Weedcraft Inc

Overall Score: 7.6 / 10

[table]
[tr][td][/td][td][/td][td][/td][/tr]
[tr][th]　
Quality[/th][th]　
8.3/10[/th][th]　
　 　 Quality indie title; minor flaws
　[/th][/tr]
[tr][td][/td][td][/td][td][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Performance[/td][td] 9/10[/td][td]Runs smoothly; occasional autosave lags[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Utility[/td][td] 8/10[/td][td]Minor glitches; no major bugs or crashes
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Controls[/td][td] 8/10[/td][td]Simple point & click; mandatory manual
execution of some dull, mundane tasks[/td][/tr]
[tr][td][/td] [td][/td][td][/td][/tr][tr][th]　
Gameplay[/th][th]　
7.8/10[/th][th]　
　 　 　 Casual management game
　[/th][/tr]
[tr][td][/td][td][/td][td][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Challenge[/td][td] 8/10[/td][td]Decent challenge, but overall rather easy;
no difficulty settings or challenge modes;
update adds noticably harder campaign[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Content[/td][td] 7/10[/td][td]About 30 h in a laid-back / completionist
playstyle (~15 h rushed); no replay value;
free content update adds a third scenario;
another free update adds sandbox mode
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Diversity[/td][td] 7/10[/td][td]A diverse mix of management tasks and
frequent unlocks keep things interesting,
despite its recurring, repetitive elements[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Immersion[/td][td] 9/10[/td][td]Being neither shallow nor very complex
plus the constant need to micromanage
make for an immersive, addictive combo
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td][/td] [td][/td][td][/td][/tr][tr][th]　
Design[/th][th]　
6.8/10[/th][th]　
　　Solid, yet much unused potential
　[/th][/tr]
[tr][td][/td] [td][/td][td][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Visuals[/td][td] 7/10[/td][td]Straight comic style; few animations and
many reused models; absurd plant colors[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Sound[/td][td] 7/10[/td][td]Good SFX; no voiceovers; well matching
Gramatik-like, instrumental hip hop BGM
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Texts[/td][td]7/10[/td][td]New characters for each story scenario;
mediocre story; repetitive dialogues with
side characters lose their charm quickly[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Mapping[/td][td] 5/10[/td][td]Several small 2D city maps, which only
offer more of the same though; just very
small grow rooms in hobby grower size[/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Interface[/td][td] 8/10[/td][td]Well designed interface & menus; minor
flaws; lack of UI customization options
[/td][/tr]
[/table]


　🛠️　Teething problems are gone since the first patches.

　⚠️　Rating slightly increased after the last big updates.



Update(s):


　🌱　Free DLC adds a 3rd story scenario!　


　 　 - fresh setting, characters & dialogues

　 　 - harder scenario for advanced players

　 　 - about 10 hours of additional content



　🎄　Second free DLC adds sandbox mode!　


　 　 - different scenarios and difficulty settings

　 　 - new achievements tied to sandbox mode



Tested with:

Fast, Simple, Good, Beautiful, Fantastic
1080p @ 60 fps (dual monitor, cloned)

OS: Windows 10 Professional, 64-Bit
i7-7700K, 4 x 4.2 GHz; 16 GB DDR4
GTX 1080 (8GB GDDR5X); 840 EVO


If you found this review helpful, feel free to check out my...

⭐ Curator page | 👪 Steam group | 👾 Discord

I have finished both scenarios in the game which is the current end of the game to make sure my review was complete and informed.

The Good:
Automating a city to be profitable is satisfying
The art style and general look of the game is pretty well polished
Learning and figuring out optimal grow room setups is somewhat interesting, if a little too easy
Making new strains is neato, and very satisfying when you make your first super strain

The Bad:
I personally didn't like the music and muted it.
Everything about the relationship system will give you PTSD flashbacks to Elder Scrolls Oblivion. You will solve it very quickly, and learn to skip through dialogue choices at light speed for the sake of maintaining relationships where they matter.
For growing employees, it is pretty much a complete waste of time to hire bad growers in the early game. You will find that the best way to make money super early is to sit in the grow room and play the awful water/cutting minigame while a low salary employee sells your stuff.
In the same vein of issues, playing the garbage relationship system will allow you to bring cops to your side. This will REQUIRE you to maintain these relationships with every single cop if you want to pursue this route, early on it is extremely profitable to not have to worry about cops.
The trimming action is a timed mini game, which can be messed up by pop-up dialog events, although it has little effect on the plants themselves, its very annoying to fail the mini-game for reasons out of your control.

The REALLY Bad:
The game has HUGE technical issues and seriously needs a second or third round of QA testing.
You will experience hard crashes, stuttering lag, and for whatever reason a loading screen every time you want to play a mini-game that barely qualifies to be a flash game on its own.
Yes the technical issues are that bad, if nothing else convinces you not to buy this game, the awful random lag spikes and crashes alone are reason enough to never touch this.
My game was using 35% of a i7 CPU and 9GB of RAM after having it open for a few hours, I have no doubt that lower end computers will simply be murdered by this game.
When you start expanding to multiple cities, you will begin to play at max speed more often. This will result in a UNENDING ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ OF NOTIFICATIONS from other cities that will NEVER stop. You can try to clear them all one by one (waste of time), but you will eventually give up and accept you've lost the left section of your screen.
Speaking of playing at max speed, you might find yourself at many points that can be solved simply by being AFK, especially if you've maxed out all the city buildings with upgrades. Very riveting.
IF you decide to fight the notifications and close them, you'll first realize that clicking the X doesn't do anything! But you have to actually hover over the notification log, and X of them there to get rid of them.
But wait theres more, THAT box will then slowly fade out, and as you move your mouse down to kill all the other ones, they will then all move up to fill in the empty space, making it VERY difficult to close more than 2-3 notifications at a time. Again, you will most definitely give up on fighting notifications and simply accept they are happening.

Summary:
There is a passable flash game in here somewhere, but it is not even close to worth the $17 I paid. In fact, if everything was in 2D maybe the game wouldn't need such insane resources just to run for any real period of time.
Oh and maybe hire some new QA? Seriously did no one hit these issues, how does that even make it to release?

The first time I played this, I spent a few hours in game and felt it lacked depth. I thought it was similar to a mobile game and that it felt repetitive. I forgot about it and it sat in my library, unused, for nearly a year.

My curiosity caused me to pick it back up a week ago, and I am HOOKED. I had no idea there was so much more to it. The default storyline only shows you so much, and it does it slowly. Once you delve into advanced features, like strain manipulation, you start to see the intricacies of the game.

If you find yourself yawning over anything, immediately quit the storyline you are playing and check out a custom set-up. You'll find yourself overwhelmed with possibility and choice.