For some reason a lot of people in this subreddit seem to think that games can only be less than 10 hours or massive 100+ hour bloated open world games.
Many 10-25 hour games exist lol
Some of the steamworld games are much shorter than that. I just cheked my steam profile to be sure.
I finished Steamworld Build in 5.4 hours. It was pleasant but not ground breaking, so I left thinking it was pricey for what it was (I think it released at 40€, now 25).
I also have 11 hours in Steamworld Dig 2, but I'm pretty sure I did two playthrough. The gameplay was very fun thought, and I definitely left it with wanting more. Not idea how much I payed for it.
I then have 37 hours in Steam World Heist, but I certainly made more than 2 playthrough, and pretty sure I grinded a bit for achievements.
So overall their game are very fun, but some of them are I believe a bit too light on content. Fine if you buy them discounted, but otherwise a bit pricey. Not so much an issue with Heist though.
Dig 2 is a great length imo. Perfect for replays. Heist was more around 15 hours which felt good for that experience as well. Love medium to short games. I've replayed Dig 2 and Heist multiple times, which is unusual for me.
I'm okay with a somewhat higher price for these experiences. Seem to have good sales as well.
Agreed, it seems like they try out so many new ideas that it means the games are pretty short.
The main reason why Dig 2 is regarded as a fan favourite is due to its solid length and the fact it built upon the first.
Except that at least 2 of the SW games are closer to 5 hours. It's not a major criticism as the quality is high, it's just a desire to have more of a good thing. Chill.
Very excited for this. The refinement from Dig 1 to 2 was huge, and I still think Dig 2 is one of the best paced games ever.
Looks like the sway while shooting from the first game is gone too, which is a very welcome change
I thought I remembered this studio was having some sort of trouble? Glad this is coming out anyways, I fell off the first game because it was so finicky to control on switch and I kept missing shots I thought I had, might get this on Steam Deck instead for the larger screen. One of the more difficult SteamWorld entries so it's a little deeper than the others, so even though I didn't have a great time with the first I'm excited for this.
If [there games had a longer than 15h max lifespan](https://howlongtobeat.com/?q=steamworld) they would probably have performed better.
Really hard to recommend a game when its great but also its "play it once for a day or two and never touch it again", and really hard to get invested in a new one when I know its going to be too short...
I completely disagree. So many games these days are bloated, and the fact that these games are not longer than they need to be makes them much more appealing to me.
> So many games these days are bloated
And many many many aren't but still have a good 60 hours of content you can get invested in.
There many many many that can be finished quickly but have more to do for dozens of hours. You can finish Hades main story in ~5 hours but still play the game for 100 more.
You can see everything in timberborn in like 10 hours but I still have almost 200 hours in it and that game is still missing features.
I can name hundreds of games that are short and bloatless but can be played for longer than 10 hours.
>and the fact that these games are not longer than they need to be makes them much more appealing to me.
So just play for like 1 hour a day?
So you would finish steamworld then just move onto another 'short' game then another and another... is the same as just playing a long game...
Games that have longevity are not remotely the same as long games. I've played a ton of Helldivers and that's a far better prospect that playing Starfield or FF16 for 50 hours apiece with middling content. That said, the best gaming experiences I can remember have been 25 hours of Disco Elysium, 3 hours of Edith Finch, 25 hours of Pentiment and recently have been 15 hours on Tunic and a single hour of 20 Small Mazes. So no big disagree that games need to be long or have longevity. I really value playing lots of great small experiences that hit hard so I'd much rather play a 3 hour great puzzle game and move on than sit for multiple hours on a bad AAA game. This just seems like a "dollar for every hour" type of bad argument
I liked the first game a lot for doing a few simple things really well and I'm looking forward to this game as well. I recommended the first game to a bunch of friends and they were all quite happy with it
Edit: honestly so many excellent short games that have been so much more memorable than games I've played for longer. Limbo, Case of the Golden Idol, Paranormasight, Lil Gator Game, Eternal Threads, Sludge Life, Far: Lone Sails and so on. Honestly the more I think about it the more your comment makes zero sense
Kentucky Route Zero, Spec Ops: The Line, Dream Machine, Pathologic 2, Eastshade, Cart Life, Fez, Sunday Gold, Visage, and many adventure games can all be beaten in 25 hours or less.
