Recent reviews by Daymar Thrax

I think this game has potential. But the UI needs a complete overhaul. I spent way more time trying to figure out how to do things than actually doing things. Simple things. Things that are so obvious they do not require paid beta testers to point out. I play many other factory sims in early access: Dyson Sphere, Satisfactory, etc. This needs more time in the oven though.

Having said that, if the setting appeals to you and you have a very high tolerance for frustration, this may be for you. I will come back in a few months and update this if things have improved. Just way too many other pleasant options out there right now.

I'll be honest, I didn't really care for this one at first. It's not your typical city builder for two reasons:
1) Land is the scarcest commodity. You just can't keep expanding in a stable fashion like other city builders.
2) Directly related to the first, you constantly have to tear down, move stuff, and rebuild to optimize that space.

But once I accepts this it grew on me. I am an experience city-game player and I finished one map on Pro (3rd hardest of 4 difficulty). Hats off to people playing on Veteran. I will be back for more once they add hot keys and inter-city trading.

Yeah. That's my major gripe: Lack of hot keys. You do a LOT of clicking to tear-down, move, and rebuild. That being said I do NOT recommend this game if it's your first city-builder. And I do NOT recommend it to other player's who aren't prepared to rethink and reconfigure the entire map as they play.

For those up for the challenge, a couple tips:
1) Always build while the game is paused. If you play un-paused while re-configuring, you will run out of money. Game over.
2) Related, this game plays out in surges. Set a goal, build or re-configure towards that goal, and don't un-pause until you have a positive cash flow. Once you do, un-pause, build back up to maximum cash, wash, rinse and repeat.
3) Pay attention to road types. Most buildings have a delivery range for goods that are modified by roads.
4) Save often and guard against avalanches.

They are some rough edges (early access) but the game is beautiful and I am astounded at how well balanced it is at this stage. My biggest grip (besides lack of hot keys) is always playing on pause. In fact I won on pause (very nice end-game concept as well). But it felt a little off in this aspect, and gave it a puzzle-like feel that others describe. But I already got my money's worth.

Pros:

First let me say this is a fun, fairly well balanced game. It's basically a 2-lane Clash Royale style game, but the mechanics and skill elements are more advanced.

Cons:

The RNG loot box mentality makes it very difficult to spend real cash. I was really enjoying this game and wanted to support it financially. But I was struggling to find a way to spend money that I felt good about. I finally settled on the All Masters DLC ($20) which grants you access to all Masters. Masters are similar to characters in HearthStone. They all have unique powers and when you run out of hit-points, game over. (Unlike Heathstone, this game is real-time, not turn based, and once summoned, the minions are autonomous.)

There is only ranked play. So if you care about rank (and the associated rewards), creating secondary decks and experimentation is discouraged due to the design. There are no "sand-boxes" to test and experiment with new decks.

If you are a skilled player, its pretty easy to get to a high rank. But as you approach the end-game (Master/Grand-Master), the decks you face all become pretty similar as players clone successful decks. However, if you are not lucky enough to have been blessed by the RNG gods, you might find yourself stalling out as decks beat you that you cannot duplicate. Like many Freemium games, the pricing strategy is targeted at whales. So buying stuff with gems (the in-game currency) is very steep.

Conclusion:

I still play this game, just because its fun. I'm starting to taper off, because I'm not about to spend absurd cash for cards just to advance to Grand Master. But if you enjoy this type of game, give it a try. I was a good 30-50 hours in before pay-to-win even crossed my mind. I

This game has some fun destructive physics has a decent open-world feel. It feels like Grand Theft Auto on Mars (sans drugs and hookers). The graphics are slightly dated, but it still has the best destructible physics I've seen in a game.