All posts tagged in Building
Sep 21, 2023
Fantastic Haven takes place in a world where magic has been gradually fading while technological advances take over. These advances threaten the balance, and your role as the Elders means it’s up to you to help rebalance the world. You need to save the magical creatures people like to hunt. Use diplomacy and teach people how to live in harmony with these fantastic creatures!
You’ll start by choosing the perfect starting spot. Pick from a number of different areas in Fantastic Haven, each coming with their own challenges, and begin building basic infrastructure. Unlock new research and buildings as you play to be able to welcome the magical creatures to this new haven you’re creating. Even send your mages out into the world to find new creatures, negotiate with hostile populations, and more. Every choice you make can impact how your future turns out, so choose wisely.
As you find the magical creatures of Fantastic Haven and bring them back to your refuge, you’ll place them in the quarantine facility. Then, you can place them in an existing biotope (enclosure) or create a new one. Either way, you’ll need to respect its needs, as well as its compatibility with other creatures to find it the perfect home. Your goal is to take great care of these creatures before returning them to the wilds, so meeting their demands is important for restoring magic into the world!
Coming Soon
You’ll find Fantastic Haven on Steam and GOG next year! There are plans for releases on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation, and Xbox sometime after that, too.
Planet Zoo is another great zoo game!
- Aug 30, 2023
Hometopia is a building simulation that turns you into a home designer and developer in a realistic virtual world. You’ll build your career step by step, starting from the beginning and progressing to professional home designer as you go. Learn the ins and outs of the industry and level up your skills to unlock unique content.
Engage in a dynamic job system that offers a variety of tasks to complete. Successfully execute one-room makeovers or build whole homes from the foundations to the roof. Hometopia gives you the tools to seamlessly create and design for your clients. Enter first person view to get a better look at the interiors, or use overhead view for plotting the area better. Plan layouts of homes and plots by deciding the size and placement of each room. The grid-less designing allows you to place furniture exactly where you want it, and the color wheel lets you pick the perfect colors for each item. There’s even a workshop for custom items so you can achieve the perfectly designed spaces of your dreams!
Hometopia even has player homes for you to create and design with total freedom for yourself. And if you don’t want to design alone, play co-op with up to three others to complete tasks. Solo or together, design homes across five different neighborhoods and build a successful career!
Coming Soon!
Hometopia will release in just 3 short weeks! September 27th, you’ll be able to grab a copy of this fun home builder on Steam.
For more home building fun, there’s of course The Sims 4, Adorable Home, or even Castaway Home Designer.
- Jul 26, 2023
In Millennials, you’ll create your very own college freshman. Experience the prime of your youth while also experiencing the ups and downs of college life. Attend classes, work, make enemies, and forge friendships. Even chill out and decorate your dorm room!
When you create your college freshman in Millennials, you have control over what type of person you make. Choose qualities and skills to create a hard-working bookworm or an extroverted party animal. Make time to network with those around you, as it can make college life more fun. Or go the lone wolf route and avoid making friends at all. Join a sorority or fraternity and take part in mysterious initiations. Even throw parties or arrange annual events. If that doesn’t appeal to you, though, you can join a club or just forge friendships and maybe even find love.
You’ll even have to find the perfect work-life balance while you’re at it! Partying is fun, but you’ll need to attend classes and study in order to pass exams. Mix in working part time to pay for tuition, and you’ll have to manage your time in Millennials really well! Just don’t forget to have fun, because all work and no play is dull. Oh, and don’t forget about your reputation on campus. Network with influential students, complete goals, and accumulate good grades to become a campus celebrity.
Coming Soon
You can Wislist Millennials on Steam now! There is no current release date listed.
Looking for more life sims? Check out Palia, an upcoming cozy MMO. There’s also the adorable Japanese Rural Life.
- Jul 13, 2023
I wrote about Gourdlets back in November when I first discovered the game. It’s an absolutely adorable little city builder game with no challenges, no quests, no resource management. You just unleash your creativity and build little cityscapes!
