Just about any time I want to go somewhere, I have to cross into the enshrouded area. More times than not, I try and spend as little time in there as possible. After all, I only get a couple of minutes before I die there anyway.

I, however, wanted to farm up some resources down there. Some of them I'd need to upgrade our flame altar. There was just another part of me wanting to know if I could discover any new crafting recipes by finding new materials in the area.

The area itself is also just so odd-looking. As I'd progress in the game, I'd discover each own had a couple of new resources that can only be found in those enshrouded areas. Sometimes there would even be more advanced ores that I'd not be farming outside of these areas till I was in a higher-tier region.

Something that still rather impresses me is just the number of random buildings and other areas. Not everything has to be some major site with a bunch of quests for items in it. It is just fun to see a random house and go and loot it.

A part of me also wonders how many just set a flame altar next to a random house and just take it over. Other than how decayed many of them are. The thought has crossed my mind at least a couple of times now.

Getting all the resources for the different kinds of building blocks to make a structure can be quite time-consuming. While for now our modest little encampment is slowly turning into a small village. There would come a time when we would start farming for days, and the resources needed would be. Yet the whole time, we could have just taken over a place and fixed it up a bit.

Naturally, it would not be long before I found myself in yet another dungeon. This place looked simple, but it was anything but that. We could see that just four triggers of some kind, which ended up being buttons, needed to be pressed to open a door. Behind that door would be the dungeon's main loot. Finding those buttons, however, was going to be the issue.

The long corridor in the main hallway also had four or so doors in it. Some ended up being locked, and we would also have to find the button to unlock those doors. There was also an area you could glide down into that was covered in the shroud that I suspected would have at least a button or two hiding in it.

One of the buttons ended up being one you had to hit with an arrow after you climbed up one of the sides. Another one was, in fact, hiding in the shroud areas as I thought it would be. We found another that you had to get to by doing a simple jump puzzle, by swinging, and using your hook to crab onto handles.

The fourth and final button, however, was hiding from us quite well. I’m sure everyone knows the feeling. You could have sworn you explored the place from top to bottom ten times over and still have not found what you are missing.

After doing yet another lap around the whole dungeon. I found myself on this one ledge that I've been in before. It had a slight jumping puzzle to get up to the top. It then just seemed you were to jump off and end up in the basement area.

There was also this strange glowing plant that explodes and removes shrouded time if you are in an enshrouded area. Because of that, I was staying away from the plant. Out of frustration, I hit it with a bow I had just acquired not that long ago. It blew up and revealed a passageway behind it. After a bit of clearing and going up a wall, the button was up top that opened the final door that led to a golden chest.

After that, I was back to farming for a flame upgrade. Upgrading the flame on the altar allows you to go into certain enshrouded areas that were totally deadly to you before. It also increases by a single minute how long you can last in shroud areas. Among a couple of other small benefits.

While the game itself is amazing to explore. A rather nice benefit to upgrading is unlocking further altar flames you can place down. I end up using them as forward teleportation bases. Along with putting them around critical areas that I find myself needing to go to a lot. I find these help out a lot when I'm progressing in a new area, and I'm having a hard time getting around. You only get a couple, so I have to remember to delete old ones I'm not using anymore to drop a new one.

There is also an option to upgrade the altar itself. This gives you more building space. After a couple of upgrades, this game gives you quite a generous amount of area to build in. The best part is that there are no upkeep costs. So, for once, this is a game I don’t need to log into weekly to check on fuel or anything to keep it owned.

Speaking of upgrades. We also went out and freed the alchemist. While I would not need him for now. He ends up being rather important. This game has both crafting benches and NPCS you need to talk to for making things. It can make things a bit complicated in trying to remember where you need to go to craft an item. As there are like 10 main NPCS, there feels like an endless amount of crafting benches. Then you have a bunch of side NPCs you end up unlocking later down the line as well.

Each region of the game has one of these massive towers. They make great locations to glide off from. You can also teleport to them once you have them unlocked. Part of the struggle is just getting to them. The other part is climbing the tower, solving puzzles within it till you get to the top.

This one was not that bad. Just a couple of traps to avoid. I had to find some buttons to unlock the next teleport up to another floor of the tower. It seems kind of random how hard or easy these end up being. Some much deeper into the game were easy, while others that I thought would be easy were a nightmare to get up to the top. I’m glad the early game of this one was rather simple.

Final Thoughts

It ended up being quite the productive day. With the clearing of a few random buildings, a dungeon, lots of farming for materials, and even acquiring the alchemist. The day ended with noticing I could reach a silver chest if I were a bit clever. I ended up getting a weapon upgrade out of it.

Information

Screenshots were taken, and content was written by @Enjar about Enshrouded.

Disclosure: A review copy of the game was received for free.

Disclosure: This content was written during early access.