Frostpunk Critic Reviews

I’ve never cared about the people under my command in any game more than in Frostpunk. The window-dressing isn’t perfect. Aspects of the experience are frustrating; a couple of failed games can leave one a tiny weeny bit annoyed. I am not even sure if some of the scenarios are even possible! Yet if the perfect game is a series of choices where every choice has meaning, then Frostpunk is it.

Frostpunk says that’s it’s a city building game, but it’s much more that. It’s a test and to pass it you must fail somewhere. Save a few and sacrifice many, or let them all die, but your conscience is clear. I can only hope that players won’t be discouraged by the insanely difficult learning curve because I promise you, on the other end is a beautiful game that everyone has to experience.

Frostpunk gives you an intense and truly dramatic experience. The game is so immersive that you can literally play it all day long.

Frostpunk is a bitterly cold game. Every wife crying over the corpse of their frozen husband, every father dying in the cold looking for their runaway child, every amputation, and every sacrifice made for the greater good makes it one of the most miserable experiences you can find at the moment. And yet, 11bit manages to make such unrelenting suffering an utterly stellar colony simulator and narrative experience that you’d be a fool to skip.

Frostpunk is special, it’s one of a kind in that the game is used as a vehicle to convey a message in a way that most games can’t even aspire to achieve. You’ll switch of your PC after a session and walk off filled with what if’s and that is an amazing experience. Few developers understand how to play the heart strings well, but 11 bit studios are proving themselves to be the orchestra conductor.

Frostpunk is a rare blend of social simulation, city management, and survival game that just about does everything right. There are times I wish it was a bit easier to come back from a misstep, but that’s the point of the game – you need to make choices, live with the consequences, and try again if you fail. I just feel bad that each time I do fail, the people who depended on me are let down, and likely dead. It’s that kind of emotion, a sense of real responsibility to these digital characters, that makes me think Frostpunk may be the best city management game I’ve ever played and one I’ll be playing for countless hours.

Frostpunk is an extremely polished city-builder game that builds upon the genre’s core mechanics with meaningful innovations. Despite the steep learning curve at the start, it manages to be captivating every step of the way while never forgoing that rush of adrenaline you get when the game strips away your power and complacency with yet another ethically conflicting challenge.

Frostpunk is an incredible survival city builder that is successful in both delivering an optimal gameplay and empowering it with a believable (and scary) atmosphere coupled with an immersive storyline. An outstanding feat that reaches the same heights of This War of Mine, the studio’s former product.

Frostpunk is among the best overall takes on the survival city builder to date. Its theming and consistency create a powerful narrative through line that binds your actions around the struggle to hold onto humanity in uncertain times. Hope is a qualified good, but you may not always be strong enough (or clever enough) to shelter that flame from the cold.

Even though the bleakness is palpable, Frostpunk is a captivating experience. The gameplay is unique and varied, using the best aspects of city-building and survival games, with a little exploration mixed in.

Your most important challenge in the latest release from 11 Bit Studios is having to make ethical decisions that affect your people directly. Putting the children to work? Using dead people’s organs before sending their bodies to mass graves? Sacrificing some to save others? And so on. These are the decisions that you have to make if you are to lead your people through beautiful and atmospheric frozen wastelands of Frostpunk.

It may have the framework of an ordinary city builder but there’s an insightful, and frequently disturbing, philosophical message at the heart of this cross-genre classic.

Frostpunk is a bleak and challenging colony builder/survival title that will either give you more respect for your boss, or have you rallying your co-workers to oust them.

Going in with as little knowledge of the mechanics and choices and scenario structure is the best way to experience Frostpunk. One of the most intense, beautiful, and emotionally resonant games that features arranging housing and streets ever made.

Frostpunk is a depressing, beautiful and deeply engaging survival city-builder that forces the player to make difficult choices. The dystopian reality is wonderfully made, and you'll feel cold just staring at the in-game thermometer.

Frostpunk is definitely one of the most engaging strategy games around, and one that deserves to be experienced.

I suppose that Frostpunk's main flaw is also its central conceit, because not everyone will be attracted to experiencing its icy apocalyptic wasteland or the uncomfortable ethical and moral decisions that the game forces at nearly every moment. Nobility, zealotry, authoritarianism and egalitarianism are hardly the stuff of sunny escapist fantasies. Kudos to 11 Bit Studios for crafting a game that is as addictive as it is dire, dour, and determined to make us regret our choices, no matter how well-intended.

Frostpunk is an ingenious blend of city building systems and morally ambiguous decision making. Its mechanics are streamlined enough to be easy to grasp, but it’s tension and demanding nature make it an apocalyptic experience you shouldn’t skip.

Frostpunk is bleak. Really bleak. Each decision serves not to ensure progress, but to ensure survival against overwhelming odds. It’s essentially a Crisis Management Simulator, and I love it for that. Just remember to play something more cheerful immediately afterwards.

Frostpunk is a city-building simulation game that puts an emphasis not just on efficiency, but also the moral qualities of the player as a leader. Even if you normally don’t play simulation games, you will definitely be able to appreciate its uniqueness on a lower difficulty setting.