ROI just doesn't work because the UI is so bad.trying to find information to base your decisions on is clunky. clicking on anything opens windows in random (and overlapping) places on screen. the only way to close them is to click on the small X. no hotkey or right click on the map. so you just spend your time managing the UI instead of the economy. I've played it for 10 hours which is more than a fair shot and my conclusion is to recommend Voxel Tycoon instead which is 10 bucks cheaper, way more fun and it still gets updates since it's still in early access.
rarely have i played a city builder that glued me to my seat like this one. though you don't need many apm there's a constant sense of urgency. everything about the presentation reinforces the atmosphere of surviving the iceage. the screen edges freeze, the sounds change, the music is just superb. this game also manages to tell a story which is unusual in this genre. can't wait for frostpunk 2.
i've spent a couple of sleepless nights playing this, so overall it's a thumbs up. however i wish there was more variation in the late game. once you've established a steady income it's just about repeating the same tasks over and over. the player lacks control over the flow of items. in a bigger factory it would be nice to define for example exactly to which export zone things go so they can be picked up at the closest dock. (btw it's a mistery to me why bigger items stay in the general zone) after 24h i had completed all tasks and didn't have a reason to keep playing. (in contrast i'm still coming back to Factorio after 300 hours because the gameplay itself provides motivation)
i only played it for 4 hours. 3h learning the game and 1h just raging at the crappy AI. my hunters kill an animal only to walk back to base empty handed while the village (and even the hunters) are starving to death. if they do pick up a piece of meat they only take one, not using their full inventory. you can select a worker and manually assign tasks, except half the time they ignore the order... villagers will stand idle right next to a task that needs doing asap. calling this a finished game is insulting. and how can there still be a game in 2019 where you have to save and exit to main menu to change keybindings or something as basic as changing the sound volume???? are you serious? 20 years ago games didn't have this problem. no amount of pretty maps can get me to play a game with such flawed main mechanics.
As a great RTS fan i bought this full price when it came out after months of anticipation. i was ready to love it but playing it stands out as one of the greatest disappointments of my gamer life. i can't believe they would still ask money for it. there were better games already in 97, so imagine the choices you have now.
i've spent 129hours on this so far( on steam). by this point there's nothing in the game that will surprise me anymore (unless you install mods (at least on steam they are available, not sure how mods work on gog)) and yet i still keep coming back to it. after you've explored the whole techtree there is no reason to build stuff except because it's fun to build stuff. if you need the game to set clear missions for you, don't buy this game. if you've spent days working on a castle in minecraft just because you felt like doing it, you will have fun optimising your factory and coming up with more effective designs in factorio. you can tune all the resources' availabilities and aggression level of the wildlife before generating your map, so difficulty is totally customizable. it's early access but it feels like a complete game to me.
