Recent reviews by Skynet

Surprisingly good for a free, Gacha game.

Nothing that hasn't been done already.

Technically well executed, and charming, but not *that* fun or engaging. Certainly not worth full price. Maybe try it out when it is massively discounted.

6.5/10 Recommended with serious reservations. The game is original and has potential, but, as of this review, has a core gameplay loop that is simply unfinished.

Why I recommend:
- The gameplay hook is original, and possibly even unique. This is first and foremost an economy simulator: most challenges are economic in some nature. So you earn money by taxing the peasantry, but if you overtax or mismanage them, the peasantry will struggle to be productive, and you will miss out on potential tax revenue. So you'll spend most of your time deciding on who to tax, and who to subsidise. This is the main draw and will tickle the hunger of even the most experienced players looking for original, complex game mechanics.

Why I have serious reservations:
- The game won't tell you this, but the real antagonist isn't the ruler who taxes you, or uprisings--these are just mechanisms of economic pressure. The real antagonist is the constant threat of having your peasantry make poor economic choices and give away all their (your) money. Subsidising sometimes works to address temporary issues, but often does not work if the cause of the poor economic choices isn't addressed (just like in real life--awesome!).
- However, execution of this is ultimately where the game falls flat on its face: Micromanaging poor economic choices is easy in the early game when you are managing 3 families, but gets very difficult after about 10 families or so.
- To make matters worse, many families are completely useless and paralysed without other families to buy product from. While there are traders to fill in gaps, they are too infrequent and too expensive to rely upon for sustainability. So you have to have many families to build a sustainable economy.
- Finding the right families with the right skills depends too much on RNG. The only dependable mechanic - favour, is very hard to come by early game.
- The construction aspect is passable. The primary game play mechanic behind construction is to pressure your supply-chain (awesomely done!) and to influence travel time. It is otherwise shallow. There are relatively few options for functional decoration. Most dwellings ultimately end up looking the same since space is a luxury. While the game emphasises poverty and riches, there seems to be minimal room to truly reflect that in the art style. There are only three meaningful tiers of walls for example (hay, wood, stone) .The others can be skipped or are minor cosmetic variations.
- For an economic simulator, the interface has lots of deficiencies. Key information is buried. Some information is completely missing (like details about spending and earnings on non-products)
- Performance has been a long standing problem. The developer has made improvements, but as it stands the game will lag before you reach end-game content

Simple changes that could address the most serious issues:
The developer is focused on adding sexy, end-game features (nobility, crime, armies) but really needs to focus on the core gameplay mechanic: the economic simulation and management. Luckily some simple changes could make this game more playable:
- Make key information easily available: The key information needed is wealth, cash, and mood of each family over time. Make it a line plot of all families over time. That way you can focus on what's important: who is trending up/down and what the cause is.
- Provide alternate means for families to subsist. Maybe all peasants should be able to do some basic farming or some other basic labour, and the current farming specialisation has access to more advanced farming. Make family capabilities generally more tiered. Currently, it's all or nothing in terms of production capability. Maybe the baker can make basic bread from just wheat and a stone fireplace. That way they can subsist (though perhaps just barely) until the rest of your supply chain is capable.