A breath of fresh air from usual survival

Terrafirmacraft is the original total overhaul mod, changing every facet of survival gameplay. Past 1.12.2, there is an ingame guide for the player to inform themselves about every change in the mod.

The player is presented with several unusual challenges they must overcome in order to progress; for example, in order to leave the stone age, they must melt metal ore before pouring it into a mold and carefully smith heated metal into useful gear.

The environment is full of obstacles, some passive and others actively harming the player in a task. One of the former is temperature which can be fought by several means, like adapted crops, seasonal preparation and water management. As for the latter, one can think of mining, where the very stone around the player can cave in upon them, crushing any careless miner to mulch if they do not prepare with proper supports.

A large variety of tools is available to the player in order to overcome, and even take advantage of these mechanics. A builder might intentionally cause a cave-in with explosives in order to gather large amounts of cobblestone, or an early player could create elaborate sandwiches to improve their maximum health.

Overall, this mod has a flexible progression arc, and lets the player stray quite far from progression without any punishment. Alone, it can sate a player's appetite for a good challenge, or a relaxing experience for hours.

Unfortunately, the endgame doesn't consist of much- just like any modpack, or the vanilla game, it falls short in progression past the end consisting of the most refined of steels, perfected tool techniques and masterfully cooked meals. At this point, like a vanilla player, the only thing to do is to set your own goals. This is why I rate it 4/5, rather than 5/5.