state: playing the Linux version, currently around 10 hours into the game's first map and enjoying myself immensely It is basically a city builder, with heavy emphasis on a technology tree that you gradually research, and revolving around exploring and exploiting the scarce resources that you find. In the beginning (and well into the game) you need to import a lot of goods and also building components from earth. You do that by controlling a finite number of rockets that you can order back and forth between Earth and Mars. They take a long time to travel and are very expensive, so a little planning is essential. The more technology you research, the more self-sufficient you (can) become. The first map is supposed to be very easy and indeed it allows for mistakes and you can still keep going. In this respect, it really feels like colonizing a remote planet, since you do not get second chances there either. It is still a challenge, because resources (and colonists) are always scarce. The AI does a reasonable job, for example controlling transport drones, so you can stick to your planning without too much micro-managing. The controls are functional and do their job without getting into your way - I suppose that makes them qualify as good. However, there is no real tutorial or anything. You get thrown into the game with just a few help texts. These let you completely lost after the first few minutes, and you have to find out the rest yourself. For me, I considered this a challenge, but it might put you off. Technically, the Linux version is running smoothly, despite my rather unusual setup with Radeon graphics. I did encounter one defective save game that crashes upon loading, but all others worked fine so far. So, while annoying, this seems like a rare problem. So far, I am enjoying the game a lot. It is slow paced, but I never found myself waiting for anything to finish, because there is always something else to do. Perfect for my taste.
first, I must admit: after half an hour of playing, I was ready to turn away from this game. It is pretty unforgiving at the start, especially with its rather strange navigation system, very limited air supply and almost no guidance. However, many people said to give it a chance, and whoa, they were right. In Diluvion, you pilot a submarine through often dark and dangerous waters. The interface is in 3rd person 3D with a bunch of different control schemes and lots of configuration options that leave nothing to be desired. When you dock, location interiors are rendered in hand-drawn 2D with a distinct style that is probably a matter of taste. I found it fitting the game's mood pretty well. My initial disappointment with Diluvion mainly came from the fact that these days, I used to be spoon-fed with quests and directional markers. Here, when you are told to "find" something, you better be prepared to really search for it! However, it is never unfair. You are usually given enough directions; following them, on the other hand, takes some getting used to. The navigation system is based on landmarks. Once you got a map, they get entered there. You never see your own position on that map though, but you can see the direction and rough distance to your known landmarks. You can navigate surprisingly precisely with this scheme once you discovered enough landmarks. This way, the game rewards exploration in a very tangible way. Other than the quest line you follow, Diluvion seems to be a game of exploration. There is a sense of accomplishment reaching the dark, mysterious floor of a seemingly bottomless pit, and there are intriguing, dangerous and outright surprising things hidden there - much more even than the memorable "Yamamoto Crab". There is a certain amount of grind in Diluvion, when you are working for new equipment for example, but so far this has not bothered me. I am looking forward to many more interesting finds in the deep.
first, let me clear up some misconceptions of earlier reviews: 1) It took me a while into the game (and much frustration) to find out that the camera view is _not_ locked. You can freely rotate the camera. 2) Likewise, it seems on first glance that you can get stuck. While this happened to me once, yuo can always "restart the level" regaining all lost charges etc. Now that this is out of the way: the game looks like an action RPG at first. In "light" situations it plays exactly like that. However, as soon as you get more than one dwarf to control, you _want_ to use the pause function to plan your moves and give orders to your other dwarves. Otherwise it is easy to get swamped by enemies. Which brings me to my main issue: the game does not do a good job showing you the ropes. Several key gameplay elements I had to find out by looking at the controls and just figuring them out. Other than that it is well done. The graphics are decent and loading times lighting fast. The story progresses in small units, which specifically appeal to me due to the fact that you can still enjoy the game without investing your whole evening. With just a few hours into it on medium difficulty, and having spent a lot of that time learning how (not) to die, I can not say how it develops. Voice acting is indeed a bit strange (most probably text-to-speech) but I found it still capturing the somewhat weird atmosphere. So far "We are the Dwarves" has grown on me, despite a shaky start.
