Dave.EXE

[h1] Biased Yet Truthful Review [/h1] Hi there! I'm actually one of the Devs as well as Dave's girlfriend! Dave has worked so so hard over the last 6 years- alongside Padre, Oddball, and more recently myself. I truly think this game is unique, with it's characters, art style, music and more! I really loved working on this game the last 3 years, and it has a lot of heart, and a LOT of replay value Please consider giving it a chance ♡

So, I’ve been really excited about this game for a while and have been keeping a close eye on it ever since the Early Access release was announced. After almost 6 hours of gameplay, I’ve got to say that I’m starting to get the hang of the mechanics, and everything feels much smoother now. However, the biggest problem (and I think it’s a major issue when it comes to getting new players invested) is the lack of a proper tutorial. Yes, there’s a short tutorial level that explains the core mechanics, but once you complete it, you’re immediately thrown into an open hub with little to no idea of what to do next. It’s not about the game lacking a story mode. It’s about questions or objectives like: What are OWO Charms? Where do I start my first run? What does this NPC do? How do I earn these currencies? Why are some charms locked? After restoring a timeline what else can i do? The game just throws players in without any proper guidance, like: “Start here, and after succeeding or failing a run, head over here to buy upgrades,” or “Go here to learn more about the monster that was chasing you.” For example, I didn’t even know I had a flashlight until I briefly checked the library. That’s something that should definitely be covered in the tutorial. If you don't give players a clear goal or objective to go back through the Timegate, then what's the point of continuing to play? I don't feel im unlocking a monster entry after encountering them. I don't feel like I'm making progress after restoring a timeline either. I simply return to the hub to buy a charm or a cosmetic and then repeat the process. There isn't even a progress bar or any indicator showing how much of the game I've completed. Without some form of long-term progression or milestones to work toward, it's difficult to stay motivated beyond simply doing runs for the sake of it. Going back to the library, it contains a lot of useful information and works as a nice in-game wiki. Whenever I get killed by a monster, I can check its entry and learn how to deal with it next time. The problem is that players have to walk all the way down the hub voluntarily just to access it. It doesn't have a door near the tutorial (which i think it should be), and if a player is lazy enough to just not read or explore the hub, they're going to be lost until just giving up and opening youtube. Another issue is that the game shows previews of ALL the monsters before you even start your first run. That kind of kills the mystery and excitement of discovering new threats as you play. Personally, I think it would be much better if monster entries were unlocked after encountering them for the first time. Overall, the game is entertaining, and I’m still invested in playing and seeing how much it improves with future updates. Dave’s games have always been known for their charm and replayability, and Dave.exe is a great example of that. To summarize: the game is fun, highly replayable, and requires you to strategize around everything it throws at you. However, it’s not very welcoming to new players. If you’re not already a fan of Dave’s games or interested in the DBD + roguelike gameplay loop, you’ll probably feel frustrated and overwhelmed at first. That said, I’m glad to see the game finally enter Early Access, and I wish Dave the best of luck in continuing to improve it and making it as awesome as he knows it can be. *[Pssst this was translated by Chatgpt, i apologize if some things don't make to much sense. i just wanted to give a proper review and share my first thoughts about the game. Love you Dave ツ]*

as a long time fan of dave's its nice seeing this game get finished as my friends told me about it after atcs inception enough wasting time to get on with the review ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- GAMEPLAY the gameplay takes the style of dead by daylight requiring you to collect 5 colas/vending machines to escape a timeline while a randomized enemy is after you while the gameplay is simple and explainable its not a bad game at its finest with its randomized enemies and random events to spice up the gameplay so you won't get bored. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ENEMIES and now for the big turkey of the game, the enemies possess different abilities that can help them charge stalk or throw projectiles to hinder your progress while most of them are simliar in way such as the smackus bonkus and kitty klown however there are some enemies that work differently then others such as constantly knowing where you are while some require you to race to the end of a trial to win. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PROS the game itself offers 2 in game events that can help you unlock cosmetics which add 2 new enemies in their individual events which makes the gameplay fresh, the game has a BUNCH of cosmetics which allows unique combos to be made; as for the extra stuff there are challenges that you can do which help unlock charms that can benefit you in trials to help boost your survival so your experience is a little better ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CONS this game is a bit buggy which is a bit expected for an early access release and here are the cons -bad map design -NOT beginner friendly -difficulty/unfair enemies and those are the cons which I'll explain here con 1: the maps in this game are bizarre to say the least some are fine/good while some are GOD awful for its layout and tight spaces biggest example is baldi's schoolhouse those maps are very tight and its unfair against enemies that can phase through walls or shoot projectiles or literal charging as its mostly impossible to avoid it and your more likely to die to unfair enemies you get put up against. con 2: there is a beginner difficulty sadly its not the real way to get the experience of dave.exe putting you against the most SIMPLISTIC enemies so you'll likely get bored and maybe stop playing, but the map design also isn't making it more friendlier since you have to memorize the maps where the vending machine spawns your more likely to take more time to complete it, also if you decided to pick the standard difficulty the game doesn't tell you how to prevent your demise if you happen to die to an enemy you don't understand requiring you to go to the hub world and see what killed you which is very annoying since you might not know what enemy killed you con 3 as for said above now we'll talk about some of the unfair enemies and events, some of the enemies in this game are purely not fun to go against or sometimes make it impossible to win a timeline or insta killing you if they happen to be present in the enemies section I didn't happen to mention the big bads such as (edgy dave and tompson) these guys PUNISH you for taking your time which sucks since hiding is useless when your on a time limit to complete the map the most useless mechanic are the lockers I never found myself using them 100% of the time due to their uselessness and lack of vision, not to mention edgy dave HE ALWAYS knows where you are so if you have him in a timeline your gonna TAKE even longer if he's constantly always on you requiring you take different routes and strat's to stall/complete vending machines which is the worst part about this game, and tompson is a bit more forgiving having you able to use your environment to avoid him which makes him better to go against, and last thing some random events are straight up unfair on certain maps so really good luck if you get wild wild west on Baldi's schoolhouse because your more likely not to survive ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CONCLUSION the game itself is good with some flaws that weigh it down but not too down where it gets a not recommended from me the game has a lot of replayablity and more but hopefully some things aren't just cosmetics hopefully some things such as new gameplay changes or stealthing is required since some enemies need you to be aware and stealth away the random events keep the gameplay fresh, I'd recommend buying this game if you are bored or your a dead by daylight fan looking to get away from the toxic or bs balancing so hopefully this game gets improvements and gets better as the time goes on, so at the moment this game gets a 7/10

