Comparison

Critical vs Wasteland Orchard

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Critical

Manage a reactor to prevent it from becoming critical by delivering water. Earn money over time to unlock permanent upgrades and improve your survival capabilities. Invest wisely to extend your runs and uncover secrets.

Highlights
  • Reactor management
  • Incremental income generation
  • Permanent upgrades
  • Research and secrets
  • Survival gameplay
Features
Read full description

Stop the reactor from going critical by delivering water. Robots are expensive though, so we use cheap expendable personnel instead. Money earned ramps up incrementally the longer you last. Survive as long as possible to maximize your income! Spend your hard earned cash to unlock permanent upgrades. Invest wisely to make each new run longer than the last. Tons of upgrades to buy, research to be done, and secrets to uncover. Give it a try! The longer you can keep the reactor from exploding, the more money you’ll make. Start small and watch your income grow exponentially as you survive longer and longer. Delay the inevitable cataclysm as long as possible and watch your cashflow go through the roof.

About

Wasteland Orchard

Cultivate resilient trees and harvest valuable fruit in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Manage your orchard, scavenge resources, and research abilities to survive storms and radiation. Your trees grow even when you're offline, offering daily rewards and permanent upgrades.

Highlights
  • Grow resilient trees
  • Harvest valuable fruit
  • Explore and scavenge
  • Craft items and build
  • Research abilities
  • Permanent upgrades
  • Idle progression
Features
Read full description

Survive a wasteland ravaged by storms and radiation by growing the strongest, most resilient trees with the most valuable fruit! Select fruit with the ideal properties to plant more trees and expand your orchard! Explore the map each run, scavenge for resources, craft items, build structures, trade with and receive gifts from townsfolk, research powerful abilities, and use rare golden seeds for permanent upgrades! Your trees in Wasteland Orchard continue growing while you're away so check back daily to harvest, purchase upgrades, and expand your orchard!

Screenshots

Critical4 screens
Wasteland Orchard4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Wasteland Orchard at 91% against Critical's 18%. Wasteland Orchard also leads on ads (none vs shown) and rating (4.7 vs 4.4). Critical's advantage is iOS requirement (12.0 vs 15.0). On price, ratings volume, update cadence and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Critical sells 17 one-off in-app purchases and Wasteland Orchard sells 9 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Wasteland Orchard holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.4. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 125 and 148 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 18% of Critical's written reviews are positive against 91% of Wasteland Orchard's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Critical ships an update fortnightly, Wasteland Orchard every 9 days. The most recent releases landed on September 22, 2026 and September 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard4 real differences · 6 level
Critical versus Wasteland Orchard: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterCriticalWasteland Orchard
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.4 (125 ratings)4.7 (148 ratings) — better
Positive reviews18.2% of reviews90.9% of reviews — better
Number of ratings125148 — better
Update frequencyFortnightlyEvery 9 days — better
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS12.0 — better15.0
Further details — not scored
Size99 MB237 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperWaffleStack Studio LLCDustin Auxier

Customer experience

Critical

All ratings125 ratings
Positive84.0%
Neutral4.8%
Negative11.2%
Written reviews11 reviews
Positive18.2%
Neutral18.2%
Negative63.6%

Wasteland Orchard

All ratings148 ratings
Positive92.6%
Neutral2.7%
Negative4.7%
Written reviews66 reviews
Positive90.9%
Neutral4.5%
Negative4.5%

Bugs and requests

Critical

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Wasteland Orchard

Reported bugs

8 issues
  • Seeds disappear
  • Disappointing Nerfs
  • Monotonous gameplay loop
  • Save bug
  • Game not launching after update
Show 3 more
  • Game not opening
  • Glitch where trying to claim tree treasure rewards makes it inaccessible after a storm kills trees and makes a giant text box until you close the game
  • Seeds disappear after a storm

Requested features

14 requests
  • Add search/filter radar function to tutorial
  • Journal or easily find specific trees by stats
  • More missions
  • More content
  • Make game able to save progress
Show 9 more
  • Quickly switch between all trees
  • More frequent time potion in shop
  • Balance storm requirements
  • No shortcuts/features to reseed the entire map
  • No shortcuts to add auto harvest/mulch/tree stakes/lightning wall/concrete wall to all trees
  • No shortcut/features to see dead trees
  • Not possible to make Chests keys
  • Time warp Potions should be easier to come by at the beginning
  • Balance some storms

In-app purchases

17 purchases

Critical

One-time17
  • 100 Gems$2.99
  • 100 Gems$4.99
  • Remove Ads$7.99
Show 14 more
  • 225 Gems$7.99
  • Starter Pack$9.99
  • Remove All Ads$9.99
  • 225 Gems$9.99
  • 500 Gems$9.99
  • Pro Pack$9.99
  • Pro Pack$14.99
  • New Player Sale$14.99
  • 500 Gems$14.99
  • 1400 Gems$19.99
  • 800 Gems$19.99
  • 1400 Gems$29.99
  • 3000 Gems$29.99
  • 3000 Gems$39.99
9 purchases

Wasteland Orchard

One-time9
  • Wasteland Starter Pack$1.99
  • Peaceful Harvests PhillipAddOn$1.99
  • Peaceful Harvests BountifulAdd$2.99
Show 6 more
  • Great Listener$3.99
  • Bountiful Orchard$4.99
  • Nature's Bounty$5.99
  • Peaceful Harvests$6.99
  • Shard Shaman$12.99
  • Time Lord$19.99

Questions

Is Critical free?
Critical is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Wasteland Orchard free?
Wasteland Orchard is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Critical or Wasteland Orchard?
Wasteland Orchard is rated higher. Critical averages 4.4 out of 5 from 125 ratings, while Wasteland Orchard averages 4.7 from 148 ratings.
Do Critical or Wasteland Orchard have ads?
Critical shows ads; Wasteland Orchard does not.
Which is updated more often, Critical or Wasteland Orchard?
Critical ships an update fortnightly, and Wasteland Orchard every 9 days. Most recently, Critical was updated on September 22, 2026 and Wasteland Orchard on September 24, 2026.

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