Mars Horizon
Iniital Review 12.4 hours into Mars Horizon®
Update since initial review at bottom of review.
Second update December 2022 since initial below that update.
An update beneath an update… that is like four wall breaks. Mind blown!!!
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Graphics are fantastic
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Smooth operation and easy to follow learning tutorial
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Not for under age of 12 years old, bit too advanced for under this age.
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Few small non game breaking bugs, grammar, and what not. Nothing to get excited about.
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FPS runs fine on a modern machine 2012 or better. Older and you may have some issues with processing of the information or video being smooth.
– Real player with 71.3 hrs in game
Read More: Best Mars Education Games.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner. This is easily the best manager I have played in a decade.
However, a warning up front. This is not readily obvious. Not, because the game starts outright weak. Instead, it seems to deliver exactly the underwhelming gameplay one learns to expect from indies nowadays. You build a rocket, you fire a rocket, and sometimes it rains. Everything hangs on the roll of a dice. Which makes the space missions look like a lackluster mini game.
Here’s the good news. It gets better. A lot. I just ended my first (short) campaign after 65 hours by landing a crew on Mars. While doing so, my palms were sweaty, because up until the very last turn I wasn’t sure I would make it. Magic question: When did the last manager make your palms sweat?
– Real player with 67.8 hrs in game
Rover Mechanic Challenge - ERC Competition
⣾⡇⣿⣿⡇⣾⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣄⢻⣦⡀⠁⢸⡌⠻⣿⣿⣿⡽⣿⣿ play it
⡇⣿⠹⣿⡇⡟⠛⣉⠁⠉⠉⠻⡿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣦⣄⡉⠂⠈⠙⢿⣿⣝⣿ It’s good
⠤⢿⡄⠹⣧⣷⣸⡇⠄⠄⠲⢰⣌⣾⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣶⣤⣤⡀⠄⠈⠻⢮
⠄⢸⣧⠄⢘⢻⣿⡇⢀⣀⠄⣸⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣧⡀⠄⢀
⠄⠈⣿⡆⢸⣿⣿⣿⣬⣭⣴⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣯⠝⠛⠛⠙⢿⡿⠃⠄⢸
⠄⠄⢿⣿⡀⣿⣿⣿⣾⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣷⣿⣿⣿⣿⡾⠁⢠⡇⢀
⠄⠄⢸⣿⡇⠻⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣏⣫⣻⡟⢀⠄⣿⣷⣾
⠄⠄⢸⣿⡇⠄⠈⠙⠿⣿⣿⣿⣮⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⣿⡿⢠⠊⢀⡇⣿⣿
⠒⠤⠄⣿⡇⢀⡲⠄⠄⠈⠙⠻⢿⣿⣿⠿⠿⠟⠛⠋⠁⣰⠇⠄⢸⣿⣿⣿
– Real player with 2.9 hrs in game
Read More: Best Mars Education Games.
hard to play
– Real player with 0.3 hrs in game
Red Planet Farming
What a great little game. Approachable for casual players, challenging for min/maxers, and those looking for all achievements. An incredible value considering it’s free; it took me about 15 hours to get every achievement and max out settlers in every map. It’s not hard to progress through the game, in fact if you’re trying to speed run it, it seems simply ballooning your population as quickly as possible is the way to go since all progression is based on population numbers. But if you’re trying to go for a certain strategy or goal you will find yourself restarting the 4 levels multiple times which can get frustrating. If you are such a player here’s a tip: the “results screen” is effectively the save point, so if run into a sudden bad result and want to avoid a population crash which will destroy an “optimal” run, alt+f4 at the results screen when you see your food production is significantly below your population needs, then continue the level when you restart the game. don’t do it if you’re only a little below, since knowing how to loose a few people without invoking the cemetery is necessary for an optimal run in the early game.
– Real player with 14.5 hrs in game
This development of this game was funded with a grant, and apparently it’s completely free, but if it were sold for money, I would pay for it. I would pay at least 5 dollars.
