Dissent on Mars

This game is a really cool blend of colony builder and life sim, with a strong sci-fi twist. You’re not just placing buildings—you’re designing how your whole society works, from the economy to the government. What makes it stand out is that you actually live in the world you create, playing as a colonist and experiencing the effects of your own choices. It’s packed with systems that let you experiment and see what happens, whether you’re aiming for a peaceful utopia or watching things spiral into chaos. Curious to keep exploring and see how far it will take me!

Game has a cozy art style that I adore, and the soundtrack is also really good. That said, it’s a bit rough around the edges. 1080p max resolution in 2025 is kinda odd, and the price feels a little high for what you get compared to similar games. Still, I had a good time with it overall. If you’re into this type of game, it’s worth supporting the devs.

TLDR: This game is too shallow for what it's trying to be, and too expensive for what it does have, don't buy it. This game isn't Rimworld. It isn't trying to be Rimworld. What it is trying to be is a political-economic simulator. Unfortunately it fails at being a political-economic simulator. I've always loved games with a realistic economy, games with player run economies like Eve or Prosperous Universe, or simulated economies like X4 or Capitalism Lab. I don't like multiplayer, so I've mainly played singleplayer games. Unfortunately, X4's is a space game first and foremost, and Capitalism Lab is too abstracted and high-level. I thought Dissent On Mars was the single-player agent-based economic simulator I was waiting for, but it just sucks. The primary problem is that even in the fully free market economy, the player is required to intervene, primarily when placing new buildings. Regardless of the options you choose, practically everything is determined by the player. Land use, resources, homes, regardless of it being a free market or a cooperative ownership. Ownership of homes and workplaces must be determined by the player, even in a free market, colonists cannot buy/sell buildings. Many of the 'choices' allowed are chosen for you in the first few menus. After those, all the choices really only have one or two options selectable for any one of the primary economic models. There isn't as much actual choice as there appears to be. For a game in which the economy is a primary point, it is incredibly simple. Resources are harvested directly within the workplace, then made, then either sold to colonists or decayed. There is no second-hand market, colonists can only buy and consume products (or let it decay). There is no three-sector model, there are no farms or mining operations to sell resources to refiners, to then sell to workplaces. Regardless of whether you're making pizzas, bathtubs, or video games, the resources extraction and the making of the product is done in the same workplace. Pizzarias harvest their own wheat, bath factories mine their own iron, game studios chop their own wood. There are no supply chains or workplace-workplace trade. Add on to a confusing UI, lack of graphs and historical statistics, no screen resolution above 1080p, and the most egregious fact that this game costs $39 CAD, this game just isn't worth it.

Dissent on Mars is a complex game with a lot of options on how to play it and interesting systems that interact in unexpected ways. I love a good menu, and Dissent on Mars has a lot. I'm going to keep playing and see how my colony grows.

Ok to start with i know from the screenshots and comments its hard to tell what exactly it happening with this game so thats all i plan on doing since the others make it clear why the game is bad. All you do in the game (after planning where the buildings are placed) is to repeatedly make economic plans for your town/village/whatever. You tell each person where and for how long they work there. Each person has things they are good and bad at but that does not seem to matter as if they have no passion for the job then they hate it making them unhappy to do said job. Each person has an allotted time they can work each day. They make items and as far as i could tell each item has a single use (if they make a bed they use it once to sleep and another must be crafted...like why?) they get money for making each item that they make and then they use said money to buy items they want/need. Honestly the game does this so poorly with little in the way of UI to track people struggling or needing adjustments and with you having to craft an economic plan every single day for ALL of your citizens it just winds up being a confusing, fatiguing mess of frustration and annoyance. Give it a pass and pick up Lords and Villeins instead as that does it much better and you are more easily able to manage your people without it being very very confusing and convoluted.

Way to tedious. you have to micromanege a whole city. Feels like an actual job

I'm not usually a fan of this style of game because of mine own slow processing dial up style brain. But this has changed my mind. I love the style and artwork. 10/10

Nice idea in principle, but needs quite a bit more work, which will never happen cause the devs abondoned this.