Recent reviews by Anne-Laure

To be honest, I just didn't find it that good. I really thought that this would be the sort of game for me, as I always like games with great narratives and commentaries on games/films as a medium and our relationship to the content we consume. I knew the "gist" of the game, that of funny narrator whose ramblings are simple light-hearted humour packed with a meta-commentary on how you play and it having a bunch of different routes, but that's about it. I feel like that's just enough knowledge to still walk in pretty spoilers-free, but despite only knowing that, I didn't find it that intriguing and I found that it simple doesn't go much beyond its inital premise: there actually isn't that much content, and what little there is doesn't go "deep" enough for it to be that memorable, nor is the humour that amazing. What's worse is when you've seen about 80% of the game, you'll struggle to remember which paths had choices that you should go back to revisit to encounter more content, and which you've fully completed and would simply rail-roaded into watching the same ending you already saw a few sessions before. Do I really want to bother reading wikis and doing a checkmark on every quirky ending I experienced, and seeing which ones I may have missed? ... Well, after seeing what it has to offer, not really. I sort of wish the game bothered to get into a deeper story instead of constantly staying so surface-level with its jokes that it takes often much too far (which is part of the humour, for sure, but it gets boring quick).

Oh and for performance on steam deck, it's excellent, didn't run into any issues.

The perpetual crashes at the end of the "surface tension" level is extremely disappointing, I effectively had to skip that level entirely (I tried replaying it in its entirety three times). Coupled with the "perpetual darkness" bug that can only be fixed by trying a bunch of obscure console commands that worked for some and not others, trying them until you finally find some sort of combination that works for you, frankly leaves a sour taste in my mouth. You'll be left scouring through steam discussions and reddit comments, debugging and fiddling with startup options and console commands for a good 30m-1h before you find something that works.

Fantastic game overall plagued by poor testing and game-breaking bugs. I played this on a steam deck, too, so I would have thought that most / all bugs on steam deck would have been fixed already.

EDIT: ended up continuing the game and finishing it. overall, there were 3 levels I had to eventually skip due to constant crashes, and had occasional moments with super low framerate. I had semi-regular crashes near the end of the game, but they weren't often enough to force me to skip the levels. The lighting issues became super regular towards the latter parts of the game, and were effectively constant in the final levels. Overall I still really, really enjoyed the game, but at its state I wouldn't recommend it unless you're a die-hard fan.

A game with tons of content and yet manages to be simply such a shallow experience that just lacks polish. Feels like a bunch of stuff tacked on without great foresight or planning. A great concept marred by what seems to be mismanagement issues.

probably the best CRPG around, and one of the best games ever made.

excellent!

The reality about these types of farming sims is that the make it or break it aspect of the game lies primarily in the "soul" of the game: One doesn't play it for the challenge, the interesting mechanics, or intelligent game design, even if these may greatly aid in making an even more pleasurable experience. One plays it if one likes the atmosphere the game creates: the art, the story and characters, the music, the relaxing yet varied flow of the day-to-day life in Stardew Valley.

Before speaking of this "soul" however, I do want to bring up the core of the game itself: I felt like the majority of the game just didn't mesh well together: it felt more like a series of mini games stuck together into one town: the farming minigame (which absolutely doesn't improve on the original design at all. Perhaps the only interesting thing here is the possibility to craft artisan goods, but even that is just too minor to save the game), the fishing minigame (same hardcoded behaviour for each different type of fish), the dungeon mini game (with its incredibly repetitive and uninteresting dungeon, exceedingly boring enemies, frustrating controls and whose only true challenge lies in two things: the size of your inventory as you slowly fill up your pockets with various loot each worth a middling sum of money, and the quantity of food you brought with you, to counteract the inevitable need for more energy to dig and find the ladder to the next level down.), the "animal husbandry" minigame... and yet, there is absolutely no new development of mechanics or design, which might have saved this experience: if you've play harvest moon games, absolutely nothing here will surprise you. Worse, it will feel elementary and somewhat empty.

So, what about the soul I mentioned ? frankly, I just didn't feel it: I didn't really get attached to any of the characters, and their interactions with me felt robotic and pre-planned (reach 4 hearts of friendship, and unlock a new, irrelevant scene with character X), and just didn't feel that natural. The town itself is pretty and large enough, yet I just couldn't get attached to the overall art style, although I can tell the creator put lots of work into it, and it stay very coherent and doesn't feel out of place in the game. The "main" storyline (with the town hall and whatnot) is predicable and doesn't deviate at all from the most cliché'd storyline you could come up with for a harvest moon game.

This is a product of love and extreme hard work. I won't deny it, and am still happy to have spent my money to support such an endeavour. But frankly I just wouldn't have bought this game, if there existed a better competitor out there. Want a good harvest moon style game with soul ? Get one of the originals. Want a game with a similar concept but instead with more interesting and well designed mechanics ? Look into Graveyard Keeper.

Un paquet de faux "choix" qui ne changent rien, un environnement ennuyant sans vrai possibilité d'interagir avec lui à part pour la quête principale, une histoire ultra-linéaire et pas très inspirée, et franchement élémentaire par moments, un système de combat falsifiant la complexité mais se révélant ultra-basique même pas 1h après... Bref. L'univers est attractif au départ mais fait tomber très rapidement son masque et nous laisse avec un jeu mécaniquement ennuyeux et une histoire qui ne vaut pas la peine de continuer. Décevant.

The idea is neat, the execution is super bland. The combat very quickly becomes a borefest, especially once you get melee (about three levels in): Anyone would naturally develop the tactic of camping ladders, going down to use melee, wait half a second for the cooldown to go down, and then use melee again. And again. And again.
Melee is an AoE with infinite ammo and extremely easy aim, which makes it extremely powerful, and the cooldown only becomes a mere frustrating and tempo-killing gimmick that is still worth suffering through just because of the overpowered-ness of the melee attack. Beyond getting new guns, more passengers, and some extra clickfests on your train every so often, the design of this game has little to offer. You'll wander around level after level, wishing the run speed was faster for both your characters as well as the enemies, scavenging for some meaningless loot with little interest in the story or its characters, which frankly serve as nothing but constant interruptions in your already long combat.

Dying means nothing, due to the vast and overly common respawn points, and resources quickly become bountiful. Where are the tactics? The planning before confronting some vicious zombies? Why can't I see the loot behind the enemies, giving me pause as to whether I should risk my life and resources for this oh so tempting prize behind the hordes? Why are resources so quick to amass in my inventory? Why am I so slow and constantly interrupted by bland dialogue that frankly adds nothing to the atmosphere? Why do my passengers matter so little?

At 15$, this game lacks polish. It runs very smoothly, the shooting is on point, the idea is nice, the art is rather enjoyable at times, but the design tanks the whole game.