Stoneshard

The game is absolutely amazing!
I've been playing it for 3 weeks non stop and the amount of mechanics, equipment, builds and strategy is making my DnD brain wiggle in excitement for more.
Soundtrack is an absolute banger and I wish for it to be fully in Supporter Pack
Hopefully there will be more random encounters, events and such, perhaps Caravan Ambush or something like that.
Thank you! :Battle Cry:

If there were a Nobel Prize for game mechanics, it should go to this game. I'm constantly surprised by clever solutions I haven't seen in other games. The game is far more realistic than I expected when I first saw the pixel art graphics. The character development and the perks you unlock are amazing. There's never enough money, so you always have to work for it. Exploration is the best it could possibly be for a 2D game. There are "question marks" on the map - which I usually hate - but here they are done correctly. They are explained as rumors you’ve heard or tips someone gave you, and they’re not overused. Hunting, cooking, and combat are genuinely fun. Inventory management is hard but rewarding. Even the save system eventually grew on me. Death has real weight, so you have to be careful. But there's no annoying checkpoint system - the game saves when you exit. If you die, your save is deleted and you respawn where you last rested. Sleeping, like everything else in this game, has real meaning, not only progressing time. Overall, one of the best systems I've seen in gaming.

Very promising game prototype.

Pros:
- Very nice graphics
- Cool gameplay mechanics
- Open world
- Nice boss fights

Cons:
- A huge amount of routine walking [!]
- There is no mechanic to speed up game time
- Too boring non-key locations (with similar encounters like bandits)
- Too few unique and interesting quests
- Similar procedural dungeons start to get boring very quickly

This is an awesome turn based RPG.
Pros:
Pixel graphics are really really good.
Music is phenomenal.
Combat feels visceral, I know what I just said for a turn based game but it's true.
Skill system is the same for all characters but there is depth to it based on which character you play.
There is probably 10-20 hours of gameplay for each run depending on how much you want to complete.
Game is hard.

Cons:
Replayability is interesting - you can keep starting new builds and keep trying new things but at some point it starts to feel old - future expansions will build up on it though.
Game is hard and sometimes it feels like brutally unforgiving.
Inventory is too limited (but later you realize most items are not worth anything and you just need to pick up the essentials and the big ticket items to vendor).
Official wiki on the official website is derelict - totally outdated.
IRL war started where the developers are from and development was stalled for years. However last two years the game has picked up pace.

Overall I've been playing this for one year now, and the last update "Rags to Riches" added new playable characters for free. I totally got my $25 worth out of it.

work of art.

Been waiting a long time for this game, last update made it all come together much better! Looking forward to caves and 1.0!

Just wow! this game is difficult but it has this Diablo vibe that I can't ignore it does a great job on updates and even though it's indie it has a premium vibe about it and quality and attention to quests is really premium like so I hate the difficulty but I can't return this gem.

really cool game, can be unforgiving as heck, interesting save system (no savescumming)

the game needs more time to cook, which is a shame considering its been "cooking" for 5 years (for a pixelart game)
high level play is a crapshoot.. its either a breeze or you get jumped by 5 stunlocking enemies. raised this problem with the discord and as you can imagine the general expression is the game is perfect

One of my absolute favorite games currently. I rarely provide a review on anything, but this title and the devs deserve it. It is an absolute GEM of a game and will have you enjoying yourself for hours.

If you enjoy strategy games and RPG games, this is a MUST HAVE.

PROS:
-Art Style = this game has the most killer art style seen in pixel art, every single scene and item is so well drawn that it is an absolute eye-candy
-Ambiance = the setting of this world and the lore are top notch, can't wait for more areas, more factions, more continents and foreign lands
-Freedom = freedom to roam and build any build you wish with endless combinations and variances with freedom to slow-play for very difficult to get up builds
-Difficulty = this game is meant to be a CHALLENGE, this is a game that WILL punish you and have you solving for a weakness you overlooked in your build, but once you get it right it is a PURE JOY to experience, instead of getting absolutely obliterated, you are the one doing the obliterating suddenly and with a very marginal fix
-Development Team = listens to the player base on discord and takes appropriate steps to curtail or adjust as per player feedback, while not letting up on the FUN FACTOR (difficulty).
-Replayability = think you've mastered the game with one build? Try another, and you will feel the challange all over again!

