Planet Nomads [Steam, Official Site, GOG], the rather fancy looking sandbox survival game has now officially launched into Early Access and it's looking pretty good.
Disclosure: Key provided by the developer.
Note: As always, a thorough review will take place when it leaves Early Access. It's not fair to give it a proper review when it's still early in development.
Planet Nomads is a survival game taking inspiration from many others. The resource gathering is very much like No Man's Sky, incredibly similar in fact to the point that it really does feel like I'm playing it. The game features both a survival mode, where you're battling the elements for survival and also a creative mode to play around as you see fit.
The survival mode gave me a pretty decent impression, even if performance isn't great right now. It starts off with you in some kind of pod falling towards the planet and an inevitable hard landing. Once out, you're now greeted with some small starting hints to help you get some of the basics.
There's animals too, it's not just about mining resources. One I constantly come across looks a little like a space Turkey. I find them everywhere, crazy little critters. They're a damn menace too, they spit some weird crap at you and bounce like they're made out of Flubber, they bounce so much they're near impossible to actually hit, which is a problem early on.
It's changed a lot since the earlier builds and it looks like it's really starting to come together nicely. As it stand right now, it's still quite basic, but a good start. It sure does look beautiful as they have the graphical style nailed down near perfectly, but it has that dreaded empty survival game feeling, where it feels like there just isn't all that much to see and do. Sure you can spend hours grinding resources, building a house and a vehicle, do a little exploring, but then what?
I do get the feeling of "yet another survival game" even if their future plans for it are grand, right now the genre has a lot of titles, some good, some terrible and this sits somewhere in the middle.
They do eventually plan to have spaceflight, multiple planets and multiplayer, so it could be massive amounts of fun when things like that are in. Once it has multiplayer, I will be far more interested. Hell, when exploration is more rewarding and more interesting I will be more interested.
I don't mean to put a downer on their new release that we've been waiting on for some time, but those are my honest thoughts on it as it stands right now. It's not a bad game, far from it, just needs a lot more of everything right now.
It's available now in Early Access, with 10% off on both Steam & GOG. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Disclosure: Key provided by the developer.
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Note: As always, a thorough review will take place when it leaves Early Access. It's not fair to give it a proper review when it's still early in development.
Planet Nomads is a survival game taking inspiration from many others. The resource gathering is very much like No Man's Sky, incredibly similar in fact to the point that it really does feel like I'm playing it. The game features both a survival mode, where you're battling the elements for survival and also a creative mode to play around as you see fit.
The survival mode gave me a pretty decent impression, even if performance isn't great right now. It starts off with you in some kind of pod falling towards the planet and an inevitable hard landing. Once out, you're now greeted with some small starting hints to help you get some of the basics.
There's animals too, it's not just about mining resources. One I constantly come across looks a little like a space Turkey. I find them everywhere, crazy little critters. They're a damn menace too, they spit some weird crap at you and bounce like they're made out of Flubber, they bounce so much they're near impossible to actually hit, which is a problem early on.
It's changed a lot since the earlier builds and it looks like it's really starting to come together nicely. As it stand right now, it's still quite basic, but a good start. It sure does look beautiful as they have the graphical style nailed down near perfectly, but it has that dreaded empty survival game feeling, where it feels like there just isn't all that much to see and do. Sure you can spend hours grinding resources, building a house and a vehicle, do a little exploring, but then what?
I do get the feeling of "yet another survival game" even if their future plans for it are grand, right now the genre has a lot of titles, some good, some terrible and this sits somewhere in the middle.
They do eventually plan to have spaceflight, multiple planets and multiplayer, so it could be massive amounts of fun when things like that are in. Once it has multiplayer, I will be far more interested. Hell, when exploration is more rewarding and more interesting I will be more interested.
I don't mean to put a downer on their new release that we've been waiting on for some time, but those are my honest thoughts on it as it stands right now. It's not a bad game, far from it, just needs a lot more of everything right now.
It's available now in Early Access, with 10% off on both Steam & GOG. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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20 comments
Like you say, the game isnt running that great atm.
And I was hoping for a better frame rate at release. This game ran horrible on my PC, 11-20fps isnt cool, stutter and lag. Ended up refunding it because of that. As the game progresses in development i will probably give it another go.
