I wish there was a "meh" rating. It's not good but it's not terrible either it's just meh. I absolutely loooove the environment and the look of the characters but that's about where the charm ends.

I was so excited to create my little ass kicking creature only to be disappointed. Your general look is tied to your class. If I wanted to be psi caster my creature had to look like something you lured out a drain. Not the fluffy iconic one. I thought you could choose your ears, your fur texture, your body shape and eyes ya know like in create-a-pet in the Sims. But no, butt ugly and choose your fur colours. How exciting.

Then I was introduced to the narrator. "I suppose I can kinda get used to this" I thought and then as the hours wore on I was ready to reach into the virtual game world and strangle the dude. He. Never. Shuts. Up. NEVER. Oh my soul I wanted to tear my own ears off. It was a godsend when I discovered the setting to turn him off, not completely but enough for me to push through.

And that's the sad part. The concept is interesting but the execution is someone hosting an Easter egg hunt but the all the eggs are filled with mouldy cheese. Go here, fetch this, smash some enemies that absorb your hits like you're 3 years old and they're some world boxing champions.

I've got the fanciest sword and fanciest gun, the fanciest pantsand fanciest hat. Now what? Finish the story I supposed? Urgh but it's such a slog. As you progress further into the world map, the fast travel points get less and less, meaning you have to traverse the plains by your lonesome self. Do not even bother with your mount, the damn thing doesn't move any faster than you. And can I say what the hell? Why do you only get to have one mount at a time? Why do you not have a catalogue of the mounts you've tamed and get to pick which one you ride?

Squibbly, squabbily, diddly doo, I give this a 4/10.

If you're certain kind of person - you know the type - that enjoys doing domestic tasks in video games immensely but are allergic to them in real life then you have come to the right place my person.

You will drown in trash, be trash, embrace trash and then you will destroy it into little pieces and vacuum it up and you will do it for 90% of this game. So if this is your jam, then I do suggest you get it and try it out.

However, despite having put in hours into the game and although I have had my fun with it and fully intend to finish it, I cannot recommend it in its current state.

It's janky. Like, one of my biggest irritations is the combat. What is the point of it? You swing your drill and evil robots go boom. They are annoying and they await you around every corner. I see no point to them. They are not even the main antagonists, the trash is, yet you have to deal with them. I wish the developers had left the damn things out.

Ugh and do not even get me started on the NPCs. Mass Effect's husks have more personality than these people. They just stand there, like statues, and only occasional move. It's jarring. Like, it would have made far more sense to have the talking animals be the NPCs instead of bothering with human beings that provide no valuable aesthetic to the game, they just detract from it. Have Cornelius the chicken run the farm store and Napoleon the pig the general store. It would be far more pleasing because at least the animals are more animated.

Then we get to the world itself, now as mentioned, every damn corner is filled with heaps of trash so you are gong to be drilling and vacuuming until you are blue in the face. The world is dead and do mean that from a literal and environment point. You need to fix the world. Okay good, nice. But your actions do not always lead to enough reward. Not to mention there are very little game effects present in the game, like for example you have to melt large blocks of ice with bonfires but instead of there being a melting animation, the blocks just... disappear. Bruh, I know coding is hard, I am a developer myself but come on? This is just lazy on another level. There are so many graphical glitches like the sky flashing black, the distant stuff being super wobbly and just the placement of the assets in general. Some of them clip in each other or clip through the ground. The doorways do not always touch the ground and just breaks immersion.

It really feels like the developers closed their eyes and did a quick job of the terraforming of the world and then just copy pasted all the assets in, moved them around a bit and called a day. There is so much more you could have done but nah.

Lastly, the economic system. I do like the concept of food being the most valuable resources and turning your meals into lasting products is a nice touch but that is where it ends. You cannot sell anything you collect. There are some conversion machines to turn fruit into jam and milk into cheese but all this is for is unlocking recipes and cooking. That is it.

The game is just too easy. You don't really have to work for it. You just move from area to area and suck up trash and hey look, the pumpkin seeds I needed to unlock recipe B6. The quests where you have to collect things you just collect them hand them in to the lifeless NPCs and get your reward. Oh and you don't even have to look for these collectibles very hard because there is usually 2-3 extras in the world just in case you thought that maybe you'd have to work juuuust a little harder.

Oh and inventory management is nightmare and your stacks are tiny. Something players absolutely love beyond a doubt.

Hey, at least you can upgrade your movement speed and move superrr fast.

I get to run around barefoot in a princess dress and hit rocks with a gold pick axe (that probably weighs 3 times my character does. Damn girl, do you lift?) while Mickey Mouse watches on. Need I say more?

