The Crust

About

The Crust is a single player survival city builder game with post-apocalyptic and science fiction themes. It was developed by VEOM Studio and was released on July 15, 2024. It received mostly positive reviews from players.

Welcome to the Crust - a game that gives you a role of the CEO of the gigantic Moon colonizing company. It is a large-scale economical simulator that also brings elements of survival along with rich setting and dramatic script.

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75%

Audience ScoreBased on 1,855 reviews

story143 positive mentions

stability81 negative mentions

Engaging and addictive base-building and factory automation gameplay with a strong strategic layer and multiple mechanics like resource management, colony simulation, and trade.
Immersive sci-fi atmosphere enhanced by excellent soundtrack and polished graphics, with a compelling story and voice acting.
Active development with frequent updates, bug fixes, and developer responsiveness showing commitment to improving the experience.

Late game performance issues including severe FPS drops and bugs that cause systems to freeze or crash, sometimes requiring restarting the game or losing progress.
Drones and AI-controlled units suffer from poor pathfinding and prioritization, causing frustrating micromanagement and inefficiency in logistics and repairs.
Game is in early access with many bugs, incomplete features, UI/UX inconsistencies, steep learning curve, and pacing issues making some missions frustrating or impossible, especially time-limited contracts.

story
620 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
23%
74%
3%
The game features a generally engaging and well-crafted sci-fi story that integrates base-building and automation gameplay, enhanced by voice acting and branching choices. However, many players find the story pacing rushed and overwhelming, with numerous time-limited and often frustrating missions that can lead to softlocks and frequent bugs, detracting from the overall experience. While the narrative adds immersion and depth, it still feels unfinished and unbalanced, and many recommend sandbox mode over story mode until further polish and content improvements are made.
- “Rarely do you get a factory sim style game with a decent story and voice acting that has such good immersion.”
- “The lore itself is also very well made, the whole storyline is well written and your decisions do matter overall.”
- “The story mode is mostly voice acted with the odd cutscene here and there, a fun little story mode with an overarching threat to motivate you to keep optimizing and producing.”
- “The story has you making critical choices without any info on what the various options are going to mean, with missions that are down-right impossible to complete without save/load.”
- “Story mode jumps from 'send 200 of this stuff whenever you get around to it' to 'here's a 7 part timed quest and you lose the game if you fail' with no warning whatsoever.”
- “The game has a story that is basically an over-glorified tutorial that makes you repeat yourself, the atmosphere feels clunky and not very well thought out as well as not letting you feel like a pioneer but rather a person put in charge of an over-explored moon, and you’re just there to pick up the scraps people leave behind with annoying hauling missions.”
gameplay
320 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
30%
63%
7%
The gameplay of "The Crust" offers a solid and engaging core loop with well-designed mechanics blending automation, base building, and resource management in a sci-fi lunar setting, appealing especially to fans of colony sims and factory builders. While praised for its depth, strategic complexity, and unique features like multi-level maps and research systems, it currently suffers from numerous bugs, clunky UI, balancing issues, and occasional repetitiveness that hinder the experience. Active developer support and promising updates suggest potential for improvement, but the gameplay remains rough around the edges in its early access state.
- “Fun game with layering of mechanics and systems to manage that would keep any RTS fan sated.”
- “The GUI can be a bit clunky for building sometimes, but otherwise most of the mechanics are pretty solid, well thought out, and make sense in the universe the devs have crafted.”
- “The core gameplay loop is engaging enough to keep you hooked, and with further updates, this could easily become a standout title in its genre.”
- “Endgame materials feel useless, core gameplay is riddled with bugs, half of the game mechanics involving colonists barely work, and performance is utterly trash — the worst I have seen in a long time.”
- “"The crust" does not get much better with time; it becomes much more repetitive, and the narratives full of interactive meaningful choices do not save the gameplay over time, unlike "Frostpunk" where procedural narrative choices maintain engagement.”
- “As of right now, I can't recommend playing the game; the mechanics of the science system and how the rover works with mission timing make some missions impossible to finish, and if you don't manage research carefully, it can completely ruin your progress and leave you with nothing to do for a very long time.”
music
149 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
56%
42%
2%