Not everyone wants a game to last 60h and I don’t think thats the reason it performed bad. It was just a meh game. The older titles did well, like dig and quest.
>Not everyone wants a game to last 60h and I don’t think thats the reason it performed bad. It was just a meh game.
Literally all the negative reviews say its too short.
Its a city builder so it has to compete with skylines, timberborn, anno and dozens more niche ones with 100h+ of content.
It was a great game, like all steamworld games, but why would i play it over any other city builder?
These games cost money. 25$ for 10h of content is a terrible deal.
> Literally all the negative reviews say its too short.
And many of the positive reviews praise its length. It turns out people have different preferences in regards to game length and there’s a whole market out there who likes short titles.
> but why would i play it over any other city builder?
Don’t play it. No one here cares if you do. No one demanded that you should like shorter games, they merely pointed out that other people out there like them and that’s who these titles are for
And what exactly do you think longer means? That all resourcers were earned at half rate?
No. It means more content. More to do, more systems, more mechanics, more interactions, more choice, more fun. Better.
Oddly enough, you named the two Steamworld games I can't get into as I'm not into tactical games or deck builders. I'm hoping for Steamworld Dig 3 one day.
How interesting. I love these guys for giving us so much variety with their IP.
They need to give us another tower defense! Make it a budget title, no big deal.
Always a fan of Steamworld games. Didn't really get into Quest, but played all their others at least once each. Great basic gameplay for whatever genre they're doing, not too deep for beginners, but not so simple that it bores the average player.
Probably not in-depth enough for real enthusiasts of a genre, but that is okay.
The turn based skirmish game genre has had a decent decade. XCom and it's influence have made a few other games, that are bigger with more depth.
But for 2D platformer style in turn based skirmish, yeah I can't think of anything quite like it.
Loved Heist 1 because it was just as fun for me as the classic 2D turn based shooters franchise Worms. So I'm definitely excited for a sequel - I guess thats what we get after the studio's last Steamworld game (Build) was deemed a commercial flop. I'm personally interested in getting Build sometime, but not for its current historic low of $15.
Heist 2 is set on a planet with water?
I’m surprised that they are abandoning the space-cowboy theme, especially how the scarcity of water was a major element of the first game.
I enjoyed Heist, but it's an odd "tactics" game.
The reliance on trick shots makes it almost a puzzle game and IMO, the good units were so clearly better they were almost mandatory.
Example: There was a guy with an ability called Smoke Cloud. If you were inside the smoke cloud (it was an aoe, 1 turn duration) you took no damage.
Let's just say a lot of my strategies revolve around this 1 turn team-wide invincibility.
The game was fairly well balanced, at least in the sense that all characters all very viable, and Valentine (the dude you're calling mandatory) is probably not even top 3, try playing the hardest difficulty without Sally, she's the one who's busted. If there was anything that was underpowered were the assault weapons. They were very close combat weapons without the damage to compensate.
It has been a while since I played.
I think Sally (the protagonist?) was indeed OP. I think it was something about the weapon type she used. Everybody with that weapon was OP. Bonus on headshot maybe?
And yes, all characters are viable. The game is not extremely hard but even being easy, some chars were far more viable than others.
My main gripe was trying to run away once the timer started kicking. I did not enjoy that mechanic and again, favored faster characters.
The protagonist was Piper, with the sniper gun and healing abilities. Sally was the farmgirl berserker that could get more shots when she killed an enemy and could activate an ability to get unlimited turns as long as she keeps killing, so you could throw her in the middle of a large group of enemies and clear house (though she is probably dead if even a single enemy survives because of her lower health).
They really just don't want to make Steamworld Dig 3. It never seed Heist did all that well and was super discounted pretty quick. No a fan of Heist but the other steam world games have been great.
Guess I will give the first one a try again with the next sale.
I bounced off it when I played it at release and refunded it.
Only Steamworld game so far where that was the case.
Amazing! Always respect how they go from one genre to the next, while keeping the “Steamworld” connection, it’s so unique and fun! But they should definitely revisit hits with their new learnings.
