Hi i am a Weaver, and this review definitely has some salt in it, but hear me out. I genuinely wanted to enjoy SpiritVale, but after investing my time and effort into this game, I’ve reached the point where I can’t recommend it to anyone.
The biggest problem for me is how the dev handles the botting issues and how the nerfs come in in bid to stop that. The result? Legitimate players are the ones paying the price. It’s incredibly frustrating to spend time building and playing a character properly, only to have it weakened because of what bots are doing.
What makes it worse is the way patches and balance changes are handled. The game often feels like it makes kneejerk decisions — characters get nerfed or changed, and all the time and effort you invested into building them can suddenly feel wasted when the next patch arrives.
There also seems to be a serious bias in balancing. Some classes that are already dominating DPS continue to get buffed or remain untouched, while classes trying to catch up somehow end up getting nerfed again. With an already small player base, you would think the priority would be creating a healthier and more balanced game, not making the gap between classes even wider.
I’m also uncomfortable with how much influence the developer appears to give to a private Ko-fi group of early playtest supporters. From a player’s perspective, it creates the impression that major decisions are being heavily influenced by a small group of people rather than by the wider player base or the actual state of the game. At times, it honestly feels like the developer isn’t playing the game from the perspective of an ordinary player.
And ultimately, there’s no sense of security for your investment of time.
If one class can effectively be killed off because of a balance decision(in light of zerk now weaver), what’s stopping another class from being next patch? Why should players spend hundreds of hours building a character when there’s no confidence that their class, build, or playstyle will still be viable after the next update?
That’s the part that bothers me the most. Players invest their time because they care about the game. That time should mean something.
I don’t expect every patch to be perfect, and I understand that balancing an online game is difficult. But I do expect developers to understand the impact their decisions have on the people who actually play their game.
The player base is already small, the classes are still far from balanced, and yet the balance seems to be getting more skewed rather than better.
Personally, I just don’t think anyone should have to go through what this game has put its players through. I wouldn’t recommend SpiritVale in its current state.
