Not every game needs to be a tense, dramatic experience. This has been the spirit that has driven the success of the likes of the ever-replayable Stardew Valley, where a fun adventure is as much based on relaxation and lightheartedness as it is the drive to explore and progress. While The Iron’s Hot, from developer Bontemps Games and publisher Humble Games, is the latest game to provide this kind of experience.

While The Iron’s Hot sees the player cast as a blacksmith who washes up on the mysterious land of Ellian. There, they must grow their blacksmithing business, exploring Ellian and meeting the various groups who call the land home and providing for all of their smithing needs. Taking on a similar structure to games like Traveller's Rest, While The Iron's Hot has an enjoyable gameplay loop but is unfortunately hampered by some design flaws.

A Vocation, Not A Profession

In of immediate comparisons, While The Iron’s Hot fits nicely into the growing subgenre of the cozy game. Although there are some moments of relative danger here and there, overall the tone and gameplay is very much a comforting experience. The player's emphasis is on their blacksmithing, as they learn more and more templates to provide additional items to the people they meet along the way.

It helps that the blacksmithing itself is made up of a selection of minigames, from smelting the ore to crafting individual components and finally putting together the end items. While The Iron's Hot essentially takes the Minecraft crafting system and expands on it with further elements to make it more related to smithing itself. It comes together nicely, particularly with the more unique items that come up at plot-specific points.

The player will need to use gold to ols and buildings regularly as part of the main story, so it's well worth picking up extra smithing jobs whenever they're available.

Aside from this, the other elements of gameplay within While The Iron's Hot a little bit more hit and miss. Player control is extremely basic, mainly either moving around the overall map on a tile-based system or taking part in very basic 2D platforming, rather than the more versatile dynamics shown in the game's peers. While The Iron's Hot can feel a little bit restrictive, outside of the smithing itself.

A World To Explore

On paper, While The Iron's Hot can feel like there could be some real drama afoot - washing up on a mysterious land after a shipwreck, having to build a new life from scratch in a world of forests, swamps, frozen tundra and deserts - but it's all actually quite pleasant. Whether it's aloof lords of secretive towns or the whispered-about guild of thieves that works out of the shadows, most people are rather friendly to the player. There are some more dramatic moments later on, but even these are revealed in a light way.

This means that While The Iron's Hot provides a fun and breezy adventure. There's nothing particularly deep at play, but there are enough little pockets of interest to keep things engaging most of the time, and enough variety of location and oddities to uncover to keep the player entertained. Bontemps Games set out to create a light-hearted world and generally succeeded.

Where While The Iron's Hot struggles is with its more character-driven interactions. Although games like Stardew Valley or Spirittea don't have that much depth with character moments, they have the illusion of depth thanks to the way they are designed, and this makes the player feel that much more attached. Those after a similar kind of atmosphere here might feel a little disappointed.

A Bad Workman Blames His Tools

While The Iron's Hot could find itself a nice little niche of players, especially because of how charming it is, but there are some serious caveats that need to be considered. There are some serious issues with clunkiness that need to be addressed that make While The Iron's Hot feel quite sloppy as it stands. Some of these can be extremely frustrating, like clipping through the scenery during some 2D platforming moments and getting stuck needing to restart the game, or coming across the occasional side job that breaks and cannot be completed.

On top of this there are also minor issues, which on their own could be overlooked but compile into an overall picture of sloppiness. As one example, when the player has an outstanding item for someone that they've completed as a radiant quest but then has to speak to them about a larger plot point, the dialogue about the radiant quest will override other talking points and leave the player without key story context. It's clumsy and buggy, and given how simplistic the game is overall it's quite disappointing.

These will all be issues that will hopefully be addressed with time over future patches. There is one overriding issue that will be a longer fix, if it can be addressed at all: that While The Iron's Hot lacks the expansive nature of many of the games that it emulates, both from a character and gameplay variety perspective.

Our Review Score & Final Thoughts

Overall, While The Iron's Hot is something of a mixed bag. There's a lot of charm and a lot of promise, but a lack of variety and some unfortunate bugs and sloppy design hold it back from being a must-play. Those who enjoy a cozy game or are after a light-hearted fantasy will still likely enjoy it, but that recommendation does come with some footnotes.

Source: Humble Games / YouTube

While The Iron’s Hot is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch. Screen Rant was provided with a PC code for the purposes of this review.