The Elder Scrolls: Castles in IOS

★★★★★ App Store Editors’ Notes

★★★★★ Amazing Game So Far

So I haven’t gotten very far (only 1 year in to my first dynasty) but I’ve noticed how many great things they put into this game. Just in general the game took everything great from fallout shelter and added more features into this game. The only downside I’ve experienced is nothing within the gameplay itself, but mainly lack of quality of life features. For example the drop down to see certain citizens who fall under different rarities or races or age, which is helpful, but it would also be helpful to separate them by compatibility with others (whether they hate someone or are friends with them) and a way to see different peoples traits so I can know who to put together to pass their traits onto children. The other feature that would be helpful is a free edit mode to move buildings around. What this game did better than Fallout Shelter is the ability to move your buildings around rooms instead of the building being the room, but if we could freely move them around at the same time then it would make it easier to decorate our castles the way we want, especially since most people earlier game are most likely building shops without be able to really decorate easily because of room building costs and everything. TLDR: great game, but some quality of life updates would help make it a much greater game.

★★★★★ So Far So Good

I have been a big follower of Bethesda for sometime now. Ever since oblivion and even daggerfall. And I have to say with good interest and with a happy heart, that this game is as close to their elders as possible. If you want your wallet, obviously, then you will have an extremely good time. If you’re nervous about the game, then don’t be just try and play for yourself. I guarantee if you love Skyrim oblivion or even morrowind. You will love this game. With all the Easter eggs, and Little nods to the past games as well as the creative story riding and character driven narrative behind a generation upon generation, day by day. You will enjoy this game as much as you enjoy well the sky, the Earth, the clouds, pretty much how I enjoy every morning sunrise. This game offers so much and is well-balanced enough to allow even the me adventure to find possibility. As far as I see right now, I give the game at 10 out of 10. And that’s a lot coming from me. I’ve seen that that’s this flops in the past and in the terms but this one, it hit the nail on the head. As the saying goes. If you feel that my ruin might be misguided, just pick up employ the game for yourself. Then make a judgement upon what you will.

★★★★★ Almost perfect!

It’s really addicting! I love the pace that the king gets tasks. It’s often enough where I have fun, but not so quick that it’s stressful, it’s just right. The building is also very pleasant. It’s easy reorganizing everything and the game won’t let you build yourself a sinkhole if you build it unorganized. Then there’s the little relationships of all the people and the potential consequences. It feels meaningful to make decisions, deciding who gets happy and who gets angry with you, knowing each person can impact you in some way! The only problem I have right now is that some outfits do nothing. I feel the nobles outfit should give 2 extra coins per order, while the rulers outfit should dull the effects of all emotions from decisions? The pathing is also really bad, during a boss fight I move the character out of danger and immediately to star fighting again so I can deal damage in that really tight window that is offered, then the character goes right back into the damage zone! When directed to attack during a boss fight, the character should move straight backwards then attack, not to the closest attacking point then attack. But alas, I’m not a developer so I don’t know what’s right. But I’m having immense fun from this and am loving the game so far! Improvements to make: Better AI pathing for fighting bosses, make all clothes do something even the Noble and Ruler outfits.

★★★★★ Let me play offline

This has potential to be a good game, but the downfalls are too big. The biggest problem is that the app must be connected to the internet 100% of the time, or it freezes and requires a restart. Why it needs to be connected to harvest a resource, or give a command, I do not know. It makes it impossible to play on the subway, on roadtrips with spotty service, etc. which are really the only situations where I’m motivated to pull up a game on my phone anyway. The game itself has a good foundation, and the freedom in building the castle is a cool mechanism that I haven’t seen in a phone game before. The prompts your ruler has to decide on repeat way too often. I’ve been cursed by the same wizard 10 times. I fight a few guys and lift the curse, rinse and repeat. When will I be given the option to fight him? When will he become a hashed out adversary? The same 10 prompts just repeat every 2/3 days and it gets boring quick. Last, the people who made the game obviously don’t know much about any elder scrolls lore. You have a statue to Mara, and a rinse and repeat prompt that the Bretons don’t like the Orcs, then no other indications that we are in the elderscrolls universe. I think research was done for aesthetics (which are great) but story/world is lacking. Fix that and allow the game to be played offline and you’d have a great game. Hope they keep updating it, because it really does seem like a cool game.

★★★★★ Honest feedback

I want to start by saying I really do enjoy this game, for what it is. The whole happiness mechanic is thought out and not too challenging, but it is a headache at times when you are trying to put people where they best fit skillwise, even if they are working with an enemy or not working with family (for tribal characters) However the game feels very pay-to-win. The prices for things with gems in the store are too high considering how slowly you earn gems to begin with. The person that auto-collects materials runs so slow in between stations and doesn't collect materials when you are fighting, he just isn't worth the gems in the first place (and the fact that he has a 30day limit and isn't permanently yours for 500 gems is atrocious) Once you have built a material station for the first time they are impossible to build a second one due to the high cost of building a second station, and I’m a level 50 already. The way that characters regain health makes it take 2x longer to actually accomplish anything because you have to place them from one station to another back and forth and back and forth. The game has the ability to be do much nicer than it is on release, and I’ll check in with it once or 2x a week after my 30 day pass (almost $15 a month, also high) runs out to see if its updated. After the initial release hype i bought extras to get it jumpstarted and feel like it hasn’t jumpstarted at all.

★★★★★ Great game! A few minor issues though

This game is amazing! I can tell that this game is what Fallout Shelters was always meant to be. Engaging crafting, very intricate relationships, and making choices as ruler that affects everything. Minor gripes though. There NEEDS to be a buyback system for gear and equipment. I spent a few HOURS making some stuff for a quest and upgrading them, just to accidentally tap SELL and poof it was gone forever, and I only got like 2 gold from it?!?! Come on guys…. Another problem is the camera movement system. It works great, except that it is WAAAAAY too easy to accidentally click and drag a person, either making them jobless or putting them on another job. I had 2 people at one point without jobs because of this for a while…. Lastly, when you tap the thing to making a ruling decision there really needs to be a way to back out. To be locked into a decision that has to be chosen IMMEDIATELY is a bit annoying sometimes, especially when you’re trying to craft, but then you have to sacrifice something. I see no reason why we shouldn’t be able to postpone decisions without making a choice immediately. Other than those complaints, this game is awesome!

★★★★★ Underwhelming elder scrolls experience

There are a lot of good mechanics that makes this game unique, however after short time you will realize that it is just a cash grab version of fallout shelter. I was surprised at the small number of building types and the linear/level locked upgrade system. The paid battle pass system is designed as an obvious attempt to produce a feeling of FOMO. This game is missing a lot of what made fallout shelter great. There doesn’t seem to be any point in making it to the endgame and the quests/combat are too simple and get old. Aging seemed like a great countermeasure for offline time-skipping but we can’t play offline anyways. I have played fallout shelter for years and it kept me entertained through long flights and deployments. I don’t see myself having the same experience with this game because of the rampant monetization and repetitive gameplay. I think what would really take this game to the next level is the ability to defend the castle from attackers, loot on enemy corpses, making the base level track entirely free (can still offer an additional track for p2p), and adding rooms to develop skills. It seems like a lot of thought and hard work went into getting the game this far and it would be sad to see it not live up to its full potential.