This War of Mine

Karma-Hammer! - 9/10
Introduction:
First off - no, 'This War of Mine' is not like Deadlight or your typical war game and it's not your typical survival game. It shows everything in a different angle... it deals with the normal citizen and how war can affect und brutally change their life. You have to question yourself...how far would you go to survive? My group was starving in my first game, one was ill and another one wounded. I decided to raid some obviously empty houses at night due to my misery, but the house wasn't empty. There lived a old couple. The old man told me that his wife was ill and I should leave. He didn't want to help me or at least trade with me, but I couldn't leave, because otherwise it would have been the death of me and my party. I started to explore the house while the old man was begging me to not hurt anyone. I found a huge amount of food and medical equipment, more than the couple would need in a long time. I took some food to survive two more days and only the really needed medical stuff to get well soon. Everything else remained untouched, so they could easily live on too and I moved on with a bad feeling. In the same night I got raided myself. Karma. During the next day I had some visitors, friendly neighbors. They gifted me some vegetables and didn't want anything in return. Karma, I regretted my nightly activity even more. This was just one tricky and remarkable situation out of many.
A day in 'The War of Mine' is split into two parts, the day and night time. During day time you're in your house and you have time to work on new and helpful stuff for your party, manage the needs of your people and from time to time you will get some visitors. Before the night starts you'll have to choose, if you want to go on raid or completely stay at home, which person is allowed to sleep and which one(s) should guard the house. After you've made your decision you'll either start your raid (with time limit) or directly switch to the next day. This system works pretty well. How many days you have to play to finish the game can vary. (45 days in my first game)
Thanks to some randomization it's worth it to start another round. I'm currently in my second playthrough and it's still interesting and the game came up with different and new situations, which I haven't experienced in my first game. Great!
Pro:
very good, interesting and unique game topic/setting
great atmosphere
great survival feeling
good art style
dark, sad, melancholic and overall fitting OST
interesting and very different characters with own stories
some characters have addictions (take care of it ... or not)
tough moral decisions which are completely up to you
you're often pushed to limits how to handle things (especially if you're starving, sick or wounded)
your actions can affect various situations and people will react to it
keep building offers various different ways to handle and specialize your 'production'
random generated world/loot and different starting parties
environment and item prices will change from time to time
good replay value (my first playthrough was about 10-11 hours)
no bugs, crashes or glitches in my play time
Contra:
your keep always looks the same and only the starting loot and some furniture are randomized
the 'end' can come kinda suddenly, if you have no radio (you finish the last day and boom...end)
combat can be a bit awkward and random sometimes
unexplained character skills (some are self-explanatory, some not)
you can only raid with one person at night
Conclusion:
Pure quality! The devs have successfully turned a very interesting, but difficult topic into a great survival game with loads of moral aspects. It made me question my actions and behavior several times and even as a good and helpful person there were decisions I'm not very proud of, but sometimes things need to be done to survive in a cruel world. Hands down, 'This War of Mine' is one of the best gaming experiences I had in this year. Absolutely recommendable!
9/10
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This War Of Mine is a harsh, unforgiving and absolutely delightful game.
You begin with a small group of ordinary people, each having their own skills and weaknesses and try to survive through a civil war that has left you with barely no resources. At it's core, the concept of the game is quite simple (yet innovative for all I know): during the day, you must make the best of what you have to organize your shelter in order to tend to the needs of your group while at night, you go scavenging for the resources you are in dire need of.
Where all this really takes off, is how the game mechanics have been fine tuned so that each and every day, the stakes are to the max. As it is the case for any realistic survival situation, every bits of food and material is vital and must be carefully managed, every step you make while scavenging can be deadly and have irreversible consequences - this is a rogue-like game: you cannot save and everything you do generally have irreversible consequences.
For instance: you must have water to cook food (per the game's mechanics, raw food is less nourishing) and given a group of four people, you hence might need a certain amount of water to feed them well. Let's say one day you forget to tend to your water collector, the raw food you have might then not be sufficient to nourish everyone in your group. Being malnourished, someone might get sick so that, on your scavenging night, instead of simply having to find a little amount of food, you now must find water, lots of food and some meds. Meds are usually rare and chances are you'll have to sneak your way in some dangerous place to find some (and perhaps even kill someone if you get caught stealing), all this because you forgot to tend to your water collector!
Add to this mix a bunch of unexpected, random events such as kids begging for meds at your shelter, a friendly neighbor offering you a batch of vegetables, your well crafted survival plans can easily go south in the blinking of an eye. This is, in my opinion, what makes this game so addictive, intense, frustrating and yet deeply enjoyable.
On the technical side, there are very few bugs. The graphics are a perfect fit to the game's spirit; the environments are diverse and not repetitive and while the music themes can be a bit repetitive they do create a very good atmosphere.
In all, if you like survival games for the sense of vulnerability and intensity they provide, if you appreciate rogue-like games such as FTL, you will definitively love This War Of Mine.

