EcoGnomix

Genre: Board Game / Roguelike / Management Simulation

Players: 1

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Review:

(Note: Review code provided by the kind folks at Untold Tales)

EcoGnomix, released in 2024 on PC and Nintendo Switch, is a game that combines multiple disparate elements. At its heart it plays much like a hex-based turn-based Board Game, but it has strong Roguelike elements, as well as some Management Simulation mechanics as well. The result is something truly unique.

The core gameplay of EcoGnomix has you exploring in progressively deeper levels of a cave, positioning workers on a hex grid each turn to gather resources and at times contend with enemies. The main resources you’re looking to gather are wood, which acts as your primary currency, and food (mostly chickens), which gets spent every turn… not on your workers, but to keep a flock of aggressive bats at bay. Some workers collect one type of resource or the other, and different workers can do so in different ways.

Every turn, additional hex tiles will crumble, and then you’re given the opportunity to reposition your workers freely to wherever you want, purchase additional workers, or signal that it’s time to move on to the next floor of the dungeon. There’s a bit of a risk-reward mechanic in this – stay longer and you can potentially clear out more resources, but you have to be careful how you do so or you can risk your workers taking damage or running out of food and having the bats descend on your party, ending your run.

The farther you go, the more you encounter new elements. You’ll find larger chickens that take longer for your workers to kill but yield more food, carnivorous plants that steal nearby resources, and moving enemies that can give you better resources if you take them out, but can also damage your workers if you’re not mindful of their movement patterns.

As with many Roguelikes, players can choose their route down a branching series of pathways, with some rooms offering more food, more wood, treasure chests that offer a random reward, shops to buy upgrades for your workers that last throughout the current run, or bosses.

After each run, you’ll return above ground where you can build structures in a mode that’s comparable to a simplified Management Simulation. I think the gameplay in this part of the game is a bit underbaked compared to the rest, but it’s still a nice additional element that adds variety.

The presentation in EcoGnomix uses simple but colorful and appealing 3D visuals with a look that’s a bit like scale models bathed in some nice lighting, and some of the textures even look like they have thumbprints still on them, which is a nice touch. These are joined by a whimsical soundtrack and voice over for characters with a goofy cartoony feel, with the main one having an “old timey prospector” sort of thing going. It works, even if it’s not quite as endearing as I suspect it thinks it is.

Overall, I think this is a good mix of elements, and I really appreciate how original it is, but there are a few issues here that hamper the experience, and it’s mainly in the Roguelike progression. This game doesn’t let you continue progressing as normal once you finish a boss fight, instead booting you back to the surface and making you repeat the trip multiple times before it will let you move on. This can be really frustrating if you’ve found yourself making real progress only to be forced to reset everything to zero not because you ran out of luck but because the game didn’t want to let you continue.

This problem affects the progression in the Management Simulation part of the game too, because booting you back before you can make real progress stymies your effort to get resources you need to build better structures in this mode. And sadly, even the Board Game mode has its own flaw – the hex tiles that are going to crumble will do damage to your units if they’re standing on one when a turn ends, but these tiles are not always clearly indicated, leading to you unknowingly placing your units in danger, which can be frustrating.

In the end, I still think EcoGnomix does enough that’s interesting and unique to make it worth a look if you like Board Games and Roguelikes. I just wish that it didn’t have such glaring flaws in each of the game’s primary elements, because if it didn’t I could absolutely see this being a much better game. As-is, it’s merely a pretty good game.

tl;dr – EcoGnomix is a game that combines Board Game, Roguelike, and Management Simulation elements in gameplay that’s primarily about sending small teams of gnomes into a mine to gather resources while fending off ravenous bats. There’s some really compelling and original gameplay here, but I feel like each of the main components of this game are flawed in some way, keeping the game from reaching its full potential. It’s still fun and original enough to be worth a look though, especially if you’re a fan of its individual genres.

Grade: B-

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