評論

• gamedeal user

  Aug 6, 2020

  20 Hours in, and I cannot recommend this game, not now, not ever. Normally I would say; "not recommended for now, but perhaps in the future" but not this title. Again, an overzelous developer that continues to throw in systems without fixing previous systems or keeping in mind that the complexity and micromanagement of previous systems grow exponentially. In my 20 hours of playing thus far, I've not encountered any major bugs as stated in other reviews. The occasional graphical glitch and an NPC stuck on a wall do to a bed being too close, but nothing that couldn't be easily fixed by picking up the NPC With the hand tool and setting them down elsewhere. No, the problem with the game isn't bugs, which for an Early Access title can sometimes be excusable, the issue is micromanagement to the point of absurdity and frustration. - 1: You will rarely make enough profit to remain solvent and in business. Constantly trimming costs but also at risk do to militia raids and thieves. - 2: Everything requires some sort of resource and an employee to repair or restock. Even torches require that you purchase Fat to keep them burning, candle holders need candles, wash tubs need water. ever... single... step.. described above must be done by an NPC that has to path and find the supplies (which you have to individually order), and then walk back and restock, re-light, repair, restore the item. All of this -on top- of all the other chores and duties your NPCs already have. Now, at first this might seem 'fun' on paper. But the moment -anything- breaks this chain, your Inn can go from doing very well, to disaster all because a thief stole a stack of plates (which unlike soldiers/militia do not show up on their hands). -3: Time scale is completely out of whack. It can take a customer and entire day to have a drink and eat a meal, but the same is said for your employees who can take hours to finish a task, to then be interrupted and move on to another task. -4: This is most evident when your garden gets ravished by wild boars. They walk into your tavern willy-nilly, navigate -through the main hall-, through the kitchen, into the store room, and then outside to your garden (which in my case I had fenced in to avoid this issue), to then trample your garden and break items. And yes, your bodyguards, staff, cook, Innkeeper, other patrons all watch like idiots as these wild boars walk into your Inn and do this. The same can be said for rampant militia, but at least that makes a little sense. This is the sort of nonsense that occurs when a Developer lacks /any/ game design experience and does not focus on making FUN and engaging systems but puts the cart before the horse. -5 The game currently suffers from a show stopping bug that won't be evident until several hours in. That's where your mugs and plates, critical to the operation of your tavern, vanish. After running several tests, I confirmed that the mugs do indeed vanish into thin air no mater how many I ordered and had in stock. This creates a serious problem when trying to remain profitable, pay back loans, or expanding your tavern. As it is right now these seem direct design decisions by this Developer and do not seem like bugs (with the exception of #5 which perhaps when fixed might alleviate some of the issues). Do I recommend? Not at all. I strongly suggest you come back to this 1-2 years into the future if you're still interested and something better by an experienced Game Designer isn't out already. To see if these issues have been done away with and the game loop has been improved, as well as the addition of Quality of Life improvements (auto-ordering for example).
• gamedeal user

