izigame.me

The premise of the game is very good, I just wish it was better crafted. Here are some of my thoughts:
The positive ones:
- The characters look beautiful and they fit the narrative of the game just fine
- I absolutely love the crafting of food and drinks and the management of the tavern/inn, it's a lot of work but very fun!
- Dealing with mad customers is one of the best parts of it, very funny haha
- The cat and everything to do with it is just perfect and it makes me think that the dev must have one at home because the cat's behavior is just so on point. And also, it's the cutest little thing in the game. Love it!
The negative (or rather the constructive criticism) ones:
Oh boy, where do I begin?
- The game itself can be VERY confusing and even though there are a lot of pop-ups explaining the mechanics of it (and I mean >>a lot<<) you find yourself lost and confused of what you should do to advance in the game
- The amount of pop-us is insane and very boring, I don't want to have to read a whole "manual book" about how to play the game, I just want to learn playing it. If you need that many informative pop-ups there's something wrong.
- The construction of buildings and items is too complex. It took me a whole week-game to figure out and make a simple small chest because there are just so many parts you have to get done before you can craft it. It's not just getting wood and metal, you have to get the wood, process it into planks, get the metal, process it into metal bars, then process it to make nails and other parts of the chest. I mean!!!!!!! No. If the premise of the game was to be a constructor or a carpenter that would make sense. Since it's not, that amount of details is just a waste of time.
- The collection of raw materials is so boring and takes a lot of game time. And there are NOT enough trees you can actually cut down to make whatever you want/need to make, so it takes a lot of time to get a few simple items done. The trees are the main problem to me because you cannot differentiate which trees you can cut down or not and it took me a while to understand that you can only "interact" with the very few ones near the tavern. Wow.
- The pace of the game is way too fast. You just cannot get anything done properly because of the amount of tiny pieces you have to get in order to craft stuff and run a tavern to make a profit. Basically you have to choose if you're gonna open the tavern and make money or if you'll just focus on the dumb steps you have to go through to craft basically anything in the game.
- Farming is the absolute hell. It takes forever to open space in the lawn because the tool doesn't work in a straight way and neither does it make a square, instead it opens up space by creating a semi-circle on the ground and it can get pretty messy fast. Since it's not a delimited area, it's very hard to get it the size you need. Other problem I have with it is that the character is kind of stiff and hard to manage when using a farming tool, so more times than not you will miss a spot and that will leave out a space "unworked" (meaning there's still grass on those spots you missed) and it's very annoying and time consuming having to get it right and clean. When you use the tool it appears a command telling what you're doing, "cleaning" and "planting", but if you don't move the character enough you will end up "planting" which means the space you just cleaned will be filled with grass again. Sighs. After all that you still have to prepare the soil to be able to plant anything, so you'll use another farming tool that has the exact same problems as the first one so it takes a lot of time and patience to open a small space in your garden. And in a game as fast paced as this, when I say it takes time I mean most of your day.
- Constructing farming buildings such as coop and barn have the same problem as crafting small objects: there are too many materials to get in order to be able to build them and it's not exactly clear what you really need because the "ingredient" list is just the image of the items you need and not their actual names and it's very, very small. Some things you need are also very hard to get by because you need to develop your skills on different things many times in order to be able to craft that one tiny piece you need to complete the list of materials and again, it's such a waste of time.
- Skill points and the skill tree are messy and you can spend your points on things you cannot yet do/make because you're too early in the game. Also it doesn't show how many points per skill you have to spend so it's a game of try and error. It's a simple game mechanics, it should be simple to implement.
- In a point in the game you're able to get workers to help in the tavern but you cannot see how much you have to pay them neither how that payment is gonna be made (by day? by hour?). Also there are only 3 types of workers: bartender, someone to clean the tables (ONLY the tables) and someone to clean the rooms if you have them. So if you hire say the bartender and the one that cleans the tables, you'll pay a lot of money each day so in the end of the day your profit will be minimal AND you'll be left with the most boring tasks of all: cleaning the floor. And mind you that the game is fast paced so sometimes you need help in order to get the other things you need to do to advance in the game done, such as crafting materials, buildings and food/drinks for the tavern. I don't understand why the worker that cleans the tables can't also clean the floors. It'd be already a massive help in the early game stages and you could focus on the fun part of the game which is managing the stock of food and drinks and dealing with customers (aka THE PREMISE OF THE GAME).
- Construction mode and the "definition of the use" for each space in the tavern. I mean, why? It's too complex and it doesn't fit the game. The construction mode would be fine if you, again, didn't need to craft every single material (from the stones used on the walls to iron nails) to build or expand your tavern/inn. Since you do have to, it just adds complexity and it's again very time consuming. If the game was about constructing stuff from 0, then it'd make more sense. But since it's about the managing and keeping of a tavern, it does not. The "definition of use" for each room is just dumb and unnecessary.
- In a smaller note, the game visuals are not there yet. The art itself feels flat but I guess since it's still in development that's probably gonna improve with time (fingers crossed!).
- For a game that is still in development the price tag is WAY TOO EXPENSIVE and not worth it. Not yet.
When all is said and done, the game's essence is very fun but there's a looooong way to go yet in development. I do sincerely hope that they will fix those problems so the game will be as enjoyable as the ones it got inspiration from (I'm guessing stardew valley lol). Because the price tag is so expensive for a game still in the "early access" stage, I'll be asking for a refund. But I hope someday in the future when it's completely done I can purchase it again (for the right price this time) and enjoy it more! I hope I could make myself clear and I mean all of those "negative" points in the best of ways because I really believe in the game, but as of right now it's not there yet.