My Little Blacksmith Shop

I've seen a lot of negative comments, and I wanted to preface this review by saying that I haven't been getting a lot of the same bugs as some people, especially with the tutorial. I picked up this game for the first time in a while after a few years away, and I've had no major issues. This game is a PASSION PROJECT, for 10 dollars on steam! You can complain that it's buggy or unpolished because it's no longer in early access and that's valid, but keep in mind it's literally one guy working on this. He clearly cares a lot, enough to actively mention community sentiment changing his plans for the game. I feel like a lot of people are spoiled for choice seeing all the incredible indie games releasing nowadays. It's valid to be upset with bugginess or unpolished gameplay, but a few minutes of browsing the update schedule will tell you what you need to know - this isn't going to be the next Silksong. There is no seasoned team of devs working on this that's been polishing the game for almost a decade straight, waiting for the right opportunity to crash the internet. Game design is an interative process. So in short, if you like blacksmithing, give this game a buy. It may not be everything you hoped for right away, but the dev WANTS to make a good game. Every update gets us closer to that. He doesn't have the luxury of unlimited time or budget, or the superintelligence needed to do everything right on the first try. I hope that anyone who reads this develops a similar sentiment, and joins me in eagerly waiting for this game to blossom like I know it will.

I've never left a review for a game, but this one I feel requires the need for one. First, the good: 1) I love this game, or rather the idea of this game. I yearn for a cozy little blacksmith game where i can just make tools and weapons all day. And early on long ago (before I had gotten it on steam) this game scratched that itch for me. 2) The freedom to do whatever is nice. I really enjoyed how this game allows you to obtain your materials in different ways. Whether thats mining in the cave nearby to collect ore to then smelt into ingots, going to the local shop to grab guards and handles, or just ordering everything off the catalog in your shop yard. Second, the bad: 1) I genuinely feel like this game was better a hand full of years ago. And what I mean by that is I was able to progress a decent amount without any hinderance. But now, after a few years, I've booted up again, played just under an hour, and experienced more bugs in that short time frame than I have in the years prior that I've owned and played this game. One of which crashed my game in a way I've not seen before. 2) It still feels a bit clunky. And thats ok, thats to be expected from an indie game. However, for an indie game thats been out for almost a decade... it's a little ridiculous. I could probably add more negatives and even a few positives if I really sat down and put in the time to think about everything, but I don't. I don't think a lot of people who play cozy games have the time to put that kind of time into something. And I don't have the time to put a lot of effort into playing a game that has been in development for almost a decade for it to be arguably worse than it was years ago. Again, I want to love this game with all my heart. I want to sit down on a day off and become enveloped in this little world serving customers who need swords, shields, and axes. I want to spend a day in game mining to get my copper ore so I can save my coins. I want to explore the amazing world that has been crafted for me to discover. And I want to leave a positive review, but sadly I feel this game isn't there yet. To the dev: I do cherish the fun times I've had in this game, and I do sincerely hope it becomes the dream it was once meant to be. I will always be rooting for this in the bottom of my heart. I can't wait for the day I sit down again to play and get lost in this paradise.

I ran into three game-stopping bugs while playing in my first hour. I love the style and the idea, but I feel like I'm playing an alpha build

I didn't really believe the other reviews, but the tutorial is literally impassable because of the bugs. This game used to be good. Obviously the devs just don't care about it anymore.

>go to European fantasy town >black residents >master blacksmith is a black dude named Muhammad Yeah no. Do not buy this game. Do not support this developer.

2 hour spent trying to craft an item. game is broken.

