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[debvon]

Hmm.. I fail to see how this can be compared with Terraria.

[Canisaur]

I suppose it's more of an alien-planet-exploration sidescroller.  Updated the topic.

[Lexx]

Looks like it has potential with the non blocky terrain system they are showing off on their forums. If this will let me build a sci fi survival compound on the planet and work from there I will be happy. Pre ordered and going to see how the beta on the 10th goes.

[Sergius]

Well it says there "sandbox".

Anyway, I hope it's NOT like Terraria, which basically made you just put back the blocks that you mined, like dirt or rock, or new ones. I don't think I care for another one of those, I hope that the building involves more man-made structures (like that zip-line elevator thing, was it built or part of a "campaign"?)

[Sergius]

So, I got in my email a link to download the "early beta".

Holy crap 553 MB. Well, I guess we'll see.

[Canisaur]

The beta was (finally) released on Friday, and I spent some time playing it over the weekend.  It is (as expected) barely playable, but it has promise.

I'm still not really sure where they're going with the game though, gameplay-wise.  They have plenty of time to work that out, but right now all you can do is wander around, hack at jellyfish, shovel dirt, and craft a few things.

[Canisaur]

I'm raising the withered skeleton of this thread to tell you all that it's now on Steam!  And beta backers got their Steam keys today!

...and they still don't have multiplayer. 

Anyway, why are you reading this?  Go play Starbound.

[Gabeux]

Since no one posted any kind of review about this, I'll copy-paste my own.
I have no idea why I got this game, since I had never heard about it (actually, I know. I played the hell out of Starbound beta before the balance patch and wanted something similar, but finished).

Jumping to the last section of the text is enough for most people.
My greatest disappointed on it is that I ONLY expected that it had survival on it (based on description) and there is none.
There it goes:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

My opinion about this game is very ambiguous when it comes to the part where I must say if it's worth buying or not.
Hopefully it will shed light on people that haven't bought yet and are looking for an unbiased review.

[ Overview ] :
This game is a cross of Under the Ocean and Terraria.
It's graphical style is very cool, with nice looking objects, equipment, armor, bases and world.
Also, a non-blocky-pixel-sandbox is a great change.
You're dropped in a planet that is very dark and the days are very short. The darker it is, the more frequent are monster spawns and some can even get tougher if you fight them in the dark (no worries on that, though, since your armors have lights - once you get some energy storage equipment).
Note: I have no idea why a human ship is orbiting such planet and no idea why you crash land in a pod there.
You discover the backstory through datalogs you find during exploration.

[ Positive Points ] :
- Tutorial gets you through the basics, enough to move ahead.
- Non-blocky-sandbox.
- 3D characters on nice 2D environments.
- Tech-tree and rich crafting system comprised of resources and components. Your tools, equipment and armors aren't made only of metal ingots - sometimes you need to make secondary components like rubber and silicon, or more complex ones like a dynamo or motor. It is a fresh and interesting crafting and discovery scheme with great potential.
- Diverse lamps, technology, power and wiring makes base building look cool and planning ahead is necessary.
- Digging/mining spread of 3 blocks or 1 block, toggleable.
- When crafting or researching, the craft/research system takes resources from inside storage containers, like barrels and closets, so you don't have an inventory full of resources everytime you want to do something - you just have to be near your storage.
- Some itens takes time to crafting or research, which feels better than "instant crafting" in this case.
- Elevators, hover-platforms, switches, rifles..technology - nice features.

[ Negative points ] :
- ANOTHER game that puts "Survival" in it's description and features no survival at all. If "surviving" aggressive mobs is "survival", so all the games that feature aggresive AI is a survival game? There's no need for food, water or sleep, which made me wonder what's the fun in "surviving" an alien planet in this situation.
- Technical-wise, the game feels like a beta. It seems that every technical detail was made to annoy the player. If you keep autosave on, it will interrupt your game abruptly and prints a big "SAVING YOUR GAME" title every time it autosaves, it's terrible. Graphics can't be tuned at all (except toggling 5 or 6 options). This makes playing on older machines really hard or even impossible. Also, turning off dynamic shadows breaks the (bad) lighting system. Last but not least, the game can crash everytime you try to exit it - in my case, forcing me to CTRL-ALT-DEL my way out.
- Lighting system is weird (radius/spread/emanation) and annoying for a game that tries to be beautiful. It also doesn't look realistic - underground, you have to put way too many torches because of it.
- Performance can be bad for no reason in many situations, leaving me to believe the game isn't optimized at all.
- Movement system is annoying. Even if you tap a button, your character starts running, which looks bad and can give you many fall deaths (combine this with poor performance and autosave, guaranteed deaths).
- The music, initially "Okay", gets repetitive and annoying really quick, and the sound-effects sometimes are awkward or way too loud compared to other effects.
- Backgrounds look very ugly and out of place. Also, you can break very deep cave walls, and the background is usually a plain blue color that may or may not emanate light.
- Resource gathering and base-building takes a long time compared to other games.
- Research system feels weird: you waste the same resources to research a new item that you would use to craft it (also investing research points). It feels like a relabeled leveling system for crafting.