This War of Mine has an interesting take on survival games by putting the player not against zombies, or the wilderniss, but against human nature. You begin with three survivors in a city under siege during a civil war, supplies are running low and they just arrived at an abandonned building. This will be their holdout for the war.
You will then manage their daily lives, making workbenches, chairs, beds, and everything else they need to get through the war. Of course, with supplies low, you need to prioritise. Do you really need a second bed? Maybe that material can best be spend on something else..
At night, you go out to scavenge supplies. You bring one (Only one per night) of your survivors to a location that you hope has supplies you can use. Once there, you can encounter many things. It could be an abandonned building with nothing there. There could be a friendly (But well armed) trader, there could be civilians like you just trying to survive, or you could be shot on sight by the locals. Or there can be any other event... Or nothing. There is plenty of variation to be had.
Personally, I went to a church, unarmed, as I had nothing yet. The priest told me about how the place was robbed, and asked me not to disturb the refugees under the church. So I went on to the ruined building behind the church. Scavenging up supplies, when I notice there's sound outside the door. It's just standing there, so I creep to the door and look through the keyhole. Just then, a man with a pistol turned around and made for the door. I looked for a place to run and hide and set off, just as he opened the door.
"Oh, Hello there. Don't worry, I'm just looking around"
He seemed pretty friendly. So I just went on my way to pick out some more nails and wood for my own business. It went alright this time. But plenty of people are less friendly than this guy.
Combat, which you will at some point get into, is not explained in any way. So you will likely have to take a bit to learn about it, and stock up on bandages as you do so. At the same time, the stealth system is not explained, but easy enough to understand.
With all this, you are tasked with making your group survive the war. Or at least as long as you can. It can be easy, challenging, or at times nearly impossible. But that's war, and neither the government nor the rebel forces will help you there - You're not their problem.
And once you've gone through the game, you can ask yourself if you really did win. Did you end up stealing from old people to let them starve? Did you rob a priest for fuel? Shanked a doctor for a bandage? You can ask yourself what winning really means in war. And if just surviving is all you should try to do.

Entered a building with other people.
The building's description had said "Danger" which ment hostiles. Bandits.
I grabbed my knife and was ready for those bandits.
I saw one bandit and after breaking in through a window, she ran calling for backup.
One guy showed up with a shotgun and chased me off but I waited.
He searched, and couldn't find me and then I got the drop on him.
We fought, he couldn't shoot, and three stabs later he fell.
I grabbed the shotgun and went inside.
My friends needed food, and these bandits were killers. They deserved what they got.
I grabbed food, supplies, and another bandit showed up!
I fired at them with the shotgun, and they dropped with a gurgling scream.
One bandit ran after me! Surely they had a knife!
No... she ran past me to the man's corpse.
She was crying. She called me a murderer.
I fired again and she dropped.
There was silence then, and I had to hurry up and grab the rest of the supplies before more bandits showed up.
I opened a closet, and snagged the food.
But, the inventory of the closet said "Private"
Someone owned this wardrobe?
I looked outside toward the other building, and between the two.. a garden someone built?
One guy had mentioned they were running low on meds.
This.... no.. it couldn't be. It just couldn't be!
This wasn't... this wasn't an abandoned building being picked clean.
This was another group's safehouse.
These people are.... were.... survivors!
...and "I" was the bandit.

Initially, I wanted to play the game peacefully; scavenging but never stealing, growing foods when I could, trading for whatever else I needed by growing tobacco and crafting cigarettes. After repeatedly failing to keep my characters alive, as they met fates such as freezing to death, starvation, sucumbing to sickness, or being murdered by armed thugs, my morals began to fade.
I started a new game, and I was done being the victim. I crafted a knife for Pavle, my chosen assassin, each night going out in search of trouble. Like a trained hunter, I’d stalk bad guys as they made their rounds in a building. I'd jump out of the shadows, the armed thug caught totally off guard as he smoked a cigarette, quickly stabbing them to death. I was ruthless, meticulous, and my characters were living great. That is, until I slipped up and one of them shot Pavle in the back as he tried to escape. Things went downhill after that. Pavle survived, but nursing him back to health slowly depleted my limited resources.
Another night, as Pavle climbed through the window of a fortified home, he came face to face with an armed female guard. Pavle quickly dispatched of the girl, but what came next chilled me to the bone. As the girl’s lifeless body lay on the floor of the home, I heard footsteps coming from the floor above. Pavle hid in the shadows, waiting for the next victim to show their face. This time though, instead of a heavily armed thug, all Pavle saw was a grieving mother. She ran to her daughter’s body, falling to the floor in tears as she held her murdered child. As Pavle emerged from his hiding place, she screamed at him, just wanting to know why he was doing this. The unfortunate reality of the situation was that Pavle still needed the shotgun that poor girl was carrying, and nobody was going to stop him from getting it.
The profound weight of his actions had begun to take a toll on Pavle. Severe depression and sickness had started to creep in. Still, when Pavle was physically able, I sent him back out into the night. More dangerous encounters led to Pavle suffering another gunshot, this time worse than the first. As he returned home, empty handed and bleeding profusely, I knew what would come next for my once glorious killer.
With Pavle returning with an empty backpack, I only had enough food to feed 2 people. Someone would need to go without. As I looked over my 3 survivors, all hungry, Pavle stuck out as being a particular problem. He was very hungry, bleeding at an unprecedented level, and severely depressed. With the extremely limited resources on hand, I knew there was little that I could do to get poor Pavle back to 100%. So I stopped feeding him, and I stopped bandaging his wounds. I told myself it would be much easier with him gone, scavenging for 2 should be much easier than for 3. He died 2 days later from his injuries, a hero to some, monster to countless others.
These horrible actions weren't Pavels though, they were mine. I was the monster responsible for murdering a mother and child. I was the executioner of countless men and women that were likely doing the same as I was, whatever was needed to survive another day. In my quest to keep my companions alive during the war, I lost something just as important. My humanity.
Read the rest of my review at

