Among Trees is an open world survival craft game that launched in 2021. With it’s beautiful art style and calming, atmospheric vibes the game could easily be a cozy adventure to bundle up with on days when you need to unwind. However, underneath the pretty wrapper of the game hass a hollow underbelly that could unfortunately leave a bitter taste in some gamer’s mouths. To decide if the game is worth it for you, let’s talk about Among Trees. HISTORY The story of Among Trees starts back in June of 2020 when it was launched as an early access game on steam. During this time there was a lot of hope for the game among the people playing it, in fact it looked to have a wonderful future. The potential for the game was bright as it hosted a beautiful art style, a chill experience, and devs that promised over 6 months worth of updates before the official release. This was, unfortunately, not the future that the game would hold up to. After a year and a half in early access on the Epic Story, Among Trees launched with very little updates to the disappointment of those hoping for its success. Since the launch in 2021, the devs have made no statements about continuing its development. In fact they haven’t made any comments at all, leading the community to deem it abandoned in a half completed state. Which can, sadly, be felt when playing the game. I am of the opinion that developers do not need to update their games after release. Shipping a finished product on launch day and moving onto other things isn’t inherently bad. That’s why I don’t blame the devs for not updating Among Trees after its official launch. However, that method has two parts. The most important being a Finished Product. Which Among Trees doesn’t seem like. It appears to be more like a chip bag half filled with air, the potential and lure is there but it doesn’t leave you fully satisfied and some will probably leave with a rather bitter taste in their mouth from these unfulfilled promises. To really understand we do need to talk about the game itself though, and not its history. GAMEPLAY I am a sucker for beautifully aesthetic games and Among Trees definitely filled that itch. Plus I love a good survival game. The artstyle and cozy feelings of it ushered me back into the warm feelings that valheim and games like Lost Ember gave me when playing through them. It offered a cute house that, while I couldn’t build it myself, did allow for upgrades like a workshop, kitchen, greenhouse and brewery. It game me chances to take several screenshots that were all gorgeous and it was a chance to try something new. The gameplay overall consists of mostly foraging and exploring the world in order to get these upgrades done and sustain yourself through food and water. That, however, is pretty much the only thing that the game offers. I played about three hours of the game, upgraded things and explored a little. By the time I had unlocked my workshop, attic, and greenhouse I found that I had lost interest in the game with no interest in going back out for more things to do the brewery. By this time I found that after the beautiful artstyle had been admired that the game felt empty overall since I wasn’t interested in hunting for the steam achievements. One of which was playing for 50 in-game days. Since I’d barely made it to 15 and my interest was already waning, this seemed grueling and unfun. By the time the lure of the beautiful sights wore off on me, the game became mostly a walking simulator between the several drop sites around the map and other places to forage or mine. Which was a very slow, tedious process once the “oh wow how beautiful” feeling wears off. I didn’t run into any bugs, the game played very smoothly in fact. However, the smooth gameplay didn’t make up for the lack of things to do and something to keep me coming back. After the three hours of playtime, I promptly uninstalled the game because I sadly didn’t see myself going back to it ever again. WRAP UP After I had finished playing, I did a bit of searching through the community for Among Trees. Mostly to look into the background and see if my feeling of the game being half-empty was shared with others. Unfortunately, this does seem to be a shared opinion. There were even some that asked about mods that could potentially flesh out the game that the devs had left half finished. What I found out was that the underbelly of the game was done in a way that left a lot of spaghetti coding, which is hard for people to mod into. This means that Among Trees is simply what it is with no additions available to it that would, in my opinion, make it more worth the 15$ price tag. Now, this isn’t to say that I think that games need to be complex or long or anything like that. I have a review out on a game called Lost Ember. It is an extremely simple game that follows a story, the mechanics are run and change into other animals. It is for all intents and purposes a very simple game that I would highly recommend. The difference in them is that while Lost Ember feels and is a completed game, Among Trees just simply is not and it can be felt. I like to view games at the very minimum asking: did I get at least one hour for every dollar spent on this game? At roughly three hours of actual gaming, 3 afk on the home screen, and the price tag being fifteen. I can’t say it’s worth the money. Would I maybe pick it up on sale if I were given the chance again? Probably and I’d definitely say if you don’t mind the half-finished state then it may be a very pleasant game for you to try. However, I wouldn’t pick it up at the full price. Its definitely not worth it at 15$.