I'm enjoying the hell out of it. Best $20.00 I ever spent.

Is Valheim grindy? Not for me. It's a survival game. You gather resources and build stuff that makes you stronger while mobs of varying deadliness try to kill you. You arrive with nothing, the prey of boars and greylings, and slowly become the most dangerous thing in the world.

Just now I have a windmill and two stone ovens, a spinning wheel, artisan table, fermenter, smelter and blast furnace working away on the base I built on top of a major hill. I am sitting by the ovens, which must be watched, enjoying the view of all that industry and the meadows beyond. Excuse me, the bread is done.

Same thing in Subnautica. You can't explore the big wreck until you can build a radiation suit. And you can't do that until…I'm not sure, I haven't got that deep into Subnautica yet. It looks gorgeous, though.

My huge gripe against Valheim is that other great games I bought on sale are languishing. I'll get to them eventually, no doubt.

I've been playing solo the whole time. It's fun, not too bad once you know what you're doing, but "hold my beer" moments will be punished.

Mostly I'm responding to point out that players have recently discovered that the old map generation tends to result in Mistland areas that are too small and not easy to get around in. The map generation system will be revamped for the update to solve this problem.

For a new player your choices are to:

a) start on the experimental build, which might have unforeseen problems in it, but keep the same map when the update hits

b) start in the normal branch and keep that map, with the risk of it not having a large enough Mistland area once you get that far

c) start in the normal branch and advance your character and gear as much as you can now, knowing that you can use that same character on a new map later and bring your stuff with you because characters and maps are saved separately and you can just log off of one map, and log on to the other, transferring stuff into chests as much as you want

since a lot of it has been said already, ill just add a short opinion piece

- valheim rightfully exploded on initial launch. the game itself is a great one, immersive and loveable. they ARE taking a long time to add content, but for all ive seen so far, every time content comes in, it is very polished and the game from launch always was on the very low end regarding bugs and glitches. quality of the product is good.

i still find myself playing a bit every once in a while just because i feel like havin some valheim. i love it enough to use it as a filler consistently, aside from the occasional full multiplayer sessions we do every once in a bit again.

this is how a game can feel when its not run by soulless corporate money printer minds

Never did multiplayer but played almost 700hrs solo. If it ever gets grindy I listen to a podcast or something, but it never bothered me. This game gives you certain feels I don't get from other games, art design and style is charming, well balanced gameplay. It gives you a general goal to defeat a big boss in each biome while still having the freedom to make your own goals. I enjoy figuring out logistics of transporting resources, being creative with house builds, then decorating my house with new material I come across. Overall this game just feels good to play.

1a) Yes
b) Depends on your playstyle. It allowed you to grind a lot to upgrade your armour before moving on to the next tier, but you never have to do that. Group can be more grindy, if multiple people want the max upgraded armour for some reason, since then you have to widen your gather radius.
c) Depends on how much you rush probably. 50h for "seeing most stuff" is realistic I'd say.

2) Your choice but: Mistlands is mostly "more content" and it's not finished. Stuff might change on the beta branch.

1a) Yes

1b) Very grindy. Every biome adds a new resource to grind to create/upgrade new gear. Solo vs. a group depends. You can split the grind among yourselves but you'll need more of each resource to cover the group. As an experienced player, I never upgrade my gear beyond level 2. The exception to that is max level troll armor which I use in the swamp biome (which may not be the best idea for new players =) )

1c) As stated above, 50ish could sound about right.

2) To be honest, I'd wait until Mistlands is out officially and read what people are saying then to decide if it will still be a game you'll want to invest that much time in. Mistlands diverges quite a bit from the first five biomes and it may not be your cup of tea afterwards.

1) It's fine to solo, it's not a punishing survival experience. It's more fun with coop but that isn't a deal breaker. I do both.
2) Most of the newer content (Mistlands / etc) will be many hours into the game so other than magic, it won' t be terribly different. It's up to you. Test branches often come with numerous bugs.

---I'm trying to wait for the proper build but I may not hold out either.

1a) The game is well suited for solo play and is nicely balanced at moving at each players own speed. Basically if you want to stay at bronze level forever just don't fight the second boss but at the same time if you want to advance fast you can do that too (though being prepared does take a little time and going to fast will mean missing some great adventures.)

1b)It's as grindy as you want it to be. If you want to build huge structures you'll need alot of resources, If you want to just stick to outposts then less resources. Once you've played awhile you will learn some tricks to make harvesting resources quicker. i.e. chop down trees that are close to each other and they will normally knock each other down saving time. Use a troll to mine copper for you etc.

1c) No idea it depends on a number of factors, how quickly you get used to the game mechanics, how quickly (lucky) you find the next bosses location, if you prepare correctly and how lucky you are at not running into situations that require you to "go get your body / gear" It's best to be prepared and if you do it right i.e upgrade gear, stock foods / potions, have spares to help get your body, don't be afraid to run away and come back when stronger you can easily get 50+ hours. If you go with outposts and portals and the like you can easily get 150+ hours. If you go full explore / build / farming / loot 600+ hours is easy.


2) Stick to the current stable build, the test one is well for testing and as you are new you won't really know what is out of place / bugs or a game mechanic. Also the test involves the mistlands area and so is late game so it won't really affect your start and learning the ropes.

Also some advice, don't rush, stick to the areas you are leveled / prepared for i.e. if you kill the first boss meadows and black forest is for you but stay away from the swamps until you have poison resist potions and have killed the second boss etc. and stay AWAY from the plains while sailing as Deathsquitos do some times fly off-shore abit and can 1-shot you.