Bitcraft Online Early Access Review - 2025
Is this the Runescape/Albion online alternative you've been waiting for? Perhaps. If you're ready for a big grind.
Today we’ll be talking about a strange obsession of mine for the last month or so. I want you to imagine an MMO game like runescape but all the towns are user generated and the world is fully customizeable.
Those of you who are particularly MMO savvy will think of something like Albion Online. You would be mostly correct as well. Albion online has many of those core aspects, but it lacks truly user generated content.
I’m not hating on Albion Online. I put plenty of time into that game and I enjoyed it for a while. Lately I’ve found something that scratches more of that long-term MMO itch without the restriction of being a deeply entrenched decade old game.
Today’s game is Bitcraft Online.
It touts itself as:
“… a true single world MMORPG with a cozy, community first focus. Set in an ancient land, BitCraft invites players into one shared world, where slow-burn progression, idle-style experience and long term goals shape your legacy. ”
— Bitcraft Steam Page
and yeah I’d say that hits the nail on the head. So lets talk about it.
Firstly I’d like to talk about what confused me the most: How is the game an idle-style experience?
This didn’t make sense to me in a fully explorable 3d world. Especially since I’ve also been playing Melvor Idle which is just Runescape distilled down into an idle game.
See where I talk about it here:
What separates Bitcraft Online’s idling from other games is twofold.
One: You have to be logged in to idle.
Two: You can only idle for as much stamina as you have.
I have to say, as frustrating as these systems seem on the surface level, I’ve ended up really enjoying the game because of them.
Having to be logged in mimics more traditional gaming instead of something that I can just forget about.
The stamina system is definitely frustrating at first as well, but it provides good motivation to continue upgrading your gear and progressing through the story. These guide you to interacting with other systems either through crafting or through the market which I’ll talk about a little later.
So how does the game work you may ask?
You’re dropped in on a random spot in a random continent in a large world. The current world is made up of 9 continents each with its own server. You can travel freely between them at any point using teleport points (which regenerate passively) or by sailing the distance yourself.
As you might expect the game revolves around training skills and crafting. It really is as simple as clicking on the resource and collecting it. Taking it back to a crafting station and refining it until you reached a finished product.
Each of these actions require a specific amount of effort to complete, excluding gathering, and the amount of effort you can exert in one sitting is based on your tool and the amount of stamina you have.
While working on a task, you don’t have to interact with the game at all until the project is done or you run out of stamina. If you run out of stamina the task can easily be continued once your stamina is recovered.
The game world is made up of distinct biomes which host a large variety of different tier resources. This means that travel is required to gather all the resources you need in your journey for higher level gear, at least… a little later on.
This also leads into towns. You’re gonna need somewhere to put your stuff away, rest, and craft all your future clothes and tools. Fortunately for you the world is filled with player made towns of all shapes and sizes. Towns level up in a similar fashion to the way players do except they take significantly more resources and effort to level.
Often times you’ll see towns list huge crafting jobs they need help working on, or resources they want to buy from you. When it comes to shared crafting jobs these allow you afk xp training with the tradeoff that you don’t receive any of the goods when the job is finished.
Each town is also outfitted with a teleporter and a market (if they’ve made one) where people can put up buy and sell orders on tools, resources, clothing, and other items.
If you need something specific the game has a global market search where you can see what every town in the game is offering. Feel free to seek out the best deal possible… that is… if you’re willing to travel to get it.
On the positive side, I really like the way that the market works and the system for crafting. It’s the perfect combo of afk and active that allows you to have something to do regardless of if its planned or not.
On the negative side, the crafting recipes are overwhelmingly convoluted at first. Rest assured there is a pattern to crafting, and I did eventually figure it out, but it did not stop me from crying a little bit on the inside while learning.
I do highly recommend Bitcraft, but only for a specific kind of person who is looking for a game with an intense grind. The game is also updated extremely frequently which makes it fun to be along for the ride, but some of you may prefer to wait.
Finally Bitcraft is going to launch free to play, but the early access version costs money.
I still recommend giving Bitcraft a shot.
Here: Bitcraft Online
Thank you everyone and I’ll see you in the next one!