Take On Mars

Take On Mars
62
Metacritic
55
Steam
67.934
xDR
Our rating is calculated based on the reviews and popularity of the game.
Price
$5.39
Release date
9 February 2017
Developers
Publishers
Steam reviews score
Total
55 (1 704 votes)

Take On Mars places you right in the middle of mankind’s most exciting undertaking. Start out in the seat of a rover operator, finish as the first human to have ever set foot on the Red Planet.

Show detailed description

Take On Mars system requirements

Minimum:

  • OS:Windows Vista or Windows 7
  • Processor:Intel Core2Duo 2.5 GHz or AMD Athlon Phenom X4 or faster
  • Memory:2 GB RAM
  • Graphics:NVIDIA Geforce 8800GT or ATI Radeon HD 3870 with Shader Model 3 and 512 MB VRAM, or faster
  • DirectX®:9.0c
  • Hard Drive:6 GB HD space
  • Sound:DirectX Audio compatible
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Reviews
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Obarh-Eight
Obarh-Eight

Sometimes you find a hidden gem of a game in Early Access. Take On Mars is NOT one of those. There's no game here! Just a partial tutorial, a non-savable multiplayer option where there are no players, and a few limited scenarios that are barely playable.

I pushed through 6 hours to see if there was something I was missing, but it's a big NOTHING burger! Don't waste your money. Luckily I got it on sale, but even on sale it's not worth a cent!

Lil_fluff
Lil_fluff

Gets boring and hard 10 hours into the game.

Ravusy
Ravusy

This became abandonware right after they pulled the Early Access tag. Riddled with bugs. Treat it as a unfinished failed Early Access game.

pikor
pikor

I came back over a year after I bough it and still not fixed. Training scenario is still broken. Camera zoom still does not work. I had so much hopes for this game. Disappointment.

afghan_serbia2007
afghan_serbia2007

Knightsleepers is a personal friend of mine for many years. He has been actively making a mod that improve game play experience, allowing multiple people to play lag and glitch free. He does this with open source code free of charge because he loves the game. He ask for nothing other than reviving a dead game he enjoys. Only fools would slander his efforts. I support my friend 100%.

TheAvPman
TheAvPman

This game could be incredible. It has so many mechanics that could be game changing. Sadly everything that makes this game fun and interesting is broken in some way and since the developer abandoned it I can assure you that things are going to stay that way.

Mantier
Mantier

This Game is great ,,, Great work on the new updates knightsleeper

SL4YR
SL4YR

Interesting game, been playing it since it came out. It has certainly come a long way.

Not action packed or anything, but I enjoy roaming the surface of Mars and just seeing what's out there.

Cool ambient music makes it a pretty atmospheric game. I enjoy upgrading the rovers and trying them out on the surface.

Shadow614
Shadow614

I loved the mechanics of this game, and the campaign was good, although I wish it were longer. The negative part of this game is that the multiplayer has barely any activities for the player.

Just Lewis
Just Lewis

This has to have the worst user experience and interface I have ever seen in a game.

The sway and motion with every movement of the player character gives you motion sickness. Head bob can't be turned off and sprinting feels so bad. Difference between sprinting and walking is quite dramatic too so you kinda have to sprint.

Inventory is very poorly laid out:
Everything inside the object you are interacting with is on the left of the screen, your inventory on the right and the ground is at the top. Accidently miss any of the tiny boxes when handling something in the inventory and it is dropped to the ground. Shortcuts for picking up an object put it in the largest slot first rather than look for the smallest slot available too.

I don't remember playing this game before but I tried it again today. Cannot get into it because it's such an uncomfortable interface and experience.

moonlightavenger
moonlightavenger

I'm so tired of seeing this. Great concepts ruined by buggy games.

William Brown
William Brown

Its very difficult not a lot of instructions but once you get into it and remember to save often its a really good game if your not in a hurry

Tango
Tango

Its sad that they abandoned this game but it is great fun if you have the patience for it, its one of the best games for surviving on mars

ToothpasteMain | Twitch
ToothpasteMain…

Neat concept, but just another forgotten "Early Access" title

ssku
ssku

Far too many bugs in an otherwise very interesting game.

Anonymous
Anonymous

it's good, but not *that* good, I like it but I wouldn't recommend it.

drink
drink

I was playing the tutorial when one of the pieces I needed to complete the 3d printer fell through the ground, and then fell forever. At that point I realized that this was not a serious effort, and uninstalled. Bye, Felicia.