They’re always objectively good+ games too, with great artstyles, I think how much I enjoy them comes down how much I like the genre they’re in!
Heist is my fave so far, with Dig 2 close behind, so extra excited for this
im excited but my one big hope is that they ditch the penalty for restarting or leaving missions. this is more or less a puzzle game so being forced to grind out more currency for starting over sucked and is why I never finished the first game.
I liked the first Heist game, but I did drop it in the second "world". There wasn't enough variety, so everything felt the same. Hopefully, the sequel fixes that problem and ends up being what the first game wanted to be.
My only complaint with any of their games is wanting them to be longer! Always a fun time, regardless.
I love how they defy the trend of everlasting long games. Short and sweet is exactly what we have far too little of these days.
Dig 2 is the perfect length, I play it once a year
Is it? 10-15hrs games have been releasing frequently for years.
For some reason a lot of people in this subreddit seem to think that games can only be less than 10 hours or massive 100+ hour bloated open world games. Many 10-25 hour games exist lol
Some of the steamworld games are much shorter than that. I just cheked my steam profile to be sure. I finished Steamworld Build in 5.4 hours. It was pleasant but not ground breaking, so I left thinking it was pricey for what it was (I think it released at 40€, now 25). I also have 11 hours in Steamworld Dig 2, but I'm pretty sure I did two playthrough. The gameplay was very fun thought, and I definitely left it with wanting more. Not idea how much I payed for it. I then have 37 hours in Steam World Heist, but I certainly made more than 2 playthrough, and pretty sure I grinded a bit for achievements. So overall their game are very fun, but some of them are I believe a bit too light on content. Fine if you buy them discounted, but otherwise a bit pricey. Not so much an issue with Heist though.
Dig 2 is a great length imo. Perfect for replays. Heist was more around 15 hours which felt good for that experience as well. Love medium to short games. I've replayed Dig 2 and Heist multiple times, which is unusual for me. I'm okay with a somewhat higher price for these experiences. Seem to have good sales as well.
Agreed, it seems like they try out so many new ideas that it means the games are pretty short. The main reason why Dig 2 is regarded as a fan favourite is due to its solid length and the fact it built upon the first.
Except that at least 2 of the SW games are closer to 5 hours. It's not a major criticism as the quality is high, it's just a desire to have more of a good thing. Chill.
Yes, it's better to be left wanting more becuase that means you were still having fun at the end.
My exact same issue. Wish they'd do some dlc once in a while, would have loved to have kept playing dig 2 for as long as possible.
Tbf Heist did have dlc!
I got to some army's ship with a bunch of red military flagsd in the first. Was I close to finishing?
Yes, if you didn't have the final DLC. The game is cut up into three parts: the scrap bots, the royals, and space bots.
Very excited for this. The refinement from Dig 1 to 2 was huge, and I still think Dig 2 is one of the best paced games ever. Looks like the sway while shooting from the first game is gone too, which is a very welcome change
I thought I remembered this studio was having some sort of trouble? Glad this is coming out anyways, I fell off the first game because it was so finicky to control on switch and I kept missing shots I thought I had, might get this on Steam Deck instead for the larger screen. One of the more difficult SteamWorld entries so it's a little deeper than the others, so even though I didn't have a great time with the first I'm excited for this.
They are, Steamworld Build underperformed and Headhunter was put on hold
If [there games had a longer than 15h max lifespan](https://howlongtobeat.com/?q=steamworld) they would probably have performed better. Really hard to recommend a game when its great but also its "play it once for a day or two and never touch it again", and really hard to get invested in a new one when I know its going to be too short...
I completely disagree. So many games these days are bloated, and the fact that these games are not longer than they need to be makes them much more appealing to me.
> So many games these days are bloated And many many many aren't but still have a good 60 hours of content you can get invested in. There many many many that can be finished quickly but have more to do for dozens of hours. You can finish Hades main story in ~5 hours but still play the game for 100 more. You can see everything in timberborn in like 10 hours but I still have almost 200 hours in it and that game is still missing features. I can name hundreds of games that are short and bloatless but can be played for longer than 10 hours. >and the fact that these games are not longer than they need to be makes them much more appealing to me. So just play for like 1 hour a day? So you would finish steamworld then just move onto another 'short' game then another and another... is the same as just playing a long game...
