I put a pretty good amount of time into this one, not scum or icarus though. decent amount of time into conan while it was in EA, not sure on where it endedup. tiny amount into ark.
7days to die, palword, valhiem, etc. a good number of others various amounts in..
Ok, so enshrouded. This one stands out for 2 things. 1. its mostly handcrafted voxel world. 2. its voxel base building.
1. handcrafted voxel world.
so, they used a.i. proc gen to generate the world in the first place, then went in after and refined it to build specific elements. theres times you can tell, other times when its pretty finely handcrafted. The preset hand crafted world absolutely plays better as a single player game. Theres lots of hidden treasure you'd miss out on playing party running off in every direction at once. its 1000% more enjoyable to explore and uncover at your own pace here.
The voxel world, you can dig anywhere. you can read amusing reviews complaining about being locked in the tutorial area by the grapple hook gateway. people who never thought to just dig a tunnel up the cliff. (or noticed the obvious path across) Theres entire ass dungeons HIDDEN behind collapsed tunnels, under rubble, etc, you need to keep your eyes open notice a tell, or whatever and DIG. This is largely why the world reseting is a thing. its not minecraft where, when hollowed out, you can expand spawn more progen world. if the world didnt reset, mining it out, would create a dead server eventually.
loot... is pathetic atm. there are so many hidden chests, and dungeons.. but way, way too little loot to fill them. a huge part of the game atm is finding some super cool secret dungeon, chest, opening it... and getting the same level 10 green wand you already got and salvaged 20 times. This is by far one of the biggest flaws with the game atm.
2. voxel base building. lots of visual pieces. massively simplifies actually placing blocks, so actually building things is easy and effective. something landmark failed at for example. it was so powerful and complex.. that it was a chore to just build a simple 4 walls and a roof... The things people are building in this are incredible.
your bases, up to 8, are permanent with no decay mechanic. Everywhere outside of them is a 30min timer.
limited, repetitive enemies are the other big flaw here.