Blacksmith Master

As a big fan of Untitled Studio's previous game, Tavern Master, I was very excited to get my hands on this game. Unfortunately, I found myself extremely disappointed. I will avoid comparing this game to Tavern Master, as I believe they were looking to create a completely different experience here, which I can commend. Fundamentally, this game suffers from system bloat. So many of the systems laid out are completely superfluous, offering essentially infinite resources with very little monetary and time commitment. Other systems are so unintuitive that you'll have 2 floors filled with smelters just to keep everything running smoothly. The sheer number of employees you have to hire is so massive that you'll just dedicate an entire half a floor to bench space. And managing what they're even supposed to be doing becomes a nightmare in itself. Between trade routes, barrels, your shop, and the vast amount of things for your guys to craft, you spend a majority of your game time in the UI fi...

This is a no go. Practically an idle game. This has no rhyme or reason into the pathways or progression. No balance to the costs of anything and mired in tedium. There are far better blacksmithing games out there and much better economy/storefront management games. This feels like a cash grab after they made Tavern Master.

Be warned toward the end it becomes a slog. It's got solid foundations, but it is missing the spark of Tavern Master. It needs a lot of additional quests and the ability to build around the city you are in, and participating in competitions. Perhaps even some special quests involving supplying arms for wars, or becoming so prestigious that you must craft a customised item for royalty that requires the best of the best of your blacksmiths and hundreds of combined staff hours (e.g. using a Game of Thrones reference crafting the greatest sword from the rarest elements for a prince's name day - success = riches and prestige, failure = death of 5 of your best blacksmiths).

there is no challenge, no way to loose the game. no insentive for making more money other than progress the skill tree kinda boring

I was really excited for this game, but I just didn't like it. Progression doesn't feel satisfying, and the overall design of the game feel very disjointed. Like you can never get organized, because it's impossible to set up the way you'd want to. It's just not a winner.

So, I just dumped ~70 hours of my life into Blacksmith Master and my first thought was: wow, my assistants work harder than I ever will. The game runs shockingly smooth — even when I had what looked like a small medieval riot of hundreds of dudes hauling ore around like caffeinated ants, not a single hiccup of lag. Big thumbs up for the optimization. Gameplay loop? Super satisfying. You start off tinkering with a couple smelters, then suddenly you’ve engineered a factory so efficient that OSHA would pass out if they saw it. Watching the system click into place is peak cozy-efficiency gaming. That said — once you hit “end game,” it’s basically: Step 1: Make gold. Step 2: Flex scholar points. Step 3: …uh, keep making gold? No mine expansions, no deeper forest to conquer, just infinite iron to feed your infinite smelters. At that point I felt like a dragon sitting on a shiny pile, except instead of treasure it was neatly stacked ingots. Still — those 70...

practically none of the steam tags listed on this game are true. this is an idler game. progress is idle and slow af. almost no variety. bland. unimpressive. you personally are tasked to clicking a button when you want to start the next day, and when an order is ready. so this is like 2 clicks per game day. progress is slow af. you get mastery points at a very slow rate. mastery points are needed to unlock basic stuff. you can click to promote workers, and you have to click to hire workers, and when mastery allows... you click to add a new bench or order. the game is not good.

Overall I like the artwork and the concept... However I keep seeing "challenging" in other reviews. I only have 2 hours in the game and i'm to the point i'm clearing $40k a day profit. Not sure what to do with the money or what else to do in the game as I am already rich. Yeah I have a lot to unlock but the question is -- Why? Hope to see more updates.

Fun game significantly harmed by the glacial pace of early game unlocks. At times feels like it's intended to be played as an idle game, were it not for manual changing of the day.

Too much meh. I'm 30 hours in and I feel I dont want to go on, with over a million tech points, every "technology" unlocked and 6 million gold I am really struggling to see a point. Micromanaging the assistants through their tedious jobs isnt fun. and you just need soo many staff. This isnt a medieval blacksmith, its a 1920's sweat shop, and sadly you have to give everyone painstaking tasks: exactly what to build, exactly what size of what type of ingot to carry from A to B, what ore to put where, what shelf holds what pot, although not a sword, no no that does on a different shelf... Its painstaking, and it feels like I should be getting a wage for doing it. Quarter the number of staff you need, have the assistants make the ingots that are needed, or loose the sizes completely and just have the blacksmiths take 2 ingots for a medium ingot requirement etc, and have assistants assigned to carrying just fill things that need filling. I dont care what merchant orders are filled, just...