The game's music is widely praised for its immersive, atmospheric, and high-quality soundtrack, often considered a standout feature that enhances the space and automation gameplay experience. While many appreciate the variety and depth of tracks, some note repetitiveness and desire a music selector or more songs. Overall, the soundtrack is regarded as exceptional and sometimes even worth purchasing separately.
- “Easily the best soundtrack to any A or AA game I have played; 100 odd tracks so repetition isn't an issue and just high quality both vocal and instrumentals.”
- “The music is phenomenal—honestly some of the best I’ve heard in a long time. I’m so glad I picked up the soundtrack, and huge kudos to the musicians for creating such an immersive experience.”
- “The soundtrack and music perfectly complement the atmosphere, creating a long-lasting and surprisingly soothing experience.”
- “The soundtrack is terrible.”
- “Don't moan in my ears and call it music.”
- “The music in this game is hilariously overdramatic, as a handful of drones move bricks around the moon.”
graphics
139 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
54%
42%
4%
The graphics are generally praised for their solid, detailed, and aesthetically pleasing sci-fi style that enhances immersion and complements the gameplay well. While not groundbreaking or ultra-realistic, they strike a good balance between clarity and functional design, running smoothly even on modest hardware for the most part. Some users note occasional dated visuals, minor graphical glitches, and stability issues impacting the overall experience.
- “The contrast between the barren lunar landscape and high-tech interiors creates a compelling sci-fi aesthetic.”
- “The graphics are good, I liked it right away. The gameplay itself is not boring, but on the contrary, it gives you the opportunity to try all the mechanics and experiment with them.”
- “Everything is clear, the graphics are crisp, and it seems to snap into position very smoothly.”
- “We have 90s real time strategy games like "Earth 2150 The Moon Project" that are set on the moon surface, that look more appealing than "The Crust", because they understood in the 90s to use illumination to fix the dullness of visuals of a grey setting.”
- “The graphics feel dated, and the game crashes roughly every other session.”
- “While the settings say "high" it looks like mashed potato graphics.”
stability
83 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
2%
98%
The game is widely regarded as very buggy and unstable, with frequent crashes, graphical glitches, and multiple gameplay mechanics not functioning properly even well into early access. While some players find the bugs tolerable and see potential for improvement, many report save-breaking issues, frustrating roadblocks, and awkward controls that significantly hinder the experience. Overall, the stability is a major concern currently, though ongoing patches suggest gradual progress.
- “So much content already, and while not entirely bug free, I've yet to encounter one that breaks the game in any way.”
- “That said, it is an early access game, not bug-free, and incomplete. I believe many of the negative comments come from expectations higher than those for an early access title.”
- “The game is a complete buggy mess since release, with save-breaking updates forcing players to start over.”
- “Despite frequent patches, it remains a buggy mess, even for an early access game.”
- “Features are mostly in a buggy, half-baked state, causing regular roadblocks that require tedious workarounds and reloading previous saves.”
optimization
80 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
14%
63%
23%
Optimization is a major pain point for this game, with many users reporting severe performance issues, especially in late-game scenarios involving large bases, numerous drones, and complex logistics. Although developers are actively releasing patches and improvements, the optimization remains poor, with frame rate drops, CPU bottlenecks, and limited multicore utilization frequently noted. While some report smooth performance on mid-tier systems, the consensus is that significant optimization work is still needed before the game can handle large-scale play smoothly.
- “Unfortunately one of the biggest problems is performance currently, but the developers promised an update soon which improves the performance significantly.”
- “Lots of bugs fixed, new content and better optimization!”
- “There are definitely some performance problems, but the devs are actively working on the game and respond on their Discord to your questions.”
- “Despite the game being in early access for nearly 2 years, the developers are mostly focused on delivering performance improvements and forget about delivering deep content for the game.”
- “In its current state, the endgame performance completely ruins the experience.”
- “The endgame performance is also not good; my frames started to drop even though I have a high-end machine.”
atmosphere
40 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
57%
33%
10%
The game's atmosphere is widely praised for its immersive, cosmic, and haunting lunar ambiance, strongly enhanced by a well-crafted soundtrack that deeply complements the setting. While many find the environment engaging and atmospheric, some critiques point out scientific inaccuracies and occasional clunky execution that diminish the sense of realism and pioneering spirit. Overall, the atmosphere stands out as a major strength, creating a compelling mood that resonates well with fans of sci-fi strategy and base-building genres.
