Icarus: Great Hunts Campaigns Review Summary

Fun new missions and valuable legendary weapons plus great tools, but this DLC needs other paid add-ons, floods you with Quarrite, and runs poorly.

New missions are fun: New missions are generally well-received, described as good, interesting, and challenging. They are varied, well-designed, and engaging with unlockables and modifiers.

Legendary weapons are valuable: New legendary weapons feel valuable, satisfying, and add flavor to the game. They provide meaningful choices and are fun to use.

Great new tools and weapons: The DLC introduces cool new tools and weapons, such as the mining armature, bio lab weapons, and the anti-materiel rifle. These additions are highly appreciated and enhance gameplay.

DLC is highly praised: Many players express overwhelming satisfaction with the DLC, calling it awesome, worth the cost, and a great addition. It is frequently described as interesting and difficult in a good way.

Campaigns add replayability: Great Hunts campaigns add entire storylines to each map with choices and consequences, breathing new life into old regions. They make old saves enjoyable again and add hours of new experiences.

DLC requires other paid DLC: Many players report that the DLC requires purchasing additional expansions to access all content, such as weapons, bosses, and missions. This creates a paywall that feels like a bait-and-switch and forces multiple purchases.

Quarrite spawning overwhelms players: Quarrites spawn densely and are highly aggressive, making the game unplayable in affected areas. They have sniper-like detection, are heavily armored, and cannot be disabled, ruining the experience for many.

DLC overpriced poor value: Many reviewers feel the DLC is overpriced for the amount and quality of content provided. The weapons and items are often seen as underwhelming and not worth the cost.

Poor optimization and performance: The game suffers from poor optimization, including low FPS, stuttering, and performance degradation, especially in multiplayer and boss fights. This issue persists despite updates.

Bosses unbalanced and buggy: Bosses are often too strong, have buggy mechanics like regenerating health, teleporting, or becoming immortal, and cause crashes or lag. Some bosses are impossible to complete due to bugs.

DLC adds three new bosses: Each new map (Olympus, Styx, Prometheus) gets a unique boss tied to the campaign. Defeating these bosses unlocks legendary weapons and new crafting recipes.

Legendary weapons and tools: New legendary weapons, attachments, and tools are added, many locked behind boss fights or mission completion. These items provide powerful upgrades but may have restricted customization.

New tech tree and crafting: The DLC adds new items to the technology tree, including weapons, armor, and accessories. Some recipes require boss drops or legendary biomass to craft.

Boss fights have mechanics: Bosses feature multiple stages, unique abilities, and debuffs that require preparation and skill. Examples include movement speed debuffs and splitting into smaller forms.

Great Hunts campaign structure: The DLC introduces campaign missions across existing maps, each ending with a legendary boss. Missions are replayable and can be tackled solo or in groups.

Boss fights cause lag: Performance drops significantly during boss fights, including framerate drops to 5 FPS in caves and lag when many Hammerhead slug boss copies are present. Boss encounters are a common source of poor performance.

Performance degrades with progression: World performance degrades hard as players progress through great hunt missions, and low frame rates occur at the end of campaigns. The host also loses 10-15 FPS per participant until the game becomes unplayable.

Stuttering and FPS problems: Players experience stuttering through biomes and frequent FPS problems. The game still needs performance optimization, and it runs worse than some AAA titles after five years of development.

Quarrites lag and teleport: Quarrites lag and teleport around even with a 25ms ping, indicating network or optimization issues. This behavior disrupts gameplay despite low latency.

Not recommended to buy: Multiple reviewers strongly advise against purchasing the DLC, calling it a waste of money and not worth the price. The negative sentiment spans both the expansion and the base game.

Recommended for Icarus fans: Several players recommend the expansion for those who already enjoy Icarus, calling it a must-have or solid content. It is seen as a good addition for dedicated fans.

Supporting free updates: A few players purchased the DLC purely to support the developers and the free weekly updates. They view it as a way to show appreciation for ongoing support.

Buy on sale only: Reviewers advise waiting for a discount, stating it is not worth full price but may be worth it on sale. The value proposition is questioned at the current price.

Best as final DLC: Some suggest buying this expansion last among all DLCs to get the most out of it, or only if you own all other major content. It is considered an optional addition.

Community fair range: $20.00 - $30.00.

Reports show persistent friction and no clear turning point: one player calls the experience overall fun but tedious, while others describe a boring mandatory kill loop and severe performance/progression bugs.

Friction: Frequent mandatory kills required just to do anything; Story can feel tedious; Performance worse than some AAA games; Bugs that delete all progression.

Dedicated Franchise DLC Supporter: Buys DLC on discount, keeps up with weekly updates, and plays multiplayer where only the host needs the expansion. Motivation: Supporting ongoing development and sharing DLC missions with co-op friends. Stance: sale.

Veteran Solo Completionist: Plays solo, saves before branching content, plans DLC order, and seeks additional challenge. Motivation: Completing all campaigns and proving mastery through solo and challenge runs. Stance: buy.

Loot-Chasing Progression Grinder: Grinds missions for legendary weapons and tier upgrades, experiments with attachments and builds, and tolerates repeated grind for new content. Motivation: Chasing legendary gear and tier progression in a content-rich but grind-heavy expansion. Stance: sale.

Monetization: The reviews describe a paid DLC/expansion with layered dependency on other paid DLCs and some price/value complaints. However, there is no direct evidence of real-money microtransactions, premium currency purchases, loot boxes, gacha, battle passes, or a pay-to-win cash shop. Positive reviews also state the DLC is optional, not pay-to-win, and that free updates and earnable in-game currencies are present. Applying the override rules for traditional DLC and absent MTX evidence, the score is capped at 20.

Frequent Free Updates and DLC: The developers, RocketWerkz, are praised for releasing free updates weekly since the core game's release, alongside regular paid DLC. This ongoing support is viewed positively by many reviewers.

Overpriced and Costly Totals: Reviewers frequently mention that the DLC is overpriced, and that the total cost to access all bosses reaches around $110. This pricing model is seen as steep, especially when content is gated behind multiple paid expansions.

Content Integrated Across All Maps: The Great Hunts adds content to existing base game maps and will also apply to future regions. This integration breathes new life into older areas and ensures ongoing relevance.

Map-Specific Campaign Access Requirements: Accessing each campaign requires owning the corresponding map DLC, such as Styx or Prometheus. Without these, only Olympus missions are available, limiting the full experience.

DLCs Sold as Separate Missions: The content is structured as multiple DLCs that add many missions, and the Great Hunts is part of this model. Some see it as a way to sell more DLC.