Its really got some nomad skys wibes to it aswell ^^
Last edited by Zelox on 25 May 2017 at 10:49 pm UTC
And I was hoping for a better frame rate at release. This game ran horrible on my PC, 11-20fps isnt cool, stutter and lag. Ended up refunding it because of that. As the game progresses in development i will probably give it another go.
Its really got some nomad skys wibes to it aswell ^^
Last edited by Zelox on 25 May 2017 at 10:49 pm UTC
0 Likes
Ok, so it runs ok. Not well (underwhelming for a 970) but it's good enough for now. It really looks very No Mans Sky esque. It's great to have a game like this on Linux, and I'm very excited to try the spaceships later :)
2 Likes, Who?
GustyGhost May 26, 2017
Planet Explorers without the home-made feel.
0 Likes
Like you say, the game isnt running that great atm.
And I was hoping for a better frame rate at release.
Yeah performance is abysmal for me with anything but lowest settings (RX480). Looks like it's using Unity 5.4.2f2, so it's OpenGL only (no Vulkan yet). Hopefully they'll switch to Vulkan at some point (for which they need Unity 5.6).
Last edited by Shmerl on 26 May 2017 at 2:44 am UTC
1 Likes, Who?
Yeah performance is abysmal for me with anything but lowest settings (RX480). Looks like it's using Unity 5.4.2f2, so it's OpenGL only (no Vulkan yet). Hopefully they'll switch to Vulkan at some point (for which they need Unity 5.6).OpenGL or not, that's not normal. A lot of games on GNU\Linux works fine enough (10% FPS drop from Windows counterpart is acceptable IMO).
0 Likes
@Areso: I suppose it's not. But Unity with OpenGL really isn't optimized for heavy graphics.
0 Likes
yet another survival game
Yep, the issue, for me, is that many of them stays forever in Early Access or suddenly drops to Release, and then... nothing. They are buggy or very uncomplete or lack players for multi or interest for solo.
Also i hate the balance of most of them, and the lack of ecology concern : destroy a forest to build a shelter, dig a mountain to build a fireplace. Eat meat to stay healthy because veggies are not enough...
Last edited by Tchey on 26 May 2017 at 7:16 am UTC
1 Likes, Who?
I'm really looking forward to getting this, but I think I will wait for the performance issues to be addressed.
0 Likes
Kallestofeles May 26, 2017
Seems to run just fine on windows:
View video on youtube.com
Another promised land like ARK... let's hope I'm wrong, very wrong.
View video on youtube.com
Another promised land like ARK... let's hope I'm wrong, very wrong.
0 Likes
This is exciting news! I feel inexplicably confident that Planet Nomads will see its way to a final release, and I'm going to wait for that release before I buy for the usual I-don't-want-to-tire-of-it-before-the-final-release reasons.
0 Likes
Smellymangames May 27, 2017
It struggles with my 770. I need to play with settings more or it is just early access woes or it is too beefy me.
Too much stuttering and freezes. Has potential if things get ironed out.
Too much stuttering and freezes. Has potential if things get ironed out.
0 Likes
it runs great on my end. 60+ fps all maxed except bloom and motion blur. with few dips down to 45 in places where it loads new trees or terrain. thats 1920x1080. pc specs in profile.
i havent reached far yet though, small building with few machines. playing survival mode.
its installed on a SSD
Last edited by Xpander on 28 May 2017 at 9:11 am UTC
i havent reached far yet though, small building with few machines. playing survival mode.
its installed on a SSD
Last edited by Xpander on 28 May 2017 at 9:11 am UTC
0 Likes
My only issue is when travelling to new areas, and when it is autosaving. When that happens the image freezes for maybe a second or two, and when it continues, some time has passed so ideally, that doesn't happen in combat.
0 Likes
Really annoying is that it pauses a while before the "saving" icon appears. Making you wonder if it has crashed.
0 Likes
Seems to run just fine on windows:Well the difference here is that Planet Nomads doesnt look terrible on Linux, whereas ARK has a huge downgrade on Linux.
View video on youtube.com
Another promised land like ARK... let's hope I'm wrong, very wrong.
0 Likes
Kallestofeles May 29, 2017
True that!Seems to run just fine on windows:Well the difference here is that Planet Nomads doesnt look terrible on Linux, whereas ARK has a huge downgrade on Linux.
Another promised land like ARK... let's hope I'm wrong, very wrong.
Xpander got the game as well and reported that it ran rather fine, the issue just seems to be that the game is jiggy as hell when recording - I can live with that.
Will give it a go next month. :P
0 Likes
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