Banished

I skipped the tutorials and went straight in, and I made a lot of mistakes and had to restart several times, but I enjoyed learning how to play the game through trial and error. Eventually I reached a point where my population had grown enough that I needed a second temple, and then shortly thereafter, a second school, and then more houses and fields of crops. And then it sinks in very quickly that the game has essentially ended and that I'm starting again. That's the shortfall of this game. There's no tier after the first. You're able to build a decent town in just a few hours of gameplay and then after that there's nothing really new to unlock or discover and it becomes repetitive as you just expand by doing the same things over again. The other main issue I had was that once my population grew beyond 700 - 800 it became difficult to keep track of things because the UI is simple and doesn't cope well with the complexities of later game. A mine runs out of resources way on the other side of the map and I don't notice right away. The blacksmiths were depending on this resource. The blacksmiths quickly deplete stockpiles of this resource and then stops producing. Then the town quickly runs out of tools. Now everyone is running on half-efficiency and I can't get anything done. People can't quite harvest food or gather logs for firewood as quickly as they need to so now people are starving and freezing the death. Now I have fewer people and not enough to assign to the various important tasks. Now the town is doomed, trapped in a death spiral. All because a mine closed and I didn't notice for two minutes too many. I wish it were a little easier to keep ahead of things like this but the warning system in the game is just simple 'bong' noise that goes off so often for so many things that it gets tuned out.

I can't play this game. My people either starve, die because of the cold, or stop reproducing. I probably more than 20 villages so far, and all my attempts sucked. Having that said, I love this game, and if you consider that ONE person created this... I'm mindblown. This is such a good game for being a one-man effort. I liked that there was no fighting, as I don't like to fight in games, and I recommend it to people who also don't like to fight. The graphics are cute, it runs on my shitty computer, and it's a good game to play if you have some time to kill and don't want to think too much. It might probably get repetitive after a while, unless you suck like me, then it will always be fun cos you will never go too far in the game. It's not a perfect game, sometimes the AI is pretty silly. For example: I'm building something and they have to cut down a bunch of trees and get rid of some rocks to do it. Instead of using those trees and rocks to build the building, my people have to carry them aaaaalll the way to the stockpile and then back to the building. Makes no sense. But for a one-man effort (and the price on sale) I can't really complain.

I really enjoy playing this game. I wasn't sure if there would be enough here for me. I typically enjoy meeting goals, finishing quests, basically achieving something specific. This game doesn't have any of that. It is a simulation that allows you to build as you please. I find myself coming back to it again and again. I do hope they continue to add to this game though. I'd love to be able to add decorations, more professions, or perhaps have different kinds of land maps.

Not sure why but this game I keep playing for hours and hours. It is exciting and the hardest part of the game is keeping your population in check. A mods make it much nicer, the mine that allows you to pick stone or coal and the mod that provides stone bridges.

Love it!!! Been playing many years on and off and will continue too ;)