Heat Death: Survival Train

I was drawn to the game by watching a short video from a youtube page playing the beginning. The graphics and design made it look awesome. Seemed like it would be fun to play. It was, until I realized that even though there is a decent space to explore, you can only walk, and that is about half my shown gametime. Walking around trying to find items that were barely there. I almost got the the last stop in a short time, with still not much engagement. I got lured in thinking there was going to be more substance to the game play, and a reason to build up the train. By the time you build up your train somewhat, it is the end of the road, and you really have no need to do anything else. Not unless you want to joy ride back and forth on a train track with no purpose or reason to even be playing the game. From reading reviews from a year ago, it seems not much has changed except whatever pointless "lore" update they seem to be trying to milk this game for another round of unsuspecting people. Save your money, and see if they bother to add more to the game, unless you want to waste your money, then go for it. Just play the free demo and call it a day, but the demo is half the game, and the second half is no different than the first.

Has development stopped? bought this months ago and it has not been updted, Tiny map and very incomplete. otherwise great concept.

Cool concept. Dog sht execution. Game lacks music and almost no sound effects for various things and objects, I'm currently at the 3rd station in the game...so not very far into it. At this point it's supposed to spawn a weapon chip so you can proceed. It did not. So I am now stuck and cannot proceed any more. Wonderful. I would also add that the game has this very annoying and unessesary stamina aspect that adds nothing to the game. (Basically, if you run out of stamina, you die soon after). Also, it appears that the devs have possibly abandoned the game given what a lot of people are saying. Complete waste of money. ---------------- Update on the Weapon chip issue.. The chip finally spawned in station 3 after restarting the game 2 more times. I had already watched some videos so I knew exactly where it SHOULD spawn. However this is apparently random on whether it will or won't. So I ended up spending about 5 hours on my 1st run. Most of which was spent going back through all 3 stations and the areas in between over and over and over. Just to make sure I didn't miss anything. Run #2..spent 2 hours basically doing the same thing and once again got no chip. Run 3..after finally making to station 3 AGAIN, it finally spawned where it was supposed to. What an absolute waste of time. Why would you create a scenario where your players must have a critical item to progress... and then make that item spawn left to a random generator? Maybe you get the item, maybe you don't. If you don't, start the game over from scratch. Wonderful game design.

[h1]Oscillating on the edge[/h1] Before you get the ability to grow plants, the game is very difficult. Food and aid kits are sparse (you frequently receive damage from your radioactive engine) and you have to keep pushing forward. Once you can grow plants, the power becomes an even bigger problem. Radioactive fuel rods are limited. And despite having 2 wind turbines and 2 solar panels, I can't drive at even the lowest speed without draining the train's power cells. All the power related items are locked behind non-craftable items that you have to find. The main point of the game very quickly becomes waiting/crawling or playing Dynamo mini-game to get some extra power. [h1]Micromanagement hell[/h1] [list] [*] Chests have a size of ~20 items (depending on the item weight). [*] There are no bigger chests. [*] You can place chests one on top of another - they are still separate chests. [*] You can take all items at once from the chest, and you can store all - but it stores items from the top of your backpack. There is no option to store matching items. [*] There is no sorting in the backpack. The newly picked items go to the bottom. This means that the order is pretty much random. [*] You cannot take multiple items at once - either all, or 1 at a time. [*] To build something, whether an item or an element of the train, you need to have resources in your inventory. There is no auto-take from chests on the train. [*] After a fight, you have to manually find and repair every object. And you need to have the resources in your backpack. [*] Projectile turret needs to be manually resupplied with the ammo. It stores only 25 bullets and you will spend 3-5 shots on an armored drone. [/list] A good thing is that there is no backpack limit, but if overencumbered, you cannot run or jump. However, the tracks are on a raised platform that you cannot walk on to. This means that if overencumbered your train is inaccessible to you... Interactible items in the world are highlighted, but the distance is very short, as short as your reach. [h1]Mute game[/h1] The sounds in this game are a total disaster: [list] [*] There is no music or any kind of ambient sounds. [*] Certain sounds are super loud, e.g. a geiger counter (did I mention radioactive engine?). [*] Certain sounds are super quiet, e.g. enemy drones shooting at you. [/list] [h1]Other[/h1] The world is very empty and linear. There is nothing between POIs. You hardly ever move farther than 50m away from your train. There is no exploration. You just slowly keep moving forward. Placing objects on the train is messed up sometimes. For example, to build a wall-mounted heater you have to aim at the ground, not at the wall. Building a 4th corner ceiling is also something that can easily take a couple of minutes. Demo progression carries over to the main game.

I like the train building mobile base thing and survival parts. I HATE that it is still incomplete. After a short while I reached under construction. I bought the game Jun2026.

Lack of resources makes this game suck.