I've been following the development of this game for several years now and it's so surreal to finally see it on Steam. I've loved it for years, and I can finally leave my best attempt at an unbiased review on this game down below: First off, the game is incredibly replayable, with 40+ enemies and random events the game doesn't get boring easily. My favourite enemy by far is Ducktor Dungy (this has nothing to do with the review I just wanted to mention it)! The game also has a lot of unlocks and a few challenges on Berry's Beach to unlock certain charms. The sheer amount of content that is still being expanded on is amazing. While I do think there are things that could be improved on, such as optimisation for beginner players and fixing a bunch of bugs, the game is in early access so it'll have a lot of time to get smoothed out eventually! Also, the RNG can be a bit wack sometimes so I hope that gets some fine tuning in the future. I can't wait for this game to get fully polished and be the best game it can be. Thank you, Dave and everyone who's worked on this game!

[h1] Extremely biased review here. [/h1] Writing this "review" to congratulate my little brother on the release of Dave.exe. This is by far his most ambitious title, and I'm extremely proud with how dedicated he has been. I hope your hours of hard work will pay off. Good job, buddy. Wishing you a happy and healthy launch. Love you.

I'd love to like this game but it's simply very unfair to a beginner player. As many people said, nothing is explained in the hub. I didn't even know how to start a level at first. And when I did, it was almost impossible for me to get even a single Vending Machine done. The city map is especially stupid, you spawn and the robot girl automatically sees you. A lot of maps have long corridors where if a fast enemy sees you, you're just dead. I know this is definitely supposed to be a hard game, but it should be beatable on the easiest difficulty to get new players used to harder challenges. I have played a couple of Dave's games before and I'd like to love this one as well as the others. But it's simply too unfair. I'm not planning to refund this game, I want to see how it grows.

man i love how incredibly fast some of these monster are,i sure love not being able to fend myself and probably die million of time! haha,seriously though some of these enemy are really fast and it's not very fun to go against with a terrible base movement speed,which not only does it make the game feels sluggish,it's also doesn't feel very good to play with,and the other ability in your arsenal are VERY unreliable,quick dash is pathetic while vaulting is very sitational due to map design,but who know maybe these issue will fade away once i have gotten my hands on speed boost charm,but if those are essential to the game enjoyment,i think this game is poorly design

very fun game imo, I've been following dave's work for a few years and have been playing this game since the patreon-exclusive days. very replayable, the enemies are goofy and have their own charm, a ton of good music (for the most part, I'm looking at [i]you[/i], grubbler /lh), and I love the look of the maps. I do also enjoy the amount of adjustments you can make to gameplay between the charms and difficulty modifiers fair warning: there is a general lack of difficulty curves and the game isn't beginner friendly, though dave has been working on trying to improve the experience. some maps can be very visually similar and thus confusing for new players, some maps can also just have confusing layouts to learn in the first place and be difficult to navigate before you learn them proper. the game's audio balancing can also be weird sometimes, leading to loud moments you can't really turn down without turning down something else

edgy dave gave me a rimjob

The game I was probably most anticipated for to come to steam aswell (in my personal opinion) Daves greatest game. its literally just dbd but singleplayer. a simple yet fun loop with loads of enemies cosmetics random events tons of quests and challenges and overall its just funny too. ive been playing this game since the patreon hell i even subscribed to it cause of the game. I unfortuantly cant support Dave though as i dont have the money to do it but if i did i 100% would. its very fun and challenging and cant wait too see what more stuff Dave will add to this game as it already feels perfect and well made. my only gripe would probably be the loading times being way too long but i already know its getting changed to be better. please buy this game. its the perfect asym game to play for any type of mood both the laid back and wanting a challenge type. plus your supporting a amazing creator too by buying it this man had made loads of bangers in the past and this one is a masterpiece amongst them. my dream came true and im thankful for Dave Microwaves games for putting this game on here. Good job Big D I hope this Project turns out amazing