izigame.me

A comprehensive review of everything in game so far.
So this game has been on my list for a while, so even though it was Early Access I just HAD to try it. Most Early Access games are absolute buggy messes, very incomplete and lacking in content, or get abandoned with no real story. This game, however, is not one of those. It has everything you'd expect from a survival craft - base building, biomes, temperature, hunger, tool and armor crafting, and more. Advancing through schematics and stat changes in a manner similar to Ark, but with the added twist of still needing to learn special schematics via exploration, in-game vendors, and combat. There are also small settlements and wandering peoples to interact and trade with, a bounty system, and even roving Pal and bandit gangs to deal with - sometimes those nuisances can even launch raids on you or your base! While the story is not fully developed, there are definite hours of content to enjoy in it, and countless hours and activities outside it to do so as well. On the first stretch of the starter island (I haven't even fully explored it yet!) I have already spent almost 8 hours at the time of posting!
On top of that, it also has the monster taming concept of the game. At face value it resembles that of the traditional Pokémon style capture - battle and weaken, use better capture devices, type matchups, etc to increase capture odds - but with freeform combat - that is, it is not turn based and you, players, your Pals, and even wild Pals can dive in and out of freestyle combat as one may please in any encounter. There are even dungeons and raid battles in which you can encounter some dangerous Pals and their handlers in special arenas, to which you can queue up with other players or drop in on during!
However, there are multiple purposes to these Pals, they're not just combat buddies. For starters, when summoned while roaming you can, if you have the right gear, ride or use special abilities while exploring, including flying. They can also be assigned to bases to work autonomously, building or crafting whatever you queue up, or directly assigned to specific roles. Their abilities even play roles in base mechanics, for example a Fire Pal may kindle campfires or furnaces while Water Pals turn waterwheels for mill or Electric Pals charge electrical objects! You can also breed (dis)similar Pals to create eggs and incubate them for offspring that can inherit the abilities of their parents, or become hybrids of them! If you run low on certain resources, rather than going hunting to eliminate and "farm" certain Pals you can literally farm them - throw them in a ranch and they can start to drop some of their loot table! You can even catch the people NPCs of the game, though doing so can put a boutny on you and they rarely offer special bonuses apart from combat partners and crafting at a base, they do not have special abilities, nor can they be put in a ranch or bred for resources.
As far as its Early Access stability goes, I have encountered one crash bug and one animation bug, the former an issue with sorting duplicate stacks (stack limits are MASSIVE so its not as prevalent an issue) and the latter with getting stuck in the crafting animation (fixable by dodging out of it). Frames are stable as is the multiplayer latency, or lack thereof.
All in all, if you're a fan of survival-crafts, open world exploration, base building and management, and/or monster taming then you will absolutely LOVE this game!