(BELLWRIGHT) My thoughts and early access review after 40 hours

[@PlayBellwright]

We're glad you gave us a second chance and we appreciate your honest take on the game!

[@Oinnelstan]

Greetings. A fair review, I believe. I'm 90 hours in, across 3 separate games saves. I am enjoying the game immensely. The combat is initially somewhat slow and clunky, however, as I am levelling my character up, I am becoming faster and more effective in all aspects of combat. So, a sense of progression and, thus, achievement. Archery, both for hunting and combat, is enormously satisfying when levelled up a bit. Surprisingly, I am enjoying the time spent hunting, experiencing a genuine thrill when I achieve a head shot on a distant deer that is partly obscured in heavy foliage, or shoot a bird, in the midst of full flight, from the sky. With respect to the building mechanic, you are indeed correct, in so far as it is initially exciting and novel to build a structure log by log, board by board, but after a while can become somewhat tiring. However. this is where your villagers come in. I initially tried to build my hall by myself, but rapidly came to the conclusion that it would be a "click fest", and so I left it to the villagers to complete, and was surprised when, an in-game day or so later, I came back from a hunting trip to discover the towering silhouette of my newly constructed hall awaiting me. Nice! I have heard that the AI generated voices will later be replaced by those of human voice actors. I will say that I was waiting for the then impending release of Manor Lords. I decided to try Bellwright to pass the time 'till the release of Manor Lords and I am yet to purchase as I am happy guiding and nurturing my fledgling medieval community to ultimate global domination! Yeah, we'll see how that goes...😎 Talking about Manor Lords, I feel both games are very similar, in so far as the player is tasked with building up a functioning medieval community to the point where it can take on hostile, opposing forces in the greater game world. In fact, I think that there is an argument that, to some extent, Bellwright is a first person version of Manor Lords, with the ability to viscerally interact with the world's environment and its players, as opposed to simply being a passive observer as we see in Manor Lords' third person view. I hope that modding is supported, as this will open up all sort of possibilities for us history buffs. I wish the Devs. all the best, as I believe they are on to a winner. Be well.

[@CitiesTurnedToDust]

I've been completely screwed by early access games a couple of times, when the developers suddenly evaporated. So now I never buy games until they actually get finished. Not even finished and at first release either. I mean fucking finished and showing good reviews.

[@gabeilie]

Thanks for the review man! I was looking for info on this game more than just the people saying the developer will abandon it and whatnot.

[@esheppard19]

that was a helpful review, thanks man.

[@edwincortez2122]

Can you play a co-op session? My friend and I are looking for our next game and Bellwright looks like the game we have been dreaming about. Only issue is there's not much light on a thoroughly detailed experience like yours for co-op.

[@squeekydinky]

I'm 40 hours in and absolutely love the game. It's true it's not for everyone, but maybe that's okay. Some people don't like cilantro either, and I feel sorry for them. Haha

[@Marcenos]

Right in the Audio Options it tells you the AI voices are placeholders for early access and it will be full voice acted on release...

[@seecha8970]

Like the game; the grindiness can be fleshed out. A lot. Specifically, grindiness when it comes to quest mechanics and quest items.

[@CptFugu]

This game is right up my alley, but the devs have a rep for abandonware. I'll wait until the final product is released before I decide if it is worth my hard earned money.

[@scanix100]

Aren't those AI voices just a temporary solution, I think devs said that and it will be full voiced later.

[@Trextorluck]

They are, it's even said on the steam page exlaining that these are placeholders

[@jamesmohr7373]

I tried to get into it. Hit the mid game and tried building the Town Hall. After fighting against multiple raids and not knowing that looting all the chests OR claiming the flag stops the bandits from respawning, I was able to gain 1 level in agility before running out of enemies to fight after 20 hours. Not fun in its current state between that and spending 90% of the game managing food instead of questing and combat (that they are supposedly so proud of). I'm hoping the rebalance the spoil timers, food buff timers, and AI. The food buff timers on the AI and their inability to manage their own buffs is the absolute worst. I ended up just managing them manually from their inventory because it is not very good right now. This game could be a lot of fun but the XP, respawns, and food need to be adjusted to allow for more time to quest and combat.

[@scooterbgaymes]

Why do people say "Kind of A Funny Story" when it's not funny at all? Great beard btw. :)

[@WheezinGeezerTV]

I'm into it for just over 205 hours. The good far outweighs the bad. So, it's playable, and I enjoy it, but there are parts that I hate enough I don't think there is any way I could buy another game made by Donkeycrew or whatever their name is. The horrible combat. The same reason I got a refund on Last Oasis. Worst combat ever. I don't mind "the clunkiness" as you might put it, it's the concept itself, garbage. Instead of going into combat with a style or plan, they want me to go it and wait for a prompt from them as to what they want me to do, instead of what I think might be good. And although I would have connected if I got to do what I wanted to do or thought I should do, I miss because I didn't do what "THEY" wanted me to do. I'd like to actually watch some of the combat, but nope, if you want a chance to win that fight you need to concentrate on their little combat icon so you know what you're allowed to do. Building in tier 2 might not be if done right, I didn't do it right and got screwed so bad that's when I stopped and wrote their review. I had decided to move to my next village location when reaching tier 2, I built the Village hall near the pond/lake, but because I didn't have villagers there who lived there, if they came at all to help they were hungry and left. I had everyone set to zero on everything but building and I built the Village hall, the first Barn, the first House and half of the second house before I got help. The building should be an option in the settings or something, single board placement for those who hate life, and maybe similar to how the tier 1 buildings were built as an option. So, the world is setup pretty nice in that you need to be careful about using up your resources, but the combat is ass and I won't recommend the game just based on that.

[@BobWobbles]

I quite like the combat. When I first started I was terrible and couldn't last 10 seconds but as I got used to it I grew to really enjoy the sword fights. The key is to manage your distance, learn to block and watch your opponents closely. I deliberately made the choice to not use shields because I wanted to learn how to block with the sword. I'm now at lvl 9/10 with the one handed weapons and when I max out I might start using a shield. Haven't quite decided about that yet. Anyway, each to their own I guess.