DESOLATE Review Summary

Immersive world and story with solid co-op, but janky combat, bugs, and an abandoned feeling mar the experience.

Interesting world and atmosphere: The game's world is described as interesting, strange, and well-realized with good visuals, atmosphere, and lighting. Players enjoy exploration and the apocalyptic setting inspired by Stalker.

High potential and content: Many reviews mention the game has great potential and many creative elements. Despite some issues, the overall content is considered quite good.

Great Russian voice acting: Players highlight official Russian voice acting as a strong positive, mentioning specific known actors like Boris Repetur. This adds immersion to the story.

Cooperative multiplayer works well: Players appreciate working 4-player online co-op without issues, with fine-tuning of co-op difficulty and the fun of not suffering alone.

World exploration and town repair: Exploring the medium-sized big world and collecting/repairing old towns is enjoyable, with leisurely exploration supported by a large open map.

Combat is janky and unpolished: Players report that combat mechanics feel sluggish, slow, and unpolished, with melee attacks lacking impact and often missing.

Confusing story: The story is confusing and difficult to follow, leading many players to skip it or find it nonsensical.

Game feels abandoned: Multiple players perceive the game as abandoned by the developer, with no ongoing support or updates, contributing to an overall empty feeling.

General jankiness and bugs: The game is widely described as janky and buggy, with glitchy hitboxes and various technical issues affecting gameplay.

Voice acting is cringe: Voice acting, particularly the protagonist's lines, is described as cringeworthy, amateurish, and barely passable.

Open world survival crafting: Players describe the game as an open world survival crafting game, similar to Fallout or STALKER but stripped down. The core loop involves collecting, crafting, and surviving in a hostile environment.

Exploration and anomaly encounters: Exploration is key, with players encountering multiple monsters, zombies, mutated animals, and anomalies. The open world is filled with interactive elements and environmental hazards.

Cooperative multiplayer support: The game features four-player online cooperative play, with some noting it as optional co-op. It enhances the survival horror experience on an island with anomalies.

Melee combat and ammo scarcity: Due to ammo scarcity, combat heavily relies on melee strikes and blocking. Enemies are tough, and weapons include pipes, melee tools, and some firearms.

Diverse quest types: Quests involve gathering, crafting, hunting, and faction missions. However, some missions require about 5 real minutes of travel between them, and fetch quests are common.

Poor performance optimization: Players report severe optimization problems with low FPS, lag, and visual quality degradation even on high-end hardware like RTX 5060.

Serious crashes and stability: The game crashes frequently, including UE4 errors, crashes within 15 minutes, and co-op disconnections, indicating critical stability issues.

Memory and resource leaks: High RAM consumption and memory leaks cause the game to become unplayable over time, leading to crashes or slowdowns.

Collision and geometry bugs: Players can get stuck in textures, which disrupts gameplay and immersion, especially in combat or exploration.

Strongly not recommended overall: The majority of feedback advises against purchasing the game, using phrases like 'do not recommend' and 'do not buy'. This is the most frequent and consistent message across multiple clusters.

Not worth time or money: Multiple users state the game is 'not worth your time' and that every hour feels wasted, emphasizing a lack of value.

Avoid even on sale: Several reviews specifically warn against buying the game even at a reduced price, indicating the game is not considered worth any investment.

Game not mature yet: Several reviews state the game is not ready for purchase in its current state, advising caution or waiting.

Game is fundamentally flawed: Some reviews describe the game as 'fundamentally flawed on every level' and state that fighting is pointless, suggesting deep systemic issues.

Community fair range: $3.00 - $10.00.

Game completion: 90.0h.

Story completion: 20.0h.

Session length: 4.0h.

Desolate starts with significant friction from inventory limits, boring quests, and poor combat, but becomes fun after leveling up, acquiring better equipment, or playing cooperatively with friends.

Friction: strict 60kg inventory weight cap forces constant backtracking; fetch quests are repetitive and tedious; clunky combat with poor hit detection; lack of tutorial explanation for core mechanics; early equipment feels weak and frustrating.

Unlock drivers: leveling up improves combat and gear; earning a room at Oasis Camp reduces inventory hassle; co-op play makes exploration and combat more manageable; crafting provides meaningful progression and healing items.

Co-operative Survivalist: Team-based exploration, cooperative stealth and combat, sharing resources and covering each other in dangerous areas. Motivation: Shared cooperative survival experience with friends. Stance: sale.

Atmosphere-First Explorer: Slow, cautious exploration, avoiding unnecessary combat, focusing on lore, environmental storytelling, and stealth. Motivation: Immersion in a unique, atmospheric post-apocalyptic world. Stance: buy.

Euro-Jank Connoisseur: Patient playthrough, tolerating bugs and jank, seeking out all content, and enjoying the quirky design. Motivation: Appreciation for ambitious, unpolished games with unique charm. Stance: deep sale.

Steam Deck: The game is generally playable on Steam Deck with no need for proton tweaks or launcher workarounds, but suffers from occasional frame drops, crashes related to early access, and minor visual artifacts like lighting issues and glare. Most users still recommend it, but the technical shortcomings prevent a seamless rating.

Linux and Proton: Based on a single user review, the game runs well on Steam Deck (Linux/Proton) with only a minor lighting glare when turning. No launch issues, crashes, or required tweaks were reported. The user rates it as effectively verified despite the store label of 'unsupported'.