Kyk neh, when I started this game and I was hard locked to ‘Joe’ I immediately became a bit apprehensive. I do not like not being able to customize my character and especially choose my gender and my voice. Those things matter. People like being represented and having choice. There was a bit of salt in the wound when they named the player character Joe. No offense to the Joe’s out there. It’s so bland.

Oh but they use this to its full advantage. The jokes. Oh bless the devs’ souls, the jokes.If you spend any time on the internet and know your memes, this game is going to slap you with them every chance it gets.

The jokes are so… stupid. So bloody stupid they’re good. So cringe. So dad-worthy. It sends shivers down my spine. Lekker.

Anyway, moving on to the game.The colors are quite muted. Lots of green and brown. It’s a bit of let down when compared to Serin Fate or Stardew Valley.

What it lacks in color, it makes up for in animations. They’re basic but they’re fast. I am an impatient player and having to sit through animations that take f-o-r-e-v-er (I am looking at you Animal Crossing) is like slowly rubbing your left toe on sandpaper.

There is a sell-box. You just dump your crap in it and magic voodoo (the game’s word not mine) makes it all go away and money just clunks into your pocket. I cannot stress enough how important a sell-box is in games like this. A true blessing.

Speaking of blessings… There is a tutorial that’s actually good. Legit. So often are these neglected. And it’s cheeky too. Tutorials can either not be there or too in your face. This game has perfected that balance. It holds your hand juuuuust enough so that you’re not reeling from too much information but you’re also not yelling at the wiki gods to tell you what you should be doing next. I am not the brightest crayon in the box and the definition of lazy has got a picture of me next to it and this game makes me want to talk to NPC’s and actually read through their replies instead of skipping it all and then yelling at the wiki gods for the answers.

There are so many settings it makes me excited to just think about it.

The controls are intuitive to an extent. Which is nothing to scoff at in of itself, but you can waste a lot of energy accidentally swinging your axe at the wind which for all we know could offend it and bring down the wrath of the rain gods on poor Joe’s head.

I am sure the game will have a stupid joke lined up for that as well.

Inventory management is a bit janky. They’ve got the basics but none of the nice QOL features like quick stashing items or shift clicking to move an item from your inventory to the target inventory. BUT… the stack sizes are big. I love me some big stack sizes. I HATE IT when you can only stack a miniscule amount of wood and you have one chest dedicated just to wood. I need space to place my army of flamingos, not chests. What am I going to do with an army of chests? NOTHING. But plastic flamingos have just that right amount of cringe that you can kill a nation.

I give this game a 5/7

Ohhh this is a pretty shell.
Ohhh that is a pretty fish.
Ooooh pretty flappy green stuff.
...
There is something behind me isn't there?
It's big isn't?
How screwed am -

Whelp. I am ded.

The idea is brilliant. The execution is more wonky than a duck walking on stilts.

Bugs everywhere and no convenient shoes nearby with which to squash them yet.

I am sure it gets better as some point but I'm hard pressed to see how and when the magically transformation from irritating grinding to an astute-mannical-person-eating-fest-of-monster-party will take place if at all.

I tried to Google - Google was hard pressed to present me any kind of concrete answers. Nothing is inherently obvious and you have to click everywhere to figure out how anything works.

At least there is a tutorial on how to use the camera - woe to me if I did not know how to use the camera... as if it is not obvious and universal to every game of this kind. Perhaps if they were doing something different then a camera tutorial would be the next revolutionary in I dont know how to play this game please help me tutorials.

A tip on how to write letters would have been more helpful thank you very much.

"DO NOT PUT THAT IN YOUR MOUTH."

"AH FUDGE STICKS, someone please help Frank - he's been stabbed by a flesh eating tree again."

"NO no no no, chop 'these' trees first - not those."

"Stella - there is blood in the road. Be a dear and clean it up."

The micro-management never ends. I understand these monsters are braindead - really I do - but it would have been lovely if they had the common sense to chop the trees next to the friendly creek and not next to the monster eating trees because that happens to be a thing.

Verily I cannot recommend this game - it's too confusing.

I like the game. Flight Controls are atrocious. Mining takes forever but the game is fun but not worth 60$.

It was a lazy afternoon. Things were quiet. Dinos were being eaten down below while I was relaxing on top of my majestic bird. Everything was right with the world. I saw something shiny in the distance. It caught my attention for sure. I decided to investigate.

Pressed "E".

Dismounted my bird.

Fell to my death.

Survived.

Got eaten by giant chickens with teeth.

5/7, would die again.

But in all seriousness. This game is terribly optimised. My rig isn't exactly some pansy little girl to get bullied on the playground yet Ark comes prancing along on its low requirement promises, spits on my poor PC's shoes and then steals its candy.

Despite that, my experience so far has been epic even though it looks like a game from 2003 came and peed on Ark's graphics.