Crashing into the sandbox role playing genre Crashlands takes players on a crafting adventure where you’ll progress your available arsenal of weapons while you fight and even tame a diverse roster of alien beasts. Originally an exclusive title to PC and mobile the game was later ported to a number of console platforms allowing all gamers the opportunity to push through the survival story driven adventure.
Crashlands opens with players hurtling through space on a delivery contract with their trusty robot friend Juicebox who helps to make the solo deliveries manageable. After an attack on the ship players are forced to use their escape pod and land on the randomly generated world below with unknown threats. With Juicebox to guide players on how to survive the harsh environment players will look to thrive amongst the strange plant and animal life that brings its own diverse threats but also opportunities. In time players will encounter other NPCs that are vulnerable and require your assistance as part of the core gameplay loop.
This alien themed game world is by far one of the greatest selling points of Crashlands with unique enemies and plants to farm for materials to improve your own chance of survival through the crafting mechanism. Combined with a lack of micro managing your inventory (particularly welcome on mobile devices) you’ll be able to focus your attention on the joy of crafting, exploring, taming, base building, combat that each can be pushed based on your own priority pathway.
While one element of this low micromanagement gameplay is how you manage your materials the other is the way new tools integrate straight into your spacesuit with your avatar Flux automatically pulling out the ideal tool. Crashlands also does away with any sort of durability on these tools which keeps you focused on the adventure once again as you and Juicebox fight through all sorts of alien life forms. Further to this you’ll find an infinite inventory so you don’t need to spend hours micromanaging a limited number of inventory slots.
Weapons on the other hand take a little more time before you are given crafting access but do offer a wealth of depth once unlocked and designed in this manner to be the primary yardstick of game progress. Every piece of gear in Crashlands once crafted will also vary slightly giving you extra resistances or elemental damage chances that does also give you a potential use for older resources that are quickly accumulating.
To support this should players not be happy with your recent crafting creation players can recycle it and reclaim some materials to try again. Not only does this crafted gear improve your attack and health but it also alters the appearance of Flux which is a nice small touch to your adventure. All of this is wrapped within a quest based structure to slowly feed the player with new mechanics over time with diligent players being rewarded with extra recipes and other secrets alongside the core boss battle structure.
These boss battles much like the other alien life forms you’ll encounter bring their own attack pattern challenges to overcome that may make particular weapons and strategies ideal for the situation at hand.
Summary:
- Crash onto an alien planet and attempt to survive with your robot friend Juicebox.
- Craft unique equipment, tools and weapons with randomised attributes that visually change your appearance as you progress.
- Master quests and explore the game world to uncover secrets and find the next boss battle.
- Simplified inventory and resource harvesting management systems keeps you focused on the gameplay.
- Tame alien creatures from the environment and build your own base to create a new home on the alien planet.
Links:
- Buy Crashlands (Humble Store)
- Buy Crashlands (iOS)
- Buy Crashlands (Android)
- Buy Crashlands (Nintendo Store)
- Buy Crashlands (Microsoft Store)
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Review Platform: PC