Baumannator
Baumannator

This game started out great in early access but than they rushed it out unfinished and it is now now abandoned. This game is buggy, missing many features, please don't buy this game.

apep.menethil
apep.menethil

Great game and pretty challenging

iluve2read247
iluve2read247

I played the tutorial and I couldn't get the canister mounted on the rover even though I used the full canister the game kept saying it was empty and on wrong, so I thought maybe I should use a game controller Nope! although the game says it supports it, my controller don't work. This game had so much potential but then the dev just abandoned it.

Tuxide
Tuxide

This game is a toy. If you're looking for a serious rover sim, Webots is free and open source now.

Dein Oberstleutnant
Dein Oberstleutnant

If you're really into sim games.

FriskyJohnson
FriskyJohnson

Cool concept. Abandoned. Don't buy.

Servant
Servant

This game is abandoned. Waste of money.

Pablo Guise
Pablo Guise

Game breaking bugs, but the workshop has the fixes. Fine for £5.00 but thats about as much as I would pay given the other reviews about the devs.

slatan
slatan

This game is not for everyone, IMHO it has a limited audience but would really benefit from going VR (/shrug).

The "missions" in the game feel like they were written for the types of persons who would sit down at a party and sort the chex-mix into different bowls. There are no pointers or hints for some goals, and when you can figure them out in most cases they are not worth attempting.

I put the game in DEV mode (sandbox) and actually started having fun - there are certainly some mods you must have (as I've never figured out the stock cable stuff to make things work). You will also still die (last time I attempted it) if you setup a single habitat and a plant room with an air-lock (instead of exchanging the air types, it pulls a vacuum and kills you (even if you leave the door's open (bugged)).
Item placement is horrible and will take you forever to figure out; but once you have it down its not as bad.
making everything work is also not that clear, and you will have to experiment with a lot (keep backup saves).

Prince Yuval
Prince Yuval

great atmosphire and carrer mode. multiplayer could be more fun if more people would play it

Frozzen
Frozzen

It's the Science and not a lot of the sci-fi

Max
Max

The game is pretty good, if you put aside the bugs and lack of updates.
I feel these types of games have a lot of potential, they just need a loving developer.

Simon Ferocious
Simon Ferocious

Clunky as hell with bugs all over the place. I actually quite liked it.

Cosmic
Cosmic

I would avoid this one.

It was never finished for a start, the technical and performance issues are a significant problem regardless of your computer specs, the recommended requirements are meaningless when an RTX and 8 core CPU struggles with 10FPS, it clearly never has and never will get any optimisation patches, the fact its still on sale in this state is pretty shocking.

Geneticus
Geneticus

I am really torn on this game. On the one hand, it is a buggy mess. The physics in use is not uned well at all making things explode without warning. Hitting a Cargo truck ladder, for instance tears the retractable side stairs off and can't be repaired. Turning fast while holding a spare space suit can send everything not tied down flying in random directions. The game does however have some incredible game systems, that would have made gameplay absolutely incredible.

The game looks like the crafting experience was intended to be modular. Habitat building and the 3D printer are the core of it. You gat a 3D printer that can print items from raw elements, but only small items. What is unique and incredible is you can then use it to make a modular 3D printer able to print items at any scale. The largest item is the giagantic Mobile Labratory Rover. Had this modular concept been carried through to include designing, saving, and publishing the printable items themselves, it would have offered limitless varied emergent gameplay. For example, the resource processing refineries could have been player designed and built using combinations of modules impacting the performance of the refinery as well as the look, size and output characteristics.

It can be confounding to get the game into a sandbox for single Player. The game auto saves on objective completion in scenarios only. A timed autosave is nowhere to be found resulting in hours of work lost after a physics glitch sends you supermaning helmet glass first into the rocky ground. !!!!Warning!!!! : Don't run while holding electrical cables!!!
Death leaves you seemingly stuck waiting for a respawn or load from previous save option. There is no instruction and you have to manually load a previous save from the ESC menu.

QoL UI options are non-existant. Most games will implement the ESC key contextually, meaning if you have a open secondary window like the map or Inventory, ESC will close them successively before bringing up the game menu. ESC is the only key that can close the 3D printer menu, but you have to exit other UI sub-menus with E or I. Making muscle memory for efficent gameplay, very frustrating.