- “The stunning lunar landscapes, immersive atmosphere, and thoughtful strategic depth make it a must-play for fans of base-building and sci-fi strategy games.”
- “Mostly, I really love the atmosphere of this game – it gives off lonely, haunting vibes, which are perfect for the setting.”
- “Whether it's the pure instrumental tracks, the audio snippets from real world missions (I'm pretty sure the infamous "Houston, we have a problem" from the Apollo 13 mission is there), or the tracks with vocals, they all help set the atmosphere.”
- “No effort at all in the cutscenes to match the senses of scale or realism implied by the text; a 'geostationary' station that is clearly in low Earth orbit, a space station at an unspecified 'Lagrange point' which is clearly just a couple thousand km above the moon surface, an asteroid strike that somehow causes a surface-scraping dust storm on the moon despite it having no atmosphere at all.”
- “The game has a story that is basically an over-glorified tutorial that makes you repeat yourself; the atmosphere feels clunky and not very well thought out, as well as not letting you feel like a pioneer but rather a person put in charge of an over-explored moon, and you're just there to pick up the scraps people leave behind with annoying hauling missions.”
- “There is no atmosphere on the moon, so I don't think there would be a pressure wave like that, nor would it do the damage the game is implying.”
grinding
27 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
4%
96%
Grinding in the game is widely criticized as tedious and frustrating, especially in mid to late game where manual setup, repetitive production processes, and inefficient automation become overwhelming. The lack of quality-of-life features like blueprinting and copy-pasting conveyor setups exacerbates the grind, making resource management, maintenance, and contract fulfillment feel slow and laborious. Overall, while the early game pace is acceptable, the gameplay quickly devolves into a repetitive, grind-heavy experience that hampers enjoyment.
- “The game in its current form is extremely tedious.”
- “Tedious automation and conveyor system, annoying byproducts (looking at you, slag), and still lots and lots of bugs, especially with colonists, which wouldn't be so bad if they weren't required to boost the productivity of most facilities to a reasonable state to fulfill endgame requirements.”
- “Some of the big contracts with large amounts of heavy resources get super tedious when you need to fill like 6 large containers for it and then fill them in short order.”
replayability
22 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
32%
54%
14%
Replayability is generally praised, especially due to procedural generation, strategic depth, and difficulty options that keep gameplay fresh and engaging. However, some users note limited variety and unfinished features in early access hinder replay value for now. Ongoing updates improving stability and content are expected to enhance replayability further.
- “Lots of replayability; I've started and restarted 20 games, and it is never a drag.”
- “It's super playable, endlessly replayable, and just plain enjoyable.”
- “Replayability certainly exists since the map randomizes the node locations in every new game on sandbox and campaign modes.”
- “The procgen-replayability of "The Crust" is a lot worse than it is in "Whiskerwoods."”
- “I don't think that this has any replayability in it.”
- “Sandbox play is identical to tutorial campaign so there is no replayability.”
humor
10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The humor in the game is noted for its unintentional charm, with players finding amusement in its poor balancing, overdramatic music, and quirky bugs typical of early access titles. Some appreciate the game's tongue-in-cheek moments and ironic achievements, though certain humor elements, like the character Alice, are divisive and not well-received by all. Overall, the humor adds a lighthearted layer despite some mixed reactions.
- “The music in this game is hilariously overdramatic, as a handful of drones move bricks around the moon.”
- “How funny, after finishing the tutorial you get the achievement 'now the fun begins'.”
- “This is an early access game so bugs are to be expected - some of them are quite funny like the ice machines working when there is no power but hey - early access says it in the title!”
emotional
4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Users find the emotional engagement lacking due to a generic corporate storyline and slow early gameplay, suggesting a preference for a more intense, nationalistic narrative that fosters stronger player connection. However, they appreciate responsiveness to issues like bug fixes communicated through community channels.
- “I prefer race, blood, soil, survival and a more exaggerated and nationalistic and emotionally engaging storyline, instead of bland generic mega corporation A vs mega corporation B.”
- “So the story could have more engagement or be more emotionally engaging to the player than basically 'Amazon vs Microsoft' type generic mega corporation.”
monetization
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
50%
50%
The monetization is praised for being honest and straightforward, with no misleading microtransactions, aligning well with the game's bold advertising claims.
- “Honest game with no BS microtransactions”