[ Summary ]:
Based on the points above, the game feels unfinished and lacking heart, which makes it, currently, a skippable title.
It would show potential if it was a beta, but it seems the developers think it's safe to say it's an 1.0.
For 10$, I can stay positive in the recommendation, since it seems that more content will be added and more work will be done. But if the devs leave it in it's current state, there's no point in buying it - go for Starbound instead.

It's been a while and I'm still playing the game to figure out what's it about.
Hopefully it's creators won't let it down.

[Gabeux]

Alright, since I make it kind of a secret hobby to play barely known games so I can train the critic/review side of me that has no idea what's it doing, I'd like to update my opinion about this game, even though I don't think any B12er will really care about it, now that Starbound has reached us.

Will post the updated sections of my ""review"" below, but to save your time..don't waste your money in this game.
It's unfinished, buggy, has broken features and a broken storyline (which is unfinished too, apparently) - pretty much everything except basic stuff is broken. And it's 1.2, no Beta or Early Access warnings.
I SERIOUSLY have to stop insta-buying things just because they have keywords I like in their description (survival, scifi, sandbox)  .

Spoiler: Updated ""review"" sections (click to show/hide)

- UPDATED! I no longer recommend this game, don't waste your money on it's current state!
Updated Introduction and Summary sections! -

[ Introduction ]
My opinion about this game WAS very ambiguous: I couldn't say if it was worth buying or not. Now that I sinked in more hours to discover what the game's about, I must label it as DO NOT BUY.
The current major version of the game is 1.2 and there's too many bugs (including game breaking bugs), story progression is broken, and there are many unfinished features.

Hopefully the review below will shed light on people that haven't bought yet and are looking for an unbiased review (I'm not an early supporter nor an early hater).

[ Summary ]:
Based on the points above, the game feels unfinished and lacking heart, which makes it, currently, a DO NOT BUY title. Plus, the devs had the boldness to launch it with no "Early Access" label.
It would show potential if it was a beta, but it seems the developers think it's safe to say it's an 1.0 (1.2 actually).
Even for 10$, it's not worth getting in this: no one should launch an unfinished, buggy and broken game with no warning about it.
If the devs leave it in it's current state, this will just be forgotten.
For your current sandbox needs, go for Starbound instead - even in BETA it's more finished, polished and stable.

I've ditched many hours and still haven't found what the game is about.
Don't waste your time

[Mephisto]

And it's 1.2, no Beta or Early Access warnings.

A misconception that I see basically everywhere is that version 1 means the software is done.. Software leaves alpha/beta when the developers say it does, not when the version numbers reach some arbitrarily large value. The numbers themselves are also completely arbitrary. +1 release does not mean +0.1 to the version number.

The software I work on at work left beta at 143.24 or something like that. 143 is the number of months that the company has been in existence. 24 is the week of the year for the current release.

For a more high profile take on it, look at Mojang. Minecraft has went through three different 1.0 releases.

[Gabeux]

I agree, I work with software development too, so I know that version numbers isn't much of a deal and everyone does it differently.
What I meant is about the state of completion the game describes itself in (1.0 is the 'full' release version, I believe), when it's unfinished and feels like a beta.
Yet, they say it's already out of beta.

They also say in the game's description that it will be expanded like "the others in it's genre", which further leads to believe that they have a finished game on their hand and they will now expand content, which is big lie.

I seriously don't understand what would be the motivation to launch broken and unfinished software with no notice, if anyone ever pays attention to these guys, it'll be very bad for their reputation. Like the Space Engineer guys: only if the whole B12 positively reviews their games, I'd consider paying for it, after what they did (Miner Wars and all that).

I'm not mad, I'm just..very confused I guess.