The research and tech trees only apply to campaigns and scenarios. in a sandbox start they have no function. You start with the basic (2 massive cargo containers) items to build everything and have no progressive tech or science progression.
If the game hadn't been abandoned, the Modding community wouldn't also be a ghost town.

If this were my project, I would have implemented a voxel based terrain system with better resource collection (different types of rock, water extraction through permafrost and Ice...), science and tech progression, reparable vehicles and items, cargo tie downs, scrap and recycling systems, waste management and processing, economy through a reachable Mars orbital station, and a full ECS allowing player created items to have capabilities and stats based on the source elements and components used in production. For example, having a materials choice in making a refinery could allow lighter carbon composite materials at the cost of being able to refine only low temperature non metal resources. Adding some Factory game elements would result in the players creating various mining and production facilities tailored to making large constructions.

None of this will come to pass however. Playing the game makes me feel sad that it will never reach its potential. I don't recommend this game for anything more than casual play for the average gamer. However, any indie developers should definitely spend at least 30 hours playing. It is a great example of brilliant and bad design rolled up into a single unfinished package.

SHINHIND
SHINHIND

played a few hours and it has crashed on my Core i7 10th gen, Geforce RTX2070 so many times that its unplayable, i want my money back!!!! also it is a great game if it did not crash or that it was so hard to get resources. and the ball of dirt runs out of dirt so you have to move your surface extractor 150m or more to get more dirt even though there is nothing but dirt where you were. so disappointed looks it it would be the perfect game if those issues were not a issues. Bohemia Interactive Should be Black Listed on Steam. Steam needs to take this game down. publishers should earn the right to be on here.

cidaalluck
cidaalluck

very hard but informative, play this and you will get all of the desire to ever go into space out of your system forever. There is no place like earth.

HL_scientist
HL_scientist

Take On Mars is an Acquired taste, you either like it or you dont.

T.O.M is a realistic take on the whole exploring mars, this is a SIMULATOR, so prepare for it to be a boring process. Not really anything to do except for survive and build a modular base, maybe better with friends. It has its downsides and BUGS.

I suggest getting it on sale.

bmwbaxter
bmwbaxter

Waste of time in my opinion. I have tried like 15 times but can't even make it past the intro.

swatkats radical squadron
swatkats radic…

not sure why people are hating on this its actually a good game

you can build mars rovers and explore mars

as well as do a manned story like the martian

as for bugs i have never scene any TBh not saying there not there any game have bugs

for those people who say the game is abandoned thats questionable

the game was released in 2017 and everything the planned was done ;)

be like saying the abandoned arma 2 lol

DiluteWings
DiluteWings

manned mission is thrilling, and rover missions take time to do but are interesting

KWPaul_Games
KWPaul_Games

Abandoned, buggy not worth the time. My 140 hours are reflected from keeping with development from when it was first released on Early Access till Abandoned. Sad because it had great potential

Mic
Mic

3 hours in and don't know what I'm doing here. It doesn't tell you anything about the task you need to do to advance.
Tutorial is all about human on Mars, Campaign is all about getting to Mars. Well I think it is as I'm not getting anywhere.
I have several achievements already and don't know what I did to get them. Especially created a craft, tried but can't see it anywhere.

Voldar
Voldar

However much I like simulation games, I've given this a good shot, but this is not a game, it's torture. Somehow the developers have completely lost the idea that a game should be fun along the way.

Examples of bad design:
1. Rovers are _extremely_ slow, time warp does not exist, and waypoints etc. cannot be set automated.
2. Grind! You'll have to do _several_ 'repeat' missions to save up enough money for the next step in the tech tree (and see #1)

Once you've had your fill of the rover-grind, you 'restart' the game into human exploration mode and you enter into a save-scumming scenario in which you'll _guaranteed_ be frustrated as hell having to save-load 10+ times to find stuff in time etc. Horrible design.

