What is Palia?
This is our honest Palia Review. We will cover the good the bad and the ugly. For those of you that do not know, Palia is a new online game that is a mix between WoW and Stardew Valley. Think World of Warcraft Mists of Pandaria and you will not be far from the mark with the farming crops. You have a farm such as in Stardew with land you can use, which is for yourself only, you cannot see other players unless you invite them into your farm. You level up skills such as growing crops, mining, foraging and so on, much like in Stardew.
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The World of Palia
Palia is a very beautiful world and alive with wonder. You can find treasures lying around and hunt the animals that roam the world. There is loads to do to fill your time and you never get bored of your surroundings, it feels alive. As you level up your skills, you get new quests to unlock better tools for your skills, this is where the issues begin to arise.
Palia Review
Resource Gathering: Copy and Paste Mechanics
When I was persuaded to come and play Palia I thought it would be like Stardew. When you need ore you go to the mines, go to the correct level and mine until you are content. It is nothing like that. Instead it is more like wow. The nodes or resources spawn in the open world where there are 25 other players all competing for a rare resource that has a slow respawn time. In the beginning when you just need Copper or iron ore this is not an issue.
When you get to the tier three requirements though this begins to feel exactly like WoW farming does. Running around the map trying to get to the node before another player or hoping beyond hope you can get your required amount before you die from boredom. This was the beginning of the end for me. When a game that revolves around farming and leveling your professions makes it boring, tedious and just downright annoying to farm then you know there are issues.
Palia Crafting: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
This wouldn’t be an honest Palia Review if we didn’t talk about the sorry state that is Palia Crafting. The crafting is just as bad. Have you ever played one of those Facebook or mobile games where everything on it has a timer on? That is Palia.
Everything you craft has an IRL timer on it. You want to turn your hard earned Flow tree wood you have spent 3 hours farming into Flow wood Timber? Well tough! You now have to wait 3 mins per 1 wood to turn it into timber. You may be thinking, that’s not too bad. I could just put more machines down to turn it into timber so I will have 5 or so running at once. Ah ah ah. Nope.
There is a cap on the amount of machines you can have on your farm at once. To get more you have to buy a “Crafting License” which increases the amount of machines you can have by 1. It also increases the price each time you buy. This would not really be a bad idea. Except for the fact that you only start with 5 available slots and everything you craft takes IRL time.
Palia quickly begins to feel like a mobile game. Where it forces you to wait for your items to finish refining before you are allowed to continue playing how you want and do activities you want to do.
Online MMO Palia: 25 Player Cap
The online aspect just feels completely pointless. The only time partying up would be beneficial is to do group farming for rare materials. If it was not online you would not need to group up anyway. There is almost no interaction or group activities to do with friends. You have separate farms so couldn’t help each other craft or grow crops. The quests are not really things you need to group up for, more go talk to someone then give them resources.
Moving from one area to another has a big delay because it is online as well. Palia is trying to find a server in which there is an open spot for you to be in and there is a que. So at times you have to actually consider, “Do I really need to go to town to buy seeds and wait in a queue or shall I leave it for now until I need more so I do not have to waste as much time waiting”.
What You Will Love about Palia
Saying all of that there are some great ideas that have been implemented brilliantly. The hunting skill is really good fun. Stalking a deer through the grass, shooting it with your bow and collecting your loot.
The fishing mini game may be the best I have ever seen in a game. It is simple, easy to understand but also relaxing and enjoyable to do.
Palia Tedious Game Mechanics (Time-Gating)
Growing and harvesting crops has some good positives and negatives. The idea that each crop has a benefit for the crops around it is brilliant, you can really set up a perfect system if you wanted to. The negative is that there is no automatic watering with sprinklers or something along those lines and Palia is online so it continues when you log off.
The crops do not wilt or die if they are not watered but they also do not grow. This may sound ok but this means you need to either log in several times a day to water your crops or stay logged in and playing for a long period of time watering your crops once a day.
Each day in Palia is 1 hour long. So when you plant a crop it takes 3-4 in game days to grow and for you to harvest. That means if you want to actually make money off your crops you need to log in 4 times to water then harvest or play for that period. It all just becomes tedious and about watching the timer instead of enjoying the game.
Conclusion: The Beautiful Turd
Overall they have an excellent idea and I can see what they are trying to do with their game but it feels like they are failing. The game quickly becomes a chore to play. It is more about waiting than playing and enjoying. The positives is that it is beautiful and it is good fun to run around the map, climb the cliffs, and glide through the air. The skills are good fun to level up as well, until you get to rare materials and are fighting with 25 ish people over a few nodes with long respawn timers then it begins to feel like wow again.
The entire game quickly begins to feel like a mobile game. Where it forces you to wait for your items to finish refining before you are allowed to continue playing how you want and do activities you want to do.
I do think people should give this game a go for themselves. It is free to play and what has driven me insane with the continual waiting for things may be a nice change of pace for another. If you want to check it out for yourself here is a link to their website, https://palia.com/
Currently this is a beautiful turd. However it is in beta. There could be an absolute diamond in the center of it if they fix a few issues.
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