This game has good potential. I am aware it's in early access, but its also been in early access since...2024? but between fatal crashes and bugs where I can't click anything..it can get frustrating trying to advance. There is some things that just feel absolutely not necessary. I have no idea why when I get cold why death is so fast and I also get hungry at the same time, so if I do recover I die from extreme hunger all the sudden. And every time I've fought drones has been in bad weather so I can never collect anything from them. I feel what I can carry is meh in capacity, if there is a backpack yet I have no idea, but it still seems a bit meh to make metal scrap common and needed in everything but is the most heaviest. the good pros about this game is the fact that you are somewhat building your own train, the decorating system looks like it's going to come out really nice and I hope engines become more advanced.

My recommendation is provisional, as Heat Death is still a work in progress. It's literally a 'game on rails', a format that usually works against most games. However, there are some locations that require our intrepid survivor to pull an occasional Scott of The Antarctic move to discover some hidden lore or supplies, forever mindful of a meagre 15-minute outside operational window between ice storms. Bear in mind that over-snow movement is PAINFULLY slow, so it's advisable to carry a supply of spare batteries for your woefully inadequate environment suit, as well as soup or energy drinks and a first aid kit... But don't overdo it. Your weight limit is 30 kg, so this excursion could go one of two ways. In most cases, your heroic efforts may either yield a few lousy kilos of common loot, or a decent swag of items that are far too valuable to drop. Big decision time. Blueprints and certain tech components are essential for making progress in the game, so they should be your first priority. Now it's gripe time. Like most survival games, Heat Death is extremely stingy with its available resources. However, there is a tendency to hide critical lore entries and valuable tech in unmarked locations 'off the beaten track', as it were. Well off the beaten track, as it turns out. The items that are found in the stations do not re-spawn, although the hostile drones you'll encounter most certainly will. They will be your primary source of materials and tech components. As for those hidden locations, there are very few clues to work with. A map HUD or even an occasional marker pole to indicate the presence of a POI would be most welcome, but that isn't going to happen. Your only option is to scope out the icy terrain for anything that might be of interest. Ah, yes. Station 69 and the remote Laboratory. My favourite gripe of all. There seems to be an unwritten rule in game design concerning areas that require feats of parkour to reach: Make the jump mechanic as pathetic as possible. Heat Death has gone quite a few steps further with this idea. 1. Provide no clear indication of the one and only path that the player needs to take to reach the objective. 2. Make the terrain fairly difficult to traverse, liberally including areas where forward progress is reduced to frantically bouncing on the spot to extricate oneself from an invisible hole. 3. Don't forget that 15-minute window between ice storms. 4. If you didn't save your progress at the station or on your train, you're completely boned. 5. Make the gap just wide enough that a one-picosecond delay in hitting the jump button will be sufficient to totally pooch the landing. 6. A bad landing won't kill you outright, but the second attempt most probably will. I guess most folks will write that gripe off as a 'skill issue'. As I'm a 70 year old gamer, this may well be the case. However, I've watched YouTube clips of 'name' reviewers whose playthroughs consisted largely of them constantly re-arranging inventory space aboard their cluttered trains while heading into an imminent drone encounter at breakneck speed. Not one of them has twigged to the fact that the inventory crates can be stacked quite neatly. Attention to suit power, stamina and health levels also tends to fall by the wayside, as does the repair states of their trains and equipment. The concept of farming the drones for resources also appears to elude them. In my book, that's the real 'skill issue'. In summary, Heat Death: Survival Train has the makings of becoming an enjoyable game at its current stage of development. It's no Subnautica, Planet Crafter or No Man's Sky yet, but it does have potential. Bugzapper's Rating: 7/10. P.S: You'd think that any civilization capable of interstellar travel would be able to carve steps, build a safe pathway or install marker poles to delineate safe paths to remote buildings, but noooo... :( Addendum: Well, I finally made the leap across that blasted chasm. Looted the laboratory (yay, woo) and started the return trip. Hit a nasty patch on the way down, slid a fair distance to land on an icy river. Entered a long, long cave, found absolutely bupkiss and promptly fell through the terrain. Naturally, the 'Unstuck' command doesn't work when you're falling, but this glitch doesn't even have the good grace to allow the the player to land. Devs might want to look into that. Not at all happy.

The game has good features. It has fun survival mechanics. The death screen is a problem. If you are in the middle of something and die, good luck it has a strong chance to just force you out of the game and back to the main menu causing the loss of so much progress and souring the mood for the game. They need to move the options for after you die to one side of the screen and stop inputs for o.5-1.5 seconds. DO NOT BUY THIS UNTIL ITS OUT OF EARLY ACCESS!!!

Wait until more work is done on the game to buy it, if any more work will be done. It has the potential to be a fun game eventually, but the lack progress and communication here on it's steam page gives 'abandoned game' vibes.