All posts tagged in Building
Dec 20, 2023
We’re another week closer to Christmas and I can’t wait! I love going around the neighborhood looking at people’s decorations. I think that’s part of why ACNH having lights in trees feels so satisfying to me. What else is super exciting about the Christmas season, is the new gaming systems and games you get! And with Steam Decks being fairly popular, what better way to celebrate the approach of the holiday with some gift ideas for that system?
The following list only features games that have been Steam Deck verified, to save the gamer in your life some troubles and heartache!
My Time at Sandrock
My Time at Sandrock is the long awaited sequel to My Time at Portia. And just like the prequel, this one takes place in a post-apocalyptic world 330 years after the Day of Calamity destroyed a lot of modern technology. You accept the role as a builder of Sandrock, a desert community. Gather resources to build machines, befriend locals, fight enemies, and lead the town to economic prosperity! Uncover the backstories for over 30 NPCs while you forge friendships with them. Complete side quests, play fun minigames, and even team up with a friend to play the game together!
APICO
APICO is a lovely game where you leave your boring city job and return to Port APICO, where you grew up, and return to your beekeeping roots. The APICO islands feature a set of lush, beautiful environments for you to explore. Each biome has its own breed of bees for you to discover. Gather resources to use in your studies or crafting. Make and sell Apicola (honey) and other beekeeping items you will discover. Play fun beekeeping minigames, without the stings! More importantly, breed different cross breeds of bees and discover 30 new species to help repopulate the APICO islands with. Plus, uncover the secrets of the islands while you explore.
I even have a review of APICO here, if you want more information!
Cornucopia
Cornucopia offers the same comfortable features players have grown to love from the farming game genre, but in a lovely 2.5D pixel art style. You plant 52 types of fruit trees, 15 types of berry bushes, and grow 52 different crops, including their different artisan varieties. Sell crops or cook them up in one of 200 different recipes! There’s also logging, fishing, mining, and pet breeding to occupy your days. Also enter the pets into competitive races or use them to help you fight monsters. Then, kick back and relax with some crafting and decorating. Unlock furniture and decorations to turn your farm into your favorite getaway. Make friends with Cornucopia’s NPCs, too. Who knows, maybe one of the over 47 NPCs will catch your fancy! Romance them, go on dates, and unlock their romantic cut scenes. Even marry one, start a family, and decorate their room in your house.
While the Iron’s Hot
Play as a simple journeyman blacksmith in While the Iron’s Hot. You’re looking to become a master blacksmith. This game features an exciting combat-free experience. Journey to the mystical lands of Ellian where you’ll meet a cast of quirky characters. Explore tunnels full of puzzles and resources. Master every step of the blacksmithing process. Smelt ore, turn metal into ingots, and shape them into useful items. Use your skills to repair machinery to open up new areas to explore. Craft equipment that helps you explore new regions. Even work hard to restore the defunct blacksmithing town of Stal. Revitalizing the village just might prove to Eillian’s artisans that you’re worthy of being a master blacksmith!
Loddlenaut
In Loddlenaut, you play as an interstellar custodian who has been hired by the spacefaring mega corporation GUPPI to clean up their mess. They’ve inundated GUP-14 with pollution, and want you to restore the planet. This is an open-world ocean adventure where you’ll get to explore this beautiful alien planet, along with the corporate ruins of GUPPI. You’ll find remnants of their buildings, ships, and machinery that have all sunken to the bottom of the game’s ocean. Use your bubble gun, clean up the trash, remove oil spills, and uncover clues about the past inhabitants. Unlock better gadgets to help you clean up different types of ocean pollution. Recycle the trash you collect and use it to craft items. Even befriend cute little axolotl-looking creatures called loddles!
Did you get a new Switch instead? Or perhaps you got one for someone and want some games to go with it. Either way, check out my list of 5 Farming Games for Your New Switch!
- Dec 20, 2023
Make Room is an adorable little sandbox simulation game where you create small dioramas. Choose from over a hundred different objects to craft the perfect reading nook, cozy kitchen, or comfy bedroom. Freely place each item exactly where you’d like it to go. Choose from a number of different colors to make the perfect aesthetic. Even pick what the outside of the room will look like, resize objects like trees, and more!
Release Date
This lovely little room maker, Make Room will release sometime next year and can be found on Steam!
Paralives boasts better room-building than The Sims if that was your favorite part of that game. Or there’s Tiny Glade, that’s just building cute little buildings and such!
- Dec 13, 2023
In As Far As The Eye, you play the role of the wind guiding the Pupils as they journey to the center of the world. It’s your job to manage their resources, their buildings, and their whole lives. Direct them to a bigger and better life in order to make it to their destination while surviving life and the rising waters that threaten them. Ensure they survive and thrive!
The roguelike tribe system gives As Far As The Eye a fresh feel each play through you take on. Plan out the route the Pupils will take to reach the center of the world. Not every route spells disaster, but each one holds its own special discoveries. Explore and search points of interest along that path to discover long lost treasures, and even meet allies along the way. And before you head on to the next spot, harvest resources, build your mobile village, and stock up on necessities!
As Far As The Eye reminds me a lot of dotAGE, which I absolutely loved. They both lack enemies, and instead pit you against random events that threaten the survival of your people. You overcome these events by preparing your people, in this case the Pupils, appropriately. Instruct the Pupils to conduct research that will improve their skills in agriculture, crafting, scientific and mystical arts. You’ll also want to improve your Pupils through the job system, as well as upgrade buildings for better results.
