Project Explore definately falls under the Edge Of Space scams section. If your reading this and have not bought the game, DO NOT BUY IT! If you happened to just buy it and have yet to play, then highly recommend requesting a refund immidiately before it's too late! Those of you who know me, I only give negative reviews for games that are falsly advertised, incomplete, or my posts are deleted by the owner. This game falls under the first two!!!
[h1][b]AGAIN DO NOT BUY THIS GAME!!!! IT IS INCOMPLETE!!!!![/b]
That being said, here are my findings and why the negative review.
Unless you have knowledge of how to run a server, this so called multi-player game gives no instructions on how to run one. Setting up the server for me was easy, as its basically the same way you would run one for Terraria or Starbound, which is locate the install folder, click on the server executable, and answer the questions your firewall throws at you.
Click play from Steams menu to run Project Explore and after selecting multi-player, add your server in the list. Youll have to find the server.txt to actually name your server, because the game client despite showing the name, actually only displays the title to you, everyone else trying to find you, just sees the defualt name. server.txt is located in:
C:\Users\YourAccount\AppData\Local\Project_Explore_Server.
I figure those of you who got ripped off who got stuck with the game, at least can get a partially semi good server running.
[b]This game in incomplete. It was put into the regular market and being sold as a completed game, not an EA game, yet 95% of the content is missing and not even written in the game. Reading the forums, the author said he has been working on his own, which I would never give bad feedback for, but to sell a game as completed, when people have complained since 2015 that the game cant save all the user data, and anything a player puts into a chest gets lost immidiately, and never fixed in 3 years, that looks very bad.
The house I built, everything I put into it, in all the containers was gone. This was bad for me because my tools were in the chest and with no tools, you cant make more.
Tearing the game apart to see what it is made of took even less time than it did with EOS. This is because there is next to no content. Now just so you know, this was in multi-player mode. The server window would not accept any commands what so ever except for save and stop commands. The author told me some features were accidentally left out. Reading the forums, this was mentioned back in 2015. Three years and still not fixed?
Just like Edge Of space, the menu shows a lot of items you can make, but only 2% really exist. Looking at the chest I made, I discovered that other then the GUI information and graphics, nothing was written to actually store anything, so this is why after you close the chest and reopen it and find all your things gone, that is the cause. A lot of game code is missing. EOS actually has more content that this game, and that says a LOT!
The last two things were the nail in the coffin as the saying goes. Not only does the game disable Steams overlay which prevents users from taking screenshots and reporting the game, it also leaves an executable running in the background so despite closing the game, it burns up time so Steam actually thinks your playing it when actually your not. I caught onto this earlier today when I was playing TileMiner which the owner has been honest since the game was returned to the store, and even when he removed it. Took a lot of yelling people to talk him into returning the game to the store, and even though TileMiner is incomplete as he stated, there is still a LOT more content then this game. Anyway, while I was playing tile miner, a notification poped up telling me I got a card. Looking into my inventory, I found a card for Project Explore. I was like, how can I be getting a card for this game while playing another? After hitting alt-ctrl-del and looking in task manager, I discovered a executable running for Project Explore. Nice little routine which if you dont catch, burns up the time so when you do catch the issue of the incomplete game, chances of getting a refund are even worse, because Steam sees hours of game play yet all you did was load the game up, and either closed the game a few minutes later, and still it runs in the background. As I said above, screen shots using steams client are disabled, so the person who wrote this game and put it in the store for sale as a completed game, made it so you most likely will never see your money again, once you realize you really cant play much.
Items stored on the character so far are ok, but try playing a sandbox game like this and storing what content there is all into your backpack. you cant, and a lot of items have very small stack limits.
[/b] [/h1]
This game is highly NOT recommended due to being sold as complete in the regular store, and items needed to show proof of peformance are deliebertly disabled. This game has 95% less than Edge Of Space. Buy at your own risk!
EDIT:[b]
After talking with the author of the game, he brought to my attention that all the negative review bugs were for a different version of the game and that this one is a totaly new re-write.
I myself have not seen these other versions, but if this is true, this game belongs in the EA section. For a rewrite to have the same bugs, its just plain wierd. Also, nothing was written, at least in multi-player to put armor and weapons on. No stats page for these items. If this gets put in the proper section on the Steam market, and the bugs and missing code get fixed, I'll update this review.
Things to note, armour can be equipped by right clicking it on single player game, not the server. Also, the chests work so far in single player. Its the multi-player server thats missing key elements. If your just buying this for single player or multiplayer features, both have seriouse issues. I just edited the ending of my review after several findings. First, thank you Steam for the refund. Even though it's not much, the fact you look out for your customers, is highly appreciated!
The only thing you can do with this game so far is just build. The great ratings and reviews this game had, was from another version. This one is a complete rewrite and needs to be put into EA status. Here are the really bad issues:
[h1]
Multi-Player -
Chests do not store items, and act more like recycle bins the moment you close the lid. The GUI is present, but seems the code is missing to complete storage in multi-player.
No monsters, no way to spawn them either as commands for admin were accidentally left out.
Can only build with limited items.
Single-Player -
Despite the fact creative mode activates a menu to get just about every item in game, many of those items do not work, making it so the only thing you can do is build.
Monster spawners do not work. They can be placed, but other than that, they are non functional.
If the game is put back into EA status and shows improvement within a reasonable amount of time, I will redo this review to reflect the changes. But until that is done, I sadly must leave it as it is.
[b]EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. ***** THIS GAME IS MISSING KEY FILES WHICH ALLOW FUNCTIONS LIKE THE STEAM OVERLAY AND SCREENSHOTS TO BE TAKEN. RUNNING THE GAME THROUGH THE STEAM OVERLAY WITHOUT THEM LEAVES YOUR PC EXTREMELY VUNERABLE TO ANY TYPE OF ATTACK. IF YOU BOUGHT THE GAME, AND STILL WANT TO PLAY WHAT CONTENT THERE IS, RUN THE GAME FROM THE FOLDER IT WAS INSTALLED IN. RUNNING FROM THE STEAM CLIENT IS EXTREMELY RISKY *****
7-30-2018
Sadly, the games promised content has not been restored and is still an unplayable shell. I decided to name a new game level that will describe games like this that were at least at one point working, then butchored. We have (EA) For Early Access games that are still in production. Games like this, (Late Access Resets) LAR.
