TLDR: 10/10 recommended if you like never ending rain Do you like the first 2 hours of a citybuilder, and then get bored? Read no further, just buy this game. Here is my take as someone who really enjoys the later stages of citybuilders: This game took some time to get used to. Early games were way too inefficient. I kept trying to build settlements that would stand the test of time. No use. The storm will destroy it all. You don't need to have all the different buildings. You don't need to fulfill all your villagers needs. You don't need huge stockpiles of food and resources. You just need to drag your settlement over the finish line, then get out. Yet, as you can tell by my hours played, I thoroughly enjoy it. Every settlement is different, due to the various races, biomes, all sorts of modifiers. The meta progression is well setup. There are loads of ingame achievements (the steam achievements and a whole list of further ingame achievements). There are ingame goals to work towards, that will take quite some time. So you won't feel like you're just spamming settlements for the sake of it. (At least for the first couple of hundred hours.) The RNG took some getting used to, as someone who never played roguelites. But now I appreciate the challenge to make it work with what you get. The devs are amazing! They really listen to the community. Very responsive in case of any issues. It's a small team, and it shows that they put their hearth and soul into it. Now that the game is released, it's not abandoned. There are a couple of smaller free updates planned, and a paid DLC (see roadmap). All in all, zero regrets that I gave this a shot. If any of the elements speak to you, try the demo. You won't regret it. Even if it's just that you like rain. Especially if you like rain. So much rain! May the storm be gentle on you.

Against the Storm is one of the very best games ever created. I have hundreds of games in my Steam library, and if I had to pick 1 single game to play for the rest of my life, it would be Against the Storm with almost no competition. I have never simped as hard for a game, as I am about to in this review. Other survival city builders (which I also love) often run into the problem of being 'solved' after you spend enough time with them. You know what you need to build, and in what order, and then you've usually more or less got things under control. Against the Storm's drafting and random resource nodes make every game an unknown challenge. The difficulty can be set high enough to consistently challenge even veteran players, and it simply never gets old. Pushing the prestige difficulties feels super rewarding. The new player experience is perfect. The way the game introduces new mechanics over time does an amazing job of easing new players into a rather complex game. The number of quality of life features in the UI (more of which have been added, frequently) is superb; all game designers should be studying the interface options in this game. The constant time crunch is oppressive in the best way, doing an amazing job of keeping the tension high. The horrible cello(?) sound effect that plays when a race's resolve is too low, is horrible in the best way. I could keep going, but it would probably be redundant at this point. I do not have a single bad thing to say about this game. I really don't. I've thought about it often while playing and of course while writing this review, and I truly think that this is just a perfect game. 12 out of 10 and I can't wait for the DLC coming out later this month. I thought I had already reviewed this masterpiece of a game. My bad!

You know the moment. The moment you know you've won. The moment when a strategy game run goes instantly from exciting to tedious. Because you've won, so why bother now ? For the achievement maybe ? Sure... You've started hundreds over hundreds of Civilization, Endless, GalCiv, AoW, Old World, Total War or other games. How many did you finish till the very end ? If you're like me, a few dozen. It's just not fun to button-push when the struggle is gone. But here, when the game is finally won, it's the end of the game, give or take 2 minutes. The exploration & struggle phase is until the end. And when it's the end, it's time to restart again, a new, harder exploration & struggle phase with a different twist. It's the most captivating game that has any relationship with a map, units, resources, and it blows my mind it's not even a 4X, considering I've nearly played them all, since Civilization 1. A total absence of enemy military, and yet, there's quite enough adversity. I've seen more victory (or defeat) screens with Against the Storm in a year than with a lifetime of Civilization. That means something.

Years ago i wrote a very short review on Anno 1404 and the 2500 hours i spent on the game, saying without an inch of doubt that the game was the best citybuilder i ever played and thanking the devs for it. Against the Storm makes me reconsider (the best status, not the "thanks" part obviously). I ll give thanks this time around to creativity, ingenuity, originiality. Damn Mother**** talented devs. 40 year i ve been gaming, and you still manage to surprise me and drink my time like it's your 7 o'clock coffee. Curses and love !

Does what most city builders fail at, endgame. Each settlement can be completed , there is a definite end goal to succeed. This process can be refined for optimum build / work orders. Add some sprinkles of roguelike elements to keep each run fresh. Even without combat those CPS ( Clicks per second) matter. *note- Pause often, think logically about your next move and bask in never ending rain.

