From Soil to Bottle Reviews

Too many bugs. All my stored wine are gone!!!! Where are they?

Solid game. It's very fun once you know how to play and start to make money. Chill and challenging at the same time.

Took a couple attempts to realize I actually needed to read the manual to do better. After that it was pretty fun learning all the things that go into making wine and trying to make a really good one. Also the art looks awesome

There is a surprisingly well made and very deep and complex game, beneath a somewhat difficult to understand UX and some strange control schemes. There is a guide/manual into the Guides session of the game forum, but is still long and tedious to read. Once you understood at least the basics process and actions (there are not many, they are just difficult to understand at first, as said), this is a very nice game to play! The selling cost is a bit high for the product, but is a very unique game, and the devs are active on solving any issues or delivering new content, so... At the end I will give the game an 8 on 10! Very good, just a bit difficult to play the first hour of gameplay.

Game Premise: The concept of running a winery sounds intriguing, but the game itself feels underdeveloped with a broken game loop. Tutorial: The tutorial is essentially worthless; it fails to explain any key mechanics. [h3] Gameplay: [/h3] The core gameplay revolves around waiting for grapes to ripen, fermentation to complete, and for suppliers to offer good prices. This cycle is tedious and lacks engagement. Making even minor mistakes can lead to bankruptcy due to high maintenance costs, with the only source of income being wine sales (once a year, against monthly costs). Starting Conditions: You begin with no equipment, forcing players to take out loans just to start operations. The disparity between the low price of wines and the high cost of machinery creates an uneven economic challenge. Mechanics: Fermentation mechanics are poorly explained, leaving players unsure of how to manage this crucial aspect of winemaking. The game depends heavily on a single harvest per season, and it's easy to lose crops or miss supplier offers due to unclear mechanics. Harvest Management: Key factors like soil quality, pruning, cutting techniques, and weather are supposed to impact grape quality, but these elements are not explained, leaving players in the dark about how to optimize their vineyard. Overall: The game has potential but is currently hindered by its lack of clear explanations and engaging gameplay. A more detailed tutorial, clearer mechanics, and a less punishing economic model would greatly enhance the player experience.

I love tycoon and management games, and have played a few of this type before (Hundred Days, Terroir, Brew Tycoon). I am always looking for a new vineyard game to scratch this particular itch. I liked the look of this game, before purchasing it, even. My PC isn't the most powerful, so the fact that it is simpler gfx-wise is a plus for me. Looking over the screenshots, it seemed to have the depth I was looking for. I was a little concerned the game would be too confusing and/or complicated to learn, but it actually was not too bad a learning curve, at all. This could be due to my previous experience with similar games, as I mentioned. So, it may be more difficult for those who, in particular, have no clue how wine production works or have limited experience with tycoon games. However, after playing 30 minutes, and getting a grasp on the basic production cycle, I found the game draw me in much more than I thought it would. (Though I did hope it would). What I like about this game is it has a perfect balance between being relaxing, and needing attention. It's by no means an idle or hands-off game, but if you want to you can coast along at the slowest speed (or pause if needed), and just take your time monitoring your fields, etc. At least between harvests. Harvests themselves hectic, but that is the time you will be doing the most work, cultivating, crushing or destemming, fermenting, bottling, then giving out sample bottles of your wine to reviewers and businesses in the hopes they'll like it and pay you a good price-per-bottle, and in buy many of your bottles. I picked up this game this morning. It is now nearly 4pm, and I have somehow put in 6.5 hours. I find it to be a very enjoyable game, somehow relaxing and stimulating at the same time. It is rewarding to figure out different ways of improving your wines. There are ups and downs, as random events can rough you up, as they do IRL for vineyards. (frosts causing stunting, nearby forest fire smoke affecting taste, mildew, parasites... or you can have visitors end up partaking a little too much in your wine, causing you to foot a cleaning bill. I don't know what the long-term game looks like, or how much of the game I've seen. I've mostly been focusing on one type of red wine, and can experiment with others to see how it goes. There are a three settings/locations you can play, which kind of act as a pseudo difficulty level. At any location, you can choose to play in the northern or southern hemisphere, which simply affects which time of the year harvest is / when the seasons are. The three locations change the backdrop of your fields. They also affect things like moisture/rain level, hot and cold extremes, and soil quality. I ran into several minor bugs, but have reported them with the in-game bug report feature. None of them are game breaking. If you have little knowledge on how vineyards operate, doing some research on YouTube could be a fun extra-curricular activity/learning experience. There's one I quite enjoyed that was short(ish) (15 mins) and to the point, "Introduction to Winemaking" on GuildSomm International's channel. If you need a bit of a knowledge starter/boost on this topic. I have been going on for too long with this review. I can sum it up by saying I am enjoying this game a lot, and will definitely be playing it further. If you like tycoon games, and want a good vineyard simulator, this could be work taking a look at. I am sure glad I took the plunge.