The Tomorrow Children is endowed with a very particular aesthetic - strange at times, but with an identity of its own. There is a certain satisfaction in building a village from scratch with just the fruits of one's labor, but alone, the journey is far more boring. The game excels when it's enjoyed with other players, but unfortunately the community isn't large or very active at the moment, so the player experience may be compromised.
Your experience with The Tomorrow Children will vary, especially if you don’t get any players visiting your space. But when everything clicks like a well-oiled machine, there’s a strange sense of appeal here that makes it intriguing enough.
Definitely a love it or hate it kind of game, and I love it. Play it!!! Not very often do we get some solid indie games like this, and this one is definitely worth your time. It's also on sale pretty frequently.
Unfortunately, the game's issues run a bit deeper. Like the 2016 version, the gameplay is stiff, slow, and rather dull, and sometimes it's unclear precisely how to proceed. Inventory space is a near constant headache. Building up your town is hard work, which is probably intentional but isn't very fun — especially when giant monsters unceremoniously wander over and destroy your buildings. Fighting back can feel futile and isn't particularly satisfying, either. It's tough, because there's great potential in its collaborative, common goal nature, and Phoenix Edition really does make many improvements to the overall experience, but its cold, repetitive core holds it back.
The Tomorrow Children is a weird, unwieldy game that had me sighing at just how obtuse it is while still somehow simultaneously entranced. The social action concept is a strong one though moment-to-moment gameplay will quickly become too much of a grind for most players. Hopefully it can find a new audience but, at the very least, it will help rehouse those fans who adored the original release and mourned its server shutdown.
The Phoenix Edition brings some balance to the troubled The Tomorrow Children. Now you can play offline in the new single-player mode and have a little bit of help during the hard work... but after six years most of the structural issues of the original game are still there!
For me, this is one of the best games of the last generation.
It's one of the reasons why I haven't given up on video games.
As a player of the 2016 version, I am happy that the game is alive, it has a single-player company, but as a Russian, I am seriously disappointed that the game has not been released on PC, because Sony may close the servers again and this masterpiece will remain on the closed box .
فرحة لا توصف بعد عودة هاللعبة الى بلايستيشن
لعبة تجمع فكرة العاب التنقيب و البناء لكن باسلوب جداً فريد و فريد فيها فعلياً , الهدوء وثيم الفراغ
مع فكرة الاشتراكية ( اللي مب سوفيتية ابداً) مضحكه وكوميدية , احد الالعاب اللي تقدر تدخل في عمقها و تفرغ فيها طاقتك ب اقل ضوضاء ممكنه و برضى مشبع داخلي في العمل و الانتاج لبناء مدينتك كما ترغبها انت
The PlayStation exclusive that no one knows about. Shame, because it's extremely fun for people who like working/grinding in multiplayer games.
The gameplay loop is this: You have a town to sustain with resources like food, coal, gold, etc. Around your town come out dungeons that looks like pieces of art straight out of a museum.
First you buy whatever tools you want, like a pickaxe and a shotgun, hop onto a bus that takes you to the dungeon, and you crawl through it however you want, getting materials, killing enemies, finding treasure... with other players (NPCs, online with friends or online with strangers). Teamwork is used by delivering the material you guys collect back to your town, and building your town more and more (like adding a police station, turrets to kill enemies, flowers to decorate your town with). The most important material of all are these Russian dolls you find all over the dungeons, which you bring back to town to turn into town residents. When you turn a certain amount of Russian dolls into town residents for a session (lets say 100 for this certain session), you complete the town. Once it's done, you can go back to start the grind all over again but now you need to collect even more resources and more town citizens.
And all of it looks AMAZING with its unique art style and ray-tracing, especially on the PlayStation 5 with 60 FPS.
Again, if you like grinding in online games (like in an MMO) or being lost in a game for hours building your town and collecting resources... this game is perfect for you.
This game is like capers: chances are you will either love it or not care for it at all. This ultimately comes down to the fact that what makes this game attractive isn't brilliant mechanics, an amazing story-line or other common ingredients. This game is truly unique, however. Unique in its setting, its atmosphere and its visual representation. It is an experience unlike any other, and that's what makes it enjoyable to some people, including me.
In recent years, I've slowly transitioned from competitive and grindy AAA titles to games that I can finish in an evening or a week. Games that have something unique about them, either by telling an interesting story, showcasing a weird art style, an alien world, or by creating an atmosphere that feels like another dimension. I've come to dislike PvP and to love co-op games that I can (optionally) play with my dear friends. It is for this change in my preferences that I do love this game now, but probably would've dismissed it if I had first played it 10 or so years back. It is for this reason that I am sure there will be plenty of people who won't care for this game, and then some people who will appreciate it.
When it comes to the gameplay arch, there is a goal to beat, a way to finish the game. Once you get there, the game will suggest you move on an join the world's of other players. However, if you prefer, you can continue with your own world for as long as you like. It will get repetitive, but the almost meditative, relaxing nature of the game had me return a couple of times. I eventually put the game down after about 60 hours of game time. At this point, I'm satisfied and will happily move on to another unique indie experience. Chances are, however, that I will return to the Void every now and then to help out a friend who picks up the game, and I'm looking forward to those times.
The developer also seems very active and in tight communication with the community, so chances are there will be more content coming to the game over time, making it worth to check back in every now and then.
With that said, if your preferences are anything like mine, do definitely give this a go.
An addicting action/resource collecting/town management game that sadly *still* falls short in introducing new players in.
As a fan, it's still that same fun game where you can get lost within it for hours. Venturing out with other players into the Islands (which are destructible dungeons) and exploring every inch of them is still so satisfying and fun.
Making your own doorways, tunnels and staircases to help everybody be able to explore every pocket of the dungeon, and discovering treasures and an abundance of resources to carry out while using real teamwork, is extremely fun. Managing your resources and expanding your town is a more calmer type of fun, but it serves as a good break from all the exploring. And in the middle of all this, there are giant monsters that attack your town, which quickly turns the game into a Town Defense style game.
And all of this presented in a dream-like world, where all the characters, items and surfaces look like real materials, such as wood, glass, and plastic. And the lighting too... They use their own version of Ray-tracing, which is incredible when seeing it run on the PlayStation 4.
EDIT on bugs (9/8): They've been fixed, and they also added more solid floor to the Islands for easier access!
In the end, The Tomorrow Children is still this unique, one of a kind, fun experience we once saw many years ago, and possibly can turn into an incredible experience once they address a few more issues and more new players learn how enjoyable this game actually really is.
SummaryThe Tomorrow Children: Phoenix Edition takes place within an alternate future following a failed experiment to unite the minds of all humanity. The return of civilisation now lies in the hands of Projection Clones; life forms capable of venturing deep into the Void in search of preserved human survivors. That’s where you come in...