To give a fair review you have to judge a game against its own design goals. With that in mind, here's the description from the Steam page:
A free-roaming squad based RPG focusing on open-ended sandbox gameplay features rather than a linear story. Be a trader, a thief, a rebel, a warlord, an adventurer, a farmer, a slave, or just food for the cannibals.
Research new equipment and craft new gear. Purchase and upgrade your own buildings to use as safe fortified havens when things go bad, or use them to start up a business. Aid or oppose the various factions in the world while striving for the strength and wealth necessary to simply survive in the harsh desert. Train your men up from puny victims to master warriors. Carry your wounded squad mates to safety and get them all home alive.
So far so good. I guess you could argue that "start a business" is a bit suspect, since I don't know if they ever really got the shop counter working.
Freeform gameplay in a seamless game world
in the largest single-player RPG world since Daggerfall, stretching over 870 square kilometers. The game will never seek to limit you or restrict your personal play style.
Definitely true -- even to the game's detriment at times.
Custom design as many characters as you want
and build up a whole squad to fight for you. Characters will grow and become stronger with experience, not just in their stats but their appearance too.
"As many characters as you want" is potentially misleading, but it's technically the truth. You can recruit new people up to the 30-person vanilla limit. If people die, you can always recruit more.
Original take on the RTS-RPG hybrid genre.
No "hero" characters with artificially stronger stats than everybody else- Every character and NPC you meet is potentially an equal, and has a name, a life.
This one is mechanically true, but I'd say the second part is flat out false. There is combat among wandering groups, caravans, and stuff, but other than that the NPCs and factions in the game are quite static without player involvement. The player is the only rags-to-riches story you'll ever find in the game -- that starved peasant in the United Cities you meet on day 1 will still be a starving peasant on day 100.
You are not the chosen one.
You're not great and powerful. You don't have more 'hitpoints' than everyone else. You are not the center of the universe, and you are not special. Unless you work for it.
True, but the game's systems are so hilariously broken that the "you aren't special" vibe wears off fast. You can become fabulously wealthy in a matter of days.
where you can research new technologies, upgrade your defences and craft new gear.
True, and I'm surprised this isn't more emphasized in the marketing materials, given that it's a pretty large chunk of gameplay.
Purchase and upgrade your own buildings
to use as safe fortified havens when things go bad, or use them to start up a business.
True, except where noted above.
Variation and possibilities of gameplay.
Be good, be evil, be a businessman, be a thief, live in a town, live in the desert, travel alone, travel in hordes, build a fortress, raze a city. Devote yourself to freeing slaves, or maybe end up a slave yourself.
You can do all of these things, in some sense, but to what extent is it interesting or meaningful? The game isn't going to react or treat you any differently in most of these cases, so a lot of it will just be LARPing.
Dynamic, ever changing world.
Support or hinder whoever you wish, or keep to yourself, the world won't stop moving. This is not just a "game", you are living and surviving in a simulated world.
Mostly false. Imagine you decide to just sit in town for a year, mining copper to pay for food but otherwise doing nothing. How different will the world look at day 365 compared to day 1? My guess is, not much.
Get captured by cannibals and eaten alive
, or sold off by slavers and forced to work in the mines. These are not scripted events, just a regular part of this chaotic world that ruins your life by chance. Anything can happen, yet anything can be overcome if you have the strength.
This is true, and one of the game's stronger points. The early game is intimidating when you're a new player.
Absolutely no Level-scaling.
The world does not level up along with you, and the shops don't change their inventory to only items matching your level. At the start of the game almost everyone will be stronger than you, and survival will always be a struggle. The game won't hold your hand or help you when you're down.
This is true, apart from the "survival will always be a struggle" bit.
Realistic medical system that affects gameplay.
A character with a wounded leg will limp or crawl and slow the party down, wounded arms means you must use your sword one-handed or not at all. Severe injuries will result in amputees needing robotic limb replacements. Blood loss means you can pass out, and the blood will attract predators. A character’s stats are affected by equipment, encumbrance, blood loss, injuries and starvation.
All true, as far as I know.
that allows for characters to reason and work towards long-term goals and desires. Squads work together and carry their wounded to safety. Characters can be setup to take care of micromanagement for you and run production in your base.
I guess this is true in relation to friendly AI. The base automation seems to work pretty well overall, which is a nice feature. I can't really think of any cases where the enemy AI did anything other than zerg rush.
Aid or oppose the various factions
in the world while striving for the strength and wealth necessary to simply survive in the harsh environment.
Technically true, although the implementation sucks. Take the Cannibal Hunters, for example. Can you really "aid" them in any way other than following a group around and helping them in battle? Does the game in any way acknowledge you for doing this? This is a group that should be looking for recruits to replenish and expand its ranks, yet there's no way to join forces with them even when it would make sense to do so.
with no design influences, or alterations dictated by men in gray suits who have never played a game before in their lives.
Indie good, corporate bad, sure.
There are no fantasy-knock-off cliches. No magic.
The world certainly does have a unique feel to it, which is one of the strongest aspects of the game.
----------------------------
So overall, I'd say the game delivers quite a bit on its promises, especially early on when you're still learning. But inevitably you start to see the limitations of the simulation, and how the decision to throw out almost all scripted content leads to a world that is just flat and disinterested.