  Nov 4, 2019

  I want to get something out of the way: This is a fun game: I bought it only a week ago and I've clocked 15 hours into it so far. The premise is solid, the blending of simulation and RPG dialog/choice mechanics is well done, and the core systems are well-designed. The main reason I'm not recommending is bugs and lack of explanation of core mechanics. First, the good stuff: You play as an innkeeper who's just inherited the business from his uncle, and the campaign acts as a sort-of tutorial and gradually introduces you to the different elements of running an inn. You buy/make supplies, hire staff, set prices, and plan the layout of the building and furniture. There's an overworld screen which helps with getting supplies, unlocking new recipes for food/drink, attracting new customers, and unlocking new furniture for your inn. The simulation itself is quite solid and is fun to mess around with in sandbox mode. Optimizing walking paths, tricking out your inn's furniture and decor just the way you like it, and figuring out what optimal prices are and what recipes share ingredients and attract your desired clientele is more than enough to keep you occupied. If you're looking for similar premises to judge the simulation aspect of the game by, a lot of people have compared it to the Sims and I think that's a bit off. The vibe to me is more like Evil Genius or Dungeon Keeper, except that where in those games the goal is to level up and please your employees, here your goal is to serve your customers. The sound design and voice acting of the game strongly reminds me of Firefly's Stronghold, a childhood favorite, but it lacks that series' humor and tends to be simply serviceable and nostalgic if not much else. Now for the RPG aspect - the game also promises to be an RPG, and here it (sort-of) delivers. Throughout the campaign you end up in dialog with various factions vying for power in Yorevale, Untermarch, and Sambria. Your inn is situated at the crossroads of all three. How convenient, eh? As a result, you meet various characters that you can talk to and try to ally with (or ruin) using your character's speech skills. There's wisdom, oratory, deception, passion, and intimidation, and you level each by using it, regardless whether the speech check succeeds or fails. You use your speech skills as well as your own decision-making to ally with, undermine, and generally serve various faction interests to ensure your inn stays open and you don't get killed. There's soldiers, a griffon-based mail service, exotic foreigners, shifty cultists, powerful seers - all the usual tropes (good, bad, and cringey) you would expect from a medieval fantasy game in 2019. You get a lot of choice about who you get to serve and support, but the story really isn't designed to branch in the way you would expect given how many factions there are. This is where the RPG portion falls apart or hits its well-designed wall, depending on how you look at it. As far as I can tell, these skills are mostly equivalent. Now, you shouldn't focus on just one, as there will be circumstances where not all 5 are available as options. The game does force you to be strategic in that aspect. However, the actual effects of the skills appear to be mostly flavor. If the skill succeeds, you get bonus relations score with the person you're talking to and if it fails then you lose relations. All the different skill choices give you is different flavor text - so whether you intimidate someone, lie to them, give a fiery passionate speech or appeal to logic and wisdom is ultimately irrelevant. I would consider this to be kind of good, as this game is fundamentally about tavern management and it wouldn't do to have selecting one skill over another radically change whether you unlock certain tavern features (especially since your patrons expect all features available when you hit certain tavern rep, represented by stars). However, it does mean that the RPG choices kind of fall flat as the storyline seems so far to be pretty on-rail. For example, there's a character in the early game that you can choose to kick out or ally with. Whether you ally with her or kick her out, the next portion of the game has you doing a bunch of stuff to resolve the fact that someone is spreading rumors about your inn: if you kicked her out, it's her; if you allied with her, it's folks who hate her guts. The RPG portion is still fun and the story is engaging - especially because it affects the gameplay (a portion of the story has you dealing with a military commander, and as a result her soldiers cause a ruckus at your inn). However, it's not fundamentally what the game is about: the game has a sandbox mode with no story, but it doesn't have a story mode with no tavern. So if you're going into this with the RPG portion being your preferred focus, I'd stay away. The simulation really takes priority, with the RPG providing motivation and unlocks to gate progression in campaign mode. If you find yourself liking how this game sounds so far, read on, because there's a reason I'm giving a thumbs-down. And I, again, want to be clear that I am enjoying the game and am going to keep playing it. The bad: The game is really, really buggy. The mechanics are not well-explained and the bugs exacerbate this: I didn't understand how fuel worked for lighting, for example, because the lighting I had chosen for my first run was lanterns which are currently bugged (they take fat to refuel but the worker gets stuck in an endless loop trying to refuel it due to my placement). Now, had there been a clear explanation as to how this all works, then I would've known that I'd hit a bug instead of spending time buying candles as an alternative fuel source. Spoiler on that: just stick to torches if you want to use fat as fuel or splurge on chandeliers and candle holders if you're okay with spending for candles. None of the aforementioned light sources have refueling bugs, unlike the lanterns (which is a shame, as the lanterns are a nice middle-of-the-road option once you've graduated beyond primitive torches). The encyclopedia locked away in the Innkeeper's journal does not count as good explanation, by the way. That's minimal explanation, and in many cases (especially when discussing special employees and what stats to look for, how to fire them, what they do, etc) it's missing details or explanations entirely. The actual UI isn't very intuitive either. It's hard to tell if something is actually confirmed - like sending an employee to get medical treatment or barter for a new recipe/furniture - because there's no sound effect and no popup indicating something's happened. Instead you have to dig into the menus and check if that specific employee has their action updated to traveling, for example. The quest UI also appears to be a bit buggy, as it sometimes fails to update when I've finished an objective due to the trigger for objective completion being different from the actual objective. For example, there's an objective called "Confront the Countess", but the objective didn't clear when I confronted her in dialog; it only cleared after she walked off the map, so I was left milling about for a while unsure what to do because she was stuck in a door. Being fair, that bit's my fault due to poor planning resulting in that route being flooded with foot traffic. Verdict: This game, for all the fun you can have with it, is very clearly still in beta phase and shouldn't have released fully (EA would've been great for this). The developers, to their credit, have been listening to player responses - if you see the recent news and patch notes, they are working on the major bugs. But as it stands currently, I simply can't recommend this game. If you're okay with a buggy experience you'll need to restart a few times, then I actually would recommend this. As a full purchase, I would give it 6 months to a year for the devs to patch major issues.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 15, 2020

