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A mobile game with base building, farming, exploration, and combat | First Impressions - Dream Land

3K View2023-03-22

A spaceship has crash landed on an unknown planet. A group of survivors emerges from the wreckage. There is no way to repair the ship, leaving no choice but to salvage it for parts and set up a makeshift base.

Dream Land is a casual simulation game that deals with four major gameplay elements. Base building, Resource Farming, Exploration, and Combat. All of these four aspects are all done by your team of survivors who in turn have basic necessities that you need to manage like sleep, food, and hygiene, highly reminiscent of popular games like The Sims and Rimworld.

Dream Land features a base building element that is anchored by the main structure: Base Management Center, a “Town Hall” of sorts that determines the settlement's base level. Upgrading it will result in more benefits and unlock more construction opportunities for buildings. Players can build walls, doorways, flooring, and many different objects such as workbenches, beds, and other furniture. There is always an attainable upgrade just around the corner, which makes it very enticing for players to keep coming back for more.

Of course, in order to build structures and upgrade them, players will need resources. This is where the resource gathering comes in. Players can issue commands to the team to take down trees for wood, mine for ores, and pick out fruits and plants. Players are also required to take part in farming or hunting to provide food for the settlement.

Exploration for Dream Land comes in two flavors. Exploration around the settlement, where players can hunt, battle marauders, look for resources, and farm. While there is also the “World” exploration that allows players to travel beyond their settlement in an overworld that reminds me of Civilization’s hex tiles and participate in various activities such as enemy raids, looting, and defending important assets in a tower wave defense format.

The combat, while automated, is nicely presented with potent sound effects and satisfying enemy kills. The combat boils down to the team’s stats, level, and gear, versus the enemies’.

Despite the casual look, the whole game is fully simulated, with each of the player’s commands requiring a survivor to physically execute, running around the settlement every so often. Crafting using the workbench, gathering wood, or building structures will occupy a survivor’s time. Even as simple as moving furniture is done by the survivor. The queuing system works really well and players won’t have to worry about any pathing or queueing issues that may arise from constantly issuing back and forth random commands for the survivors to do.

In summary, my initial experience with Dream Land has exceeded my expectations. I’ve found it to be a fun base building and simulation game, with interesting exploration elements and an enticing progression system enough to keep players coming back to their settlements for upgrades.

Full Review will be posted soon here on Taptap! Stay tuned!

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