I don't understand the seemingly low ratings.
The progress in the game is very addicting, watching numbers go up is not usually satisfying to me, but this hits the mark by the way of build optimization. Stat upgrades seem semi-random, every level you can upgrade one stat more than the rest of your options, and while it might not be the minmax stat to take, it lets you add versatility to a character, then you can use a mindblowing number of gear to try to exploit it, to make your character that was only a fighter until now be able to tear out someone's soul, so they can aid in magic encounters now.
I didn't have an issue with there not being a manual, I didn't even do the tutorial, and most things were completely intuitive to me, however, crafting is a major part of the game, and it is daunting, even after having finished the game once. I didn't even find an extensive wiki.
Most of your time will be spent trying to craft the optimal gear so that your characters can function, and fuction effectively in combat/social/magical encounters, several at once, if possible. Depending on what "essence" the crafting materials you use have, the same item you craft might scale with a different attribute, and it might be used in a different kind of encounter. Then you have to think of balancing whether you want everyone to be used in every encounter, or have a small group of elite specialists for each, etc., it's a never ending puzzle.
The overworld actions are exactly as addictive as the Civilization games, it has the same "just one more turn" effect on me.
Combat can be a bit hit or miss, the main issue being keeping track of initiative, and whether it's worth to take an action to manipulate initiative (usually not, sometimes it's life or death). Autoresolve is an option if you prefer to just stick to optimizing builds and improve in the overworld.
