Conglomerate 451 - Review @ Screenrant

Screenrant checked out Conglomerate 451:

Conglomerate 451 Review: Nothing to Write Home About

Conglomerate 451 is a cyberpunk dungeon crawler that commits no major sins but fails to rise above its betters, making it a forgettable experience.

The cyberpunk genre is very much in the cultural eye at the moment, at least in the video game industry. CD Projekt Red's upcoming Cyberpunk 2077 remains one of the most anticipated video games of the year, despite release delays. To pass the time, RuneHeads has developed a different cyberpunk experience in the form of Conglomerate 451, a roguelike dungeon-crawler which illustrates the grim, dehumanizing nature of privatized technological progress but which fails to use that technological progress to make a memorable game.

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Ultimately, Conglomerate 451 is a hard game to recommend. It's not a bad game, it's just too average for its own good. Just about everything the game does is done better by someone else. If you want a first-person dungeon crawler, there's Legend of Grimrock. If you want an RPG with a large roster of characters and permadeath, you're better off with Darkest Dungeon or something similar. Even the out of combat progression systems are better handled in games like X-COM. Conglomerate 451 is playing in a crowded space, and like the corporate drones in its own cyberpunk dystopia, it just can't establish its own identity.

Score: 2.5/5

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More information.

I guess I cannot disagree more with the conclusion.
I mean...yeah every mechanic is covered by someone else already and most of the time there is already a game doing it better. However each game gives it a unique spin.

And I am not aware of any first person crawler in a cyberpunk setting, or any first person crawler which combines "crawling" with XCom-Meta-Game mechanics like permadeath on soldiers and research.

I posted this in the dungeon crawler group already, but maybe this is of any help here as well:

After playing it for just a couple of hours, I would say that the game certainly has it's strong points but also some issues:
-I think the concept of the game which goes into the direction of XCom whith missions, research, improving and losing your characters is quite cool.
-The game as 3 minigames for hacking. These are all on a timer and a bit twitch based which contradicts the turn based aspect of the game. This can be an issue if your reflexes are bad and you are doing bad under pressure.
-The game becomes somewhat repetitive within the very first missions already. The map layout is very very similar from map to map, and also the short notes from the robot (with a very cringy humor) are even repeating within the same mission. You will have more variation in mission layouts later on though afaik
-Some of the balancing isn't really good. Some of the tech you can research actually sets you back, and you can spend tech points to unlock story. This is a newbie trap in a game which is on a timer (you only have 75 weeks in campaign mode)
-The controls and the information available for the player isn't optimal.

Overall, I still think it can be a fun game. But at the moment I am also considering to wait a bit until further patches, as it seems like there are some things which obviously have to change.
The Developer just mentioned that the first post-release patch will come tomorrow (monday). It also seems like the developer is very receptive on feedback and replies within minutes on postings in the steam forum.

Added it to my wishlist, I might pick it eventually.
When no timers mod appears.

Note that Screenrant is mainstream following site. For any game review they put, a grain of salt is needed.

" If you want a first-person dungeon crawler, there's Legend of Grimrock. If you want an RPG with a large roster of characters and permadeath, you're better off with Darkest Dungeon or something similar. Even the out of combat progression systems are better handled in games like X-COM."

What if I already played those games and want to play something new? Just because those games were better, it doesn't mean this game can't be fine on its own. I'd rather play a game that might not be as good as another, than play the same game again and again until something new and better comes out.

I grabbed it. I like these types of dungeon crawler games. Comparing it to Grimrock is kind of silly in my opinion because the games play nothing alike, this game is turn based and Grimrock is still too "twitchy" for me to enjoy. Not to mention Grimrock was all focused on puzzles whereas... well, they're just not alike.

Shrug. It's a nice little addition to my games library for the $20 or so I think it was, but I'll be waiting to see if it gets patched up a little bit more before spending too much time with it.

Nice visuals, but the mission timer and procedurally generated levels are big turn-offs for me.

While I know that timers are always a big controversal topic, I'd rather see them as limited amount of missions.

Correct me if I am wrong, but afaik, you only have a very limited time in Firaxis XCom as well.
In Conglomerate the campaign just has 75 Weeks. And You can fill them with "random" missions or you can do story related ones which pop up at certain weeks and you have to beat the final story related mission before the timer is up (or maybe it just appears at week 75 and you have to do it, I don't know).

Other games do pretty much the same, but by reducing the resources more and more so that you are forced to act until a certain time or they just force a final mission on you.

xcom2 has whatever timers and it was the first (and only) thing I got rid of. IIRC no mod was needed just some config file change.

Having timers in a game can be the case of developer not being with touch with the audience. They refuse to put timers disabled option in the game. Call it story mode, baby mode, casual mode, doesn't matter, just add it. PR companies know timers suck and never advertise them.
Timers can however be monetised so even if developers don't want them in the first place, a publisher can still insist on puting them in a game for sakes of selling time shortening scams.

Note that I have nothing against minigame timers. These, unless a minigame is irritating even without them, don't affect the game as a whole.

Kordanor said:

The Developer just mentioned that the first post-release patch will come tomorrow (monday). It also seems like the developer is very receptive on feedback and replies within minutes on postings in the steam forum.

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Am I the only person who would consider this to maybe NOT be a good thing? Seems like being in active development and yet paying such close attention to Steam comments are incompatible states.

JFarrell71 said:

Am I the only person who would consider this to maybe NOT be a good thing? Seems like being in active development and yet paying such close attention to Steam comments are incompatible states.

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I don't think so.
First you actually need feedback in order to see what you actually should change. Second: Not everyone is doing everything, and while the company is tiny, it's not a one-man-show. So while one guy is doing the forums, the other might be working on the game.
And as a third thing: I am pretty sure, they also spend their free time on the game. The developer was quite active on the forums during the week end, and it might very well be possible, that he is doing forums in his "free time", while working during office hours. That's probably not very healthy, but understandable with a small project which can determine the future of the company.

And the first patch is out:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1022710/announcements/detail/1709616757522096599

No major changes yet though, but fixes (and I encountered some of these issues) are always nice.