Do No Harm

The game's dosage system is pretty frustrating, because the doses don't "stack" (a red dose of 2 units and another red dose of 4 units does not equal 6 units), you can waste an 8 dose because the game expected you to use a 9 dose that time, practically eating half of your reserve of that drug. I found myself with no black medicine on the SECOND day and there was no obvious "reject patient" or any option like that, so I just sat there not knowing what to do. The game fails at all levels to provide enough of a straight-forward and well explained dosage system and tutorial.

Complaining about complexity and steep learning curve in a game like this is the same as complaining about souls-like games being hard. Yes, they are, that's the point - and this is why I don't agree with most negative reviews. Yes, the game doesn't help a lot in explaining the mechanics, but as I have seen, it might just be intentional. The tutorial messages outright tell you: Just experiment! You are not required to treat every patient successfully. I assume that you are not supposed to "win" for the first time, it's part of the learning curve: you fail, you start again and try better, with the knowledge you acquired in the previous run. The game offers replayability, so that works well with this mindset. Being said, this game might not be suitable for everyone - and that's okay. I refused to load a previous save for my first playthrough when I made a terrible mistake, just to see what would happen. After I reached a point of no return (ran out of money and couldn't buy a single medicine or laudanum), I just roleplayed into a doctor descending into madness, intentionally trying to kill as many people as possible - and I had a blast! Being said, this game is an underrated masterpiece and is significantly more enjoyable if you are are a fan of H.P. Lovecraft and all-in-all, Lovecraftian horror. You can't just expect a game like this to be fully understandable from the beginning: uncertainty is part of the atmosphere - and if there's only one thing this game NAILS, is the atmosphere. Easily a 9/10 and can't recommend enough for Lovecraft fans. I love how the game plays with you, especially with the anomalies, like when the totem warns you about an unnoticed anomaly - "Didn't you see the clock moving backwards?" and things like that. It gives the chills every time. I can't wait to start another save and try again, hopefully surviving till the end!

Its a decent take on Lovecraftian lores with a person aiding the victim population medically. The "humoral" system here can be quite interesting but it loses its shine in the long run. Think I made it more than 20 dayz as a save scum learning and practising the game mechanics but I lost my interest & any remaining motivation later. Unless the devs make this more interesting by introducing more lore based mechanics or some new system which could be easy to get into, the game won't go too far. Probably worth more buying on a sale and worth a try.

I'm sorry to give this game a thumbs down, because I really LOVED the consept and the graphic style and design! But to me there were too many annoying aspects that ruined the whole experience for me. The dialogues should have an option to be manually clickable for progressing so that I actually have the time to read them. Especially when reading out loud (for videos) reading takes longer. Even the endings I didn't get to read because the text just kept going too fast! I struggled a lot with the whole diagnostic and dosing system, and feel like this was not properly explained. I kept trying to find the exact right answer using the tools and found over and over that they don't provide the exact answer and you just have to try and fail and feel your way to the right dosages on each patient. Which is very frustrating when you need to treat as many patients a day as possible to earn enough money to buy what you actually need every day. And since the doses don't stack I often wasted a lot or all of my medicine on one patient just to get the dosage exactly right. The math is frustrating, it's all overly complicated, and if it's all a guessing game then at least tell me so I don't waste too much time on each patient. After playing ~20-30 days I got stuck in a cycle where [spoiler] the tendril-monster thing just kept killing me and I had no way to prevent it.[/spoiler] At least nothing I tried worked, and the little explanation in the book was of no use. I also feel like the devs could have put some more effort into the endings..? [spoiler] After all those hours with awesome art style graphics and detail giving me an ending(s) with just a single (or two) illustration and some text felt very disappointing. [/spoiler] Maybe I kept doing everything wrong and my brain just didn't understand the explanations the game was giving me. Either way it started out great, but turned out to be a frustrating experience. Sorry for any spelling mistakes and poor vocabulary. English is not my main language.

Yes, the dosage system requires some learning. Yes, you're going to make mistakes while figuring things out. If you want a game that holds your hand, then obviously this is not for you. However, the core gameplay here is quite enjoyable if you have even the smallest amount of patience to figure out how things work. The PROBLEM is that ultimately this is an anomaly spotting game that pretends it isn't. It does not list itself as an anomaly spotting game at any point, but that's what it is. Literally your fail condition is not spotting anomalies. I am so utterly sick of this lazy game trope and insulted that that's what this game is while pretending to be something else. It also has very little story for a game using the "Story Rich" tag. I just wish games would ACCURATELY USE THEIR TAGS so I wouldn't have to refund so many improperly tagged games disguising themselves as something that they're not.