CONS:
-Development Time = its a smaller team so the development time is a bit longer
-No Voice-over = no real or ai voices for most dialogues, gotta read most of the text yourself


My overall rating: 9/10 as close to perfect for this genre as you can get so far. This is a FUN game that offers HOURS and HOURS of entertainment with a fantastic community. The only thing missing is more content and more updates and more DLCs so that we can explore the entire world of this master-crafted gem!

The developer failed to deliver quality content and the main storyline, instead focusing on DLCs and endless early access.

There is a lot to like about stoneshard. The combat and character skills are fun. The music is great. It can be very challenging. This game is good if it is the type of experience you want. A hardcore dungeon crawling rpg experience. They are absolutely nailing the vibes. When this game is finished I would give it a 9/10.

If you've been waiting for updates on it, then you're used to waiting a long time unfortunately. The development has been slow. It's still a fun time. It seems like they left room to add more places to explore later and possibly tie into the storyline.

Right now I would call it an unfinished gem. It is sure to polish up and shine brightly.

Fantastic game, great variety of enemies and procedural dungeons. The game is really as hard as you want to make it, you can cheese a meta build with tons of buffs/potions and run through even some of the late game dungeons. This is a strategy nerds ideal game, with an extreme amount of customization to suite even the sweatiest of play styles. The procedural dungeons are literally game changing, the varying layouts and dungeon crawling make every expedition fresh. Though you can plan for most encounters, the game will force you into nearly unwinnable circumstances at times. Though this game can be very easy if you build your character right, there is a level cap so you are forced to pick a certain play style very early and cant really branch out for the rest of the game without basically throwing your chances of clearing higher level dungeons in the late game.

There are some small things I would like to see added like estates you can buy or guilds you can form, maybe even one of the destitute villages you can take rebuild and run in the very late game. The caravan was a great QOL addition, reducing the extremely tedious trade/inventory problem. I do have some issues with certain mechanics like crazy expensive weapon/armor repair and your character needing to eat every 5 seconds, but those are just tedious things that can be managed with preparation. I like to experiment and make my characters stronger so I would really prefer a higher level cap for more customization opportunities (I know about mods, but i'd like to see it in the base game).

The game is still in early access and the devs are constantly adding content. I can't wait to see where this goes and am definitely looking forward to any sequels.

As others have stated, the game overall is good held back by terrible design decisions around wasting your time with a barebone save feature mixed with rng combat encounters.

Good game. Too bad taking so long for custom character creation to be implemented. I haven't played since November 3rd 2022 because I've been waiting for this feature. Maybe they will introduce it in 2025? Review= 7/10, Review after character creation= 9/10?

it is a very fun game, so fun. the only thing holding it back is it's save system. numerous times you'll die to lose hours of game play constantly. you're ALWAYS outnumbered but you will never get back up or companions. there is a class system and no way to make your own character so you get stuck with the shit classes they have already made and no way to recoup skill points you spend. so when you have a character you like a little but now you've finally got armored warfare? to bad, you'll not be able to get back the points you had to waste into something else to get you by. the game itself has so much going for it just a few stupid ideas are dragging it down. If you think you are worthless and want to waste your life then this game is for you. if you value yourself and your time look elsewhere.

Still no character creator, we get 3 characters instead and it specifies being free DLC when this is Early Access. Stealth mode and lighting in low priority, so i guess ill just assume it will never be added. Actually, feels like they said that just to provoke disappointment.

I am not a hardcore rpg player and almost fell off in the beginning but i'm glad I stuck it out as Stoneshard is now one of my favorite games.

Character progression is the main hook of the game right now and planning builds is so fun, if you were the kind of person that couldn't finish Skyrim because you wanted to keep trying new character builds you will enjoy this game. The developers were able to make turned based combat seem fast-paced and it's always exciting.

