All the Mods 10: To the Sky ATM10SKY

So far (got some of the Star items but haven't gotten deep into the harder items of the Star), this pack's been alright, but boring.
Firstly, the resource generation can be interesting at times, even if repetitive. For instance, I made a setup to convert cobble to end stone so I could farm draconium. That's the highlight of my resource gen however, and other than that it's been the original but boring GeOres, as well as the overused but sorta interesting Ex Nihlio (or whatever the port/remake used here is)
However, a lot of the progression to the Star just isn't pleasant or satisfying. Although hard to make pleasant and satisfying progression due to their requirements opposing each other, I expect at least one of them to be done, but it isn't. The Star, due to it's nature, forces you into the same gameplay path each mod offers by default, which can be okay in a simpler pack where such isn't needed to live in the world, but in a pack with such a set end goal and deep progression requirements for some of the more repetitive mods (looking at you, Antimatter Pellets) I'm just not happy, as the points in progression chosen are either after you get almost all the useful stuff, or before you get any useful stuff, meaning you're either doing too much or too little to enjoy it.
I will say, this pack is surprisingly optimized, running on 8GB of ram decently well even when I have Discord and Youtube open.

Do we even have to talk about this? As usual, the ATM team delivers a modpack packed with mods and mechanics that sound interesting, but the experience ends up falling short in many areas.

First of all, this pack is a kitchen sink in its purest form. You can literally do whatever you want and explore whichever mod interests you. While that freedom can be nice, it also means that most progression feels unfocused. You end up blazing through many mods because almost nothing is gated behind anything meaningful.

Resource generation in the late game is another big disappointment. It basically comes down to bees and nothing else. Want a new item? Get a bee for it. While that system works early on, it quickly becomes repetitive and makes the endgame feel boring and shallow.

Then there’s Modern Industrialization, which is actually a very interesting mod and takes a fair amount of time to progress through. Unfortunately, it isn’t required for the ATM Star, which feels like a huge missed opportunity. It could have added a deeper and more meaningful progression path, but instead it’s mostly just tacked on for players who feel like doing it.

Overall, the pack offers a lot of content on paper, but because of the lack of progression and meaningful integration between mods, the experience ends up feeling less engaging than it could have been.