White Sands

I rarely post reviews. Sorry but no. Early access or not... when you don't know what to do, don't see the units you're supposed to command, clicking on targets does nothing and graphically you can't really tell what is what... you just switch it off and ask for your money back. My apologies to the creators, who I am sure meant well - please invest your time in something else tho.

I wanted to like this game, really I did. It feels very clunky and unfinished (unpolished?) Summary: Not enough explanation on what you're doing and too many game breaking stalls that make you restart. This game might make more sense to someone who has actually been in a military setting rather than someone that just wanted to get into an apocalyptic military sim. The controls the tutorial tell you to use are either incorrect (keys A, B and C do nothing?) or incredibly convoluted to figure out. There is a very high lack of explanation on what each unit is designed for. Some have a short description others have none at all and I'm just guessing the differences. I've tried several runs with and without the tutorial, had a really good run going and the game just stopped sending out troops so I had to restart. Missions are very pick and choose which is fine -- but it becomes an overwhelming task to do 2 of the 20 plus missions popping up which makes the game entirely unfun when you get a horde of pop ups "Failed Mission" because you constantly lack troops. There is zero explanation on how I even get points to buy troops. If there is one I could not find it. I've had my troops stall out in base and not deploy even when they are full on every stat, they've gone on patrol and just stalled out sitting there for the entire day with zero reason to and they will not disband/dissolve. The support seems weird in that it sometimes has fired without me designating an area to fire upon. (Click once get targeter, click twice set area and pew pew, some have a click thrice for line up.) The pause command will not stay paused when I check mission pop ups that come in too many droves to read at once. As a quality of life problem: It is hard to work around the tutorial window to read mission pop ups. In any case I'll be setting this game down and will not recommend it to anyone I know.

Very cool concept. I really dig the John Carpenter style music. If you improve the controls a bit, its going to be even better.

This game isn’t ready. The core concept and vision are promising, but the current state feels fragile, like something barely held together. The storefront markets it as a playable game, which is misleading. I didn’t expect a finished product, just something functional and it’s not. I’d only recommend buying it to support the developers. Otherwise, you’re not getting a "game." A crowdfunding campaign like Kickstarter would have been a more honest approach than presenting it this way. Right now, it’s a laggy, unpolished mess. For a game with pixelated PS1-style graphics, the performance issues are baffling. It feels more like a concept slideshow than an RTS. Even the basic controls fall short of the standard set by older games like Command & Conquer. The still images used are poor AI-generated. It’s clear the developer(s) have a vision, and I hope they achieve it. If they do, I’ll update this review. But as it stands, it’s not worth your time.

Way too many problems right now to justify a price above $15. Coming from someone experienced in QA it feels as if the game was a little rushed before a lot of playtesting was done. To start off with the good: -Extremely good communication with the developers. -A huge map that you can explore/expand into at will. -Plenty of random events. -A good variety of units. -Going out of your way to send units to deal with things requiring farmers, engineers, etc. at a settlement not only physically changes some of the town, you also get a bonus of doing so (i.e. if you spot something that says it needs farmers with a drone, and you piggyback some farmers along with your main squad to deal with whatever's there, you'll get a food bonus if you tell said farmers to go into the structure that needs them). Now for the bad: -Extremely poor camera controls. -Hope you have good memory. Some camera controls are only explained in the tutorial. They do not appear in the keybinds menu. -Cannot rebind all keys/commands (such as the horrific idea of using right click to do everything on the battlefield). -No indicators or anything for your units on the battlefield. You pretty much have to use the nightvision/FLIR modes just to try and see them. -The only indication that a unit is yours is if you move the center of your screen over something. -Complete lack of visual distinction for your infantry. You will constantly either not see them or confuse them for civilians. -Despite various structures at civilian towns needing engineers, farmers, etc. you can't directly deploy any there. They must tag along with a mission that just so happens to spawn at that town. -Units usually ignore orders and do their own thing. -No indication of what vehicles can carry infantry on the recruitment/buy screen. -Descriptions of units are more flavor text than actual information on what that unit actually does. -Numerous instances of there being multiple units that should just be rolled into one type. For example, there are both Engineers and Construction Workers that do very similar jobs. A similar confusing situation are two different units, Tunnel Rats and Tunnel Rat. -Speaking of issues with names and the like, some units don't have a description. -Helicopters can fall out of the sky and explode even if doesn't show them taking damage or anything. -Speaking of taking damage, there's pretty much zero feedback if a unit is taking damage. You have to put the very center of the camera over a unit just to see it's stats. -Selecting a unit doesn't reveal it's stats or anything (also, right clicking to select units? Really?). -Are all the images used to depict units AI generated? Personal favorite is the Nomad Camper with the front wheels under the center of the vehicle. -None of the vehicles that are supposed to be a certain IRL vehicle looks like them. Probably related to the previous. -Performance isn't great (and my PC exceeds the listed requirements by quite a bit). It freezes temporarily every single time you hire more units, or units enter or leave one of your bases. -There's much more, but I think you get the idea. Many problems to be found. I feel like the game absolutely has a lot of potential. Keep an eye on it, keep it in your wishlist for now, but at the time of writing this review it is absolutely not worth the price.

中文

After about 1 hour, I can say that it is a very promising game

Fallout vibes. I like it. 

its a hell of a game I tell ya. I only see 3 problems with it so far. first that direct control works funky sometimes. Second, the game has some bugs as any other fresh early access game does but it is nothing to cause you trouble gameplay wise. Third Ui which is cool but its old school and a bit chunky but its very nice to play with still. If you dont wanna play it cause people say its unplayable, I tell that sounds like skill issue and its a fine ass game. I only played for 4 hours and I already cleaned 2 sectors of the virus. in the end, it is worth the time and money and its a really nice game.

Tutorial assumes you already know how to play. "Click a unit and give it orders." Okay, how? Where are the units? Assuming I can find one, which ones are mine? Nothing on the screen is interactable. Seriously, all of the boxes in the UI that look like selectable options don't do anything. This $23 "game" is a video of a drone-mounted camera trying really hard to make you dizzy and nauseous as your opponent evidently "decisively wins." Huh? Happy to refund.