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I’m trying to find a way to describe games like My Time At Sandrock without it sounding derogatory. A game that has a lot of repeating components, so you can put something on to watch in the background and just vibe. Podcast game, perhaps? That sounds like the game itself is talking to you. Split-focus game? Not very catchy. I’ll work on it. Regardless of the name, it’s a genre of game that I like a lot and My Time At Sandrock is a decent entry.
I’ll admit it up front though: I’ve not beaten it yet. Not for lack of trying, though. It’s a behemothic game and my forty-five hours of playtime doesn’t seem to have touched the sides yet. I might have to call in sick from work to complete it. You can deduce then, that there’s a lot to do in My Time At Sandrock. A lot of those things have been lifted straight from the previous title, My Time At Portia, which means that the good parts have come along untainted but more than a few sins have crept in too.
Can He Fix It?
In My Time At Sandrock, we play as a builder. Rather than spending months erecting flat-pack housing, however, builders are more akin to handymen. Got an odd job you want doing but can’t be bothered to do yourself? Give it to a Builder! Our gullible builder arrives in the crumbling desert town of Sandrock to carve out a name for themselves. Unfortunately, the town is suffering from a crippling lack of water and decent turf, and a crippling abundance of angry lizard people and equally angry bandits.
Sandrock gives a good first impression. The town feels quite lively, with a good number of people wandering around. It’s quite a picturesque setting – assuming you don’t mind sand. The bright, cartoony graphics probably help with that. It just looks like a nice place to be. It’s full of nice people too. Assuming you don’t mind a bit of overly twee dialogue, all the different characters feel distinct and interesting. I ended up buddying up with Owen, the cheery saloon owner, who delights in telling elaborate stories and feeding people omelettes.
The real star of My Time At Sandrock is the building. We don’t just chop down a few trees and get ourselves an axe, no sir. In My Time At Sandrock, each part of a structure needs to be built seperately and then combined. Comissions are given to you through main and story quests (or scooped up by you if you want extra cash). So if you want to build, say, a water tank, then you need to construct steel plates, screws, rubber and everything else seperately. Then, of course, you need to mine and smelt the ores to begin all that work too. It’s quite involved and it’s quite cathartic to see something you’ve been working on for hours finally come together in one big, shiny piece.
Timing Of The Screw
Note that I chose the word ‘hours’ quite carefully in that last sentence. The biggest frustration of this building is that everything has an artificial time attached to it. So if you want a good number of screws, you might have to sit around for ten real minutes until it’s done. It’s a little… mobile game-y. There was a moment, a good few hours in, where I ended up stopping for a moment, completely surrounded by slowly ticking clocks, wondering what on Earth I was supposed to do now. It just completely scrambles my brain and I’m not sure I like it. Feels like padding things out.
If I was being generous, though, I’d say it gives you an impetus to explore what else My Time At Sandrock has to offer. And by God does it has a lot to offer. Here’s a quick list, you can: fish, play arcades, hunt down enemies, fight your friends, go relic diving, go mining, go bobsleighing, hang out with people, customise your house, raise a yak – the list is endless. That doesn’t even touch on the colossal amount of side quests. This is a massive game, that’s constantly handing you new toys out of its sandbox. They’re all reliably fun too. Even the fishing is bearable, placing it far above many in the genre. You can also romance the townsfolk, which is nice. I like all the characters to be honest, without really a miss among them.
The problem with this is one you might encounter if you open a real-life toybox: My Time At Sandrock is bad at giving us a point to all this. Take growing crops, for example. Outside of a handful of quests, there’s no real need to grow them. Money is abundant, so no need to sell them and only a few crops are used in crafting recipes, most of which can be bought. They can be made into food – but health and stamina items are cheap and abundant. In the end, the list of things I felt like doing began to dwindle. Some are just shallow in principle too, like the combat. Very abundant and ridiculously easy combat, that boils down to repeatedly pressing X until enemy is dead, with some light dodge rolling here and there. Either that or shooting them with what feel like nerf guns.
Second Verse, Same As The First
Most of My Time At Sandrock‘s issues have been transplanted wholesale from My Time At Portia. In my view, both are missing a general goal to aim for. There is a main story – a pretty good one in the case of Sandrock – but it’s very stop-and-start. It mostly revolves around building giant structures, with occasional combat sections. Forty-odd hours in and I still have no idea what I’m working towards, making it all feel like I’m just twiddling my thumbs. Something like the debt mechanic from Hardspace: Shipbreaker would give me a personal, independent goal to work towards.
Still, My Time At Sandrock does bring some new features in that are unique to its setting. Given that we’re in a desert, water is scarce. That means no cutting down the trees, as less foliage means more desert. Instead, you get wood from piles that form up in the sand, as well as cutting down the local shrubs. You also need to keep your machines topped up with water to beat the heat. There’s a pleasing environmental theme that runs throughout, which forms a big part of the main plot. While a lot of mechanics are transplanted from Portia, Pathea Games have definitely given some thought to the setting.
As a way to relax, My Time At Sandrock is great. It looks wonderful and is full of interesting people to talk to. Still, it strikes me more as a jack of all trades, rather than a master of any particular one. It was enough to keep me interested for over forty hours – which is probably as good a review as you need – but I do wonder how long it would last if I wasn’t reviewing it. It’s certainly worth a look in – it’ll put a big smile on your face after all – but I wouldn’t blame you if you left Sandrock to the desert sands after a while.