Steep learning curve but once you learn the mechanics the gameplay loop becomes almost relaxing and I like to play while I catch up on shows

Excellent game for passing the time and learning to look at situations from every possible angle to find the best outcome. I would call this game a better option to Tales of the Maj'ael, NeoScavanger and Zed Zone...unless they were to have a child in which case Stone Shard would be the offspring.

This game can be somewhat frustrating due to the save system, but its a fairly deep RPG, with well thought out content. I'd definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a challenging yet rewarding game experience

There is a lot of depth of the character skills tree to experiment many different builds. Combat is brutal throughout the entire game, you can get gang up by enemies and die quite quickly if you're not careful.

gameplay is amazing but needs more time to cook as the main story is incomplete and world is empty just a sandbox

I thought I'd give a positive review for the game, but unfortunately I can't.the reasons are as follows, the game is unfinished, there are a lot of bugs, Dev is very slow to work on them, and even when the new patch comes out, forget about the old save. The summary is that the game is super well conceived, but the developers are slow or poorly working on it. My advice is to buy the game only when it's finished, not before.

Разработчики должны тщательно различать сложный игровой процесс и пустую трату времени. Например, в трейлере упоминается свобода пробовать разные сборки, но нет функции «сбросить навык», из-за чего любой билд требует 20-30 часов повторяющегося труда. Кроме того, время обновления подземелий слишком велико, из-за чего темп завершения финального испытания намеренно затягивается. Игры должны продлевать свою жизнь за счет насыщенного контента и сложных боев, а не за счет ограничения удобства игрока.
Наконец, есть такая штука, как управление проектами! Погуглите! Я почти уверен, что в команде разработчиков нет должности, отвечающей за управление проектами.

Devs must carefully distinguish between challenging game difficulty and time-wasting game difficulty.
For example, the trailer mentioned that you can freely try different builds, but there is no "respec" function, which makes any bulid require 20-30 hours of repetitive labor.
In addition, the dungeon refresh time is too long, which makes the pace of completing the challenge in the endgame deliberately extended.
Games should extend their life with rich content and challenging combat, not by restricting player convenience.
Finally, there is a thing called project management! Google it! I am pretty sure there is no people responsible for project management in the development team.

It's a cool idea, but not really a fun game.

The game feels like a slog and a grind(not the good kind). Locking out so many ability trees, really takes a lot of the fun out of the game for me. Not being able to create your own character in the early access is a mistake, it really should be one of the top priorities for a game like this that is so slow and punishing.

The movement control system in combat is frustrating because one misclick can be the difference between life and death, making permadeath unplayable. And personally I feel like this game should be designed around permadeath, when realism is the goal.

My suggestions:
-Make permadeath the default
-Make the game less punishing
-Add more wildlife to the squares, there is no reason for so many squares to be so barren and have to spend so long travelling to find anything
-Prioritize 'Create your own character'
-Don't make it so hard to sell things you loot, there is nothing worse than having a tough battle against 3 bandits and having nothing worth selling or no one who wants to buy them. Don't know who would have thought that was a fun mechanic.

This game is a low fantasy indulgence into RPG gaming. The attention to detail and flavor takes center stage here. The world they have crafted was created with careful intention, and you can tell they take joy in inviting others to explore this amazing place they have made. Worth.

Im Sorry but whats actually going on with this game? Been sitting on this game for YEARS waiting to be able to simply make my own toon atleast! your releasing DLC that actually have more premade toons..? This is starting to feel like raid at this point. Think the vision was lost here, releasing DLC when your base game promises are still not done, or spells. whole trees....Literally missing huge chunks and DLC is coming out? O_o i dont get it and i give up here and forever.

The game is not released yet, but it is already a great game as it is right now.
One of the best indie games.

