New Frontier Days ~Founding Pioneers~
There are a couple minor issues I have with it but overall I definitely feel I’ve gotten $9 worth of play out of it even just so far ;) and I’m not done.
– Real player with 48.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder Building Games.
I bought this game because the ad for it looked like it was a good game. Sad to say the game play is nothing like that. The User Interface jams up A lot and is not easy to use, also it has some glitches, I had to restart the game like three times thanks to that. I would NOT recommend this game to anyone!
– Real player with 8.1 hrs in game
Kainga: Seeds of Civilization
i previously did a hastily anger fueled review after losing my thinker to walking into the water and ending my game but after another 14 hrs can say nothing has changed and my thinker had died a few more time this way. The road map will be very delayed to add new content as alot of the games current content needs alot of bug fixes, i’ve never played a game with so many bugs early access or not i’ve played plenty of pre release games too with less bugs then this.
Do not buy until Dec/Jan and even then unless rolling in $ wait for a sale. the sheer amount of bugs and stuff that just doesn’t work will turn you off the potentionally great game
– Real player with 37.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder Roguelite Games.
This game has so much potential but really needs to be balanced in order to stave off some real frustrations. The RNG aspect of the game really works against the player in most cases, and the enemy tribes start off ahead and are a real hindrance to get your tribe out of the mud. They attack or demand tribute almost immediately, and 9 times out of 10 despite how big the map is, you spawn right next to them. Aside from the tutorial there’s no “starting area” to get your feet wet and learn the game. One map has half of the inspiration areas inaccessible (including the inspiration that allows these areas to become accessible, the other map has hardly any resources, and if you don’t “draw” the right tech after inspiration, you’re screwed. Because of all of this, it took me 20 attempts to pass the first challenge. A third map is unlocked later, but is harder still.
– Real player with 32.6 hrs in game
Cultures - 8th Wonder of the World
It’s still addictive as Northland; but it’s a step down. The UI is worse, you can’t “give extras to everyone” anymore; instead the game only lets you toggle a switch for giving equipment to new civilians. The weaksauce carrying/merchantry system is not improved one bit; workers lose their carriages the moment you right-click somewhere, there is no easy way to stop unload orders and you gotta micromanage all carrying processes etc. And that’s bad because this game has a lotta “carry goods” missions.
– Real player with 93.9 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder RTS Games.
Update (original review removed, rewritten here): Would I love this game this much if it didn’t have reminiscent value to me? Probably not. Would I still, if made to play it, fall in love with the characters, be drawn into the simple yet intricate challenge of village growth and conquering objectives, and be awed at how a 2003 game looks and functions so well even today? Abso-viking-lutely.
These games are worth the dollars, but currently on sale, there has never been a better way to spend $1 in all of Steam, ever. Kick back and enjoy this beautiful world.
– Real player with 66.8 hrs in game
Cultures - Northland
A classic game, one of the first videogames I played on PC. My friends dismissed it as a “cardboard-cutout” silly RTS, but despite all that, I still love the game.I’ve recently had the pleasant surprise to find it listed on steam, as I misplaced the original CD, and bought it at a slight discount to see if it still runs (windows 10 64bit). Gotta say, I had to fiddle with the resolution and graphics settings a bit, but I got it to work, and it was worth it.
A few ways in which this game differs from other strategy games: left click is only for selection; placing buildings,setting work areas, taking various actions and whatnot require right-clicking. All subjects have their various needs (if played on easy or normal difficulty) that need to be satisfied. Vikings require signposts to be placed around to go to faraway places. This need can be bypassed by scouts(who place the signposts) and military units.
– Real player with 39.1 hrs in game
Childhood game, therefore my review might be subjective.
Very good, old school RTS game with colorful graphics, simple rules, many campaigns and no need for DLC’s. There could be more main missions as well as side missions apart from those at Skirmish mode.
Let’s not forget that the game production is dated as of year 2000, the 2015 is the release date on steam, not the actual production time. As of year 2000, the game can be easily compared to old The settlers or old Anno titles.
Although few aspects of the game could be more extended, such as main heroes. Great example here can be Spellforce series or even Warlords Battlecry where the main hero can use spells, have certain attributes as well as the inventory.
– Real player with 34.9 hrs in game
Patron
Coming from Banished, and particularly modded Banished with RK, or North 7… there is a lot I like about Patron, a ton that I (hopefully just currently) dislike about it, and hope to see what it may become. So everything in this review should be seen through the lense of a long time fanatical Banished player. As what I like and dislike about Patron as it currently stands are so closely intertwined, rather than a list of like/dislike, I will discuss various aspects of the game and what I like/dislike about each of them.
– Real player with 150.5 hrs in game
Despite promise, Patron needs baked a little longer.
You know those game dev sims, where you have to wait a little while after a game is “done” to work out some bugs before you release? I don’t know that that happened with this one.
Nevertheless, I have worked around the bugs that have caused it to crash (and crash… and crash…) enough to get it to work at least in windowed mode and given it a try. And so far, it’s kind of just making me want to play some Banished with the Colonial Charter mods in place.
– Real player with 49.7 hrs in game
Siege Survival: Gloria Victis
I first heard of this game during the Steam Game Festival back in February and I spent maybe 2 dozen hours trying out the demo before getting the full game.
Siege Survival is heavily inspired from This War of Mine, and incorporates many of the same looting and resource management aspects, such as base-building, scavenging the city at night, trying to keep your people alive until the end of a war, and more.
I think Siege Survival handles some aspects very well, even better than TWoM, such as:
– Real player with 100.4 hrs in game
I really tried to like this game, I did, really. I think the hours speak how much I tried. I gave up a few times on the hardcore mode because while I didn’t mind a challenge, I didn’t feel like doing the siege again, but harder.