Since November, developer AuntyGames has added some great new features to the game. You can now enter buildings and decorate them! Build cozy homes for your Gourdlets and sweet little cafes for them to frequent. This adds another level of customization for players to create the cityscapes of their dreams.
Fences are now more intuitive to build, too. It’s easier to form corners and make enclosures with them. So, if you had been wanting to create tiny zoos or farm pastures, now it’s much easier! What’s also easier is placing land tiles. Gourdlets has a paint bucket tool that lets you create islands without the hassle of all the individual clicking. And my favorite addition is farming! Place tilled dirt tiles, plant seeds, and the Gourdlets will water them and pull weeds. They’ll even pick the mature crops!
You can find Gourdlets on Itch.io, as well as Steam!
- Jun 7, 2023
Renovate, Decorate, Plan, and Manage the Town
Congratulations! You’re the new mayor of Go-Go Town, a declining, rundown tourist destination. One short phone call was all it took, and now it’s up to you to not only take care of this crumbling place, but return it to the vibrant tourist town it used to be. Can you make Go-Go Town prosperous again?
Luckily, you’re not alone in your endeavors. The aging population of Go-Go Town will help teach you the ins and outs of being the mayor, starting with construction. Part of your job will be to collect materials and repair current buildings across town, or build new structures and shops. You’ll also have a number of power tools at your disposal, from chainsaws and drills to leaf blowers and trimmers.
Once you’ve repaired the town, you’ll get to decorate it, as well as plan how you want the town laid out and what shops will populate the streets. It’s your job to decide which types of shops to build, who will run the shops, how those shops will bring in money for Go-Go Town, and how to manage the supply chain. Will a new arcade with neon lights do well? Or perhaps a burger joint for tourists to grab lunch at will be better? Oh, but what about a souvenir shop? Everyone loves taking home a memento of their vacation!
Running a whole town will keep you busy, but the residents will help you out. Expand the industries in Go-Go Town by hiring miners, fishermen, lumberjacks, shopkeepers, and more. With the right combination of tools and people, the town will run smoothly. When you run out of room in your now prosperous town, you can expand. Unlock useful new tools and skills in the tech tree so you can build bigger houses, terraform the land, and much more.
Make Go-Go Town an incredible place to visit, and some of the tourists may even decide to stay!
Coming Soon!
Unfortunately, Go-Go Town! doesn’t have a release date available. However, you can Wishlist it on Steam!
For more cute life sims, check out Dinkum, My Time at Sandrock, and Wylde Flowers!
- Mar 15, 2023
Explore An Open-World and Compete in Courses
Some of you might be familiar with mobile game developer Foxie Ventures. They’ve put out games such as Virtual Sim Story, Wolf Tales, Dino Tamers, and Horse Riding Tales (which is also available for free on Steam). A few months ago they put out incredibly cryptic ads to sign up for their new game, Star Equestrian. Now, Foxie Ventures has released this new mobile game, and of course I’ve been playing!
Star Equestrian is a beautiful open-world MMO adventure game that centers around, you guessed it, horses. You play as a character you create, with a name you choose, and experience a traumatic riding injury. Once recovered, you don’t allow that accident to keep you from horses, and re-establish yourself as an experienced equestrian.
Explore an open world where you can collect items like carrots and lettuce to feed your horses. Go in search of your lost horse, Snowdrop, and complete quests for the residents of Evervale to see if they have any information on him, too. Ride around practice arenas, sprint across cross country courses, and participate in show jumping to improve your horse’s skills. You’re not only chasing down your lost horse, but chasing your dream of becoming the best rider, the Star Equestrian.
You’ll also get to build your very own ranch, where you can customize the interior of your home and build stables to house your horses. And what I think helps set Star Equestrian apart from some other mobile horse games is the ability to interact with your horse. You can pet them to help raise the bond level, which unlocks certain skills. It makes the game feel a little more personal and cozy. I have high hopes for this game, as so far it ticks what I want out of a horse game (quests, competitions, story, and interaction).
