Ok, so. I went into Casia pretty much blind. Friends of my channel told me it was a very difficult game, and had a pretty glaring issue where you could become 'stuck' and unable to progress because of the way the game was set up. Basically, they told me to BE CAREFUL. Ok, cool.

They were not kidding.

The difficulty curve of the game, to me, feels somewhat broken in the early stages. You can easily lose if you aren't careful, or try and take on too many enemies at the same time. Also, unless it is a human-type enemy (and not all of those are 100%) they do NOT drop gold. I was told this was done in the favor of realism, as animals wouldn't be carrying gold (they do, however, carry items you can sell FOR gold).

The story itself is a basic coming of age for a teenage girl, Casia, in a fantasy setting. That is, she is now an adult and decides to venture out into the world. This leads to adventure, new friends, and uncovering a plot that has been unraveling for several years and directly involves Casia's family. Again, it isn't anything special or entirely unique, but I enjoyed the way it was presented.

The most amazing thing I found with this game was also one of its biggest faults: the open-world concept. There is nothing telling you that you HAVE to do X other than clues or mail you receive at home. Actually, you can even go right to the final area of the game right off the bat. Good luck beating it, however :P

Now the fault: There are a few areas where there are 'points of no return' and if you go through with them before you're ready, it can make life VERY difficult. There is the guy trying to fix his boat, but the enemies are MUCH tougher than the starting area...and there's no easy way to get back. There's also the mining town, trapped by demons. You can fight two different bosses, and if you manage to beat the easier one and then go back...yep, you're trapped and HAVE to fight the more difficult one. Thankfully, I didn't get stuck, but it can happen...so my advice? Get party members ASAP, and grind out those levels.

On party members: there are a ton for this game! Some are easier to get than others (Daan will most likely be your first) but they all make life easier. I just wish there were more characters with healing abilities.

All in all...this can be a punishing, difficult, and frustrating game. But at the same time, when you DO manage to kill that one difficult boss, or survive an encounter than you thought would screw you over...it is quite rewarding.

So, with some glaring faults, why the 4 stars? Am I just being nice? Yes and no. I’ve come to know the dev as I’ve played through the game, and they have been quite helpful when I got stuck. But that isn’t the reason for a 4 star review...I actually like the game. It has a rough, very painful start, but once you unlock more party members, and start to really dive into the story and the world, you can see and appreciate just how much work went into the project, and how much they honestly care about it. That, to me, is worth a lot more than some unbalanced enemies early on.

+Neat open-world concept and choices that can affect the game play directly
+Main character can use ANY weapon in the game
+Lots of side quests to help make leveling no so much a chore, and encourage exploration
+Lots of party members you can recruit
+Almost all enemies are visible on screen, so easy to avoid more difficult/repetitive fights

=Easy to lose track of what you are doing, or where to go next, as the game does not 'hold your hand' in terms of story
=Lack of money in the beginning can make progression slow

-Difficulty curve is very unbalanced, especially in the early game
-Main character can only learn extra skills by exploring the world, but the most effective/powerful ones are hidden
-Enemies routinely use 'Mass' debuffs that remove your control over your party, making some encounters feel 'cheap' (Mass Sleep, Confuse, etc)
-If not careful, easy to get to a 'no-win' scenario, and have to restart because of points of no return

TLDR: Hard, sometimes unfair, open-world RPG that is worth your time if you can look past (or outlevel) the unbalanced combat to see the fun hiding just beneath the surface.