Like many others probably did, I picked this game up for cheap during a sale and then forgot about it for a long time until I happened upon it again while looking for a new game to play. One thing I can say right now is that if you're interested in this game or just need something new to play for a little while, play this. Right now.
The game itself is based on a pretty simple concept(survive and thrive) split into two rotating phases - day and night. During the day you make food, build new things, have your survivors interact with each other, and deal with ailments or wounds. Nighttime is where you decide wether you want to send out one of your survivors to scavenge, guard the shelter, or sleep. Typically scavenging is the most fruitful option, as it's your main source of many of the important resources needed to create your nescessities. It's also the most gameplay-rich part of the game as you have both a time-limit and an inventory limit to consider. You will sometimes, however, have to adapt to the situation you're in and either stay put, or take a risk and scavenge in a potentially dangerous location.
For me this is the greatest strength of the game. It's quite difficult, and it's VERY punishing if you make a mistake, while also being greatly rewarding if you do something right. The first few playthroughs or attempts, you're quite likely to end up in at least a couple of bad situations, to which the solution might require some pretty big risks or sacrifices. As you play more though, you learn to avoid putting yourself in unnescessary danger as well as preparing for critical in-game events such as winter. The game does rely quite a lot on early-game decisions which can be excessively punishing when you first start out(ex. I barely survived my first playthrough without knowing how to create upgrade items), but again this is something you'll learn quite fast.
The game does lack a bit of replay value though. Every time you either succeed or fail with a new group of survivors, you'll unlock a couple of new ones, which does add a bit of variation. Locations do also have a chance of changing it up a bit in terms of inhabitants and loot, but after your first 3 or 4 runs you'll have mostly seen it all. Once you know how to deal with the different situations as well as how to accomplish your goals, there's very little challenge left in the game unless you go out of your way to assault a military establishment with nothing but a shovel. I squeezed out almost 50 hours of this game and loved every moment of it, but there are easily a lot of things that could've been done to add more content.
+
Incredible atmosphere
Amazing soundtrack
Challenging
Good writing and variation in characters
-
Lacks replayability
Little variation in in-game events

so this was my first try...
day 1 its bruno. davle. marko preparing for the horrors of the aftermath of war
day 3. marko went scavenging but got home too late...he was bruised and depressed and tired.
day 4. davle dies while stealing from a man and woman the man kills him with no hesitation
day 5. we meet a man named boris he is a good lifter so he does the scavenging meanwhile marko has lost his mind...
day 6. boris goes back to the house of the man and woman...and kills them...he still hears their screams for forgivness...marko is broken...he wont sleep...wont even move
day 7. some children come wanting medicine we give them some and it make bruno happier but marko is still broken
and we now lack some medicine but i dont think we will need it
day 9. boris goes and helps a family board up their house and garage. meanwhile bruno is left to scavenge and marko guards the shelter with whatever sanity he has left
day 10. boris and bruno returns but the place was raided we lost some things and marko is in his deathbed he has lost all hope for the world
day 12. only one can of food left....we are all starving and these kids show up again asking for food...what do we do....
day 14. marko's wounds were too much...he passed away last night...bruno is fine but boris has started losing himself
but then this woman shows up...named zleta.
day 19. havnt logged for a while because we were too busy trying to search for food and meds...zleta is helping boris feel better and bruno is running out of cigarretes...
day 21. this couple want help with their house being boarded up...its so cold...we can help them and we are all injured, sick and hungry....
day 24. .......bruno......the cold got to him.....he died in his sleep....sometimes i wonder if that even is the best way to die....
day 26. ...boris has gone insane....zleta is bleeding badly and she is trying to help boris but its no use....is this the end?...i wish i didnt give those children the last of our medicine
day 28. the cold........oh god the cold....not even the heater is warming us up....boris he.....he might die he is sick. lethally injured and insane...at least we have some food.
day 29. zleta passed away overnight...her wounds were too much...boris is....well...
day....30...... boris....he couldnt take it anymore....he couldnt sleep....he couldnt eat....he was bleeding out and he was sick...and the only thing he could think about it his dead friends and family........he hung himself today......
10/10