Comprehensively, I love this game. I mainly play on the Alpha Test Branch and have grown to love it. I want to focus on a few things the game does that I love, then move on to some improvements. To start off one of the things I have to say I love most about the game is the amount of secrets and hidden gemstones and Easter eggs and puzzles. These are entirely unnecessary for the function of the game but their inclusion is such a pleasant surprise and adds some depth to the game. So much so that without them it would seem entirely a waste. I also really enjoy the placement of workstations and their modularity regarding their placement and that of storage rack and weapon racks. I also love the mining system, as a concept mostly, but I see that there is a lot of potential regarding how the mining system could affect the player experience. I have a few suggestions for that which I will specify below. More than anything, I appreciate the looks, the aesthetics, and the atmosphere of the game. It just has charm. I also enjoy the gameplay cycles and layout of the blacksmithing itself. Do not let what I am about to say be seen as impolite, it is merely reflective about the current state of the game. It has a few issues, as any game does. Most of the issues that affect My Little Blacksmith Shop stem from technical issues. To be specific, I experience some item physics issues and have sent myself flying a few times, lol. I have two other comments that are more like suggestions than anything else, they specifically look at the player experience over a long term playthrough. The frequency of repair jobs should be lowered a little bit. Most of the jobs I take are repair jobs, I would guess its about 2 to 3 repair jobs for 1 tool/weapon creation job. I understand that repair jobs serve as an important source of income even if you don't have money or income, mainly as a fallback or to get you enough money to buy metal. For that purpose they are exemplary, but they simply allow for less creativity and less blacksmith/weapon design. The regular blacksmithing where to go a build your owns weapons will likely always be the center part of the game for most people and for progression and it is already very fun and satisfying to me. The designs, the combination and the process. They are all more interesting than repair daggers. I have begun refusing all repair work manually because of this disparity in interest. My second suggestion is that the mining system be expanded a little bit, or more like it should be tweaked rather than expanded. Right now, as a player, mining can seem like a waste of time. I frequently asked myself why this was over the last three years. I think I have come to a few reasons that if remedied could make mining more worthwhile and more likely to be something that the player is willing to engage with. The following portion is more like feedback than anything: One, I think it would be more useful to the player if either the ore veins themselves were larger in the quantity of ore or that when you broke one ore chunk two or three pieces fell from it. I believe that this change or a similar one is so necessary for the player experience because the amount of metal that the player needs for even one single day of blacksmith is so large in comparison to the amount of metal a player can reasonably find while mining. Right now for example in my latest playthrough I want to move from Iron to Steel, however I realize that It would like require 5 days of mining and searching before I had enough smeltable material to allow me to properly accomplish this switch. Even once I do that, I plan to upsell them to adelite as fast as I can in order to compensate for my limited steel stock. This leaves me very little time or reason to enjoy selling steel to my customers as it is a very time consuming substance to come by. This applies to brass as well but not bronze, as I can buy the materials to make that. Second, the location of ore veins can be a bit nebulous. Sure there is always some in the mine, and from a players perspective that makes sense, so I'm not talking about that one in particular. I mean that there should be a more concrete way to communicate to the player where ore can be found or which types of ore can be expected to be in which places. Right now, the player is forced to essentially walk around the extents of the map and of every wall in an attempt to find ore, and these veins are very scarce and difficult to find. If you could find or invent a way to communicate their locations to the player, and make it something that the player has to actually go an retrieve, either a map, a special tool or even just by changing the look of the veins to be more noticeable. I would suggest for the above ground nodes maybe having some mining equipment nearby like the vein has been actively mined before, maybe a lamppost so that miners that previously dug into the hillside could work during the night. Tiny aesthetic decisions like that would probably be the easiest for the creator, as he is very skilled at using smaller items in this way. Third, the mining takes too long, I mean the act of mining itself. Maybe lower the health of the ores a little bit, as a balancing tweak. This is the tweak I would be the least confident in. Stepping away from mining, there are many things the game does great that I love and that could still be improved, mainly how to act and interact with NPCs. They have not implemented any type of dialogue system into the game, nor do I think that do so necessary. Right now you can click to interact with people. its in a very basic form currently and could be expanded upon. From the players perspective, the NPC have really cool armors and outfits and role to play in the world, however other than purchasing from shop, (Why does the parts shop reset every 5 seconds?) the player has little to no interact with the people that have been crafted so intricately in visual design. I love the look that NPCs have and the placement of them, their movements. You even have class stratification in the Northern Kingdom. I don't know where I'm going with this to be honest, but right now its like the NPCs are their for vibes when NPCs could be more than just vibes. Overall, I love it, I think it is worth playing, but it has a it to go before its something I could call great.

A peaceful, cosy, satisfying game with some unfortunate glitches/bugs. It's a shame that difficulties stalled the development of the game. The dev really has something here and it hope he's able to finish it someday.

Completely unplayable. Tutorial is completely broken, constant crashing and bugs, abysmal optimisation, and the developers have just decided to abandon the game. Don't buy until the devs finally fix it.

i dont usually make reviews but this games tutorial enraged me so much that i hit alt f4 on my third try, i feel that the rather than paying for this game i should have been paid to endure the torture that playing this game felt like, if you like life and dont want the rest of your day ruined don't buy this game.