There is the bones of an exceptional 20-40 hour game here that is let down by the fact it aspires to adopt rogue-lite mechanics to pad that number into the hundreds of hours range but there is really not enough variance in the actual run to run gameplay to justify this. Meta-progression takes too long and matches feels very samey once you've unlocked most of the tech and have a grasp of how the meta strategies play out. There is a very uneven difficulty curve where early-mid Prestige progression can actually be harder than the hardest difficulties with max upgrades which feels very artificial when it takes several times longer to reach that point than it does to accrue the necessary experience/game knowledge to succeed at the highest levels.

I really like the concept and enjoyed first few settlements. Ideas in general are nice, graphics are cool, whole scary forest thing is also nice. What I realized after closing 2 seals, when I couldn't close 3rd, because I was too slow (lacked 3 seals), is that it is not really a city builder. The goal of this game is not to build functioning village or making sure there are materials etc. This game is basically speedrun simulator. After those 30h I have on record I went on sites other than wiki to read about strategies etc. and I realized, it is all about cheesing the victory as fast as possible, mostly using complex food mechanics. You are not supposed to make planks/bricks/fabric constantly - youshould build just enough to build needed buildings. You are not supposed to give coats to your villagers when available. You are supposed to block usage of everything, barely making your villagers survive, just to make "final push" with resolve levels that will get you win - and then you leave the village forever. You should sell/buy everything that you don't need for that final push. I consider possibility of winning without opening single glade as unacceptable (saw posts of people doing that on highest difficulty). I consider possibility of winning in day 3 as unacceptable (saw posts of people doing that on highest difficulty). If you are looking for making functioning cities it is not for you, trust me. After I realized, this game is all about cheese and speedrunning, I don't even want to open it again. Consider if this is game for you (based on above) before buying it.

Not really a city builder, its more-so a production line puzzle game. The game becomes very repetitive quickly, and whilst there are different map de-buffs that are supposed to change the way you play, the ones I experienced in the 20 hours of playtime didn't actually alter my approach to the game. They only restricted my freedom. One of the big appeals of games like this, is all the different ways you can skin a cat, and whilst the game does offer some flexibility in decision making, it feels like there is always 1 correct approach. (Which of these choices will bone me less in the long-run) The games frantic pacing and race against death also feels like it adds needless artificial tension to the game. There is never a point where you sort of get to sit back and see your creation work. There is always something that needs changing, right up until you win. And as soon as you do win, there is seemingly 0 incentive to continue that level.

I’ve spent a good amount of time playing various cities in this game, and while it’s undeniably fun with a solid foundation, there are a few key issues that hold it back for me. The gameplay is engaging and challenging, offering plenty of interesting interactions that keep you hooked early on. The mechanics are solid, and the overall experience is well-polished. However, the progression feels a bit too drawn out. Once you've unlocked all the core buildings and mechanics, the sense of discovery fades, and it becomes more of a grind than an exciting challenge. The game demands a significant number of hours just to advance, and after a while, the progression doesn’t offer much in the way of new surprises or excitement, which makes it hard to stay motivated. The water management system, in particular, is a letdown. Instead of offering a complex, creative system like pipe-laying or intricate infrastructure design, it mostly boils down to tweaking parameters and adjusting sliders. It feels like a missed opportunity to add depth to the gameplay. In the end, I’m giving it a thumbs down, not because the game is bad, but because the sheer number of hours needed to finish it outweighs the enjoyment. If you're the type of player who doesn’t mind sinking 200+ hours into a game without a ton of variety later on, you’ll likely have a good time. For me, the initial excitement wore off, and I just couldn’t justify the time investment for what felt like diminishing returns.

I hate to write a review that comes across as complaining about "too much content" or "too many updates", because developers who care so much about their game are a rarity, but unfortunately the devs have gone into "slap whatever on and see if it sticks" territory. The first signs of this were the visual-novel-esque aunt character who jarringly sticks out from the rest of the game art and vibe. For someone who has played this game from very early access days, the undeniable fact is that, the amount of content kept increasing for a while till it hit a sweet spot , and then simply kept going. And at this point the game is simply too bloated to be fun. while people who have hundreds of hours in the game definitely enjoy the new challenges and refreshes it brings, i absolutely can not "recommend" this game to any new player any more, because it is, quite frankly, simply not fun to play any more. the game has become an extremely bloated, extremely complicated mess where at this point the developers themselves admit they are making updates just to make the gameplay more complicated (boots, paste etc). It is a shame because the devs got so many things right (visuals, sound, the base gameplay loop), but they could not thread the line of respecting the players time.