My Deadwater Saloon Fun Experience

Welcome to Deadwater Saloon, your very own tavern in the Wild West. Developed by Creative Storm Entertainment. Have you ever wanted to know what it was like running a saloon back when cowboys were still around. And how they managed to entice customers. Look no further.

Please note that I was provided a free game key buy the developer. However, my opinion below is my own.

Gameplay

Deadwater Saloon starts with a create a character screen. Here you define your character’s various traits as well as their name, gender and skills. You also get to choose the look of your character via the portraits. You also can define the difficulty by changing the economy and other important stats.

Once you press play, the game eases you gently into the swing of running a saloon. First by instructing you to buy various objects such as a bar and a stove. To finding new staff to use these objects.

When you’ve completed the tutorial, the game continues. On the first day no customers appeared. But as the days fly by, they start to come into your tavern and order drinks. But before you can provide drinks and food you also need to learn the recipe for the meals and drinks. This is done via a simple menu interface where you can choose the recipe to learn. You can only learn one at a time, but the early game recipes are unlocked very quickly.

You can only learn one at a time, but the early game recipes are unlocked very quickly.

Finally, you also need stock. Very early in the game the Trapper citizen moves into the area. From the Trapper you can buy early game food and drink. Which your cooks and barkeep can use to satisfy your customers.

With more customers eventually new buildings start to spring up next to your tavern. Some bring new citizens, while others bring more items you can buy to make your life easier.

Relationships

Your character has a limited number of actions they can perform in the day starting with 3. This can be increased by purchasing items from new shops that pop up. These actions can be used in one of three main ways:

• Socialising with the locals
• Reducing your stress
• Hiring Staff

The first action will allow you to build a relationship with the town and will result in locals becoming regular customers. But there is also another option. You can befriend the opposite gender and eventually marry them. This brings with it benefits such as reducing your stress.

Though not all the actions you can partake in are morally correct. You can entice citizens into becoming addicted to various vices so that they spend more time at your Saloon. You can duel those that have wronged you. And outright murder citizens you don’t like. As long as you have the skills to do so. These actions I avoided in the beginning but became more useful as time went on.

Game Over

From the onset of your Deadwater Saloon adventure, the tutorial teaches you that if your health drops to zero, or your stress levels reach 100 it is game over. The biggest contributor to increased stress is by failing when selecting a conversation option. Each option has a percentage chance of being successful. The chance depends on your character’s traits at the start of the game. So, it is wise to spread the points out.

As you progress through the game, you’ll begin to get a notification that bandits are on their way. You then have two options, either:

• Give up some loot to pacify them.
• Or fight back with your bouncers.

 You have two options, arm yourself with a weapon or hire bouncers. Either way it increases your expenses and potentially your stress. Though if you don’t do either, you could witness an early game over.

Presentation

The font of the UI is hard to read on a small screen laptop. But on a bigger screen (22in) it is a lot easier to read. It would have been a great feature if changing the font was an option. Since the font does suit the time period.

The graphics themselves serve their purpose. You have a top-down view of the town and can zoom into your own Saloon. The character models are very basic, though for a sim game it is more than enough to enjoy the experience. I would have liked to have seen more detailed character models, and an option to fully customise your character.

The character models are very basic, though for a sim game it is more than enough to enjoy the experience

The music suits the time period very well, very Western-esq. Which really builds the atmosphere of owning a Saloon way back then. So, I cannot fault it.

Final Thoughts

I have enjoyed my time running a Saloon in Deadwater Saloon. I also hope that there is plans for more content as after a few hours you start to run out of things to do. I hope the developers get round to creating DLC whether it be paid or free. Adding more objects, and more ways to entice new travellers. There is so much potential, and it would be sad to see it go to waste.

For that reason, Deadwater Saloon gets a 3.5 out of 5. Should more content be released I am more than happy to revise my rating.