Foundation

Very disappointed in this game and can't recommend unless major improvements are made. Cute graphics, some interesting mechanics. Haven't encountered any bugs, although some functionality quite possibly could be bugged. I've played on easy setting and ended up restarting the game 3 times because I ran into problems beyond recovery because some concepts were not clear. Here is how it went down. - On the first try, I ran out of wood. The woodcutters cut the available woods clean and forest doesn't grow back by itself at all. Turns out you need to build a Forester immediately when it becomes available. It is part of the tutorial but it's marked a optional. It absolutely isn't. At least in early game, wood is important because you need tons of it. Additionally, you're getting quests that require to sell wood. You can skip it once, but then eventually it comes back and next time it turns into blackmail: give us wood or lose reputation. - On the same try, I also lost time on setting up tax collection. This mechanic is not different from Anno where taxes are the only source of money, except for random quests. However, in this game, quests are almost non-existent (or require materials you need yourself), so taxes are the only option. This is not explained by tutorial, however. The tax building requires "light fortification". It is in the research tree but very far down the line. But it turns out that Church building provides that, so you simply need to place tax building close by. You need to know this and plan for this, there is no clear information in tutorial or Help. - The "procedural" building option in this game manifests in the residential buildings. Unlike in Anno or Manor House, you just "paint" a residential area and then residents build houses there. How many houses? Who knows! You have no idea. Combined with oddly shaped territory (more on this later), you think you're painting enough for 4 homes but somehow end up with 3 homes plus oddly shaped useless gaps in the middle. Yes, you can blow up houses, but it leads to major loss of resources (you cannot move buildings for free and destruction refunds only part of resources). At first, I thought it's cool that I don't need to build each house but the more you play the more annoying this concept becomes. - The territory. In campaign mode, you pick a piece of territory you start with. You have no idea what's in that territory and especially when just starting the game, you have no way of knowing what's important. The tutorial doesn't provide any hints on this. Small pile that looks like rocks turns out to be iron, for example. The territories are weirdly shaped and very small. Some games are like that and you need to manage city within given confines. But in this game, this concept is taken to a ridiculous level. You can't control residential buildings. You need lots of building for supply chain (e.g. tool production needs 4 buildings!), and on top of it, some buildings have a "dirtyness", like in Anno. (This isn't explained or even mentioned at all, but you can connect the dots when you see the brown "aura".) So you also need an "industrial park" setup. And you need to maneuver around resources, natural features like water, all on a handkerchief-sized plot. Granted, you get a second territory quickly enough, but then it is just as quickly consumed by residences and service buildings. In order to build a nice castle like in the ads, you need to play forever and save money for lots of territory or play in sandbox only. - The money. As I said, taxation without representation is the only source. However, you need to spend money for almost EVERYTHING in the game. Decos? Money. Research? Money. Buildings? Money. Territory? Money. Promote citizens to the next class? Money. Very quickly you reach the point where you need hundreds but only earn like 10 coins per turn. I don't know what the solution is supposed to be. You can't get more people because you need more territory and to buy territory, you need money. This is like "my modem driver is on CD but CD player driver is on the Internet". - Ridiculous warehousing system. A warehouse can store only 4 items (update: you can research and buy an expansion later but it's a rather palliative improvement of poorly designed system), even though there are way more resources even in early game. The goods must be assigned to the warehouse in order to trade them. Trade, of course, is also very limited because goodness forbid you earn more money. And if you realize that you have no space and need to "unassign" some goods, then you lose them. - As others noted, total lack of information that is needed in a city builder game. On first try, I had full warehouse of berries with just one worker. On the next, with 4 workers, barely any berries. I have no idea why. The bushes were abundant. You don't know when the traders are going arrive and how much would they buy. E.g. I started producing lots of meat for trade but then trader arrived and was like "oh thanks, I'll just take 10" when I had 50. Update after giving it another chance. - Still playing with tutorial, it turned out to be not very useful. E.g. one of the tasks was to pick a specific Edict. The edict comes with some penalties but you think ok, I'll just change it (like policy in Tropico or similar concepts in other games). But it doesn't tell you that you can't simply change the edict! You need to (a) have a bailiff (research + building) and (b) pay bailiff to "remove edict". That's just asinine. - You need to look very, very carefully over the whole knowledge tree to plan your path through it. Tutorial doesn't hint at the fact that there are dependencies on items from different "branches" (and each branch has its own requirements and increasing cost that isn't just coins but some "mana" that you need to accumulate who knows how). - Some things are not explained at all. E.g. you can unlock glass maker but it needs quartz. Where do you get quartz? It's not even mentioned in help, you have to go to Reddit to find. You need to send a bailiff to "prospect" the mountains somewhere on the map. And you don't know if you ever find quartz and where. I'm already 5 prospects in and so far no quartz and no gems. - I'm further convinced that "vibe housing" is a terrible concept. In Anno, you know what is coming, what will you need and how much. Here, the villagers just randomly decide to do a home reno and whoop, there goes 40 planks. - Most annoying thing of all: useless notifications. "No access to this or that". Where? How? Why? In Anno or other games, service building have a known zone of influence that you can see. Here, it's anyone's guess what is happening. Some of the notifications are just completely meaningless and disappear on their own (like villager can't find a path - they totally can, as it turns out). And OMG, never build the Inn. You will never see the end of "no space" notifications from your Foundation Hilton. - Regularly, some messengers arrive and vaguely ask you for "help". What exactly do they need and how much? Ooooh, they won't tell. What will you gain? Mysterious "trade route improvement". - You can't set production limits. I started the bow production per tutorial task. I only have 5 bowman but forgot that production building just kept cranking the bows. No hint like buddy, you might not need that many. - The game gets laggy already at 100 villagers. I have a decent gaming rig that ran a huge empire in Anno before. My conclusion is this game actively wants you to not succeed even in "I play to relax" mode.