Red Planet Farming is a lot of fun. Disclosure, I am biased towards the theme, I love space and sci-fi. But I think the mechanics of this game work out pretty well. What makes the game fun is overcoming challenges and making progress. You have to figure out how to make a productive farm, how to plan developments, how to spread the seed base out so you don’t deplete a crop, and when you should mitigate risks (using protective measures or not).
– Real player with 13.8 hrs in game
The Last Hope
Running simulator
In the game we play the role of a viking who must save the world. To do this, he has to go through several portals in order to reach his destination, which is Mars. In addition, we have to control life, collect food and drink. On the road we will also meet various enemies.
And now what does it look like? The game is to run from one point to another in front of you. Eating and drinking is useless, all we have to do is find first aid kits, which usually lie on the road. Enemies are bugged and don’t want to attack us, so the whole game is based on running through yourself. And so through 5(?) locations.
– Real player with 4.2 hrs in game
(Got this game for free from Marvelousga.com . Thanks, guys!)
I am walkin' to the limit! I am walkin' to the limit! I AM WALKIN' TO THE LIMIIIIIIIT!!!!!
The Last Hope is a game about walking to a destination which you have to discover while making sure you survive to meet it. During your quest, you will need to maintain your health, hunger, and thirst…which can become quite a challenge in various areas (this limit is removed the moment you board the plane to the USA, which makes the experience more casual and enjoyable). The overall objective is to push a small object a short distance (like nudging it off a cliff), but with a very long run towards the destination.
– Real player with 3.3 hrs in game
Race To Mars
I really want this game to succeed. I love the idea, the current level of play is very bare, but I can see where they want to go with it and am very much looking forward to seeing it.
And that’s what this is right now. Potential. They have had issues with personnel, and their update timings are atrocious (once every month or two at best). They haven’t had a patch in a long while, but they have teased a major update that they haven’t been able to bring to fruition yet.
I haven’t lost hope in Intermarum or this game yet, but I can’t recommend the game as is. If this game is something you think sounds like a good one, put it on your follow or wish list and keep an eye on it, but don’t buy it as of yet. Wait until the next update at least. It’s a month or two overdue now. Which leads me into my next point…
– Real player with 12.6 hrs in game
This game seems to have been completely abandoned by its developers, even though they maintain that another patch is coming. It hasn’t been updated since April 2014. Time and time again we’ve been promised a patch at a certain date, only to get an apologetic sob story.
Avoid this game. It is unplayable in its current state, and contrary to recent communication from the developer, no update seems to be forthcoming.
Edit, June 2015. A patch was released in the month of March. It added a few non-essential things and broke parts of the game. The game is still unplayable. It is not even remotely finished. Avoid this game.
– Real player with 10.3 hrs in game
Terraforming Mars
This game had a few bugs to play around but it wasn’t awful. As of the Nov update you can now barely finish a game there are some many new bugs. If you are thinking of purchasing this i would recommend you not. Save your money till its fixed, if it ever is. It is 3 years after the release and still has very poor stability or chance to complete a game without bugs.
– Real player with 972.0 hrs in game
Too many bugs. Too many cards that dont work as intended. And too dumb an AI. And the recent patch just broke it. It was bearable before - mainly just an inept AI. But at least it worked. Now it doesnt even do that.
– Real player with 392.0 hrs in game
Space Company Simulator
still has a lot of bugs, but they are working on it.
EDIT FEB 2020
They are working on it, but it doesn’t seem to be improving.
What annoys me is they bring out these occasional updates and put the game on sale to make it look like they are working on it and get more people in. But the updates don’t actually make the minimum requirement make it playable.
They even have the nerve to ask people to update their review of the game. So I am.
This is supposed to be a rocket management sim. The reality is you still can not launch rockets. At the moment all you can do is make more money than you know what to do with off interest from the money in your bank account (I guess in that way its not a bad Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos simulator). You can use this money pass time and move along the research tree but that is all pointless if your company is not able to launch a rocket into space!.