Ovreall:
From the very early stages of developemnt the game it was good.
The core gameplay loop of being no-name mercenary, that suppose to die on the job, feels on-point.
Survival is not simulated, unlike in a lot of other games, your every descision in preparation for your journey matters and you rarely able to scrounge someting up, if you find yourself lacking the food, water, medicine or gear.
Enemies are, albeit simple in their behaviour have the same skills as the players, have numbers advntage, and if caught in unfavorable position, can kill even the high-level character with relative ease.
Fights are rarely prolonged, usually ending swiftly and very brutally.
The punchy and perfectly fitting soundtrack elevates every location.
The coziness of the taverns and villages perfectly juxtaposes hostile environemnt of the plague-ravaged, war-torn and famine-sticken low-fantasy medieval country. Every settlement, every item description, every local recipe or a gossip paints the deep and rich world.

At it's worst:
Combat can be a little D&D-ish and swingy, with bad luck being a quick and painfull death sentence in a crucial moment, which can lead players to risk-free, but boring strategies.



Due to small team, development goes slow, but in a steady rythm. Devs work tirelesly on the bugs, imbalances and new content. With me seeing at least 2 overhauls of the gameplay.

TL;DR
STALKER's and Witcher's illigitimate turn-based top-down child.
Highly recommend.

This one shows so much promise. The development has been steady progress for QoL and expanding the mechanics of the game.

I've played this game early in it's development and realised it was far from a complete game. Now, four or five years later I thought I'd give it another shot to see how much it's progressed. Sadly, I've returned to many things the same they were half a decade ago.

Firstly though, I want to say this game looks absolutely gorgerous and I can clearly see how much love went into the art. I also I feel like the combat is very well thought out - even if somewhat on the punishing side - and rewards tactical play really well.

It is such a promising game and I want to see it succeed so badly, but rarely have I seen this many infuriating mechanics in a game at once without being addressed. And the worst thing is, they're mostly things that are only infuriating the first time you encounter them. So they could be addressed with some work into better introductions to the mechanics or clearer warnings about how things are used.

Just spent an hour clearing a dungeon but don't have any lockpicks to get to the loot? No worries, let's just go back to town to buy some and come back later. Wrong! You return to the dungeon after spending 15 minutes walking back and forth to find the entrance has randomly collapsed and won't let you in any longer.

Some repair kits will for some reason only work on gear that is only slightly damaged. Get ready to waste a couple hundred gold before realising this.

The save mechanic is either walk back to town to save or lose the last day of progress.

Prepare to be locked into corners by citizens that are blocked from going to sleep by you but won't let you through because they must sleep now. I just had to kill an innocent farmer just so I wouldn't starve in a corner.

Want to fight someone above or below you? Don't even bother, approach them from the side because the game is locked to cinematic widescreen mode for no reason.

I will revisit the game whenever it is fully released and hopefully then will I be able to change my review to a positive one.

This game needs a "normal" save game system. The current system is anti fun. You have to sleep to save and only the two last saves are kept.
This only leads to repetitive boring game play because you have to redo the same 10 minute travel to the next dungeon again and again.
You run accidentally into a trap (due to the janky movement system) and die? -> repeat 10 min of game play
You want to test a new skill in an fight against an enemy? Find a bed, sleep, go to the dungeon and test the skill. Want to test again or a different skill? -> repeat 10 min of boring game play.
...

I don't see any benefit in this save system. There is no situation where it is more fun than letting the player decide when and how often to save.

I really like the idea of this videogame and i like deep rpgs BUT ...
i felt overwhelmed with the ammount of stuff that gets thrown to your face in the first minutes.
The level of difficulty is very high but that's not the real problem here.
The graphics are okay, i like pixel style ...

to me the main problem is the pace... very slow... too slow for what i personally like considering the usual RPG products.
The necessity to move with only the mouse click and not WASD isn't exiciting and something felt off but not sure what (consider i loved BG3, Dinivity etcc, which have the same movement mechanic).

And for the price i am not willing to keep it for a "maybe in the future things will be smother".

What i read and saw is that the latest update added tons of features but things that should have been there from the real beginning (like crafting)... if after 5 years we are still in stil development state, i don't think i'll be able to appreciated it in the near times.

Good for any person who can play only one game, and very slow pase with HIGH learning curve and read TOOOOOONS of stuff even to understand what a simple skill does ...

