The Explorator

The Explorator features a truly unique art style and atmosphere. Although the controls and general missions are fairly self-explanatory, the game still feels like an early-stage alpha right now. The developers state in the EA info that "Early Access will allow us to make corrections and modifications", but in my opinion, there isn't even a solid foundation to build upon yet. Based on this disclaimer, I expected a fundamentally playable game that just needed players' feedback and polishing, not a project in its rawest form. During my short time playing, I've already encountered a few bugs that made the gameplay more annoying than entertaining. For instance, the UI is completely glitched; the compass symbols are totally distorted and overlapping, making it impossible to know where to actually go. Then I couldn't close the compass anymore, and it stayed stuck right in the middle of the screen, which could only be fixed by a restart. This happened 2 times, so I just decided not to open the compass again. You can see the effort, the unique vision, and the game's quirky charm the devs have put into their project, but it simply isn't "enough" yet - even for an Early Access title. I'll k…

The graphical aspect of the game is done really well aswell as the quests: everything pretty much straight forward etc. its unique and fun.

So far I have done two playthroughs of the game, the second being after the recent major August update, and I adore it. The Explorator is, as is to be reasonably expected of a game that is in early access, rough around the edges, but its natural beauty, dynamism, and grandeur radiate as clear as day, especially further in. I very highly recommend it. The Explorator starts off well enough. It involves trudging along discovering mild sights and surprises, familiarising with what it offers, taking in the varied surroundings and scavenging for assorted supplies and materials; a scattering of enemies will greet you on occasion and there will be fun satisfaction and little trouble in cleaning them out. Here at the beginning the bugs are at their more irritating, whereby attempting to craft consumables will do nothing except swallow the materials, and (for me, because of the screen resolution I like to play at) buying and selling from the merchant is a niggling bother since their UI is mismatched to your own inventory. In the early game you're not sure about what the experience will be like, and there are mild anxieties about resource management, so bugs like that set a bad impression. …

There’s so much that feels ethically wrong about giving an Early Access game made by a tiny dev team a thumbs-down. And yet I feel compelled to do so because the Steam Early Access blurb reminds me that we’re buying Early Access games as-is, with no guarantee that they’ll ever be developed further. And I believe [b]The Explorator is just not in a place right now where I would confidently recommend it to anyone[/b]. The reason for this is simple: What I’ve played of [b]the current build of the game feels totally aimless[/b]. And that’s coming from someone who loves exploration-heavy shooters in the vein of [i]Project Silverfish[/i], and who recently spent way too much time having a blast with the [i]Road to Vostok[/i] Early Access build, despite that game being designed as a free-form sandbox from the get-go. But both of these games feature systems that prevent them from feeling aimless in the same way The Explorator does. [i]Road to Vostok[/i] has its very intricate moment-to moment combat, survival and weapon handling systems. [i]Project Silverfish[/i] adds lots of environmental interaction, a faction system, intricately designed maps with cool secret areas and so on. The curren…

Cozy First-Person Adventure Game with a lot of crafting. I could definitely see this being a great game to chill and unwind with. I like the artstyle a ton, it has great bones. It's obviously not a finished product, so I wouldn't go in expecting that. I know that the dev is looking for a publisher to help with the resources to see the project to it's complete potential, and I hope he finds it.

I keep my fingers crossed for the devs to keep going and finish the game. As of right now, The Explorator just oozes charm and passion. There are very few games where I just stop and admire the scenery and this is definitely one of them. After a rough first mission, the game opens up and the gunplay starts to shine, where the aim and movement are plenty responsive and everything feels and sounds as it should be. This game is absolutely a recommend from me and I do hope that more people will hear of this game so it gets the traction and attention it deserves.