Before We Leave
I have personally been enjoying this game very much! I appreciate that I don’t need to worry about war or combat, nor must I consider the monetary value of my peoples (ie. slavery). It still can be challenging, and I was pleasantly surprised by the little challenges it throws your way (ex: the gremlins!). The aesthetic is very pleasing, and it isn’t very demanding graphically. I would definitely recommend this! I’ve written out some of my experiences and some tips! ♥
- The Tutorial -
Doing the tutorial is a good idea and I do recommend it, but the tutorial will take you through pretty much the whole game, or at least deep into the mid-game – this could literally be hours and hours lol. But I would suggest stopping after you have started to explore your second planet., then proceed to your own games.
– Real player with 59.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder Economy Games.
At the time writing this I have little over 10 hours in the game! You tell me what I end up getting to :)
Check out this Let’s Play for More Visual and Audio Experince!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOdcC0ErbSc&list=PLjMDVXkLIQ3772ETUImsVXS_1AwZFdcKw
Before we leave is one the best games I have played in a long time for getting right into the game and understanding what to do. It’s not because it’s easy or simple. It’s because of the amazing job they did with the tutorial system and explaining the basics of the game.
– Real player with 31.8 hrs in game
Zen Landscape Editor
A great game, relaxing and creative just like how it was promised. But there are some things that can be worked on to make it so much more amazing. For example, placing objects like bridges is really hard to get it where you want, but placing things like people is very smooth and easy. Trees are on sand like platform which kinda ruins the green of many islands. Most objects like the villages are red, but would be cool if you can customize the colors of the ships, people, and structures. Customized controls would be AMAZING, it allows everyone to have their own style. Finally, it is a bit hard to rotate the screen for me. M for mute does not work either.
– Real player with 1.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder Sandbox Games.
This is sort of a non-working demo. Its to demonstrate the landscape editor for the game which is still being developed but God willing will be released soon. Hopefully this year. I’ve seen the demos and other information about the game, it is very good!
BUY THIS TO SUPPORT THE AUTHOR! ITS VERY GOOD!
– Real player with 0.3 hrs in game
Myriads: Renaissance
Build-up your capital island and manage its resources using city building mechanics. Are your citizens starving? Add a wetland shard and build a farm. Do you need to raise a new army? Mine gold from your single mountain shard or trade goods for gold. But be careful, space is limited as you won’t be able to extend your island indefinitely.
You cannot survive on your own, you will need to explore your surroundings. Travel into a procedurally generated world, discovering a myriad of floating islands. Send your armies to loot lost secrets or treasure chests. Trace your path and establish new colonies. But be careful, the more you explore, the more you will let your enemy know that you exist.
The capital island is limited in size, you will need to expand your territory outside of its bound. Do you need some food to sustain your capital’s needs? Send your settler ship to establish a new exploitation colony. Do you need more gold in order to recruit more troops? Build and manage trading posts. But with great power comes great responsibility: will you be able to defend them?
Enemy’s corsairs are roaming across the world, raiding and killing. Place defense towers strategically to protect your colonies from them. Use your galleons to destroy corsair lairs, freeing the archipelagos from your enemy’s rule. But be prepared to face it as it will come for you!
New technologies are the key to overcome your rival. Are your citizens struggling with the lack of space? Use the lost secrets your armies found and unlock a new technology which allows more shards to be gathered. Do you wish to recruit more advanced troops? Build cartographers and keep looking for lost secrets.
Read More: Best City Builder Turn-Based Strategy Games.
As Far As The Eye
This game was incredibly brutal until I discovered the Council building and the Knowledge resource, and then it became an incredibly fair and deep city-building/roguelike/4x game.
The biggest problem with the game is there isn’t a good reference for how all the mechanics work. I think it will be better once an online wiki is available.
My tips for a winning initial game:
Opening:
1. Get 40 wood and build a sawmill. Assign one of your workers to be a gatherer and gather wood. Later, when you don’t need wood, switch this worker to be a food gatherer and build a fruit hut for 80 (you can do this earlier if you get a 4th worker). You should have enough rations for this, and the carpenter/fruit gatherer jobs share the first 3 levels.
– Real player with 26.9 hrs in game
I too believe that this is a nice game if you enjoy roguelike games.
When I first saw the list of buildable buildings I was worried the game wouldnt have much depth, as there are exactly 15 buildings which can be built.
So .. I was worried I will just figure out how things work and lose interest in the game after a few days, because I found some safe winning strategy.
Luckily it was different!
The overall difficulty is quite high. After the tutorial campaign you get to play 4 tribes with increasing difficulty (you have to start with the lowest difficulty tribe). However, even that tribe took me quite some effort to win with.
– Real player with 25.2 hrs in game
Little Kingdom 2
Game is fun to play although since the Latest update both my friend and I have found ourselves unable to load the game.
– Real player with 17.5 hrs in game
Pros: This game is a very neat indie that with a group of friends can become quite the fun bout, its all about attrtion so no actual units and it makes for a unique strategy game for a hotseat adventure!