This game been in early access for yeas. It feels like one of those never ending projects. Developers don't have clear vision and keep tweaking with unimportant stat changes instead of focusing on finishing the game. Give us the game and then start tweaking the skill tree. Please.

This game is very time wasteful second of all it's not that much intuitive, a lot of aspects of the game like fights & so on feel a bit unclear, you need manually to click each character to see which of them is injured or not. It's not bad, but visually not so much immersive.

I mean it was a nice idea of the game long time ago, but definetely not now, game misses a lot of QOL features like being able to travel fast-forward like able to set up destination and speed up time or something, on top of that characters could have visualisation of damange taken or debuffs or if not then some kind of UI representation like healthbar should be introduced... As right now it's very mehh game, plus it still doesnt have character creation & overall economy feels very mehh as you cannot do much besides looting, hunting, harvesting plants. I would say if they made this as random gen map game with economy and all characters able to be killed then I would say it would be something interesting closer towards CDDA, but now it's so bad that I would rather go & memorise entire keyboard of CDDA complex keys rather than playing this.

So far very bad, it has a lot of content, but it's repetitive & overall almost abandoned with only minor updates and adjustements, I would highly recommend skipping this one...

A darn Gem, just get it already. Its some heretical amalgamation of Battle Brothers and Dwarf Fortress Adventure Mode. Its like playing the previous story of a new hire in BB. You are NOT the hero, and the 3 bandits over there are gonna show you precisely that, by caving your skull in with actual sticks n stones.

Were talking about a rogue-like with a firm story driven core, that gives you the freedom to do whatever you want after a certain amount of progression. Means that you got like 6 cities that are always at the same point but the surrounding lands are procedurally generated on game start. This paired with the 100+ skills and even more build options leads to a sht ton of replayability, even now in its unfinished state.

This game is hard and it retains the challenges it presents you early throughout the game, in ever so slightly different ways. If you wanna live out power fantasies this aint a game for you. In the very lategame you might be able to just do whatever you want but that comes at a point where the game shows that its not finished yet. It might be pretty fckng annoying to get into the game at first but once you get a hang of it itll be a lot of fun.

The graphics are simply amazing, effects and details go through the roof at times. Ive been playing this game on and off over the years, checking out new content updates as they released and now we received one with another set of 60+ items and 3 new characters, all for free. Before the caravan Update is was kinda meh but over the years I really noticed that the devs of this game got a vision for it and most importantly they put heart and soul into it.

What bugs me most about this game is the music... its just... half the stuff fits straight into The Witcher 3 and the other half, the more chill songs could be put into Skyrim without anybody noticing that they belong to another game, its Midnight Tundra all over again, my god is it good. Having these songs play dynamically midfight is simply amazing.

It somewhat reminds me of Wartales and I could really see it become similar in scope.

I recommend. Difficult at the beginning but rewarding once you understand the game mechanics. Hardly any games can strike a good balance between the two.

Quite literally the game that hates you.

Nothing feels worse than doing an entire dungeon just to die by bandits on your way and losing one hour of progress.
You'll get experience and feel like nothing can stop you... until you meet an enemy that's one rank higher than you. Most likely he'll drink his victory wine from your skull.

The lows you'll reach are mentally underground but it feels so refreshingly good to defeat an overwhelmingly stronger enemy, especially when it takes multiple attempts and you keep on making small improvements to your strategy.

The first time I defeated the Ancient Troll, I was dead set on wearing heavy armor. It took me a lot of attempts to figure out his attacks and which items I owned could be effective against it. The winning strategy came together like a puzzle and I managed to win that fight with nothing but a bow, a spear, the random potions I found while completing contracts, and a bunch of Deathstinger Jars I could buy from Alda.
The fight was extremely hard since I undertook that challenge without using any guide or having any strategy in mind. I didn't even know what skills the boss had but I felt like a genius after I understood its patterns and manged to take that beast down with my own strategy.

At the end of the day, this game is a puzzle. A collection of rules you need to play by an tools you can use.
I find it fun. I hope more people that like this genre will find this gem.

