Pretty torn on this one. I love its visual design, and how inventive and tactile the potion crafting feels. The overwhelming variety of ingredients and the traversal they allow on the alchemy map are wonderful, as are their cleverly color-coded designs. I enjoyed how the clients and the flavor of their demands changes depending on who you refuse service to (serve too many scoundrels and suddenly you’re only getting bandits and necromancers in the door). I don’t love the repetitive grind of the retail simulation, or the way it gates progression behind waiting on certain merchants to show up or certain ingredients to regrow in the garden. I also hated the way the alchemy formulas for the Salts and Stones depended on the same Stone from the previous stage, since I pretty much never wanted to make any of them a second time (it’s novel the first time, but tedious busywork after that).

Based on the dev’s roadmap, it seems like some of these complaints might be alleviated in the future; maybe I’ll pick it up again then, but for now I’m satisfied having created everything but the Philosopher’s Stone and a couple of higher level Salts.

Reviewed on Dec 31, 2022


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