The Universim (PC) Preview

By Thom Compton 16.09.2016

Review for The Universim on PC

Simulations are a wonderfully important, if not undervalued, genre. They allow gamers to run luxury hotels, build amusement parks, and manage wildlife. Unfortunately, they don't let gamers manage the entirety of the giant space rock those things live on. Except with the upcoming The Universim, they very much do. Now available through Steam Early Access, Cubed3 shares impressions from the current build.

The Universim is as deep as it is detailed. Everything from water acquisition to setting up homes is left to the player to manage. Fortunately, the menus are all designed to simplify navigation and selection. Making a farm is as simple as clicking it in the build menu, then letting your denizens get to work. They aren't the fastest moving creatures, but, thankfully, the only time constraint is how useless they become when they are tired, hungry or thirsty.

This all begins by picking an epicentre for your planet, then setting off to cultivate this area. This becomes taxing if you don't set up the starting town for success right away. Everything from the first structure built to an inhabitant's impending child birth will need to be weighed and factored meticulously. Otherwise, efficiency becomes almost non-existent, and your lovely blue and green ball will become a wasteland in no time.

Screenshot for The Universim on PC

Wasteland might be a strong term, but failure to be thorough and have a plan is the fastest way to fail. It's refreshing to say the least that so much needs to be taken into account. Mix in the simple controls and the beautiful landscape, and it's easy to see that building a planetary safe haven really comes down to how well the player plans. Since the planets are generated with various types of terrain, even as early as picking the epicentre matters. That's clearly the point of The Universim. If you want to have a planet that thrives, everything matters.

Being in Early Access, the game is obviously not perfected yet, though. The biggest issue is prioritising the buildings. During construction, materials and resources burn fairly quickly. The player can select to prioritise the building to more important structures, but this doesn't seem to matter. The tribe just does whatever it was told to do first. Also, tearing down old structures doesn't seem to let the player reuse the materials, meaning every structure needs to be final.

Screenshot for The Universim on PC

Final Thoughts

The Universim is well on its way to becoming a game that can't simply be played, but must be studied and learned from. Every failure teaches the player something, and the lesson is always obvious. As long as the few annoyances get resolved, this could be one of the most important sims to come out in a long time.

Developer

Crytivo

Publisher

Crytivo

Genre

Simulation

Players

1

C3 Score

Rated $score out of 10  n/a

Reader Score

Rated $score out of 10  0 (0 Votes)

European release date Out now   North America release date Out now   Japan release date None   Australian release date Out now   

Comments

janu (guest) 16.09.2016#1

Black & White is getting spiritual successor at last? Oh! I want it right now!

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