Edit: I forgot to mention. The amount of interactions between each of this game's systems and rules will amaze you. Even after playing for this long, I still discover new "bad" decisions, "useful" interactions, and "unfortunate" events. Depending on what your build is and what you're fighting, certain conditions can be beneficial to you (i.e. Sadism)

At this stage, the game is challenging and amazing. Some elements, like the need to walk back to the city on empty maps, are still exhausting and unnecessary. However, there is a lot of amazing content that makes up for it. The game is designed for a specific type of player—something between Battle Brothers and Baldur's Gate. It's not for everyone, but if you fall into this category, it will be an amazing experience for you.

I believe the current low rating of this game is due to two factors: slow development and the fact that developers don’t listen to the community, creating updates with mechanics that nobody uses, while neglecting those that would improve the experience for early adopters. The developers' lack of business skills does not mean the game is weak. On the contrary, at this stage, it is amazing.

Highly recommended for hardcore gamers.

Beautiful pixel art and game design on one side, and brutal, unforgiving combat on the other, this is a near perfect roguelite open world RPG. Music is also very very good and sets a mood unique to this game. Over 100 hours in and I haven't finished exploring everything.

A neat little game which is unfortunately extraordinarily lopsided in its current implementation. The save system, combined with some peculiar choices about the strength/potency of wildlife and the size of the map, leave it wanting. The game tends toward unfairness not in an interesting/tactical sense (though position in combat is extraordinarily important), but more randomly.

By the time you can cut through bandits with ease, wolves/boars still present a threat to such a degree that it's not worth bothering: skinning requires a skillpoint investment (of which you only get one per level) and you're likely to die, lose progress, and have to walk 3-5 minutes back to try again. ...And by the time you can confidently deal with boars/wolves, you won't need the money from their pelts anyways.

There is also the rather peculiar inclusion of caves. These are not implemented, but they still show up on your map as something to explore! ...Which causes you to trek out into the wilderness (possibly several times if you accidentally stumble into some wolves) to observe unimplemented content you can't access.

Most of this would be almost entirely resolved by implementing a standard save system: there's already a reason to rest (vigor buffs), so gating it behind bed spots doesn't really achieve anything other than frustrating the player. Likely, at one stage (given the timeline of the game's development), the game was geared toward a more roguelike experience where the save-gating system makes 'sense' because you'd try out different tactics on different runs.

As for the overworld... While this feature is 'cool,' I think it's drawn the direction of the game away from rewarding/interesting exploration, questing, and dungeon delving, to a game of chance in a mostly empty environment. Stoneshard would be a far more cohesive experience if the design was structured better, which is difficult to do with its current overworld: the randomness doesn't really add replayability or intrigue to a game which requires 20-30 hours to see a character past level 15 anyways. While the setpieces are 'fixed' and the art is beautiful, there's not really much of a reason to trek into the wilderness.

This, quite plainly, doesn't work well in a character-focused RPG where you're playing a long-game with levels, attributes, and skills.

More puzzling is the lack of custom characters. This has been a planned feature for, I believe, 3-4 years now? Given that none of the character choices have any story relevance (they just have a few battle call-outs/starting skills/quirks) and this is a 'level-your-character' style game, the lack of prioritization on a feature that's the bread and butter of RPGs in this genre is baffling.

tl;dr a neat game that I would recommend if it was more cohesive. Right now it struggles with: too large a map with few reasons to explore, a needless 'gated' save system, and non-broadcasted difficulty spikes (a single boar shouldn't be more of a threat than 5 armed bandits, but it definitely is).

This game is amazing. Already spent more time on this than Baldur's Gate and this game isn't even finished yet. It's challenging, but not so challenging that you give up. Plus I love this style of turn-based RPG.

Too long in early access. 1 year turned into 5+ and no deadline for completion. Save files incompatible with updates.

I actually really like the game but I am going to leave a negative review because of two things.
It does not respect your time and the save system just doesn't work.

Until the developers fixes the save system and balance the amount of enemies in certain areas and make so they don't group all the time this review is going to stay negative.

