Stonedeep deserves its mixed review. I really like the concept, and I can see a fun game here, but the game is mired with issues that prevent it from being fun.
So starting with the gameplay I know that I am a sucker for simulation and management games and liked the idea of dwarves just digging a huge city underground. But there were a lot of issues in how the game actually played. First off when I read reviews before my playthrough I saw that there were issues with the AI, but those were all early access reviews and I thought that they had probably been ironed out because of the recent full release. I can tell you though they have not. This is pretty disappointing to see as it was a frequent enough complaint in early access that I would have hoped it would have been remedied before being released. This was easily the most problematic issue with this game though, things are done very inefficiently, the prioritization option does not work at all from my experience, soldiers should be patrolling or something while they are inactive just stand around at the tavern (though perhaps that is realistic), and it felt like other dwarves were just standing around a lot. This is particularly disappointing because the game feels less lively because I found that Dwarves just stand in front of the tavern a lot, yeah they are doing their task I guess, the numbers are going up, but it would be nice to see more of my tunnels utilized it makes my mines feel dead. I also found the pace to be really slow, in my 2.6 hours of gameplay I felt that I had made so little progress; the AI is mismanaged so everything builds slower, research takes forever and so I do not feel like I progressed much there either, the population takes forever to grow so I found myself waiting for children to grow up a whole lot, and it feels like increasing the speed of the game is minimally helpful it really does need to be faster. I also found that the tax money was abysmal making things slower as well I was constantly researching and found that my money drained very quickly with my 2 research stations and it halted ALL of that, that was so annoying Also the tutorial is short, that is often good, but in my playthrough, I found that I needed more information (like where the hell paperwork was, managing happiness, the prioritization system (which should work), research system, etc. You make it seem like the game is mostly self-explanatory, it really isn’t, especially with some of the UI issues. And if my issues are caused by mismanagement then you need a better tutorial, advisor systems like other games (which would perhaps be a better way to do a tutorial anyways the huge popups are kind of annoying).
The UI was lackluster. The top bar was so crowded, there are too many resources there and not enough space this is especially odd because they have an open spot between the 2 parts for some reason… just create a line and add a divide if you want to separate them don’t create a camera notch spot it is just weird. That being said that does not really fix the issue, possible solutions 1. Allow me to choose what goes on the bar 2. Put only crucial resources up there (money, stone, wood, clay, and food would have sufficed for me), and create a separate menu for other resources. 3. Categorize them tighter (construction, food/drink, luxury, etc.) and create sub-menus. The left sidebar of all the events should be removed, create popups, and don’t take up so much screen real-estate with something so large and unnecessary. On a similar note, marriage requests should have been over there as well maybe I am dumb or blind, but at first, I did not realize that they were there at first and with no more notes than “complete paperwork” I was initially confused and thought I needed the throne room first so focused on that instead. Also, the scroll wheel messes with the top bar so I found that sometimes my resources would not be there and had to mess with them, nothing more than a nuisance, but still. Also if you do not want a tutorial, create a guide in the menu to help people.
With the major issues out of the way I would like to say that the music was fine, but way too limited. I felt like I listened to the same 4 songs over and over again and that eventually wore on me.
I am not a fan of the art either but it doesn’t negatively impact the experience. The 2.5D is a little odd, and the background and blocks look is okay, but slightly off of the rest of the art style, but above all, I don’t like how the dwarves look and move (including that menu dwarf). The buildings are pretty good looking though.
The controls were good except for that scrolling issue mentioned earlier, but I do wish I could zoom out more.
I also want to address, is 2.6 hours enough for this game? Yes, I wanted to give up an hour in because it was boring and slow, but I stuck with it more than many have/would normally. I know I have stuck around longer because I have achievements that only 1% of players have and even the easiest 2 only have 2.9% and 2.2%. If you can’t grip people they will never get to where I got, so I think it suffices. And if the numbers are negatively affected by the early access people not returning I think that it is still fair, first impressions are key and this game has not made great ones now or in the past.
Overall this game is not in a state where I can recommend it, which is quite disappointing. I see a lot of potential in this game, it is not going to become Rimworld or Cities Skylines, but honestly, that is unrealistic anyway, but it could be a good simulation game in its own right, but it isn’t.
This is the first game I was given through the curator program and was really excited to finally get to do a review of a game for a developer. Obviously, they did not have to do that especially because of my small follower base, and I am grateful for this opportunity. If they would like me to review this game again that is great and I would love to, but it would have to be after several major patches I cannot play this every time they have a patch. Maybe if it is much improved this time next year I will give it another try. Until then I cannot give it a positive review.