Foundation is seriously a good medieval town planner, let me expand on that: Considering you probably saw a video commenting the mechanics of the game, they feel really smooth, the zones you draw take shape very quickly and you don't need to place them perfectly so they work out in the late-game. Multiple choices for world generation add to the experience, riverlands and hills that can be customized with a map overview before you even get into the save are a big time-saver. Most function buildings don't really have much customisation options - usually just the roof colour, however something like a woodcutter camp might have sub-buildings that also look great and add benefits. The fun with customising buildings comes a bit later, the mansion, castle keep and churches all have modular building models and you get to plan your own ones. Next are trade mechanics - there are wandering traders that buy and sell off materials for you, this seems to be a little bit of a limited segment of the game but it still adds to the core experience - especially when you start out and don't have streamlined production lines of tools or luxuries. As for stuff that'd need some expanding, I'd love to see the world generation get some more love. It'd be a blast to be able to manipulate terrain like you are able to in something like Cities Skylines. With that being said you don't really pay attention to these parts at the beginning but after you spend a few good hours planning your settlement, it really makes you appreciate the game more. With all that being said, I sincerely recommend you Foundation, it is a relaxing game with the potential to make you dive in for hours.

Fantastic city builder. I like that the RTS component (Kingdom) is optional. The devs have picked up the communication in the last year which is great. Some quality of life improvements remain, a little more variety for crafting goods and improving farming with variety as well with new crops and animals.

Tried giving it a go, its really pretty to look at and I enjoy the basic mechanics...but this might sound silly, No day night cycle really ruined it for me. Its not immersive. Having to choose when my world goes dark or rainy really stinks, not to mention being able to combine "rainy" with night, day or dusk. Its cute, but it wasn't giving me much incentive to keep going. Its not going to be a city builder for everyone. On the technical side, 144fps felt choppy and not smooth at all. Couldn't figure out what was hampering the overall fluidity.

Probably one of the best medieval citybuilders out there, an adorable aesthetic and it's gameplay is simple to start with but surprisingly complex, especially keeping more advanced villager's needs supplies late game. The tutorials will teach you enough to get by while leaving room to master it. If people are leaving, the happiness system will tell you which needs aren't being met, though how is up to you, I'd personally like to see some more upgrades and research to increase the efficiency of buildings late game, but there's workshop support for mods if you jut want a production multiplier. I also cannot stress enough how pretty everything is, especially as decorating towns and buildings is essential for upgrading the system. Looking forward to its future updates and first DLCs It also runs very well at all the populations i reached.

Achei muito bom, bem legal a cidade ir evoluindo e tem coisas diferentes de outros jogos desse estilo tudo é bem bonitinho e o tutorial explica bem até oque fazer depois é com voce, gostei que da para criar mapas e o nome do reino bem legal. espero que continue com novas coisas S2

Fun medieval city building sim that allows you to get fairly creative with how major buildings look (castles, churches, inns/taverns for the most part). It's very pretty in its simple way, and I love how alive the city feels when I follow a villager going about their day. The unlock system is rewarding without feeling too challenging. The admin system is well designed, and it's mostly well-balanced (the civilian rank system was frustrating, keeping everyone a serf is the way to go). One of those games where I easily lose track of time, and find myself thinking about when I'm not playing. With the different areas to focus there is good replayability as well. Definitely recommend if you enjoy city planning, architecture, and/or medieval civilization.

Hyperfixation goes hard. I've hardly slept since I started playing this, but at least my city is prospering, even if I'm not. ETA: Semi-regular crashes starting around 1300 population, turning down some of the graphics settings and hoping that helps.