Pax Romana: Romulus
Hello All, after playing the game for a few hours (44.5hrs) I feel I can give PAX an honest review. The game is in Early Access so content is limited but the story looks promising with many possible directions. Starting off you will struggle managing Energy & Hunger needed to perform actions. I found farming, cooking items into meals, and then selling end product enabled me to build coin to buy animals and other raw materials. Farming isn’t fast and takes time but I was able to grind through it. Early on you will want to focus on mining for Turquoise to then have turquoise crafted into rune stones. These then are used to activate the rune portals to traverse the map between the different towns. Harvest wood/stone in between your crops growing. There were some bugs with different features (crafting recipes/beehives) and the Devs responded fast to resolved them. Feedback on issues and ideas were warmly received. Many games I have played you read from other players how Devs don’t care about it’s community. Locus Ludus does at least hear you an have responded. Is PAX the greatest game you’ll ever play, maybe not. Could it use more content, yes! PAX is a game that won’t give you everything and will make you work for it. It is a struggle to start until you get a better understanding of how things work (Energy/Hunger management). Berry bushes & mushrooms found while you’re out collecting resources (wood/stone) was something i overlooked early on. Due to hunger consumption you might want to save those consumables for when you decide to go out resource collecting. Going into options and turning on “sprint always” might help speed things up as well. You don’t die if energy\hunger depletes, you just walk very slow. I found using hunger items food/potions at your homestead really isn’t needed. Yes, you will move slower but you’ll find farming & tending animals takes time which wastes\burns your hunger meter. Once your established you can then consume meals\wine you craft as you feel the need but always make sure to buy enough seeds or regents prior to the next harvest. Also, be sure to take into consideration the cost of materials versus the profit of the finished product. It’s not worth buying\growing something that gives 4 gold profit if something else that you can grow/craft gives you 14 gold profit. My basic strategy in playing is like so. Plant crops & manage animals, collect (Wood/stone), harvest crops you grow, craft items (Cook food from grown crops, craft wine & cloth, smelt ingots, collect honey), sell end product. After completing the stories quest chain sadly there is little left to do. I’m grinding out the achievements but past that I’m just waiting for more content, At it’s current state I would give PAX a 7 out of 10. PAX does have potential to grow into a really good game if the Devs stick with it.
– Real player with 46.3 hrs in game
Read More: Best Rome Early Access Games.
I really like the concept of this game and I think it can grow to become great. But the risk/reward aspect is broken. More importantly, the effort/reward aspect is broken. The game has a lot of potential. There are a lot of unnecessary actions/clicks forced on the player due to the limitations of gamemaker. This game does not reward ANY of the standard gamer types - Highly impatient, Impatient, Easy going, Lazy, Lazy as Fk. These types of games will succeed only if the game rewards all the gamer types in some way. It is possible to pull off but requires a lot of thought.
– Real player with 33.9 hrs in game