  This Game could be great, but it's still broken.. really really broken.. It needs a MAJOR overhaul. I'll play this game for a little while and suddenly something stupid happens; My mugs disappear, a waitress somehow gets on top of the bar and starts smashing things, I buy a new bar and can't sell the old one because "it's still in use" even though I've ordered everyone to ignore it, the UI is terrible with menus that are blank or full of nonsense numbers and buttons that do nothing, the AI is also horrendous - there are still pathing issues and you need more employees then you have customers just to keep the inn clean and running, the list goes on and on and on.. I have to save to menu and restart 2 or three times in order to continue playing. Not just the first time, but every time, after every patch.. They upload a patch and say they've fixed the problems over and over, but they really haven't. Sometimes things are worse, or they've fixed something only to break something else. Instead of spending time fixing the multitude of problems, the dev's are trying to cash in on paid DLC and transitions to console systems. It's a real shame as I would have bought every DLC they produced had they started in early access or fixed the many issues we all are having. I've held off on this review because the dev's asked us to wait and give them a chance to fix things. Well they've had months now and instead of improvement or repairs we get ads for paid DLC? Get it together dev's or this will remain a negative review.
• gamedeal user

  Jul 7, 2020

  I was hesitant with the reviews before I purchased, but I wanted to play so bad because the idea of it was so unique to me and I love this genre. I genuinely wanted to give a good review, but the bugs make the game infuriating. Many aspects of the game don't even work ending up with you basically selling soup and booze making it feel like an idle game. Once you trudge through the campaign it completely loses its appeal. This is my first review on steam but what irked me was seeing the developers trying to sell DLC when they could be working to fix the problems of the game. Overall, a pretty big bummer. Hopefully another game, far improved, like this emerges someday.
• gamedeal user

  Nov 14, 2019

  Great game, absolutely fantastic, do not buy it. This game is so, so unstable. It's actually impressive. I have not been able to finish the campaign at all because the jenga tower that is this game keeps falling apart, often without me actually noticing. All of the 6 hours I have in this game has been across no less than ten attempts to make it through the campaign, every time hitting a brick wall of bugs that I didn't know were bugs because, being new, I don't know how this game is supposed to run. This is a shame, because the gameplay is really good, the world is nice, and it's really fun seeing my little inn prosper. I like the map, it's cartoony but not [i]too[/i] cartoony. The item descriptions are sarcastic in that nice Bard's Quest style. The music's decent, although I don't think they composed them themselves (I don't know, I didn't check, don't sue me). If I had any complaints it would be that the priority system for the AI employees is a little confusing and often nonsensical. This game would be an easy ace if the developers just knuckled down and fixed all of the bugs. Please, please do not buy this game unless you really don't care about being able to play the game properly.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 10, 2023

  I've owned this game for a while now. It's a mixed bag for me. Mainly because of the developer. The game itself is fun. I haven't had many of the issues that others have had with game bugs and performance. My opinion, the game is not bad. They have fixed a ton of bugs, but from what others state, more bugs could be taken care of. This game is well known in the gaming community for being buggy and at times unplayable. This is kind of why I don't respect the developer. My personal beef with them is the first 'season pass' DLC that i bought and now is part of the game. For those of you that are thinking of purchasing this game, the developer did a crooked thing awhile back and released a bunch of ho hum DLC's and introduced a season pass. I bought it. Just a few months down the road they decided to include the DLC's with the base game. Cool for all the new ones buying it, a giant middle finger to all of us that bought into it. Never buy any DLC from this developer. If you take anything away from this review, that would be it. I was hesitant to leave a positive review, but i am reviewing the game and for me, it's been pretty good. Just don't trust these guys. They are all about the money and not about completing anything. The only reason they have done what they have done with the game is because the gaming community in a whole had to nag the crap out of this deadbeat developer to bug fix the game. Come to find out they were making a board game that shares the same title of this game. Hopefully a bit less buggy. The game, when working is solid with bugs. The developers need to grow a backbone and listen to the community. They're not a AAA developer, but they sure do try and act like one. The future of this game is probably not good. The developer has a bad name now with the antics they pulled with this game in the early days and with the cash grab board game they made. Again, only reason for the positive review is I feel the game has gotten to a late beta stage and for the most part is playable. Yes, the game has been released and is not in a beta stage. I feel with a developer that does take the end users wishes with a bit more concern, this game would be a classic and probably topping the sales charts. Unfortunately for this game, Klabater is the developer. So caution is warranted and your experience will vary. If you found my review helpful, consider giving it a thumbs up so others can be cautioned by this developer and game.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 29, 2021

