Eco Review

Eco is ambitious and beautiful multiplayer survival game which provides you with an ecosystem and the goal - advance your civilization from the stone age to modern technology without starting pollutions and habitat destruction.  The game is developed by Strange Loop Games and it's available on steam as the Early-Acces game since February 6th, 2018.

Eco is a Dig, Craft, Build style game but it adds new mechanics to create a better experience for this game type. It's a game in which player collects resources from wilderness to build items so he can progress to the next tier.
Unlike to other games in the genre, Eco is approaching survival in a more realistic way. The game actually includes consequences.
It's pretty difficult to start playing this game and learn rules of the ecosystem but after you master it, you will get addicted to this game.



Eco is the game with consequences. Taking resources from nature, or using technology may create air pollution and it will contribute CO2 content of the atmosphere raising global temperatures (it can destroy farms or melt the ice to increase sea level). Eco is not just a dig and craft game, for this game you have to use your brain! If you cut the tree as the resource and don't replant it your world has no ability to produce oxygen and remove carbon from the air. If you eat a lot of tomatoes, eat them all, there are no more tomatoes on the earth.  Everything you take from nature, you have to replant it and hope it won't die in the growth cycle.  Eco has a farming and fishing system. Farming is a lot better than other games because it's not only about planting and plowing. Plants and animals rely on temperature and soil moisture which can be changed by natural factors or by players. It also matters where you plant your seeds because it grows better in the fruitful earth.  



One more thing that makes Eco a lot better than other games of this genre is that Eco is not you typical survival game. In eco, you are the not only one who needs to survive. It's up to you and your team to save the planet. Eco has player models and a clothing system which will give boosts to activities. Also, developers are adding a lot more depth to nature by constantly adding the new set of plants and animals. Research is pretty much classical, it's the method through which player unlock new specializations. Research is done by crafting skill books. When you craft a skill book, you can use it to create skill scrolls and later they can be distributed to anyone on the server. 

Eco also has government system which is unique a lot and it's a cool detail. Interesting thing is that you can nominate yourself to be the world leader through the "Laws" menu. Also, you can write a candidate "speech" that will be broadcast to all server players. Once an election starts you have 24 hours to nominate yourself or vote other candidates. The one who wins elections becomes the world leader and he gets the power to set world objective and to set tax rates.