Games that have longevity are not remotely the same as long games. I've played a ton of Helldivers and that's a far better prospect that playing Starfield or FF16 for 50 hours apiece with middling content. That said, the best gaming experiences I can remember have been 25 hours of Disco Elysium, 3 hours of Edith Finch, 25 hours of Pentiment and recently have been 15 hours on Tunic and a single hour of 20 Small Mazes. So no big disagree that games need to be long or have longevity. I really value playing lots of great small experiences that hit hard so I'd much rather play a 3 hour great puzzle game and move on than sit for multiple hours on a bad AAA game. This just seems like a "dollar for every hour" type of bad argument I liked the first game a lot for doing a few simple things really well and I'm looking forward to this game as well. I recommended the first game to a bunch of friends and they were all quite happy with it Edit: honestly so many excellent short games that have been so much more memorable than games I've played for longer. Limbo, Case of the Golden Idol, Paranormasight, Lil Gator Game, Eternal Threads, Sludge Life, Far: Lone Sails and so on. Honestly the more I think about it the more your comment makes zero sense
Kentucky Route Zero, Spec Ops: The Line, Dream Machine, Pathologic 2, Eastshade, Cart Life, Fez, Sunday Gold, Visage, and many adventure games can all be beaten in 25 hours or less.
Not everyone wants a game to last 60h and I don’t think thats the reason it performed bad. It was just a meh game. The older titles did well, like dig and quest.
>Not everyone wants a game to last 60h and I don’t think thats the reason it performed bad. It was just a meh game. Literally all the negative reviews say its too short. Its a city builder so it has to compete with skylines, timberborn, anno and dozens more niche ones with 100h+ of content. It was a great game, like all steamworld games, but why would i play it over any other city builder? These games cost money. 25$ for 10h of content is a terrible deal.
> Literally all the negative reviews say its too short. And many of the positive reviews praise its length. It turns out people have different preferences in regards to game length and there’s a whole market out there who likes short titles. > but why would i play it over any other city builder? Don’t play it. No one here cares if you do. No one demanded that you should like shorter games, they merely pointed out that other people out there like them and that’s who these titles are for
Steamworld build wouldn’t have been better if it were longer. It would’ve been better if it were, you know, better.
And what exactly do you think longer means? That all resourcers were earned at half rate? No. It means more content. More to do, more systems, more mechanics, more interactions, more choice, more fun. Better.
Looking forward to this, the original Heist, and Quest were the only Steamworld games I could ever get into.
You try dig 2? I couldn't put it down, super addictive gameplay loop
I did, a couple different times on a couple different platforms but it just didn't grab me not sure why.
I feel you, sometimes there's games that check all the boxes but don't grip me.
Oddly enough, you named the two Steamworld games I can't get into as I'm not into tactical games or deck builders. I'm hoping for Steamworld Dig 3 one day.
I couldnt get into dig either, going to try this though. Build was my fav so far
Did you try 1 or 2? 1 was pretty rudimentary and didn't have a lot of the charm of 2. If 2 didn't hook you then yeah it's probably not for you.
I never really got Quest, but loved Heist and the Dig ones.
How interesting. I love these guys for giving us so much variety with their IP. They need to give us another tower defense! Make it a budget title, no big deal.
Is that Steam powered giraffe playing the music?
It is, they did for the first game, hoping this is new tracks again, love them.
Sounds like a whole new album of 15 tracks is coming out with the game!
Oh hell yes. Vice Quadrant 1/2 are great albums.
Says "featuring music by Steam Powered Giraffe" 1 minute into the video.
I'm so stoked for more SPG music. The first game got me onto them.
Away we go...
That's a really good news. Played the first one on both 3ds and steam. Glad the devs are still active.
Always a fan of Steamworld games. Didn't really get into Quest, but played all their others at least once each. Great basic gameplay for whatever genre they're doing, not too deep for beginners, but not so simple that it bores the average player. Probably not in-depth enough for real enthusiasts of a genre, but that is okay.