  Such a cute game. Absolutely NOT worth the advertised $25 USD. It's too unpolished, buggy, and glitchy for such a hefty price-tag. I'd say wait for a sale and pick it up for 10 bucks or less. Some quick pointers - just save yourself the headache and turn OFF the Puppies and pets and Bathroom DLCs in the Options menu - they are both horrifically broken and will make playing the campaign a nightmare. Also, for building your Inn, be aware you can build a basement, however the steps MUST be placed within the initial central area of building area - 10 wide and 8 deep. Anything outside that area and your cellar steps won't work. I really wish the Dev could have cleaned this up more, it could have been such an awesome game. The Campaign story is actually VERY good, but be aware it IS a patience game so if you like fast paced games, this is not for you. I only recommend the game if you can pick it up on sale and keep in mind the problems that exist.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 25, 2019

  I know the patch notes mention that the game is supposed to have fixed the pathing issue, but that's not true. My chef walked clear through the wall and got stuck. Then all my servants did too and I had to make a new door for them to...get stuck on furniture right after. I can't delete this staircase, and I don't know why. I can't expand to 95% of my tavern's second floor, and it won't tell me why. The rooms I can make are scattered. Some of the journal's help menu is in...I don't know what language that is. Nobody will make the beds at the inn, so nobody will sleep in them except the staff, even though they are not marked for staff use or in a room meant for staff to use. Nobody responds to happiness ratings, loyalty does not deplete. Several perks / upgrades straight up do not function, such as "expand the land you can build on" and "more staff available for hire". Keep this game on your wishlist. Keep watching for updates, see if the game improves. Right now? Get something else.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 9, 2021

  So, i bought this game when it released ~2 years ago, played for around 5 hours, started running into a lot of bugs and little issues, and decided to put the game away for a while, to give the devs some time to fix it. I completely forgot this game existed, and just recently found it in my library, so i gave it another try. Well, despite the devs actively working on the game for 2 years and even releasing DLCs and an xbox version, not much has changed, and certainly not for the better. I really wanted to like this game, and i really want to keep playing it, but i just can't. It's literally driving me insane at this point. It's a damn shame, because the core of the game is amazing, it has great ideas and a lot of potential, the artwork is really nice, sound is really well done, and when i first started playing it again it felt like i found one of those hidden gems. Until i started running into bugs and major inconveniences again. To name a few things which are very wrong in this game: - The build mode is scuffed beyond belief and barely functional. You can't simply rip out a wall to connect two rooms into a larger one - you have to demolish one room with no refund, and then rebuild onto the other room which is extremely expensive. So you better plan your build for the entire playthrough everytime you start a game, because changing layouts on the fly is borderline impossible. (at least without using an exploit for infinite cash) Workers are sooo frustrating to deal with. Priority systems exist but the workers ignore them completely - Sarah has serving tables as top priority, cleaning as bottom priority, there are 20 thirsty guests impatienty waiting at their tables to be served, and the store room is slightly dirty, while the other bartender decided to have a 5 hour smoke brake? better clean that store room RIGHT NOW!! then all the guests run out of patience, leave without consuming anything, and sarah goes ahead idling at the bar (because there is noone left to serve after all) until she eventually goes to sleep. of couse she is also unhappy, because she really didn't enjoy cleaning, so i'll have to pay her extra or she might just quit. There is a single worker per safe capable of collecting dirty dishes from the tables, which is the starting worker, who might very be a slacking alcoholic and he'd rather take extended smoke brakes or steal from your booze supply than actually collect the filth piling up on every table - but you can't fire him, because he is THE ONLY WAY TO REMOVE USED DISHES FROM TABLES. Farm plots bug out frequently, where you can't remove them because something is apparently growing ("item in use"), but it's not actually growing it just randomly gets stuck and stays like that indefinitely. If they somehow don't break, its extremely tedious micromanagement. When a worker is done sleeping (you can't wake them up or assign them shifts by the way, they decide when they want to work by themselves), the first thing they do is leave the staffroom, go to the bar, idle for a minute, then they remember to go back to the staffroom to actually make their bed, then they go back to the bar to idle for a minute (even if they have cleaning and room service jobs completely disabled in their priorities), and if you get lucky, they migth actually start working, or alternatively they take one of those 5 hour smoke brakes i was referring to earlier. I could keep going like this for quite a while but i think you get the idea. This is almost 2 years after this game has been fully released as a "finished game", the devs keep patching it constantly, they release new content, even payed DLCs, but every patch comes with at least as many new bugs as it supposedly fixed. Some bugs (like employees consistently dropping things when carrying stuff up a staircase) have been around since beta apparently, despite the devs "fixing" them multiple times, and they always keep breaking stuff with every new patch. Please stay away from this game. You'll start playing it, you're probably going to really enjoy it at first and it's quite addicting, and then you're going to start realizing what a buggy and frustrating mess it actually is after playing for a while. Save yourself some time and sanity, this pile of crap game is most certainly NOT worth it.
• gamedeal user

