Boy, oh boy. Thrive 0.4.0. The Thrive version we’ve been waiting for. Untold centuries have passed, the sands of time drifting away as the Thrive devs worked long and hard to push out this update to everyone’s favourite far-from-complete evolution simulator. As it took so, so very long to push out, and a heck of a lot of work, it’s gonna be great and wonderful and everyone is ok.
Before I begin, allow me to sum up my initial experience in a single image;
Yeah. You can tell how this is gonna be, can’t you?
Allow me to elaborate.
initial experiences
When I first booted up this crown jewel upon the grand, golden king-tiara of the evolution simulator niche of gaming, I was treat to the new dna-intro-thingy. Looks great, save for the shakiness. Then there was the main menu. Ah. same as always.
I then started a new game, as any sane gamer would, should they not have an option panel. I was treat to Quantum’s cutscene. I tried to skip it. The game nearly crashed. Except it didn’t. It was generating. ohoho.
Got into the game, playing as my little dinky microbe. Gameplay lasted a whole 3 minutes, as thrive proceeded to feel like crashing. That’s not even the best part. The Launcher crashed. I couldn’t find the launcher. I redownloaded the launcher. :^)
Launcher proceeded to comaplin about the fact there was a missing Thrive executable- 
I did as instructed (delete a folder), and told the launcher to redownload thrive 0.4.0.
Same error again. hm.
The folder had redownloaded itself. Ok. I deleted it again.
It redownloads itself again. This process goes on for 5 minutes.
Eventually, I can play thrive again. Yay.
gameplay
Oh, forgot to mention- can’t see any chemical clouds. That was fun until I realised that the box was telling me that stuff was there. I do like the “flail your mouse around to see where chemicals are” mechanic. It really adds to the experience.
So, because of my crippling predicament, I decided to bully bacteria instead. by eating them. Eating is a form of bullying, I swear it. Do things enjoy being eaten? Most of the time, no. Most of the time.
By some miracle of christ himself, I finally get access to the editor. I see a whole new range of funky organelles. I add chloroplasts.
Unfortunately, the game does not inform me of light level as far as I can tell, so that was a waste of mp.
After another cycle of bacteria-bullying, I go back into the editor. I get flagella. I proceed to die twice and spend 5 minutes accumulating ATP.
I go back into the editor again, and add an organelle I haven’t even heard of before, nor can I remember the name. Must be that non-lawk.
I die again, and get sick of the game.
summary of pros and cons compared to previous version
+Colour
+Species names exist
+I can eat bacteria for cheap atp
+Cool cutscenes
+I assume the graphics are slightly better
+3 D. O X Y T O X Y.
-Missing clouds is a bug. unsurprising in hindsight
-Chemical clouds not that worth it anyway when you can just eat bacteria
-Launcher is cool and good
-Cutscene skipping is cool and good
-Bringing up the menu doesn’t pause the game. :^)
-Good variety of organelles, unclear worth of said organelles
Overall? meh. not exactly terrible, but definitely not great. unclear if experience has improved at all.
Take my words with a pinch of salt. I tend to be a bit blind to good aspects.
Edit- Yeah, it also likes to crash. No improvement there.
