Icarus, my new problem child: changeable frame rates and unfinished details salt away a survival soup that should actually taste good to many players thanks to many great ingredients. And I personally like it very much! After about four hours of play, one of which I spent grumbling and looking for the right settings, I’m starving for Icarus.
I find it all the more annoying that the developers of Rocketwerkz didn’t simply go the Early Access route. Valheim, for example, showed that this warning sign doesn’t scare off long-suffering survival fans when there’s a great game behind it. And in an impressive way!
I’ll explain here why you should by no means cross Icarus off your inner list if, like me, you love the survival genre. But I’ll also explain why I still don’t recommend buying it.
Why I like Icarus
The new survival game does a lot of things right: starting with the concept, which says goodbye to PvP and huge open worlds, but instead offers mission-based single player or co-op modes and delivers a large, but not oversized game world with 64 square kilometres.
And how it looks! The treetops sway naturally in the wind, fish frolic in crystal-clear rivers, the storm dangerous on the terraforming planet Icarus whips atmospheric rain at me, forcing me to seek shelter in my self-built base. The game sounds just as good: rushing water, howling wolves, the sharp clang when my pickaxe hits bare stone. Atmospherically, Icarus picks me up immediately!
And when it comes to gameplay, the pluses continue: instead of hanging around in one world for ages and three days, I have to complete missions that can take hours, days or weeks. I’m supposed to scan a few places using portable radar, but of course I have to secure the basics of survival first. So in each new mission I collect resources, cut down trees and hunt defenceless rabbits for fur and meat so that I can eat and build a bed as a spawn point. Later it gets a lot harder, but that’s the magic of Icarus.
And what’s the fun in starting from scratch again and again, like in survival?
Quite simple: by not starting from scratch! Because by completing missions, I earn in-game currency for high-tech gear and hunt for exotics along the way, which make me faster, better and more dangerous. I can then keep these weapons, tools or protective clothing and take them with me on any future mission. A small Roguelite element: I’m constantly getting better, which is enormously motivating from the very first moment. In addition, the basics are easy to learn after only three hours of play, also because Icarus noticeably reduces the grind.
I cut down two trees and pluck a few bushes, and I already have enough stuff for a makeshift shelter. This feels just wonderful after gind orgies like Ark and Rust, and is reminiscent of the gigantically successful Valheim.
The difficulty, on the other hand, comes from the later missions with really dangerous weather, nasty diseases and extraordinary enemies, respectively the four bosses we are working towards (Valheim, now really: Is that you?).
If you’re wondering who this Valheim is that I’ve been talking everyone’s ear off about without being asked, check out the Early Access test:
Finally, I found a cause: shortly after release, when player ratings on Steam were already mixed, Rocketwerkz added a warning to the DirectX 12 option. And indeed, on DirectX 11 Icarus ran better, but also far from optimal. Changing FPS between a good 90 and a jerky 20 for no apparent reason are still the order of the day.
At night, the frame rate sometimes drops to around 30, although you can hardly see anything in the pitch-black surroundings! If I accidentally set the whole forest on fire with my torch (which looks really impressive), my PC groans heartbreakingly.
Other players report even more problems: As can be read on Steam, some users can’t connect to Icarus at all or the game crashes frequently. Still others can’t understand the criticism at all and play without any problems, which indicates a lack of optimisation of different hardware setups.
Icarus could be so much better
Warm words at Christmas time make hearts beat faster. And fresh packages of patches even more so! Developer Dean Hall and his studio Rocketwerkz apparently don’t want to let the flawed release stand like that.
And although Icarus was released on a Friday, four hotfixes were released between Friday and Tuesday, addressing the most serious problems. First and foremost, stability improvements and bug fixes.
In a statement on (Steam) Dean Hall personally addressed the players and explained in open words that he was also unhappy about the launch. He apologised and promised a special effort: After the three patches over the weekend, a small update will be released every day until next Friday to address the critical problems. First and foremost, players who can play poorly or not at all are to be treated. And indeed: up to and including Wednesday, a quite considerable patch was released every day.
As the Mandalorian would put it: This is the way! The developers can only earn back lost trust by openly dealing with the mistakes and conscientiously making amends for them. Perhaps in a few weeks or months I will be able to recommend the game to friends without hesitation.
But let me be clear: Dean Hall no longer gets the benefit of the doubt from me. After he left the development of DayZ shortly after the Early Access release to do his own thing, I’d like to see him deliver on the promises he made. But I also think everyone deserves a second chance.
And good cooks know that with a little effort, a salty soup can still be salvaged.