Alba gu brath
Alba gu brath

THIS GAME HAD SO MUCH POTENTIAL BUT THE DEVS ABANDONED IT A VERY LONG TIME AGO

The Surreal Taco
The Surreal Taco

The fact is was released and had only a few minor updates shows a complete rip off. Never intended as anything but a money maker from Mars movies that were in theatres at time. Waste of Money

EUPatrik
EUPatrik

decent early-access game, not ready to be released (full of bugs)
1. the tasks sometimes say RAD or EAS, but even if you have RAD you cannot complete it.
2. if you are landing a rover near edge of the map hope to land in the map or have a safe file not too long ago :)
3. the rover with solar panel doesn't charge when you're skipping time aka. leaving it on the sun for two days
3b. it would be nice if you can have the game opened with another window (let the rover recharge while you're browsing what to get for dinner
4. the manned part is unplayable... 20kg things just fly around when you touch them with anything, buggy loaded with four 20kg containers is behaving as it would weight nothing (100kg should be stable even on moon)
now for positives:
-when on sale it doesn't cost much
-game you don't need too much brain activity
-it's a cool concept, just need work

Lahmacun Yiyici Beğ
Lahmacun Yiyici Beğ

This game is like a well-planned cruel joke. Time management is pathetic and you can find yourself without any autosaves after playing for 10 hours. Do you know what goes great with ridiculous autosaving system? I do; constant crashes or unavoidable freezing, resulting in a forced shut down, with no reason at all. Anything can be a reason to lose your progress.

This game, pathetically, does not keep running on background even if it's windowed. I've seen many posts asking for a fix but it's still not happening and it's obvious that it won't happen ever. I know that it won't happen because the game is abandoned by devs for good.

I have 6 hours officially and over 15 hours unofficially and I haven't got past the small rover stage because the game will freeze to death for no reason and my entire save is gone if I hadn't saved manually, due to the ludicrous autosave system. The worst part: I've spent so many hours restarting from the very beginning that I won't be able to refund this unfinished joke of a game.

FertZ
FertZ

i couldnt be more disappointed in bohemia interactive.

kellym41
kellym41

Every time I get a little progress going the stupid game crashes. I'm just tired of having to save every 5 mins or face a crash and lose my progress. I wasted my money on this thing!

kimmys got a gun
kimmys got a gun

fun game IF 1 you magicly get threw the tutorial walking part to slow 2 you can fill the buggy and find the cargo trust me if you do so go gamble you have the luck aswell as tring to fill it is damb near impossable...and finaly...be carfle sliding things thay will go threw the map lost forever.;..i may have over 100 hours in this game but 98 % if fighting to barly do anything ...so sad its grate grafics idea and fun ....when you arnt trying to activly build anything or fill the buggy :((((

ErikV70
ErikV70

Great game. Beautiful graphics, story and interaction.
Played through a great part of the robotics campaign and the entire manned missions.
The manned campaign is really good. I liked the buildup, atmosphere, voice acting and the level of guidance.
This game has much of what i like in survival games. Mars, resources, power, oxygen, etc.
It was much better than what I expected after reading some bad publicity. Apart from a few crashes - from which i could easily reload - i found no bugs.
Some of the work in the game could be found tedious for players than want fast action. Long rover travels and lots of mining, transport and construction.
As for me, I don't mind to do some 'work' in order to fully immerse in a game.
Now I will continue playing and try some of the custom scenarios on Steam.

Update: started modding and created a PHEV buggy. Totally addicted to this beautiful game. I like the grind and the scarcity of resources and power, as well as optimizing the UI and modding.

xox_luna_xox
xox_luna_xox

Just not my kinda game, but looked like it had potential.

Freidenker
Freidenker

It's buggy and abandoned, but man, what a great game! I always come back to play it, the sensation of being actually on another planet surviving is truly well accomplished, a game to let your imagination fly, a true simulation. Still looking for some videogame that's something alike, but none gave me the real feeling that Take on Mars does. We really need more games like this one. Thanks to the community a lot has been added to the game giving it much more of playability.

Yarminarr
Yarminarr

Pretty cool roving around mars gathering science. Buy on sale.

Dave Yogpod
Dave Yogpod

Man this game had potential but none of the content is satisfying anymore than arma is good at making guns work properly.

WarPig
WarPig

I had such high hopes for this game but sadly they have abandoned this game. As others have said in reviews just buy the game when it goes on sell and dont worry about the crashes they happen.

Mars
Mars

🎶Take🎶On🎶Mars🎶(take on mars)🎶Take🎶Mars🎶On🎶(take mars on)

Reggie
Reggie

Matt Damon Simulator in Arma 3 on Mars.

darkdragonmage376
darkdragonmage376

I do recommend this game, but be very, VERY careful...with the mods you add. (I somehow broke the game when adding mods that changed the "depletion or amount" value of the resources in the sector.)
Other than that, it's very entertaining, especially since it's done with the perspective, as if a "regular person" got the chance to go to Mars!!!

