Ulasan

• naviuserwired

  Oct 9, 2023

  I feel like this game could be optimized more and some more features could be added for quality of life and just to bulk it out more but I am having a lot of fun with it.
• Flaw

  Oct 8, 2023

  Stardew + Pokemon. Get it.
• MInty

  Oct 9, 2023

  Cozy game. UI could be better but it has potential. I just wish that the character had more interaction with the NPCs and objects. Like town events and being able to sit down on a chair. Great game so far, can't wait to see this game develop more in the future. :)
• Photo_Brand

  Oct 8, 2023

  This game needs some love from the developer... It's in a rough state right now. The characters are charming on the surface level, and the art is nice... That's about where the positive things I have to say end. MOONSTONE IS A BLIGHT! Only getting 1-2 from each island is absolute abysmal. The ramping up from the early ores being available in excess to needing moonstone for damn near everything in large quantities is absurd. Also making the barn require 3 moonstone right off the bat to even start collecting creatures in a game where capturing a ton of these little/big guys is the main idea is asinine. There needs to be some sort of early game creature inventory and maybe another tier of ore to help make the early-mid-late game jumps not feel so soul crushing and grind-y. My other major complaint is that the writing and depth of the characters and interactions are abysmally shallow. It's not even a voiced game, there is room to have more dialogue, and it's an easy fix, but the characters all feel so shallow... For a life sim type game I want more depth please and thank you.
• BoiseBronco

  Oct 10, 2023

  i keep forcing myself to play this game and i just feel like there is something missing in every category...
• sarah.steele20

  Oct 9, 2023

  The spirits are adorable and the island travel concept is very fun. This creature keeper, card building battle, light farming, cozy game style is definitely working for me. I would say this game is similar to Ooblets, but they have so many differences, and Ooblets has a goofier vibe. This is one of my favorite games for sure.
• Middie99

  Oct 9, 2023

  Absolutely love this game! Between the music, graphics, mechanics, and characters, this game is the cutest and scratched my itch for a new cozy sim game. I really love it and even got my boyfriend into it! It is a perfect mix of farm sim + 8-bit graphics + monster catcher + jammin' tunes. It's great for relaxation and I don't feel the rush to have to fit every single thing into the day and squeeze out all the time I need. Sometimes I pass out at 2am but don't really mind. Sometimes I go to bed at a reasonable 10pm. Both are great. Can't recommend this game enough. If you're just considering it, don't hesitate and go for it!!
• euen

  Oct 3, 2023

  A promising little game that still needs polishing. Mostly it needs small quality-of-life stuff, such as better UI and easier ways to transport items around. However, there's on major issue: resources don't respawn. That tree you cut down? Gone forever. And no, you don't get a seed from it to replant, it's just gone. That mine you cleared of resources? Empty forever. That grass you cut? Never going to regrow. This is genuinely a vibe-killer. I don't want to be clearcutting forests and stripmining for ore in a cozy sim game. Give us the ability to replant trees, make trees able to spawn on their own as the seasons change, make grass regrow over time, and give us some way to close old mines and have a chance of finding new ones, and I'll be much happier with the overall experience.
• gamedeal user

  Sep 24, 2023

  Moonstone Island scratched my (very desperate) Stardew itch, despite its focus surprisingly being on exploration and combat. Let's lay down the core of the game real quick: it's like Stardew Valley if you add creature collecting like Pokemon with Slay the Spire combat. Very interesting combo, I know, but they actually work splendidly together even though all these parts aren't very integrated together. I'll go through each main element of the game on their own to better review them. A big criticism with this game seems to be the lack of a character creator, which is valid. The default main character is androgynous and ridiculously adorable imo, but I understand wanting to play as yourself, not a premade character. The NPCs don't have nearly as much depth as in Stardew or some other games, but they're definitely not characterless. You can definitely love or hate characters, but you won't be spending as much time with them as you will in Stardew. Their routines are also pretty shallow, which I know is a nitpick, but it still takes away from them. As far as the farming goes, it's honestly really shallow and de-emphasized. I think the devs just wanted to make a Stardew-like game so they added farming which ended up being overshadowed by the rest of the stuff they added, which I think is perfectly fine tbh. I was NOT expecting to like the Pokemon aspect of this game this much, considering I don't even like Pokemon, but here we are. The designs for each of the spirits (the creatures) are honestly stellar! The creativity, diversity, and cuteness of them all is honestly really impressive, and honestly the sleeper highlight of this game. The fact that they can also all follow you around too is so cute and awesome and I love it. The actual combat you do with these silly guys is… straight up Slay the Spire. It's fun. This game actually has a surprising amount of exploration, and it's actually really fun. You fly between sky islands with differing biomes and hazards, looking for more resources, dungeons, or temples, and it's just good ol fun. I tend not to enjoy exploration in games very much, but you're always rewarded in this game for it, even if it's as much as a stepping stone to a further island. The progression of it is just really satisfying to me. Now, for my nitpicks. The game generally always has this air of unpolished, whether that be the balancing of prices or accessibility of a certain resource, pixel art scaling inconsistencies, weird UI animations, inconsistent menu controls, etc. It's never game-breaking or anything, not even close, and when it comes to balancing it's at least always in your favor, but it does just make it feel like an early access game when it… isn't. Honestly most of these are so minor that there's almost no chance you notice them, but it mattered a slight bit to me, so I included it. All this being said, I do genuinely love this game. Even though it has some rough edges, it's super fun, so I don't really care. It's addictive in that special way only some games like Stardew Valley have capitalized on for me. I do, genuinely, at the end of the day, recommend this game, a ton. Moonstone Island is… out of this world 🌙 (I'll arrange my own execution for that one, dw) Objective - 7/10; Subjective - 9/10;
• Dividingpoppy