I understand, and it wasn’t a bad idea to try to mix This War of Mine and Medieval siege. But the problem is, well, you kind of lost the point of T.W.M. when you tried this. That war is shit, and stupid, especially as a civilian that has no horse in the race. When you’re the focus of the siege, forced to pick a side, and it’s so binary who’s right/wrong, the message is lost. It’s a typical story of “us vs. bad men” and that’s where you dropped the ball. The events are binary right/wrong as well, pick the obviously right/morally good choices and your rewards are a mood boost plus a benefit. Versus a mood debuff plus a benefit. Closest to “conflicted” I get to a decision is the rat event where you either go for the food that can make ~12 meals and get lightly scratched or don’t. You never talk to an Ismir raider to ask them why they’re raiding us, what they hope to get out of it, and what they say to justify it all. You meet one, but he’s too wounded to talk philosophy or reason which admittingly did amuse me when I thought of trying so with a notebook and pencil in my hands.
– Real player with 50.4 hrs in game
Songs of Syx
TL;DR: Paid full $25 USD. Definitely worth it, great balance between DF and Rimworld while doing it’s own new thing. Saves not migrating versions stinks, but understandable for a complex EA game.
Amazing. Still EA and some missing features, but what is here is very well built!
I was initially turned off this game because I played a much earlier demo, but this game has grown into something truly impressive! Games in this genre tend to fall under “Dwarf Fortress” or “Rimworld”, and often fail to measure up to either. Songs of Syx strikes right between DF’s sense of scale (but then skyrockets past it as your city-state grows), and Rimworld’s friendlier UX allowing you to actually enjoy playing (but UX scaled for a massive city-state, not a couple dozen colonists).
– Real player with 242.7 hrs in game
TLDR: 8/10 (Humble aesthetics, clunky UI, but does the game play have a real arse on it…)
Songs of Syx is an increasingly curious city-builder. Though it clearly has a bit of development to undergo (0.56 is the version I am reviewing), it is making leaps and bounds with each update. Sure, maybe it’s not a whole lot to look at and things are a bit muddy and cluttered, but that’s forgivable since its function is handled with such care.
Concept
This isn’t your typical hands-on city-builder or village survival game. While it shares a lot of ground with games like Rimworld or Dwarf Fortress, it’s functionally its own game thanks to your inability to manage individual citizens. Which is kind of a blessing, since you don’t want to be able to nit and pick when you’ve bloated to a city with 1,000+ people.
– Real player with 214.6 hrs in game
Banished
Great game. It’s not so much about managing towns, more about whether or not people survive your town managing skills. Have fun.
– Real player with 2342.5 hrs in game
To me Banished set a golden standard for city builder/ colony sim games. There wasn’t anything especially new or innovative for the genre, but the mechanics and elements of the game just came together really well and the end-product was so polished. The graphics were something different, most games in this genre don’t focus on that much and usually have more simplistic pixel type graphics. This had a much more realistic look, which I thought was pretty cool.
A lot of city builder/ colony sim games have enemies that attack every so often or land you have to conquer. I like some of those games a lot, but I was also really intrigued by this one NOT having that and instead having nature as your enemy. Hunger, weather, temperature, natural disasters, etc. were your enemy instead. This focus on natural survival felt pretty original, though there are probably games that have done it before.
– Real player with 308.4 hrs in game
CaesarIA
Not a bad concept for a city builder.
I’m enjoying it so far.
I will say tho.
The buildings need an area of effect highlight when positioning them.
Buildings can have a positive or negative effect on housing development.
Some have a blanket effect, others the effect is over multiple rings, or in the case like the Markets they need to be within range of functioning storeage buildings to be active themselves.
This isnt a bad thing but as the Market description implies, it both boosts and reduces housing while needing to be within range of buildings that reduce housing development. Neither effect is displayed so theres no ideal way of knowing if the storage is within range of the markets while being out of range of the housing.
– Real player with 11.5 hrs in game
I downloaded this because it’s getting harder and harder to find a good City Builder now a days. they are all becoming apps with pay to win, and they either focus all on economy, or all on combat and pvp. sometimes you just want to play alone, and not have to fork out money to make the play smooth. Warcraft, Starcraft, Age of empires, Ceasar, and a few others were great for this, it’s a dying breed of game it feels like for me.
anywho, I saw this ans was super excited. I played it immediatly. about 6 hours into my play time I ran into a few road blocks. some things weren’t working properly, and they littlerally haulted game progression. (example, being able to appease Ceaser’s requests was broken) among a few other things like crashes, and games not saving.
– Real player with 8.3 hrs in game
Caesar™ IV
Many years ago, when I was a member of GameTap (before Steam), I became addicted to CivCity Rome. Fast forward a decade and some change later, I found Caesar IV on Steam and thought I’d give it a whirl. Having loved CivCity Rome, I figured Caesar IV would be equally as satisfying.
I was right, and I was wrong. Right because I loved Caesar IV from the moment I started playing. Wrong because it is far superior to CivCity Rome in a plethora of ways. Not knocking CivCity Rome, but Caesar IV has so many additional features and perks.
– Real player with 441.4 hrs in game
As someone who has spent more than 1000h+ in Civ V and VI, I’d say this is a great city-builder game. Easy to learn, hard to master style. As I write this I’m trying to complete the last campaign mission @ prosperity path, already completed the game in the military mode at hard difficulty.
I can assure you people who complain about scenarios being too small have only played the tutorial missions, which are small indeed, but it’s just the tutorial who tries to teach you how to optimice the space you are given to build. All other scenarios give you far too plenty of space.
– Real player with 148.1 hrs in game