At this time I cannot give Summer in Mara (ver. 1.5) a good review. The game is clearly unfinished.
I’ve already found 2 very annoying bugs.
POSSIBLE SPOILERS (Island of Qalis)
– One bug was the mail crabs (quest says to find 5 when there are only 3 on the entire island). Can’t finish the quest until 5 are found.
– As for the second bug: if I touch any of the vending machines (I’m assuming that’s what they are), the inventory system gets trashed. I can’t pick up anything, from anywhere, from that point forward.
The game has good potential, but they needed to put a little more time and effort into testing it before they released it.
As of this version (1.5), I cannot recommend it.
I will start by saying that I am a fan of farming and simulation games in general as well as RPG and exploration/survival games. I usually don't mind a lot of fetch quest and I'm okay with repetitive tasks.
So here are the good, the bad and the ugly.
The good: For an indie game, the graphics are quite nice. I really enjoyed the animation scenes at the beginning and at the end. I also liked the character design and the environment that you can explore. The music is also very good and makes the whole experience very immersive. It's a matter of taste but I also enjoyed the story, although it was perhaps not as deep as it could have been. Otherwise there is definitely a wholesome, feel good vibe to this game.
The bad: As many mentioned, the whole game is a fetch quest. There is not much else to say about that. Basically it feels like a visual novel with fetch quests in between with a little pinch of farming. I think that what's the most annoying point of this game is it's emptiness. None of the islands you visit (Although beautiful) offer anything interesting. The farming aspect, that was one of the selling point of the game, was very poorly executed. There is basically no point in farming things aside for some fetch quest. Making money is irrelevant and there is zero progression for the character aside from the fetch quests. This made the game really not satisfying to play because there is no sense of accomplishment for doing something. You just hoard animals and fruit trees for no reason.
The Ugly: The developers have not updated the game since June 2020 and the game is full of game breaking bugs. For example, I was not able to finish it at 100% because one quest item do not spawn where it is supposed to be and I tried everything to fix it. A lot of random crashes are also present. It's not unplayable but it definitely do not feel like a well polished game.
It's too bad because I really wanted to love that game but I can't.
I'm about 16 hours in "Summer in Mara", and about 60% done with the game. Overall, I've been enjoying it. It's relaxing, the art style is calming, and the music helps with this ambiance. However, I have encountered a number of annoying bugs, particularly one where a story mission was impossible until I looked for a solution on the internet. That made this a less-than-restful experience.
In more detail...
1. Although maintaining the island is a key game mechanic, don't expect "Stardew Valley" or "Harvest Moon" levels of management. You only have sixteen plots for growing crops, and half of those don't become unlocked until later in the game. You can redistribute trees and berries, so long as they go in the right ecosystem. The animal pens, however, are always in the same spot; you can't choose where they go. (Also, fences don't auto-lock, so good luck getting a perfectly straight line).
2. As mentioned in other reviews, the "300 quests" in the game summary are predominantly fetch quests. Even the main plot quests are basically fetch quests. A bit more variety would have been appreciated.
3. Not all of the controls are labeled, and in one case the wrong input is provided. It took me 30 minutes and three diving goggles to finally Google the minigame and discover that I should be pressing left shift and not "W" as the game was telling me. It also took a few minutes of experimentation to find out that my 8 and 9 keys changed Koa's shirt and backpack.
Overall, the game is rough around the edges, but I'm still enjoying it.
Sorry but this is a Deiland reskinned
- all the annoying mechanics are inherited and even updated to be more annoying
- more stupid fetch quests like "i think you need some food, i'll cook you a pie!" to make game longer
- closer to game end you'l hunt NPCs randomly placed on a random locations and meet bugs like quest items disappearing from inventory
Questionable writing, bugs, spelling mistakes, Verbal mechanics(people say something that may exist, but likely doesnt), statisticless hidden background mechanics(how or when does something grow?) and a whole lotta meaningless fetch quests for some unlikable characters.
Its a visually apealing but flawwed game which seems rushed towards the end.
There is something here, but it seemed to be infected by something which rotted it at the core.