– Real player with 16.1 hrs in game
HUMANKIND™
Loosing progress at the Dia de los Muertos Event??
I build a city with more than 300 population for nothing?
You are Not worth of my time and my money anymore!!
Mark my words. Look at the playtime at writing this review (213hours) … not a minute more, not a cent more for the many future DLCs.
DLCs that are necessary (but not paid once), as clearly the game is MISSING stuff to be enjoyed, to be recommended.
There are still games out there, You buy at release day, You play, You enjoy …. And You don’t feel fooled. Humankind is NOT one of them.
– Real player with 213.0 hrs in game
This is now my favorite Civ-like 4x game.
9/10
Cons:
-Its tutorialization GUI and tooltips leave something to be desired. For example, the fact that Fog environment (tile modifier) on the ocean stops line of sight units from being able to fire through. Some things you have to just learn on your own. I wish they could update this for as much as possible.
-This might just be a flavor thing, but the way the game is set up, you can transition to entirely different cultures as you enter a new era. You can go from Assyrian to Swedish within a campaign, without ever having dominated or assimilated any different culture-groups. Sometimes, I wish this had been handled differently, like you could only transition into culture-groups you had somehow been culturally involved with by neighbors or assimilation/domination. But gameplay wise it is still very fun as it is. Just hampers the immersion slightly.
– Real player with 155.4 hrs in game
MicroTown
Very fun village builder, easy to learn, on my second run I got to the end goal (Monument). Not much random so not a lot of replay value at present. Highly recommended but don’t expect it to keep your interest past one solid day at the present state. I really look forward to new developments in this game! Some specifics:
1. Nice easy to learn mechanics
2. Tutorial needs to teach balancing, in particular (a) how do you tell when to add workers at a building, and (b) how do you know when to build more houses, and © show how to change the number of builders & carriers
– Real player with 56.1 hrs in game
Worth the $8, a good game to mindlessly play while listening to music or a podcast. I recommend turning on background play so i can click away and do other stuff while the little guys idle away. I’d like to see a better graphics option and more content as it is updated but you get exactly the kind of game you expect. It’s quaint and relaxing. I’m satisfied.
–-{Graphics}—
☐ You forget what reality is
☐ Beautiful
☐ Good
☐ Decent
☑ Bad
☐ Don‘t look too long at it
☐ Paint.exe
—{Gameplay}—
☐ Very good
– Real player with 21.1 hrs in game
Deity Empires
Short description:
DE is the most faithful (playable) successor to Master of Magic. It has some
*4x Fantasy Strategy with seperate magic and civic research
*points to spend on perks at game start
*sophisticated economy
*incremential elements like resource upgrades and unit leveling ( (which you can turn off))
*Tactical battles and Rogue like dungeon diving (simplistic Rogue Like at the moment but there is more to come)
A negative point is, that this game is complex and/but has very limited manual (and no tutorial). As I understand it, the devs wait for the big and essential updates, before they spend time on manuals. The DE community is very welcoming. The forum search function is your extended manual.
– Real player with 783.5 hrs in game
This review is from the perspective of someone who has played a significant amount of the Age of Wonders series and the Fall from Heaven 2 mod for Civ4. I’ve also dabbled in Endless Legend, Fallen Enchantress, Dominions, and Master of Magic.
Right now this game feels like a cross of Age of Wonders and FFH2, and I love it. Below are some of my thoughts:
City Development (Tall vs Wide):
Cities start weak but can become incredible powerhouses given time and investment. For example, a starting city will produce approximately 100 gold per turn, which is enough to fund a low tier army or a level 1 improvement every 5 turns. My capitol in my latest game, however, produces 4000 (!) gold a turn, and is still not yet fully developed. I basically don’t have to care about income because this city is basically El Dorado.
– Real player with 357.3 hrs in game
First Days of Atlantis
It’s definitely a step back from traditional city builders, but in this case that’s kind of a good thing. It’s challenging enough to pique one’s interest trying to unlock the higher tier buildings, but relaxing enough that it’s a good time sink if you just need something to do while you relax. All in all, not a bad little game, especially if you catch it on sale.
– Real player with 5.1 hrs in game
Great mix of City Builder and highscore hunt. I especially like the little details like boats, people and sheep (which you can pet btw.) that move around and make the city you build feel alive.
– Real player with 2.9 hrs in game
Zen World
Zen World is a fun chill puzzle game in the vein of Dorfromantik and Mini Metro / Motorways.
At its core its a game where you expand the map with tiles, get boxes with upgrades and resources to expand more, and in the end you get a highscore.
It feels like a very basic version of Civilization that’s drizzled down to its most essential elements (that being said I haven’t played a lot of Civilization. This is NOT a 4X game, this is a puzzle game).
The developer has stated that in time there will be full controller support, more tile types, a mid-game save/load system, multiplayer (coop and versus), custom game mode with modifiers, better visual & effects and a lot more.
– Real player with 52.0 hrs in game
Very fun to play.
It’s like Settlers of Catain, but more relaxing.
Very simple to start but is has complexes that make it a mini strategy game.
– Real player with 32.5 hrs in game