I'm going to complain, not because I hate the game but because I actually really like it. Making 'My Time at Portia' or 'Stardew Valley' into an MMORPG is a great idea and it's mostly well executed. However...

The game is needlessly grindy. It takes hundreds or even thousands of hours to do everything it has to offer. It's understandable because this is an MMO and they need to retain players, but I sometimes feel like my time as a player is not being respected. If you need a rare fish you might need hundreds or thousands of fishing attempts before you get it. If you want a plushie you'll be hunting for hours or days or weeks. Everything has a time mechanic, whether it be processing wood, ore, cloth, or farming. You want your crops to grow one stage? Better wait an hour. You want to process this ore? That's 10 minutes per bar. It's all gated behind a wait period. There is plenty to do while you wait, but it feels like an needless limitation to keep you hooked.

Speaking of needless, it seems like the game is needlessly designed in a way to create regret. You can easily spend your renown upgrading your plot instead of your focus. There's mistakes you can make doing quests that result in a "bad" outcome and one-time quest rewards that once consumed are gone forever, but actually can be used for decoration. The process of choosing a name is confusing and once chosen you're stuck with it forever. There's even a precious broken sign in front of your plot that once cut down can never come back, and people keep it as some kind of badge of honor. I'm not sure why the game is designed this way, there's not even a way to delete your character and make a new one without creating a new account. New players who don't have a friend to guide them or do a lot of research on the game will make these mistakes and regret them.

Then there's the in-game cash shop. I think it's mostly okay, in that the items are cosmetic and you don't really need to buy anything to play. However the prices are often a little high and when it comes to buying an outfit that looks good, a plot environment, a pet, and some tool skins you're looking at spending between $50-100 USD. It's possible to wait for sales and use the loyalty program to get a few things cheaper but as this is a social game and you want to look good in front of other people so a lot of players just end up shelling out way too much money.

Also the technical issues are annoying, we have deer floating in the air, randomly falling while climbing, getting locked talking to NPCs, chat not working, unable to leave quest-specific areas, etc... I've heard the game developer has had a lot of layoffs, and that the game is mostly abandoned and only has a skeleton crew, that's really disappointing. I want this game to ripen not die on the vine.

As a last mention, I wanted to talk about the "exploits". While most of these are fine (animation canceling is sort of a cool skill you can learn), the limitations to building your plot just seem completely unnecessary. Why not let people clip items or build outside their plot? It's not hurting anything and creates unique design opportunities and creativity.

Overall Palia is really fun, it's just plagued with a few problems. I hope this review helps to catalyze the issues of other players and encourages the developers to do the work this game deserves.

If any new players are still interested in the game even after my complaints, use code f2942929-4f13-4147-ba10-613e55e19b62 when signing up for fruit bowl or something. My moral standing is lying down.

Note: I also wanted to point out that Steam Deck owners can play this game! It runs at 60 FPS and all online capabilities are functional right now. I used Proton Experimental but it might also work on the stable Proton.

chill game cozy as they said so have fun

The game itself is alright, nothing amazing or truly groundbreaking. The minigames are more fun than the acc game cycle grind. The issue lies in the devs/publisher, they push out sub-par content mainly PREMIUM COSMETIC SKINS that'll cost an arm and a leg. Tool skins. ♥♥♥♥♥♥ powerpoint skins from the 2000s for £5-10, that crash the game and their response? "Dont use them". The release of "content" is so that the rightfully pissed off players have something to pacify them for another month. Whilst never actually bug-fixing some of the largest bugs that have been around since day-dot.

TLDR: Palia is meh, S6 are money hungry