Holy, is this game confusing. I've played for about an hour and I'm already scratching my head over multiple different things. People say you just have to "read the book", but not everything is explained well, or even mentioned at all. It's a cool concept and it has great design, other than the confusing tools and book. Maybe I'll change my mind if I play some more, but it's already lost me only an hour in.

This whole Lovecraftian gimmick, is not it chief. The sanity meter ends up being the most confusing and frustrating mechanic in the game. If it was simply analyzing and curing patients, might have been a tighter package. The diagnosis process, while very engaging at first, and eventually gets more involved with new tools and mechanics, ends up lacking variety of outcomes. It all comes down to one of four mixtures with an additional goal of giving as precise dosage as possible. The less mixture you spend during the day, the less money you'll need to refuel it over night. Not a fan of this superficial min-maxing mechanic. The artstyle isn't cohesive, and varies in quality greatly. Some environmental elements, like an owl at your desk, and most of the anomalies are goofy at best, and don't help with the intended atmospheric mood.

Wish there was a review option between Yes and No because it would fit this perfectly. Cool idea in theory but was underwhelming in practice, mechanics didn't make a lot of sense, and not enough interesting patients.

I genuinely don't know what people are talking about when they say the game is hard or doesn't teach you enough. all you have to do is read the book. Very fun game. Edit: after finishing the game I'm very happy with how the game handles the consequences of what actions you took.

I am not a fan of psycological horror at all, but the puzzle medical aspect of the game attracted me. I finished the game after 8 hours, one of the best endings (One of the least bad ones...). Here i sit, drenched in cold sweat. This game made me shake and jump. The immersion in this game is glorious and scary. If this game had voice acting, this would be out of this world. I was not the target audience but still enjoyed the experience. Now if you'll excuse me, i need a nap with every lights on.

A good time. It's a fun game to remember. I always love me some lovecraftian horror.

[Will Update Review After 100 Percent Completion] Almost Perfect: Do No Harm is one of my favorite games that have ever come out. I love the atmosphere and story and the overall game play loop. One of my favorite art styles I have ever seen in a game. Feels unfinished in some aspects. The tutorials feel kind of thrown together and dump a lot on the player at once. A gripe of mine that breaks the immersion is the juxtaposition of what your patient's say their symptoms are and what your physical examination suggests. I understand the physical examination is a mechanic that happens later in the game to identify fish transformation and for that it is cool to see the changes. At the same time if a patient comes into the office and says they are struggling to breathe, this should be audible when you use the stethoscope but it isn't. Same with a patient that is in excruciating pain. I should be able to hear an elevated heart rate. Or a patient that has stomach discomfort. I should be able to hear that but I cant. Its overall a small thing but would create an interesting mechanic where you can cross check what a patient says their symptoms are and what they actually are. This could create an interesting scenario where the patients that are bullshitting you to get a hit of medicine can be called out on their bs. The Cannibal: Cool character, reminds me of Astarian from Baldur's Gate. Like the detail of people dying in the newspaper which hints to his true nature. My problem with him is that it is a cheap early game over that punishes the player for not killing anyone which in theory is the whole point of the game. Smaller aspect I would like to see added is more incentive for the player to purchase items besides their medicine and laudanum and examination tools. Perhaps they can purchase a larger medicine storage or maybe the lamp and light mechanic can be altered to only last a certain amount of time which encourages the player to buy better lamps or extra oil to fuel it. Blood letting and leeches could be interesting to detect certain ailments. This last one is just a spitball idea. My point is I would love to see more variety and decision made to the game play loop.

I'll say upfront that I really like the graphics. I think the mix of 3d and 2d was done well and made everything very pleasing to look at. All the character designs are unique but I do wish there were more variants of the regular patients since I think the models get cycled through too quickly. The game mechanics are pretty cool, having to manage resources and different medication to work with, but I don't think the mechanics work together in a way that make it challenging. If you're a casual player it would be fine but the guessing system with the dosages and the game being very lenient with mistakes makes it feels like I'm half-assing and just getting them healed enough to earn money and go through patients. I've only played up to the day after acquiring the magnifying glass so maybe there are more mechanics in the later days I have not experienced. I've seen many reviews about the dosage system and I do agree, the dosage system not stacking is pretty annoying. I was facing this early on too and frankly expected the rest of the game to be like this, however there is an aspect that a few reviews I've seen have not covered. Whenever you give a dose it leaves a positive or negative effect on the patient's card. For low dose patients that are at 0, you can just administer a dose of 1 and you'll either get lucky with a +3, +2, or +1. Whenever the doses are +2 or +1, you can just administer another dose of 1 or two doses of 1 (respectively) to get the patient fully healed. Basically the effects stack, requiring most low dose patients to only need 1-3 injections of 1 dose instead. This is way less than the possibility of needing a 5 dose and completely removes the guessing. The high dose patients, on the other hand, require such high doses that I find myself just giving them a 6 or 7 dose and sending them off to conserve resources. Since the game allows you to send patients off not fully healed it really doesn't matter what positive condition they are in anyway since they still give money. The game does try to change things up by adding new mechanics like the physical symptoms and alternative medicine, but those only affect the doses. Also, I don't really like the alternative medicine since it's just another guessing mechanic. The way it's presented also makes it feels like you have a scarce amount, but having 3 of the low dose and 3 of the high dose just feels like 6 dose guessing potions. On top of that I haven't used it a lot either since I can just guess a dose by giving the patient 1 dose first. The vital medicine is fine, but the 6 potion thing still applies. Another thing is that I find myself not using the humor circle either. Sometimes patients come in with medicine already taken, and I assume I need to use the humor circle to get them back to 0, but they already tell me the symptoms they're facing. Just administering those doses will get them back up enough to still be sent off and give money. I will leave a positive review since I believe casual players would find it nice. As for me, I am still mixed on this game.