– Real player with 22.6 hrs in game
Author’s note: This review was written in early access and information (along with the recommendation) is subject to change… At least it better change!
Overview
The reader can infer that Space Company Simulator is a turn-based management simulation, so we’ll skip to the blunt description of the game: Space Company Simulator is like the NASA Space Shuttle Challenger: It was used too early in the year and turned into a disaster. (Okay, so maybe not quite as big of a disaster as the initial launch of Arcade Tycoon, and no lives were lost as the result of a bugtastic video game.) The player starts out with a big pile of cash, and unlike the sort of grind fests that are management simulations, Space Company Simulator lights a fire under the player’s butt to spend their way out of a spending deficit in order to run a profitable space program. (Hopefully before that big pile of cash burns up in the atmosphere like the player’s rockets.)
– Real player with 6.5 hrs in game
Cargo Company
At present: very rough around the edges in the UI department, with a very tedious menu/window navigation scheme and hierarchy. Taking users through many pages of data that is both largely uninformative as well as redundant eventually requiring one to open window after window to reach the end of a menu thread which sometimes yields informative data or a shortcut to a specific object. Also featuring a very basic pathfinding logic regarding railroad placement which will very quickly bog down rail based transportation if not managed personally with signals and the “specific track placement tool.”
– Real player with 9.7 hrs in game
I’m quite new to this kind of game. Played some Open TTD before, which i enjoy a lot (free here on steam, check it out!)
This has a lot of the same concepts as Open TTD but expands on it in a smart way (settle on other planets like moon and you can have interplanetary supply chains that come with it).
Played for a couple of hours now and did not encounter any major problems. For an EA title this game is perfectly playable for me. I hope they will add some other methods of transportation in the future like ships and airplanes.
– Real player with 8.6 hrs in game
Mars Power Industries Deluxe
Powering Mars for the Future
_Developed by Rarykos during Global Game Jam 2018 and later picked up by 7A Games and Kurki.games for friendly development and publishing help, “Mars Power Industries Deluxe” describes itself as an “atmospheric puzzle game set on Mars” released in 2019.
While making sure that all inhabitants of our red neighbor have their needs met, strange things start to happen which threaten the hospitality of our newfound home._
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– Real player with 8.4 hrs in game
june 2020 edit: 24 new levels and a new mechanic got added in a patch.
march 2020 edit: 12 new levels got added in a patch.
in a world where mars is not just a candy bar, you are tasked with providing resources to martian settlements. and collecting strawberries, because it’s a video game.
– Real player with 8.0 hrs in game
MarZ: Tactical Base Defense
As first impressions go, MarZ: Tactical Base Defense starts off strong.
The starting menu is simple, clean, and the options are mostly straightforward. Personally I wish there was a hover tool to give a basic explanation of what each option does and how it affects the game, but, again, that is a personal preference I like to see.
The starting campaign cinematic gives the rundown on what is happening and your goals. As of writing this review I have completed about half the campaign and the more I play the less it makes sense. It does have zombies in space so I may have to lower my expectations since there may be not much effort put into making a cohesive story. Or maybe it will culminate some kind of explanation towards the end, and will likely revise part of the review then if that is the case.
– Real player with 45.4 hrs in game
Free Demo Download isn’t a complete sample and not completely representative of the game. After purchasing and starting the 4th mission, tactics, swarms, and weapon upgrades were far more difficult. Attempted to return the game, but the time played in the free demo counted against the 2 hour time limit. I don’t think free play demo time should of counted as play time after purchase. If the demo was more representative of the full game, I’d almost understand. The 2 hours is after purchase, but the timer started before I bought it. I do realize that game play should increase with level and mission advancement, but the level of increase and how much everything changed was drastic and I had the impression I was duped into buying it.
– Real player with 38.3 hrs in game