  Sep 26, 2023

  Moonstone Island is game that makes me wish Steam had a "Neutral" rating option for review. But since the question is, "Would you recommend this game?" my current answer for Moonstone Island is a solid no at this current time which leads to my choice of giving the game a negative review. So now to answer the question of why I wouldn't recommend the game. I would describe Moonstone Island as very ambitious. Studio Supersoft clearly tried to include many different ideas into Moonstone Island but like with most Jack-of-All-Trades approaches they have failed to really find mastery with any particular element in their game.

  Life-Sim

  - The villagers aren't unlikable but they don't often really feel alive. It feels like a solid starting point for a game in this genre but doesn't execute past being the bare minimum most of the time. The date mechanic is nice and helps flesh out your chosen romantic partner's character. Some villagers are very forgettable like Cleo who I had to look up their name as part of writing this review.

  Creature Collector

  - Probably Moonstone Island's most fleshed out axis of gameplay. That being said "Creature Collector" is the wrong way to describe Moonstone Island. This game is fundamentally a deck builder. Do not go into this game expecting to catch "Pokemon" and each Pokemon feel like it's own individual unique entity. Each "Spirit" (This game's equivalent to a pokemon) has a deck of cards that they represent and when you are in battle with other spirits you draw from a combined deck of cards for each spirit you have active on your team, up to 3 spirits. There are only 3 things that make each spirit truly unique from other spirits; it's passive, it's type and it's weaknesses to cards of other types. The issue here is that most of the passives are inconsequential with eachother and, as far as I can tell, no spirit has any cards that are unique to that spirit. By this I mean, if you have an Earth type spirit, it has access to all the same cards as EVERY other earth type spirit, which makes all earth type spirit feel almost entirely the same outside of their appearance and passive. Moonstone island also somewhat punishes player for actively collecting spirits due to the fact that unless you spend the tedious time to feed your excess collected spirits every day they will run away. There is an expensive recipe that you unlock early into the game that does ultimately remove that tax but it feels antithetical to a "Creature Collector" game to punish players for collecting creatures.

  Exploration

  - One of the other pillars of the game play loop in Moonstone Island that helps differentiate it from other farm-sim titles is Exploration. This feels relatively fresh for the first 5 hours of game play but eventually the vignette falls and the realization will set in that aside from their shape every island in the game is the same except for the biome they represent out of the 4-5 different types of biomes. That is unless have a randomly assigned dungeon on them. - Dungeons are just fine. They reward the player's exploration efforts with small amount loot but the main draw being a permanent stamina upgrade. I wish dungeons were more visually distinct from each other based on the biome that they are located in, it's mildly nonsensical to have to cross a river of magma in order to access a dungeon on a fire island only to be greeted by a grassy stone ruin once you enter it.

  Farm-Sim

  - Moonstone Island's farming is just kinda there . It's a feature that feels like it exists because there is an expectation for it for the genre but it really doesn't add much to the game play loop outside of generating income for the player or getting food buffs to feed your spirits. The clunky controls also contribute to it feeling like an under developed system. I feel like the devs recognized this because you start the game with access to sprinklers which automate that majority of effort required to farm in the game. There are some crops in the late game that give a lot of EXP to your spirits when you feed them but that feels more like an answer to the frustratingly low amount of EXP you get from actually battling other spirits.

  Miscellaneous

  - The UX in this game is passable most of the time but occasionally is atrocious. You will run into this the most with the inventory management and any attempt to do larger scale farming efforts. Want to plant a large field of crops? Enjoy spamming right-click/space hundreds of times to buy each seed individually since there is no bulk purchasing option. Want to quickly move a stack of items into a chest? You have to drag and drop it, right clicking only puts in 1 at a time but thankfully you can hold down right click in this rare instance. - Fishing exists in this game but it feels like it's been tacked on solely due to genre expectations. - There are character level-up RPG-like elements in the game that really don't need to exist. Very few of the passives feel like anything other than a small incremental numbers boost and some exist just to slow down the game play loop. You cannot tame higher level spirits that you encounter in the wild until you unlock certain passives that let you tame those higher level spirits. - Progressing through the temples (the game's equivalent to a story/campaign/gyms) is blocked by progressing through the seasons. This forces the player to not rush through the game but in turn forces the player to pay attention to all of the other mediocre game play & game design. You'll eventually run out of things that feel worthwhile to do in the game so that the only way to feel like you are progressing is to sleep until the next season so that you can continue to progress the game. - The game occasionally really chugs when exploring certain islands. - I've had the occasional bug that would black screen the game and force me to close out the game and lose some progress in order to resolve the issue. Moonstone Island feels like an early access game that had it's full release come preemptively. I suspect that with another year or two of development Studio Supersoft can make Moonstone Island a standout from other similar indie titles but currently just feels like it's trying to be nothing more than barely adequate to answer it's initial moonshot ambitions.