Seriously the game is good and i want to like it more than i do but as it is now it's just to frustrating with not having a proper save system, limited saves can work but this ain't it.

A very solid rogue-like that is forgiving enough to not feel like utter defeat, but challenging enough to make victories enjoyable. The tutorial, if I remember is a bit difficult, but the post-tutorial gameplay allows much more freedom.

It contains a good variety of starter classes, with custom classes coming somewhere down the line.

I love the art style, and the light survival elements, such as food, water, bleeding, etc, and how they are handled as something to be managed versus something to constantly worry over and never feels particularly cumbersome.

I highly recommend, even in early access, as you will likely get many hours of gameplay with additional updates in the future. Keep in mind that it is early access, so it may be a while until the story is wrapped, but in the mean time it has plenty to engage with.

A few tips and warnings;
1. This is not fast-paced gameplay; advancing on enemies and spamming attacks will get you killed. If you spot enemies, always consider retreat. Distance, cover, and singling out enemies is key.
2. Gather gold and make sure you always have the best equipment.
3. Read the skill descriptions and focus on what you will use. There is no respec, and skill points are few and far between.
4. Travel in the day and always return to town after a victory to save, restock and sleep.
5. Pay attention to enemies and what they can do. If you don't know a two handed enemy can pull you near to them, or that a dagger wielder can swap positions with you, you will be in for some nasty surprises.
6. Always carry liquor. When things are rough, and you are bloody and broken after a fight, make sure to drink. Do not let the pain drive you mad.
7. Always have salves, bandages and 1 splint on you, otherwise you will likely fail your objective due to time constraints.
8. Always search for traps, it is a default ability and surprisingly easy to overlook.
9. Not all difficulties (noted by the skulls beside each quest) are equal, be afraid of cultists, be very afraid.
10. The most important (to reiterate): Patience. If you rush, you will die. Only take fights you know you can reasonably win. If an enemy is adjacent to you, retreat is no longer an option.

Gets you sucked in for the first 2 hours because it feels well tested, then the game shows its flaws by being terrible and impossible to progress past that point. really wanted to love this game

Edit: Yes I made this rant on a crash out. No, my review isnt changing until release, or if the game has made the changes needed to make me want to change it. The TLDR is: This game has all the realism and punishing difficulty I love from it's niche Genre (games like Quasimorph, Cataclysm Dark Days Ahead, ETC.) None of the rewarding pay off. You feel no sense of accomplishment or reward for learning the game ever. (Maybe with a fully realized story that is all the game will need.). Sorry to any of the devs if my review comes off as hostile, but believe me it is tough love. I love your game. But also fuck your game.

