First of all, I think it would be most appropriate to compare this game with "Sunless Sea" and "Sunless Skies", cause it is most obvious that it not only took a lot of inspiration from these titles but also that it shares with them every single major gameplay mechanic. The best part of A House of Many Doors is its writing, which is among the best games I've played. It does manage to transmit the world setting and its different aspects (characters, locations, monsters etc.). It does stay on par with both games from Failbetter Games. It is quirky, witty and mysterious almost everywhere it has to be. Nonetheless, I had a feeling that in every other single aspect, the game falls short and doesn't deliver as much as the other two games did. This might be the budget thing, which I can understand, but with having already experienced "sunless sea" and "sunless skies", I feel that the world is much more empty and doesn't have much to offer. There is almost nothing to do in between locations, therefore, there is no sense of exploration, which, for me, was one of the strongest cards of the other two titles. The world looks too similar everywhere and does not offer any interaction with it. I have heard positive things about the combat in the game and how it is much less annoying than in "Sunless Sea". Tbh, I disagree with this point completely. I agree with the fights being a tad less primitive, but they are also less immersive and still underdeliver in terms of gameplay. At first, it seems complex, but once you get the gist of it, it becomes mundane and boring, and in most of the fights you just have to destroy the guns of your enemies and then just destroy their ship entirely. Immersion-wise, I don't like how you only fight other kinetopedes and cannot fight any monster at all (haven't finished the game and there might be a chance to fight monsters, but in my 12-13 hours I only fought bandits and occultists). Besides, I don't like that this is not implemented in any way into the world itself and is happening completely isolated, like a mini-game. That's why, even though I can accept criticism of the combat in "Sunless Sea", I do still think that it still is good enough for such a game as it is. It gives you much more flexibility in how to approach the battle. All the upgrades that your ship can get, can be used in a fight. In "A House of Many Doors", you depend only on your staff and your guns. Other upgrades play a much lesser role and are needed only for exploring. Exploration in this game, as I said, is boring, it is basically nonexistent. The layout of the map is the same everywhere, with the same houses, the same ruins, and, thus, the same interactions, and the same music, both in cities and outside in the house's rooms. In Both SSs you had different mobs in different map areas, different weather effects, and different visuals overall. In addition, you had different music, which was great and made every other aspect much more colorful and atmospheric. When you approach a port, you are able to see how it looks from the outside, along with seeing the mobs around it and the music playing, which gives you an initial impression of what's to come. In AHoMD, you just go through empty corridors and then suddenly find a city or some other location. The transportation here feels more like a burden and a waste of time between the cities. The areas (cities and other hubs) are done well, mainly because of writing, as I already mentioned. The crew of your kinetopede is, I think, definitely better than in "Sunless Sea", and is either on par or a bit better than in "Sunless Skies". Everyone has their quirk and unique interactions which you don't expect in the other two games. The thing is, again, all these cool mechanics could've been even better if the other elements were done successfully. The last thing: this game is not as challenging as the other games. I had much fewer problems with surviving in this game because the resources were easily manageable, and if there was any real threat to my ship, I could just run away to another room, which wasn't really hard if you juke in the ruins well enough.
Even though I did criticize this game heavily, I don't think it's bad, since it does have its own strong points. I just could not go without comparing it with the other two games, of which I think very highly. I think, it deserves a 6/10 for me, but, if you haven't played "Sunless Sea" or "Sunless Skies", you might as well start with this one, and you might like it more than me.