Chimeraland is a survival fantasy open-world game where you play as one of the game’s various races and just kinda… live life, I guess.
This game manages to be captivating yet annoying at the same time. There are many systems in the game, and I will give my opinion on some of them.
Character Creation
FURRIESSSSSS—-ahem. Excuse me. This game has the most extensive character creation I’ve seen in any game ever, and also gives a lot of freedom. You can make your character into anything from pretty young ladies to Eldritch abominations. And, you can choose your own voice for your character! Lives up to the advertisement. My favorite part of the game, honestly. The devs put a lot of effort into this one aspect of the game, and it really shows.
Controls
I’m playing on a tablet and the controls is really clunky… I can’t get my character to do anything when they’re midair (even though there’s apparently a glide system?) so I always end up falling head first… This is funny since my character is a bird lol.
The controls in the home system is also really weird. There’s an on-screen pointer where you point it to the thing in the home that you want to select. It’s pretty hard to control.
Other than that, the game is okay.
Lore
I’m pretty sure there is a lore. Yeah, I’m pretty there is a lore. Doesn’t really affect much, though.
Home System
If you like fully customizable homes, Chimeraland lets you do that. Unlike Genshin Impact, your house is in the open world and you build it from scratch. During the tutorial, you’ll choose a location to place your home (this can be changed later). You can pretty much do anything within the space you’ve selected. There is also a gardening mechanism which lets you build a farm lawn outside the area of your house. I’ve been looking around some people’s houses and some of them are really elaborate and impressive. Sadly I forgot to take a picture of some of the ones I really like. There are some crazy people who built their homes like modern skyscrapers. The game lets you do that, no problem. I love those crazy people.
One down side is that people have to fight for home space. If you like that one huge tree and want to build a tree house, but somebody already beat you to that tree, well… too bad.
The placement system is simple enough and allows you to build things easily, but moving items and relocating is a pain. Your character does the moving, and sometimes your character gets stuck while trying to move furniture and it’s annoying. And for some other furniture I can’t even find the ‘move’ function.
Also, the things in your house have limited durability and you have to constantly clean and repair them. I mean, why. Why do I still have to do chores in a game. Why.
Pet System
The pet thing in this game is really the only reason I still force myself to play it sometimes. I wanted a flying mount so bad but I got sick of the game before I got myself one. However, I did try a fish mount. It was the sunfish mount. It flops around on land like a stupid Magicarp and only ever behaves like a normal mount when in the water. I. Love. It. So. Much.
I really like the animal design in this game. Even a normal horse looks really good, and the beasts strolling around in the open world look real nice as well. I wanted to head to the ocean but I got too bored before I did that. Man, I wanted that whale but I’m too lazy to do so.
Battle
I don’t know if it’s just me but the projectile weapons in this game are really hard to control. I have no problem shooting in Genshin Impact or other games that have similar aiming mechanics, but I just can’t shoot properly in Chimeraland. It’s like shooting in the Nier Automata PC port without any of the auto-aim or the crosshair. Maybe it’s just that I’m not used to this kind of control, maybe it’s my touchscreen. So I just opt for using close-range weapons.
Dodging in this game is not as fun as in PS4 games, but for a mobile game it’s pretty fun. Your pet helps you fight so it’s a little more exciting.
Other than the open world, you can challenge totems and do boss runs on your game pod. There is a lot you can do in this game.
Environment
Those huge beasts are my favorite aspect of the game. You could feel their sheer size and magnificence, and you do feel small compared to them. I love that so much. Also, since they generally do not attack you when you approach, you don’t feel like it’s a boss fight and can enjoy strolling around with them.
The game features some of the prettiest water I’ve seen. I don’t know, but I like the water in this game. You could dive into the water. I haven’t found interesting stuff down there, but the game does have an underwater environment you could explore.
Also, the environments are beautiful. I love the East Asian vibes on some of the areas. The trees, the water, the rocks… ah, so pretty.
Other Gameplay
So there are other things like cooking, logging, crafting, mining, and that gem inlay thing I have no idea what for. It’s a lot of stuff to learn, thus the steep learning curve of this game. Cooking is a trial and error ordeal. Logging is fun because you see the trees fall and roll around. I hate the UI for crafting. And you have to upgrade the life skills which is annoying.
Some free premium stuff have expiry dates. In itself is not bad, but it’s something I don’t like when I see in a game.
Right, and this game does have coldness and hunger meters. Your character moves slower when cold or hungry. I don’t know if they die, I’ve never let them suffer that long. It’s not that annoying to constantly eat, so I don’t have much to say about this system other than I feel bad for those who chose to start the game out on the snowy mountain.
There was one funny thing though… I understand that some birds can’t fly, but the aquatic races in this game can drown. Lol, I know the game doesn’t want to give unfair advantages to one race over the other, but that’s a bit funny.
Thoughts
I wish the game would improve on its QOL stuff. Somehow this game manages to import every system I hate in Chinese browser-based MMORPG and slap it onto this stunning open-world environment, which made me both like and hate this game at the same time.
I recommend this game to those who are into exploring and just wanna see some cool animals and stuff, but honestly I don’t like Chimeraland’s gameplay. It’s a game with great concept, much freedom, very ambitious, but too many systems and other aspects of the design ruined the game for me.
bonutzuu 