This is the best yet shittiest game ever made.I both love and loath this game to tiresome degrees, but I cant recommend it to anyone. Behold my mega bitch rant, and likely the longest review I will ever make: The developers are literally asking you to pay them to shit all over your face and punish you for having the audacity to wanna play their game. Absolute masochistic a holes. I have put way too many hours into this game for this review to not be taken seriously: Unless you did your research into this game and know what you are getting into; DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY ON THIS HORRID PIECE OF SHIT! It is NOT worth your time, your money, or your sanity. I have put so many hours into this travesty of a video game and never once, not once, not one fucking time have I ever felt accomplished for the effort I put into it. At no time. The moment you kill a Boar for the first time (Or anything that would solo you in the beginning for that matter) that joy you feel will be hollow and escape you just as quickly as it came with an indignant "Whatever." Because by the time you can fight something it's a chump. And if something is a challenge to fight, well you are probably just dead. I love Dark Souls, Cataclysm Dark Days Ahead, Quasimorph so far. But any love I have for Stoneshard is being put on hold to be real about it all, if it stays this way on full release it can rot in the bowels of hell and it's developers go into obscurity because the game as it is does not respect your time and tells me all I need to know about it. And believe me it probably wont be any different in a finished state sad to say, given the developers are more concerned with a "Punishing and realistic experiance" To the detriment of any actual fun. You will never feel accomplished, you will never earn your way into being powerful by mastering it's mechanics and sticking with it long enough to earn the best gear, you will achieve nothing, and the game will hate you for playing it. "Fuck you for giving us money." Is what I imagine the developers think every time a copy is purchased. No, this is not a "The game isn't for everybody" type of review. This game is on the surface right up my alley after all. No no, don't be confused. THIS GAME IS FOR NO ONE! In it's current state. The overall positive outlook is from people too blind from what they want the game to be to see it for what it is and probably always will be. A game that hates you for owning it, buying it, or having the gall to enjoy it at any moment. Fear and hunger is kind in comparison, because at least fear and hunger does not cosplay as a Dark Fantasy Role playing game where you make your own story and fight tooth and nail to be a bad ass. Fear and Hunger tells you from the get go this game isn't for everyone and if you stick it out you may feel achieved in accomplishing what the developer asks of you. Stone shard? Treats you like you are a vile vermin who should just go sulk in the corner for ever wanting to play it, and like a narcissistic lover insists you are the problem and that it is totally what it presents it'self as. If I can refund this game, I would. Fuck the developers, Fuck their game, and if you buy Stone Shard fuck you to, because the developers certainly want to say it for themselves. Go lose your mind to the 100th time you accidentally aggravate a boar and die to it like a chump after killing a crypt full of vampires like a operator, because that sure makes sense right? A wild animal being more deadly then fiends and wraiths. Feel that hollow feeling when you go to get revenge on wolves and they just die like chumps because there is no in between, things just kill you or they are chumps 90 percent of the time. Buy this game and I hope you run into boars or bandit Ringleaders every single map you enter, you deserve it for having the audacity to want to buy and enjoy this game. Not because I think you deserve it, but the developers do. It hates you for playing it, but pretends it's worth the effort. It's not. And it never will be. And if you think im wrong, play it yourself and remember stupid, the developers intended for you to play with Permadeath ON not off, but turn it off. You wont make any progress otherwise in a never ending restart loop. TLDR: It's a game like CDDA, but you have to turn permadeath off to get anywhere and will accomplish nothing, ever. Will I keep playing it? Of coarse, especially when it is fully released, my morbid curiosity tells me to see the rest of this travesty with the hopes my review may change. I aint holding my breath though and neither should you. Does this mean I will stop playing it until it is released? No, it has it's charms but trust me if you buy it make damned sure you know what you are getting yourself into. Edit: I dont wanna come off as an a hole myself so let me say this much. It's a labor of love for sure, but one for sadists. It's a game I want to love, but the game does it's best to make me hate. I know im not alone in this. Hopefully it gets better on release and all the efforts I put into learning this game becomes worth it but as I said, in it's current state you will never feel accomplished or rewarded for your efforts, just constant anxiety off the back foot of ever increasing difficulty all topped with a tinge of too much realism at the cost of fun. Do I enjoy patching up my characters realistically? Of coarse! But I also enjoy turning my CDDA characters into nigh unstoppable cyborgs by the end of a long arduous journey to get the character there. Stone Shard is all the realism of it's niche genre, with none of the bad ass pay off. But pretends it has that pay off in it's promotionals.

Usually I dont write reviews for early access games, but this is worth an exception. The pixel art is just amazingly done! Stone Shard has that tabletop feeling, the same feel when you are playing D&D with a very competent but harsh dungeon master.

I really enjoy this game, it has a lot of old school touches. And is a lot of fun to play.
The things I would like to see some changes in is
1. Paid respecs
2. Controller support
3. An evil faction, the ability to have a dark play though.
All that poorly said, I think the game is well worth the price

I really enjoy it. It's not going to be a game you play forever, there's only so much content. The game is punishing, especially early on, and you die a lot - sometimes in really frustrating circumstances. But that's the nature of the game. It isn't for everyone, but I appreciate that it's not trying to be for everyone.

Some people might get frustrated by the length of time between updates as they add new content, but it is still being actively worked on and the updates are usually fairly substantial.

For the price, probably worth it, if you're unsure - wait for a sale.

Really enjoyable single player game with a lot of replayability through different combat styles and quests with different outcomes, especially now with rags to riches! Love it ^_^