I've tried to get this game to work on two different Windows laptops, and both have had the game crash every time I try to advance my turn. The game designer is aware of the issue and yet the game hasn't been updated since 2016. Disabling the sound doesn't help, and trying to switch to windowed mode doesn't even work. I can play one game the first time I install the game; from there on out, it crashes once I advance my turn.
This is a game where you can farm, fish, explore dangerous mines, raise animals, make friends, get married, play a minigame on an arcade machine, unlock secret areas with a few new characters, and more. The number of different items in the game is astonishing. The game is fairly relaxing because you have no real upkeep expenses and your character doesn't have to eat to live. Obviously, it is heavily inspired by Every character in the game has something like five special cutscenes. Their dialogue (which is usually just whatever they say when you click on them to say hi) will change as you get to know them. For the six men and six women available to marry, the last few of these will have romantic undertones or be straight up kissing them. One aspect of the game that may seem restrictive but that I like is how saving works. Each day lasts for 12.6 minutes of real time if you play from 6AM to midnight in game, without doing things like pulling up menus or reeling in a fish that pause the game's clock. However, you can go to bed any time you want to end your day. So each day can be over as quickly as you want. This is the only way your day ends, unless you pass out for staying up until 2 AM or you get your health drained by enemies in a place like the mines. Staying up past midnight, or worse, passing out at 2am, will leave your character tired the next day, and getting your health drained will also cost you a few random inventory items. The game saves when, and only when, your day ends. You can have multiple play-throughs with their own save file simultaneously, but you can only have one save file per play through. This is fine, because the game is very forgiving. This game has a lot of replay value.
This was a fun game once, but when I got it from GOG, there were serious issues with slow performance.
This game is great! If you like city builder games and haven't played this series, you should definitely play it. As for how it compares to other games in the series, the graphics aren't as good as more recent ones like Emperor, but the gods, heroes, and monsters walking around your city make it stand out as one of the most interesting. One thing about this game that makes it either better or worse than Pharoah, depending on your perspective, is that it tries to put all the information you need in tabs on the right side of the main game screen while you're looking at your city rather than having a detailed information screen that you have to pull up separately. One other thing that makes it different from the others in the series is that you have separate housing for the elite citizens and regular citizens (with many levels of quality within each type), and the elite citizens serve as your military. The regular citizens can be deployed for defense only as a weak militia, but their numbers can make them a powerful force. I've played Pharoah, and I've tried one of the Caesar games, but I haven't played Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom. If anyone has played Zeus and Emperor, how do the two compare?