I bought this game to play with my sister (no coop feature in game, she just enjoys watching and helping) and so far it's an absolute hit, we enjoy it very much. The story is interesting, how you take care of the patients reflects on how different characters treat you, there are multiple morality paths (therefore endings) you can choose and none of them seem perfectly "good" or "bad", it's all a grey area based on what your view on life is. I'd say in the beginning, the guidelines on how to administer medication for the patients are pretty straightforward, their prompts also give you advice on the dosage that will work best (low 1-5/high 6-9) but as your Medical Book fills with pages, it can quickly get overwhelming until you understand what's going on. My advice is, understand how the Humor Wheel works as soon as you get that page, [spoiler] as it will be very useful later when you have to mix medicine. Also pay attention to the medical cards of each patient and how the dosages you give them reflect their health (with the number scale: 0 being sick, +1 being felling better, -1 feeling worse, etc - it's all in the book). [/spoiler] The game is not just about treating patients - you have to manage your budget to refill the medications every day, buy lamp oil, potions that keep your sanity in check [spoiler] which you use when anomalies appear throughout the days [/spoiler], you have to buy additional equipment, and make sure you don't go bankrupt. If you don't buy equipment as soon as it is suggested during the sleeping phase, that is okay - [spoiler] on Day 15, a stethoscope was offered, but I didn't have the money under day 18, and still managed not harm anyone. [/spoiler]

I Haven't gotten Far, but it's a pretty good game and I happen to love Lovecraftian horror , the only thing I really have an issue with is the hallucinations , because some are REALLY hard to notice ( for example , one of them I had assumed at first was a bug in the game) and sometimes you run out of the thing to get rid of them, which makes it harder to manage. That all being said, This game scared me a LOT, which is shocking because I really don't get scared by games at often. its a soild 9.5/10, if you ask me.

Tough sell. I like these games, the sort of flow you can get into is great and fun, getting things right is neat. The time pressure and later on, other issues are bothersome, and will be to some individuals more than others. I'm normally not a huge fan of multiple endings based on what you do, given the full length of a 30-day play-through is quite an investment. Looking online, seeing the multiple endings as well as the sort of "dead-ends" is neat, but won't convince me to do a run just to have it end by changing up one or two choices. I fully disliked the fact that some choices did not seem to do anything. I'm looking at you, librarian. Might just be a bug, but I can also understand that. Either way, the characters are interesting, art style is neat and I love everything 'Shadows over Innsmouth' about this. If you can deal with that, leaning that accursed wheel, it's not bad.

Silly haha medicine game i naivly thought. THAT THE FUCK IS IN THE CORNER NAH NAH HELL NAH MY PANTS ARE SOILED WHAT IS THAT WEIRD WHITE THING WHITH THE SOULLESS EYES" IM GOING TO PLAY MY LITTLE PONY TYCOON, 10/10 game

This highly engaging medic simulator features a Lovecraftian horror atmosphere and unique gaming design elements. In Do No Harm, you take on the role of a new medic in an intriguing village where you will uncover secrets and mysteries as you progress. Cure your patients by analyzing their symptoms and the various details using your medical instruments. Decide whether to heal or kill; not all of your patients are who you believe them to be. Highly recommended!

I want to love this game, I really do but there are several bugs that just blocks my progress. Starting over every day three times till I can progress till the next one cause patients won't drop in or whatever. I will put playing this game on hold for a few months and return later, hopefully I'll be able to drop a positive review then instead.

Really good game

mmmmm lovecraftian

THE FISH PEOPLE ARE REAL AND they're kinda hot?

cool