  Jan 18, 2020

  [B]JUST A PREFACE TO SAY:[/B] This game is good! This game is fun! The gameplay and the campaign as a whole, is amazing, thats not why I am negatively rating the game, However, there are small things that build up and just mean I cannot accept recommending this game in its current state, because whilst I could endure it, I would not want someone else to have the same pain. There are some serious issues and bugs that just need to be addressed; - Game Devs are currently focusing more on DLC and paid content than addressing ingame bugs and making other quality of life improvements. Its a slippery slope guys. - When buying a new counter, it is almost impossible to remove the old counter as they will continue to path towards it, putting it outside, on different floors, didnt help, the only solution I found was to lock it in an empty room that noone could access. Even then, this caused staff to just glitch out, either walking through the wall/locked door or getting permanently stuck walking into the wall, even after finally being able to delete the item. - Characters are ALWAYS getting stuck in objects, walking into walls, in doors, and at times, even reloading the game, doesnt fix the problem, theyll walk straight back to the same place, or just still be stuck there upon reloading. - Staff hiring is finicky in general. Either the staff hiring list takes AGES to reset, or it resets whilst youre on the list, crashing the whole thing entirely, selecting a new staff member jolts the game back to the old list, but pressing hire does nothing, and anytime you select a new staff member, does the same thing. You cannot fix this by changing to a new menu, you must reload the game. - Some objects have some straight up bizarre hitboxes, not being able to fit into places where they absolutely should be able too, and then other items just being able to go where they really shouldnt be usuable? - Deleting and building rooms is straight up complicated, it seems like a simple mechanic but its just so easy to break that at times it becomes unusable, and again, this can only be fixed with a game reload. - Important character on the way? Enjoy the key spasm! - Built a fence to try and keep your staff garden isolated? Yep, theyll just walk right through that. - Some paintings just are impossible to place, as well as the occasional other decorative item. - Some items and products are missing images, descriptions. - Some menus are unclear, why does it have the "cost" for the mainhall, which obviously cannot be adjusted, but under the same menu is the "cost" for the dormitory, which you can adjust? - The games lack of real tutorial, or help function can be and will be unbearable to new players, the story does little overall to actually teach you the game. - Staff/guests being permanently trapped on stairs, in rooms, in doorways. - Sometimes when theyre on break they continue to work, sometimes when theyre working they just do nothing? This one I feel is more down to the traits, but it should be made more clear, this worker is slacking, this guy is a workaholic. - Tedious attention required on gardening, producing your own resources. The late game is just you watching garden patches, and not much else. - If youre in the world map but theres a popup for whatever reason, it cancels your shopping list, and takes you back to the barn. - Sometimes staff go on missions and travels you send them on, sometimes they dont. - Sometimes kicking a guest out of private room works, sometimes it doesnt. A few things that could be done, to instantly make this game 100% better; - Fix the guide, make it an actual, understandable guide. - Introduce some form of training/automation for the gardening. - Fix the object hitboxes! - Be able to disable objects, preventing them from being used, such as counters, for an easy upgrade - Fix the room building mechanic, perhaps be able to draw out the room using a pencil tool, then select its room type after its constructed? - please, please, when the ground is white from the snow, make the grid outline black instead.