Recent reviews by Protox13

I can't recommend this game in its current state. I want to like it but at certain points in the game (like continuing from the start of a day) options to proceed would not appear. Resetting like this and losing all of your progress is painful. Gave up at the torture tutorial when the golden root wouldn't show up and I couldn't advance- this happened several times. I'd like to buy it again once all the bugs are worked out but it's unplayable in this state.

This game is addictive. Essentially, you start out as a group of survivors in a few city blocks and must fight, scavenge, recruit, and build your way to victory. Fun for now but could stand a few teaks which could improve the game more, particularly late game. Some thoughts and suggestions:

-The overlay is helpful for determining dangerous areas or areas with resources and the default should have this on, not off.
-Have not really seen individual morale affect anything (well, one lady had to take a few days off but that's about it).
-Late game gets monotonous if you want to keep everyone busy- it's a grind of sending out soldiers to clear zeds or attack other factions, have builders claim ground, and having leaders recruit survivors. The worst part is when a few dozen survivors finish a mission, they move to the outer blocks you control. I wish there was an option to gather survivors with similar skills sets in a square, or to set a mission and automatically pick the best-suited ones for it.
-Likewise, the few dozen messages you get each turn can be a pain to manage. I just gave up going through them.
-Hard to build much beyond farms or apartments until you get to a lab.
-When a survivor is "promoted" with a new ability you can't see his or her stats until you "upgrade" them.
-Seems a bit more linear, ending-wise, than Rebuild 2. Lots more research, items, and characters. Appreciate the effort put into making individual back stories but it's hard to get that invested after the first dozen or so.
-Wish there was a more streamlined way to manage inventory and survivors.

As someone who enjoyed watching the Spice and Wolf anime, I have mixed feelings about this Visual Novel. I like the similar art style and focus on economics and business, but compared to watching an anime, it's very slow (I could watch the two OAV seasons of Spice and Wolf in half the time), and the art is relatively sparse. There are a few typos in the translation and the sometimes repetitive music can be distracting. Despite the massive reams of text, character development is quite slow (though it's there) and it's hard to feel much sympathy or connection to the characters.

Bottom line: It's fine if you're used to VNs, and I don't regret spending the time and money on this, but I probably wouldn't do it again. I prefer Telltale's stories (Walking Dead, Wolf Among Us)- the execution and production values are far superior, and were simply more enjoyable and engaging for me.

Brutal, punishing, but fair game that forces you to learn via trial and error. Think of Dark Souls, but as a rougelike (permadeath) turn-based deathtrap maze builder. Frustrating every time you die and lose everything, but it inspired me to keep trying and build better mazes. One of the more intellectually and emotionally engaging games I've played in a very long time. Read the wiki and forums for tips.