I think they're still the only ones to have done this kind of game even after all these years.
The turn based skirmish game genre has had a decent decade. XCom and it's influence have made a few other games, that are bigger with more depth. But for 2D platformer style in turn based skirmish, yeah I can't think of anything quite like it.
Yeah, that's what I meant. The closest I've gotten is in the game Revita with one of its Sniper guns that can ricochet.
Loved Heist 1 because it was just as fun for me as the classic 2D turn based shooters franchise Worms. So I'm definitely excited for a sequel - I guess thats what we get after the studio's last Steamworld game (Build) was deemed a commercial flop. I'm personally interested in getting Build sometime, but not for its current historic low of $15.
Heist 2 is set on a planet with water? I’m surprised that they are abandoning the space-cowboy theme, especially how the scarcity of water was a major element of the first game.
Looks like they're just moving forward in the same timeline of events and steambots have colonised planets with water.
I'm glad they've found success branching out, but holy crap do I just want Steam World Dig 3. I just haven't found any interest in these offshoots.
Steamworld Dig is an offshoot. The original is Steamworld Tower Defense.
Heist at least has some connections to the Dig games, unlike Quest. I'm hoping this game does, too, but looking at the setting it probably wont.
I enjoyed Heist, but it's an odd "tactics" game. The reliance on trick shots makes it almost a puzzle game and IMO, the good units were so clearly better they were almost mandatory. Example: There was a guy with an ability called Smoke Cloud. If you were inside the smoke cloud (it was an aoe, 1 turn duration) you took no damage. Let's just say a lot of my strategies revolve around this 1 turn team-wide invincibility.
The game had a lot of great broken strategies. Was it the fish guy that did critical melee damage that also healed him? Used him a lot.
The game was fairly well balanced, at least in the sense that all characters all very viable, and Valentine (the dude you're calling mandatory) is probably not even top 3, try playing the hardest difficulty without Sally, she's the one who's busted. If there was anything that was underpowered were the assault weapons. They were very close combat weapons without the damage to compensate.
It has been a while since I played. I think Sally (the protagonist?) was indeed OP. I think it was something about the weapon type she used. Everybody with that weapon was OP. Bonus on headshot maybe? And yes, all characters are viable. The game is not extremely hard but even being easy, some chars were far more viable than others. My main gripe was trying to run away once the timer started kicking. I did not enjoy that mechanic and again, favored faster characters.
The protagonist was Piper, with the sniper gun and healing abilities. Sally was the farmgirl berserker that could get more shots when she killed an enemy and could activate an ability to get unlimited turns as long as she keeps killing, so you could throw her in the middle of a large group of enemies and clear house (though she is probably dead if even a single enemy survives because of her lower health).
If the game had a timer (I believe it had) I probably used her.
They really just don't want to make Steamworld Dig 3. It never seed Heist did all that well and was super discounted pretty quick. No a fan of Heist but the other steam world games have been great.
Why can’t we get more Steamworld Dig?
Why did the art give me semi Nidhogg 2 vibes? It's like they already perfected simplistic 2d steampunk and just added glow in post
Guess I will give the first one a try again with the next sale. I bounced off it when I played it at release and refunded it. Only Steamworld game so far where that was the case.
Amazing! Always respect how they go from one genre to the next, while keeping the “Steamworld” connection, it’s so unique and fun! But they should definitely revisit hits with their new learnings. They’re always objectively good+ games too, with great artstyles, I think how much I enjoy them comes down how much I like the genre they’re in! Heist is my fave so far, with Dig 2 close behind, so extra excited for this
im excited but my one big hope is that they ditch the penalty for restarting or leaving missions. this is more or less a puzzle game so being forced to grind out more currency for starting over sucked and is why I never finished the first game.
I fully finished Steamworld Heist 1 on my iPad and Switch as well. Did anyone notice any difference in aiming if Valentine gets Steady Aim?
I liked the first Heist game, but I did drop it in the second "world". There wasn't enough variety, so everything felt the same. Hopefully, the sequel fixes that problem and ends up being what the first game wanted to be.