Will your Pupils survive?
Release Date
You can find this charming game now on Steam, Xbox, PlayStation, and Switch!
The Wandering Village is another beautiful nomadic base-building game!
- Nov 30, 2023
The planet has become hostile to humans, but they persist despite natural disasters and harsh living conditions. Your job in Synergy is to develop a thriving city while facing those natural disasters head on, making choices that will affect your people, and meeting the needs of those people. You’ll need to explore, analyze your surroundings and things you find, and experiment!
Analyzing your environment will be necessary for survival in Synergy. You’ll learn information about the plants and other elements of the world that will help you survive. This information will help you obtain new resources, as well as providing safety for your people. Plus, your new knowledge can help you build a more sustainable city suited for the environment, thus improving survival odds. You’ll also be able to assign jobs to your city-dwellers, like research! Their research will help further your goals of building a thriving city. Even exploration parties will help you discover necessary information.
Your choices matter in this strategy city-builder, so be sure to choose wisely!
Release Date
Synergy is coming to Steam at the beginning of 2024! You can currently add it to your Wishlist to keep up with it, though.
If you prefer brighter colors or pixel graphics, dotAGE is a great option for survival city-builders!
- Nov 29, 2023
Have you been looking for the next great tycoon-type game? You know, like Zoo Tycoon and Rollercoaster Tycoon where the focus was on using your creativity to build parks, while keeping guests happy. Perhaps one without puzzles or roguelite elements. A game that gets back to the roots of the genre and is just purely a tycoon game? Tavern Master might be for you, then! This is a cozy medieval management game where you’re in charge of building, maintaining, and running your own tavern.
Tavern Master equips you with many different tools to help you create the perfect business. Craft impeccable layouts and choose from any number of walls, flooring, fences, and stairs to build your tavern. Add decorations for a personal, cozy touch, too. Be sure to include a kitchen and rooms for guests to stay overnight! Arrange enough tables and chairs, plus light sources, to attract customers. Hire staff to run the kitchen and serve guests, and optimize the workflow. Customers will only wait so long!
What will your successful tavern look like?
Available Now
Tavern Master is available now on Steam!
Perhaps you’re looking for more of a life sim? Then checkout Circadian City, Little Sim World, or even Paralives!
- Nov 23, 2023
Are you looking for a cozy idle game that doesn’t involve leveling up fighters to defeat bosses and enemies? Garden Galaxy might be perfect for you, then! This relaxing little game is a unique sandbox idler where you take time to craft your ideal landscape.
You start with a blank canvas of a few white tiles, and a mysterious looking pot. Every few seconds in Garden Galaxy you’ll have a cute little flame-like visitor pop-up for a visit. Click them to earn a coin. Then, feed the coin into the mysterious pot to earn a reward! The pot will spit out cute decorations like lanterns and planters, helpful piggy banks, and terrain tiles. Rearrange the terrain tiles and decorations as you please to create a beautiful garden space. You’ll even be able to change the background color and the time of day to achieve the perfect aesthetic.
Take a moment to embark on a chill and creative journey with this pretty little idle game!
Available Now
You can find Garden Galaxy on Steam now! There’s also a demo available so you can try out the game first.
Spirit City: Lofi Sessions is another cozy idle game worth taking a look at!
- Nov 22, 2023
Solarpunk is a first person game that you can play solo or together with friends. While it is an open-world crafting survival, it’s also a cozy adventure full of resource gathering, building, exploring, crafting, and farming. Harness the power of sunlight, water, and wind to automate your homesteading processes.
Take advantage of the modular building components to build the home of your dreams. Build your floor plan from scratch by placing each floor tile. Set up walls, windows, doors, and roofs to complete the plan. Add stairs for a multi-story set-up! Solarpunk also has a variety of decorations for you to use to create the coziest home possible. Then, you can place farm plots to grow your own fruits and vegetables to consume. Each crop satisfies a different amount of hunger, so growing a variety of them can be useful. You can also trade your bounty to the merchant for other goods.
Don’t forget to build your own airship so you can explore Solarpunk’s numerous sky islands. You’ll find caves, mountains, lakes, and rivers across the world. Different resources can be found on different islands, too. Or if you’re more of the farmer type, raise and breed different animals. Treat them well, and those animals will reward you with resources! There’s no exploitation here, only coexistence. So be sure to provide them with enough food, water, and space.
Coming Soon
You can find Solarpunk on Steam where you can add it to your Wishlist. There is no official release date listed yet.
Loftia has some promise for a cozy MMO, also with solarpunk elements like harnessing alternative energy sources!
- Nov 16, 2023
The Tenants is your opportunity to build the rental property empire of your dreams! You’re in the driver’s seat of your new career, so you get to decide everything. Test your investment skills in order to earn money. Take risks or play it safe by finding the best bang for your buck. Then, choose who you rent to. Perhaps the aspiring musician will make a good tenant. Or even build a welcoming gaming haven for a group of gamer friends.
Just be prepared to deal with the various situations The Tenants has that will pop up between neighbors! How you react to things will have an affect on your gameplay. Deal with annoyed neighbors, and even problematic neighbors that might require police intervention. There’s more to it than just managing your tenants, of course. Take time to expertly design and renovate each of your rental spaces. Refresh the paint, redo the floors, and outfit the place with lovely furniture. The better the space looks, the more it’s worth!
Available Now
You can find The Tenants on Steam!
Perhaps checkout Dwarrows next!
