Stacklands
Released: April 8, 2022
Game Length: 8 Hours
Grade: B+
History
Info: Unlike some other games I've played, I left this little game alone for a little bit before I jumped right into it. Surprisingly, there has been one update after another since its release. It was only supposed to be this cute little $5 game Sokpop churned out like any one of their other games, but they felt it was so well received that they decided to expand the deck. So every update you saw a couple more cards thrown in. Update 1.1 added The Island. Update 1.2 added The Dark Forest. While that would have been a good point to play the game, they added a very weird Update 1.3 with "function" cards at the end of 2022. Some of the cards in that last update were pretty nice, some are questionable, and others leave you wondering what they actually do.
Gameplay
Discovery: The thrill of the game is finding out what you can do and how you make progress. On the normal setting, there is just enough time each moon cycle to get some things done with your villagers. You pay the currency to obtain packs that unlock various cards. Every once in awhile, you will earn an "Idea" that will be added to your side-bar. This teaches you what ingredients you need to form a new item. Some of these will provide your villagers equipment to fight off enemies. Others will teach you how to make them survive through cooking materials. Structures will come in handy to further expand the board and make things easier when it comes to building resources. The cycle continues as you discover more ideas from the packs of cards from the top of the board. For the most part, everything runs smoothly. There are a few times I wished I would have learned how to make things sooner or realized what effects some cards did from looking at the Cardopedia.
Development: The early part of the game felt rather smooth with how you were supposed to grow your village and progress into the "Iron Age" of events. However, the updates makes the mid-game feel a little weird as you "pause" your main board and work on a totally separate board. It does add some temporary relief to the pandemonium of your village when you start fresh with a single stranded villager and a whole new set of rules. Things evolve from there when you learn how to get more materials and people over from the mainland to the new place. This slowly builds up the new currency needed to unlock the "Gold Age" of events. The Dark Forest allows you to progress bilaterally by fighting waves of monsters with your villagers. Instead of constructing some of your equipment, you can now obtain them directly from your enemies. The endgame gets a little messy when there are multiple final bosses you have to fight after obtaining very elusive items in the game. I grew a little impatient trying to figure out on my own the requirements of buying items from the Traveling Merchant or Exploring the Cave card several times for a treasure map. Though, they do tell you on the side if there is still more to discover from specific avenues.
Replayability: After you officially beat the game, you can choose to discover the rest of the cards you miss. You can also try playing the game again with some added difficulty. If you knock the length of moon phases down, the game actually gets much more difficult. Villagers need to eat more frequently and the witch sends increasingly more difficult monsters. For some added fun, try to play without pausing the game. Since a second playthrough doesn't require you to learn every card, you can advance at your own pace. This made things much more interesting when you have to balance between looking at your bar of ideas and managing what you have on the board. It also makes it abundantly clear that the game needs some better visual aids when it comes to looking up what card does what. The items do not show what they require until you highlight the name in the list. If you aren't going to display what they need in the list, at the very least show what the item requires after clicking on the name.
Summary
Review: There is very little to lose when you play a game as entertaining as this one for five dollars. The developers have long made the game worthwhile and are still showing their support for the game to this day. There are still a few things that weren't made clear, like how giving a bone to a wolf turns it into a dog or adding a parrot to a pirate makes him friendly. Some newer cards like the wishing well still don't have any functionality. Otherwise, there are around 350 cards that bring enough variety to how you can advance the game. I definitely recommend this game.
2-8-2023