Kora
Kora

Amazing, yet unforgiving. Could do with more of a tutorial.

yer_average_pancak▮
yer_average_pancak▮

A very fun and relaxing game full of planning and most importantly being efficient. If you like planning games or games where you really have to take some time to think rather than just go for it, you will like this. It can get a little repetitive at some points but not too much.
The game has 2 ways to play, human exploration and robotic exploration.
Human exploration is pretty simple... kinda, you go on a mars mission as a human. This mode was modeled after the book The Martian. You take the role as an astronaut named Mark Willis and well basically lose communication with earth...

Overall would recommend to players who like simulators.

bladerunner97
bladerunner97

This is the only way I will ever get to see Mars so Yeah. Worth every penny, despite being abandoned by the Devs.

MIKEY
MIKEY

Not to bad needs a little work for optimisation and i would like to be able to drive all over mars.

gabgab01
gabgab01

this game makes me sad.

initially, i had high hopes for this game. the dev seemed competent, but got overambitious.
you see, in the beginning this was just a mars rover simulator, but after a while, the devs tried to add a manned colony aspect to the game. and at first it was GREAT! fun building system, good survival aspects, great usage of the physics engine and totally immersive with how you interact with everything, a truly groundbreaking survival experience!

heck, you even FELT wearing a suit!

combine that with an awesome modding comunity with some really talented modders, and this used to be my favourite game!

sadly, this game was riddled with bugs, especially in the physics department, and the performance was total crap. and since those problems were due to engine limitations, the devs couldn't fix them, and in the end, they abandoned this gem of a game due to lack of funding.

you see, the devs were a subset of bohemia interactive, the guys behind ArmA, and as such the dev team received funding from their corporate bosses, not the profits from this game. and at some point some manager above said "aight, this game is now bleeding money. we just cut funding and move on to the next.", which is a shame, since the original devs of this game were REALLY enthusiastic about this game!

so now it sits in development hell, a shadow of what it once could have been, and i still long for a survival game wit hthe exact same mechanics as this game.

timberdragon
timberdragon

Great Simulation, graphics are nice and its very comprehensive. The workshop content just makes the Take On Mars universe even bigger. Well worth the money for pretty much endless possibilities.

Somethign interesting
Somethign inte…

Childhood dream finally realized, now I waste as much taxpayer money as I want dropping buoys on oceanless planets.

cspuddester
cspuddester

Best game I ever played, and still the best. Please resume development.

hmabboud
hmabboud

It's not stable, it crashes a lot, and the instructions on who to play exactly, are not clear.

ChiefBootKnocka
ChiefBootKnocka

Still does not work with Xbox One controller, even though there's an option to enable it in the settings...clearly the game was designed for using keyboard.

MattMan
MattMan

I recommend this game with a condition included. If you're a hardcore crafting type gamer that enjoys the challenges of a "as close to real life as possible" type grinding. I enjoy the detail of the game and all the crafting of items but I also have limited time so typically I'm looking more for something that is a faster gather/craft type game saving more time for exploring and adventuring. I've only gone through the tutorials and played for about 30 or so minutes more so it requires some patience and strong desire to the details of what tools you'd need to build and use if you were really on mars.

Jimi Wan
Jimi Wan

Movement is just so jumpy I cannot play it

Screep
Screep

Could have been something. What there was was interesting and had some fun, but.... abandoned.

timboh__
timboh__

Satisfying slow paced scientific research. Very unique game, very niche. If you like mars, rovers or basics of scientific planetary exploration, or teasing apart a game to see how it ticks, this is for you.

Don_Maximill
Don_Maximill

I really want to like this game but I just can't, whether it be the poorly introduced controls or the extremely repetative missions which have to be done one by one manually going in and out of the probes using the space station. No overview of where the missions are or way to deactivate all unused probes. This game could use so many quality of life upgrades that would hardly impact realism and make it a great simulation game, but right now I am just not having fun.

Alliance sucks
Alliance sucks

Nejlepší hra do které vrazit prachy.

skyraptor
skyraptor

took a little practice to get started

rjlerouxjr
rjlerouxjr

may be old and not in dev as much but just give this game a try you may like it

LightTouch
LightTouch

This game are for those that like to take it slow and methodically.