I love idle games. I like having something to do between monotonous admin tasks, and I enjoy the dopamine of reaching new, seemingly endless goals. So, when a game called Idle Keep appeared on my dashboard, I was sure to check it out.
Back To Basics
Idle Keep is largely a resource management game as you collect items to craft and sell for profit. From the outset, your pixelated avatar has access to many tabs with low-level items unlocked, such as coal, cedar, and some agricultural items.
As you collect from each tab, your experience in that field will go up. I don’t believe these levels have much effect beyond unlocking the next tier of items. However, it does provide some sense of progression, which I felt was lacking in Idle Keep.
Keep Restoration
When I saw the restoration tab, I was hopeful that there would be some cool unlocks attached to this. Unfortunately, they feel more like quests with item and creature-oriented goals, and offer character upgrades or tools. Upgrading this has little to no effect on the game, and the gameplay remains the exact same from the first screen to the last.
This lack of progression was felt largely because I only ever had one avatar to control. He collects and crafts as long as you have the required materials, but you never reach the point where you feel like you’re “winning”. It’s just one guy, doing the same few actions over and over, with no real changes.
There’s also the added annoyance of being unable to truly leave the game running idle. You need to keep an eye on your resources to ensure that you have enough to keep crafting. Certainly, you can leave the game idle for several hours to ensure you have a decent number before setting your game aside, but there’s no automation and no expansions to achieve.
They Don’t Stop Coming, And They Don’t Stop Coming
Idle Keep offers players endless opportunities to grind for materials and craft bigger, better items. The range is honestly impressive, and the number of enemies and special drops was great. There’s even a skill tree to unlock bonus yields and power-ups. Sadly, I don’t feel like this is enough to save Idle Keep from becoming monotonous.
I feel quite disappointed that I just couldn’t get into the rhythm required to fully enjoy Idle Keep. On paper, it has everything I could ever wish for in an idle game, but there are lots of little things that keep letting me down. Even the achievements being locked to unlocking “pet” creatures felt like a bit of a bummer when they rely on RNG to drop.
Building To Nothing
I can make a great number of exceptions for indie developers, especially those using the Godot Engine, but Idle Keep has left me wanting from the get-go. Things like your avatar not changing when you equip him are a shame, but not game-breaking. It’s the lack of progression and growth that really let it down for me.
If you’re looking for something to mindlessly click into every two minutes to switch up your resources, then Idle Keep could be the game for you. It just wasn’t for me.
Platforms: PC
Publishers: PixelBitGames
Developers: PixelBitGames
Played On: Steam
Key Provided By: Keymailer
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