No Place Like Home – Review
Developed by Chicken Launcher and published by Realms Distribution, No Place Like Home is a post-apocalyptic simulation game. All you have to do in this game is to clean up the Earth after most humans have left, build a base, and beautify the world for those who remain.
Ellen is your character in this video game simulation. Trash-strewn fields, polluted waterways, and toxic mountains surround her grandfather’s farm, which she has inherited. When Ellen decides to make the world a better place, she sets out to clean up the farm and its surroundings, building a new house out of trash she’s collected along the way.
All the game’s mechanics become clear to players as soon as they open a new game file in No Place Like Home. In a matter of minutes after finishing the tutorial, Ellen is thrust into her new life without a preamble.
Without any cutscenes or storey indicators in the game itself, the description on its Steam page gives players a hint as to who Ellen is and how she ended up in this place. Most people fled to Mars to colonise (and probably trash) a new planet after humans had ploughed the entire planet under with garbage. Garbage piles trapped some humans and animals and left them to defend themselves from aggressive robots.
Only a handful of humans remain on this polluted world. When Ellen’s grandfather passes away, she decides to restore the beauty of his old house. Her new home is an abandoned farm, and she’s left to clean up the fields, plant crops, build coops and stables for animals, and clean up the entire area so that the humans who still live there can live in peace and safety.
The first few minutes of gameplay are essentially a tutorial for the rest of the game. Signs and trash litter the path ahead of you as you make your way through the woods. There are sections on using Ellen’s backpack as a vacuum, destroying trash towers, learning about the crafting system, domesticating animals, and farming as well as how to preserve food as the primary form of currency in a post-monetary world.
As a hands-on tutorial that forces players to learn the mechanic without lengthy written explanation, weird interruptive explanations by NPC, or the other usual ways games try to teach players how the mechanic of a game works, this should be in every game.
After completing the tutorial, players are taken to the farm. Ellen can barely see the field where some vegetables are still growing because of all the garbage. Ellen is finally able to meet some of the locals after clearing some space, upgrading her drill, and defeating a few of the more aggressive robots in her way..
There is a small shop in each NPC where Ellen can buy building plans, upgrades for her tools and crafting stations, and even unlock higher defence and HP for her character. In addition to helping the locals, you’ll also be tasked with helping to clean up and restore habitats for wild animals. However, the game’s questing system is logical and easy to understand, and most players will find it intuitive.
The visuals of the game are stunning, and the overall design is a joy to look at. The world and its inhabitants have been meticulously crafted, and the character models and portraits reflect this. The visuals and mechanics are interesting, despite the lack of a compelling narrative. Ellen can raise chickens, ducks, pigs, and an adorable species of tiny robots called Cubebots as pets, as well. Each of these animals has a personality and a strong desire to be petted by a human.
Ellen’s new home can be decorated with furniture, wallpaper, statues, fountains, and other eye-catching accessories in the video game. Style, life, and beauty are certainly not lacking in the game’s visuals. It’s also worth noting that this game has a long way to go before it can be upgraded from Early Access.
Right now, No Place Like Home is still in an early access phase. Despite the fact that Chicken Launcher released a major update to the game in May, the team still has a lot of work to do.
Performance is the most critical aspect of the overhaul. There’s a lot going on in No Place Like Home, and running it on most PCs is a real pain. On Reddit, there have been reports that this game can damage graphics cards if they are played with the visual settings turned up too high. When playing at medium to low settings, even on a new computer with an SSD, the game heats up quickly. Despite the constant updates and changes, the game has not yet reached the point where most computers can run it without risk of failure.
Resources are another aspect of the game that should be addressed. New players who don’t manage their resources well may find themselves locked out of certain features. Because Ellen needs a limited supply of materials to complete quests and upgrade her drill, players who don’t spend those limited materials in the correct places risk being locked out and prevented from progressing the storey.
Quality wood is a rare resource in the game that is required to finish the current version. There isn’t enough quality wood in the current version of the game to complete both the full upgrade of the furniture crafting station and a quest to help the local deer population.
When Ellen is out hunting for batteries for her Cubebots, she has to fight a smattering of robots. If you don’t die at least once, the combat is either ridiculously easy or so difficult that you’re almost certain to die. The combat system’s steep learning curve will hopefully be reduced in the months to come before NPLH is fully released.
No Place Like Home has a lot going for it despite being in early access. NPLH’s overall look, feel, and gameplay are exceptional, despite the game’s performance issues and slew of small glitches. You can unwind and have fun with your family while playing this game. This is a fun and enjoyable game because of the characters’ appearances, the ability to interact with animals, and the ability to decorate your own home.
