Because of the press preview hosted by Thunderful and Sand Sailor, I not too long ago had the chance to mess around with survival sandbox ASKA just a few days earlier than it entered early entry. As in most early entry video games, there’s work to be executed to get it to full launch. However even the sport that’s stay now could be a enjoyable, participating, and slow-paced sport in a market the place every thing has you sprinting for the end. It’s a novel sport that’s not fairly like anything I’ve performed earlier than, and I’m excited to see the way it grows because it strikes in direction of full launch.
First issues first: ASKA will not be Valheim. They’re very completely different video games, and the one factor they’ve in frequent is “Vikings.” Valheim is a full-on Viking survival-builder, and ASKA is a Viking colony simulation with light-weight survival-builder points. Valheim is far more about fight, and ASKA is far more about constructing. So whereas they each have components of constructing and fight, the focuses for every sport are very completely different.
ASKA is a slow-paced sport. Whereas there are mechanics like thirst and starvation, it’s simple to maintain up with these wants. It’s low-stress and targeted on regular development and colony administration with small durations of fight. I give it some thought as a mixture between Stardew Valley and Oxygen Not Included with a wholesome seasoning of Valheim. In case you are in search of Elden Ring with Vikings or a sport the place you possibly can rush to the tip and switch the world right into a blood-soaked wasteland underneath your bootheel, this isn’t the sport for you.
However if you’d like one thing that’s slower-paced, with a giant give attention to strategic constructing, villages, and villager administration, with some components of fight to maintain issues spicy, you would possibly need to give it a strive.
The backstory for ASKA is somewhat muddled. It’s the usual “folks unhealthy, unhealthy issues occurred to them, and then you definately get up shipwrecked on a seashore.” I’m not new to both colony sims or survival builders, so I instantly began selecting up every thing that I might discover. ASKA does this excellent factor: You hit the Z key, and something you possibly can work together with on this planet glows orange and all of the environmental foliage shrinks, making it a lot simpler to see and decide up small objects. After just a few seconds, the foliage grows again to its regular measurement.
It’s a small element and a smaller characteristic, however one which I discovered myself grateful for time and again, and that’s a theme I discovered all through my playtime with ASKA: It’s loaded with small however high-impact modifications that make it simple to glaze over the tough spots that include each early entry sport.
As in Valheim, you’ll carry out particular duties — like chop bushes, smash rocks, forage for meals – to degree up particular expertise and get higher at them. This occurs for almost every thing you are able to do within the sport, from foraging to constructing to crafting to combating.
Because it’s a survival sport, you’ll must handle your starvation and your thirst too. You begin the sport with a full water pores and skin, which provides you 5 drinks of water. After that, it’s as much as you to seek out extra water. Discovering water was a little bit of a problem for me at first – a lot of a problem, in truth, that it was the rationale that I died my solely demise.
See, there are particular rocks scattered all through the map referred to as “pure water collectors” that acquire rainwater and mean you can refill your water pores and skin. These include just one drink of water, and once you drink it, it’s a must to watch for it to get foggy or rain for it to replenish. I discovered one shut by, however then couldn’t discover any extra. It turned out that this was only a quirk associated to the place I used to be in search of these rocks. I used to be targeted on the seashore the place I shipwrecked, and there was just one. Nonetheless, after I died, I made a decision to go scampering by means of the forest a bit additional and located they have been plentiful just about all over the place however the place I had began wanting.
So now that I’ve established how one can not die of thirst, I need to discuss concerning the stock system, which is sort of completely different from others in comparable video games, and you’ll doubtless both adore it or hate it. You may have three completely different sections to your stock: a small objects part, a medium objects part, and a big merchandise part. Gadgets in your small objects part are issues like small stones, fibers, and meals objects. They stack as much as 5 or ten relying on the merchandise. In your medium objects part, these are issues like sticks, bark, firewood, instruments, issues like that. These don’t stack in any respect, so it’s one merchandise per slot.
One other one of many small particulars that I appreciated is that what’s in your medium stock reveals up in your character. In case you are holding loads of bark, you’ll see items of bark in your again. In case you are holding sticks, you possibly can see the sticks. It’s a pleasant element that I loved however didn’t influence the sport in any respect.
Lastly, in your giant merchandise part, you’ve gotten a single slot. You possibly can carry just one giant merchandise at a time. Much like the medium objects, these present up in your character once you’re holding them – however it’s as a result of it’s a must to carry them. For those who decide up a “lengthy stick,” you hoist it up in your shoulder and carry it to the vacation spot. If you are carrying it, you possibly can’t use your palms for different issues like utilizing instruments (although you possibly can nonetheless decide up small objects).
