly existed have been removed, despite it making parts of the story incoherent and underwhelming :c
[ +/- ] lot of the stuff villagers say is unhinged and/or out of nowhere (i.e: once I brought a dead rabbit to my mom and she threw it back outside. That's it, that's the story xD)
[ +/- ] animals have the whole colored butthole constantly visible thing going on
[ +/- ] generic responses from NPCs that everyone uses flood both dialogue and mail; children have very few pieces of unique dialogue, subsequently turning every 5 year old into extremely articulate and respectful mini-adults that barely acknowledge your familial ties

The Bad
[ - ] the family/generational mechanic is presented as a core part of gameplay that heavily defines it, but uh...you don't actually have to use it. At all.
[ - ] The end game material meant for the final boss is obtainable at the start of the game without any special tricks or glitches, completely destroying the need to upgrade your tools in tiers.
[ - ] the last boss is a joke in general. Added insult to injury:It's not immune to the Scarecrow effect & can be turned into one for the entire fight.
[ - ] skills level extremely fast, and it doesn't take much effort to fill out the required materials/crafts to fill out the skill trees
[ - ] penalties for not sleeping are practically nonexistent, regardless of how long you keep the insomnia streak up
[ - ] anyone who can get a grip on the systems and has moderate RPG/sim experience will finish 90-100% of the game within the 1st year, nevermind going 10+ years or a generation. I fully understand that life/farming sims are meant to be taken with a casual stride, but this is EXTREMELY fast progression to a bare bones ceiling. Doubly so for a game that presented itself as needing a whole family lineage to complete.
[ - - ] Money and Renown are generated far too quickly through shops, and the cost you pay for every shop you purchase is pennies in comparison to the profit you'll gain in just a few days of having them. Said cost to buy them barely increases with each town, despite their profit margins being massively higher. With the challenges you'll complete up to unlocking the ability to buy said shops within the first 2 to 4 weeks of gameplay, you'll have more than enough money to buy 2 out of 3 shops in the first town. The mats you picked up along the way will be more than enough to stock them before you get the perks to increase order inventory and enough money to order. Perks that you gain passively.
These 2 shops alone can allow you to immediately commence ignoring both Money and Renown for the remainder of the game. It does not take a lot of time for them to generate enough money to buy the next towns shops, and from there the remaining shops on the map. Even if you don't supply any of your own materials to them and solely restock through purchasing while having employees do the crafting, you will not run out of money. In fact, you'll be turned into Scrooge McDuck diving through gold piles.
Click spoiler for exact numbers:
You can sell up to 25g per blacksmith/general store. Max of 50g (first town) to 200g (once you have every Fel town unlocked) a day. It takes less than a couple casts of a fishing rod to get the max sell per day. Challenges average 25g per turn in, some going up to 250g.
It only takes you 500g to buy your first shop. This only takes 20 challenges (alone) to get the money for, and by the time I could unlock shops I had over 70 to turn in. 750g per shop in the 2nd town.
Blacksmiths are over 1000g a day and apothecaries over 1500g a day without doing a thing to them, while General Store can skyrocket up to over 8000g a day when manually controlling prices. With 4 stores, I was pulling in over 10k minimum a day from passive income alone within the first month of gameplay. All of the sold product was 1 to 2* (out of 5*) and purchased through suppliers rather than gathered myself.
[ - ] while you CAN order 50x of 1 item now, you cannot bulk order 50x of every item you want at once nor re-order everything you did last time without manually doing it every single time for every single store
[ - ] the marriage system is as bare bones as it gets; any of their relatives do not become yours or acknowledge you as family (including if they're supposed to be your spouses kid pre-marriage) + it only takes 1 pie and 1 turn in before you start getting harassed daily for not making enough money on the shops even when you're making crazy amounts of gold x_x
[ - ] time skip mechanic is irrelevant, nobody cares you were gone & shops pick up as if it's tomorrow instead of 10 years later XD
[ - ] pixel art on humans is a hit or miss
[ - ] the lack of an "Order All" button for shop inventory is sorely missed with just 1 shop and is an absolute nightmare with 4+; makes the entire shop management system a tedious chore that gets abandoned once enough money is made because of how much time it takes just to order everything
[ - ] unlike everything else, cooking cannot be done by employees and there are absolutely no options available to order anything already cooked for shop inventory
[ - ] unlike everything else, fish cannot be ordered for shop inventory even after you make the store a Fishmonger