izigame.me

Dinkum has its charm and a variety of unique mechanics, but it starts to feel stale after a while.
My recommendation for players is to go to the settings and set the 'Text Speed' to Super, because the dialogue gets lengthy for no apparent reason and almost never adds anything new to the conversation or helps you better understand what you're doing. It's your call whether you find it useful or not.
Right, so Dinkum is more of a sandbox game than anything else. You'll find your entertainment in making your little town a prettier place, placing buildings in nice spots, and creating good-looking farms, orchards, and so on.
It still has life-sim elements similar to games like Stardew Valley, blended with survival crafting mechanics, but those are not the main focus here. The core of the gameplay is the sandbox aspect.
What I like:
You can sleep anywhere with a sleeping bag; you don't have to go home to save the game. You still need to sleep to create a new checkpoint, but at least you can do it anywhere on the map. It is a bit silly, though, how you can wake up in heavy rain or a snowstorm and still act as if it's the most beautiful day imaginable.
There’s no set time to go to bed. It simply gets late, and during that time your stamina is significantly reduced. This makes it the perfect opportunity to take care of tasks like smelting or cooking, which don’t require any stamina.
After NPCs move into your town, new ones start visiting to replace those who were visiting before. This creates a continuous flow of new activities.
And it's pretty fun to befriend people by fulfilling their daily wants.
You can use the torch as a weapon to stun enemies while also serving as a light source, which gives it a dual purpose.
By pressing Escape, you can check the book to see what you've donated to the museum and what you haven't, along with other helpful information, such as what you need to do to improve your relationship with your animals.
It's enjoyable that the game doesn't hold your hand too much. You discover everything on your own through exploration and trial and error, which gives the illusion of greater depth.
Lovely music and atmosphere.
Items remain on the ground and don’t despawn. I find this interesting.
When you release an insect from your inventory, it behaves just like it did before you caught it, as it should.
The helicopter and all the vehicles are nice to use, but they might be too costly. You mostly get to use them only in the late game when there isn’t much else to do.
What I dislike:
The negatives outweigh the positives for me.
There isn't much customization when creating your character, which isn't a big deal for me, but I can see how others might find it lacking in that area.
You have to go through several clicks just to reach the pause button. Simply pressing Escape and expecting the game to pause will not work, as you have to manually click the 'Pause' button for the in-game time to stop.
This is probably because the game was primarily designed with online multiplayer in mind, where pausing is not allowed on servers.
However, this creates another issue. Even being inside a shop does not stop time, so if you plan to go mining, you need to move quickly to save enough time for exploration. In other similar games, time usually pauses when interacting with shops, unless you are playing online.
Only being able to buy a single item per day, such as an axe or a pickaxe, can be tedious, and not having the option to craft them at all is a nuisance.
The beginning of the 'plot' and the reason you move here is as plain as it gets. I don't think it makes much sense. One moment you're in one place, and the next you're suddenly somewhere else.
And why you decide to move in with some random grandma named Fletch is beyond me.
I found no reason to get attached to any of the characters, even after spending over 100 hours in the game, because they are that insipid.
The jokes they make aren't funny, the dialogue is full of meaningless chit-chat, and unless you have the text speed setting on the fastest option, clicking through it becomes a chore.
There’s no marriage system either, but honestly, that’s probably for the best since you don’t really care about them anyway.
Using machines to cut wood, furnaces to get bars, and making cement all take time, and you have to click on each one manually. This is a double-edged sword because you might enjoy the activity at first, but after a while, especially in the late game when you’re still forced to do the same grinding you’ve been doing for a long time, it becomes nothing more than boring.
I don’t understand why there is an infinite number of enemy bats, worms, et cetera, constantly coming toward you. They don’t add much challenge; they’re just a mere inconvenience, like an annoying mosquito buzzing next to your ear.
Why can’t you stack bugs and fish in your inventory, but you can have over 500 fruits in one slot? Does one bug weigh more than a bag full of fruits?
I’m not a fan of the license system. I would have preferred progressing by leveling up activities and unlocking new recipes as you reach higher levels.
Licenses are way too expensive for how little they actually do. I bought them all, which was very time-consuming, in my honest opinion. I don’t mind a grind fest, but it needs to be pleasant enough so it doesn’t feel like a burden.
The energy system feels pretty terrible, but you do get used to it.
Same goes for fishing. I’ve seen better fishing mechanics in other games of the same genre. I will give credit where it’s due. I think it’s more realistic this way, catching fish one by one by hunting them down in the water. But at the same time, since you can’t stack them in your inventory and can’t just relax while fishing because you’re always on the hunt, it once again becomes a chore.
To be honest, there should be a mechanic to catch fish by hand because you see them swimming next to you. It would be impossible not to catch them as you dive near them.
Metal detecting helps a great deal with money early in the game, but it’s pretty uninteresting. You also have to keep most of the items you collect since you need them for crafting or to open treasure chests.
After a full day of metal detecting, all I got was one shiny disk for the Tele Tower construction.
A lot of the recipes don’t even make sense. Why do you need pearls to construct a fountain?
Speaking of which, make sure you don’t break the oysters. Some resources don’t respawn in the world after you destroy them.
I don’t understand why the Bottle Brush bushes don’t respawn like the other plants.
Health kits don’t stack, and you have to use them one by one. They don’t restore much HP either.
The water can doesn’t break, but the other tools do. Why is that?
Sprinklers are not very practical, and it takes a while to get to them.
I wish I could have the map open while running around.
This game needs more random encounters to keep things fresh.
Descriptions for what you're buying can be minimal. Without a wiki, you might not even grasp what some items actually do.
Put Put.' That’s the description you have for the tractor? Sure, it might seem like common sense, but is it really? The tractor is pricey, and if it doesn’t do what you expect, it kind of feels like you got scammed, you know?
There’s no relationship tab when pressing Escape to view points with the NPCs.

It’s not exactly a bad game, but it could have been much better. The reason I give it a positive review is that, I assume, it’s the developer’s first game and it has little to no bugs.
Plus, it’s affordable.
6/10.