Let’s transfer on to managing a extra meta stock: your villagers. When you create your Eye of Odin and decide up 5 Jotun Blood, you possibly can summon your first villager. Once you summon a villager, you get a selection between two choices, and you’ll see the primary two of 5 traits that they’ve. These could be issues like “additional good at breaking rocks” or “actually hates the chilly.” The opposite three traits are revealed when your villager is totally summoned. The summoning takes 10 minutes per villager, so it takes a little bit of time.
Villagers have all the identical wants as you do: They want food and drinks out there, they want instruments to have the ability to harvest for you, they want weapons to combat for you… you get the thought. However additionally they want shelter, and so they get salty in the event that they don’t have a spot to sleep (which, like, truthful).
Villager administration was… superb. Not nice. There’s not loads of explanatory textual content. For instance, as soon as I constructed a woodcutter pit, I might assign villagers to it. The woodcutter pit is a storage location, and assigning your villagers to the pit implies that they’ll head out and begin stocking it up for you. What I didn’t notice at first is that they might run round and seize any wooden bits you had beforehand chopped down and inventory them. However as soon as they run out of these, they’ll simply cease and observe you round repeating, “I want an axe” again and again like just like the annoying youngster who follows you round the home going “Mother. Mother. Mother. Mother.” However the sport doesn’t let you know how to do that. I ultimately found out you might commerce with the villagers and provides them the software they wanted, or you might throw it on the bottom and hope they discovered it. Later, once you construct a workshop pit, you may also put the instruments in there and the villagers will discover them.
Village administration is admittedly the way you develop. Buildings take an increasing number of supplies are you progress, and harvesting all of them your self will take without end. It’s important to be managing your villagers that will help you get all of the supplies you want, together with foraging for meals for everybody. That is additionally one of many areas that I feel wants work.
In most different colony simulation video games, you possibly can assign your colonists a number of jobs with a precedence for every factor they need to do. ASKA permits you to assign solely a single job to a villager. If the villager can’t full the job anymore, he’ll simply sit down and stare. Then it’s a must to go to the villager, unassign him from his assigned workstation, after which run to the brand new workstation you need him to work at and assign him there.
That is annoying relating to foraging and cooking. You possibly can assign a villager to forage, and she or he’ll do it till she’s foraged every thing within the space (you may also set “flags” for various areas of the map, and she or he’ll additionally forage there). Then, it’s a must to watch for stuff to respawn. In the meantime, meals could be eaten uncooked, however it’s method higher once you eat it cooked (once more, this checks out). However the forager will simply cease and stare when she will be able to’t forage anymore, presumably fascinated by how a lot better cooked meals is whereas wanting on the chilly campfire pit with firewood and uncooked meals piled round it.
I need to have the ability to assign a number of jobs in precedence order. A main and secondary job would go an extended method to making work administration much less tedious. It is likely to be that after you get later into the sport, having a number of jobs per villager isn’t wanted. However I performed for about 15 hours whole and had six villagers and nonetheless spent an honest chunk of time unassigning and reassigning jobs.
That stated, once you get it working with out having to do something for a couple of minutes, it’s remarkably satisfying. Whereas my villagers scurry round doing their jobs, I’ll do issues like mark the bottom for leveling, lay the blueprints for brand spanking new builds, and simply typically handle and give attention to rising the village. It’s a extremely nice expertise.
The ultimate piece of village administration that I discover annoying is managing morale. Villagers will let you know what’s negatively impacting their morale however not how one can resolve it. The villagers’ morale will drop if you happen to don’t have defenses, and foolish me, I constructed fences considering they might be defenses (they weren’t!). I needed to construct a watch tower and assign a villager to the watch tower to enhance my protection rating. My villagers complained about work hours, so I elevated their leisure time on the schedule, to no impact. In truth, I by no means truly found out how one can make them happier about their work hours.
Lastly, I need to contact on fight as a result of whereas ASKA will not be a sport targeted on combating, it nonetheless presents fight techniques. It’s fairly commonplace fare and isn’t considerably completely different than Valheim, simply extra forgiving. In my playtime, the undead attacked my village, and I by accident stumbled throughout some wolves whereas I used to be wandering that determined I regarded tasty. Most of my fight was spent defending my village from these large rabbit/goat pests that can eat your village’s meals if you happen to don’t (continually) scare them off. They will even do that annoying factor the place they are going to dig by means of your whole varied shops and dump issues on the bottom for funsies. My loathing of those beasts is aware of no limits.
In the end, there have been extra annoyances right here than what I lined since this impressions piece is already fairly lengthy. However ASKA is one thing particular. It’s a surprisingly enjoyable and rewarding expertise even in early entry. There isn’t one other survival sport on the market fairly prefer it, and I’m right here for it. In case you are in search of yet one more place to smite your enemies and rush to complete (and invariably complain concerning the lack of content material), you in all probability received’t take pleasure in ASKA. However if you happen to like metropolis builders, technique video games, and colony sims, this is likely to be the colony-survival-builder for you.
