Bootleg Steamer Reviews

Amazing art style and the soundtrack is fantastic... very easy to get in to as well

It's got some balance problems and lacks long-term depth, but it's well themed, well produced, and worth checking out.

Sadly this is an inventive game with good physics and lots of options and maps and different ways to play. I have a very nice pc without going into specs. The optimization of how this game works is dangerous to my pc at times for no reason, it is poorly constructed and needed more time too cook. Developer should pull it until its not going to blow up someones processor. He was made aware of these issues on June 11th, Said something about a fix and nothing has been heard from since... FIx your game or become a joke like so many shovelware games.

Not sure how but I suddenly got sucked into an hour's worth of gameplay in a blink of an eye! Extremely addictive, this game throws you into the life of a true blue bootlegger as you struggle to evade the coppers while trying to figure out the most in-demand alcohols, and finishing up the other quests that pop up. Fair warning, it does take a little getting used to in the first year, but after which the potential never stops growing. Loving this game, and looking forward to becoming an expert at the game in probably a week's time after neglecting my work, friends, and social life.

Having seen this game at WASD I was looking forward to buying it and playing it in the comfort of my home. It's been a great way to spend time and I've really enjoyed my purchase so far, and I'm sure I will spend more time in this game in the future. Positives - really good fun, from working out what to buy and sell, to navigating the channels the map to avoid the traps - The whirlpools offer a great challenge - The way the coastguard works is great - Graphics are great and really fit the game - Range of boats is great, especially as they do seem to have different characteristics and visual appeal Negatives - Could do with a tutorial to help guide you through the early parts of the game - The ability to use a controller would enhance the enjoyment of the game, especially if you wanted to play on the sofa and use the TV as a monitor rather than sitting at your computer

Mediocre gameplay that gets repetitive and boring extremely quickly. Also doesn't help that there's no introduction/tutorial and are thrown into a mess of UI with no indication of what to do. Once you do figure out what's going on you're just left with the feeling of "oh, that's it..."

I've played only a few hours so far however it's pretty addictive! Narrowly evading capture by the police while trying to balance the smuggling of legitimate vs prohibited goods across the sea makes for a really fun experience. Being able to craft the perfect loadout of crew and upgrades to achieve this which is different in every run allows for a good amount of replayability. Visual wise it looks fantastic (especially when you see whales swimming below you!). Audio is also top notch. It definitely makes me want to play more of this developer's games!

This game could be fun and cute, and if they make some tweaks, I might change my recommendation. But as of right now, I literally cannot even open some menus to trade. I steer my ship into the box and the menu is then out of screen and I can't open it to sell or buy goods. It's incredibly frustrating and makes the game unplayable. Going to watch this space for a bit to see if there's any response but as of right now, I am considering returning it because it's not playable for me as it is.

[b] Overall: Fun Game! Recommended[/b] [b]Pros:[/b] + The theme is unique & the execution of it is on point + Amazing art style + Boat physics are fun + Depth and variety of game mechanics + The writing is great + Price + No tutorials for some gameplay mechanics makes exploring the game more fun [b]Cons:[/b] - Please, please, allow me to use my Escape button to exit menus & pause the game - Can't use keyboard shortcuts to trigger some abilities - Map is buggy - UI/UX: [*] The walls of text explaining game mechanics don't have any kind of colored/bold text and can not be accessed during the pause menu (in a glossary or help section or something). This makes trying to understand new mechanics while the game is unpaused (and you are being chased) quite challenging. [*] Having a smaller, secondary, icon-only menu bar in the pause menu is sometimes confusing [*] The "Quit" button is hard to find [*] While I appreciate not having explicit tutorials for some parts of the core gameplay loop, some UI elements should be introduced to the player (for example, the option to drop cargo, which is practically hidden)

The game itself is fun but the performance is atrocious. For whatever reason, the moment I load into the map my mouse starts to lag massively which isn't present in the main menu and it makes the game feel absolutely terrible to play especially since there aren't ANY hotkeys for ANYTHING. You can't open your map or town menus or do literally anything else involving a menu without using your mouse and when your mouse feels like it's always 4 steps behind where it SHOULD be it makes the game unbelievably tedious to play for more than 5 minutes. If it's a graphical issue then I guess I'll just go fuck myself since you can't change the graphic settings at all, the options menu is super barebones and you can't change anything outside of volume and window size.