Available Now for iOS!
Star Equestrian is currently available for iOS devices through the Apple App Store. There are plans for the game to be available on Android via the Google Play Store. Unfortunately, there’s no word on when the game will be released for Android, though. You can pre-register on the Play Store to have it automatically downloaded when it is available!
You can also checkout Horse Club Adventures and Horse Tales: Emerald Valley Ranch for more horsey fun!
- Mar 8, 2023
Create Castles and Transform Forgotten Meadows
Tiny Glade is a beautiful little builder game from indie developer and publisher Pounce Light. With its free-form building mechanic, the game is intended to be a purely relaxing creative outlet. So, there is no resource management, no goals, no combat, and no wrong answers! Just sit back, build some fancy castles and turn some abandoned meadows into incredible architectural scenery.
The game offers a unique building chemistry, too. Tiny Glade features a gridless building system, but also lets players watch as each brick and roof tile is assembled. You don’t need to painstakingly place each piece yourself. Simply draw a path where you want it. Click and drag to place a fence or wall. Want a path to go through a wall? An arch will appear. Want your walls higher? Just drag the top of it higher! And if you drop the wall lower, arches will turn into fences for you.
Tiny Glade looks to be a wonderfully dynamic sandbox, making it perfect for experimenting with builds. There are no wrong answers, after all. Did you build something you don’t like? Changing it is easy! Accompanied by a cozy soundtrack, lighting that changes with the time of day, and other small, cozy details, there’s a lot to love in the game. Ivy adorns buildings, fireflies light up the night, and adorable little sheep roam the meadows freely. Tiny Glade is the perfect little world to escape to.
Coming Soon!
Tiny Glade is currently in development, but will be coming to Steam eventually! There is no release date available a this time. However, you can add it to your Steam Wishlist now to keep up to date on it.
Gourdlets is another cute building game with no combat, no objectives, and no management!
- Dec 4, 2022
Farm, Craft, Explore
We introduced Meetlight and the Secrets of the Universe back in April, but now there’s so much more gameplay information to gush over. Currently located on Kickstarter, this gorgeous game has taken the word “wholesome” and run away with it. Inspired by Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Ori and the Blind Forest, Stardew Valley, My Time at Portia, and My Neighbor Totoro, Meetlight looks to be a beautiful game with a comfy, cozy atmosphere.
You will play as Anna. Anna has faced a terrible tragedy and lost her spouse. Now, Anna has taken over her great-uncle’s forge and become the new blacksmith. You’ll build your house from scratch (and decorate it too!), customize your character appearance, and befriend animals, nature, and your neighbors (some are even romanceable!). You’ll even be able to complete quests for the villagers or trade with them.
That’s not all, however. With the loss of your spouse, you’ve gained the ability of clairvoyance, which you’ll slowly develop and perfect as you play. Enter the magical world of energy where you’ll meet new inhabitants, explore lost places, and discover the secrets of the universe. In this 3D open-world, with 19 places to visit on the map (so far), there’s just SO much to do and see.
Featuring Customization, Farming, Blacksmithing, and More
If you’re not feeling like exploring, don’t worry. Meetlight and the Secrets of the Universe also has farming. Plant and care for your own set of crops, and perhaps even a fairy will drop by to help you out with them. You’ll be able to create your own farm layout and decorate your fields how you wish. Also available for your farm are animals! You will choose a companion (a cat, a dog, a rabbit, a goat, or something else!) when you start, but you’ll also be able to tame wild animals like foxes and crows. It will take time to get close to wild animals, but eventually they’ll learn to trust you. Breed your animals and collect things like wool from them to use in crafting. It appears there’s at least one horse, too, that you’ll be able to explore the map on.
You’ve also taken over as the local blacksmith, so naturally you’ll be able to create things in the forge. Your uncle left his trade secrets behind. Of course, you’re new to blacksmithing, so you’ll have to practice the skill to get better and make greater quality items! You’ll also be able to discover new blueprints as you play the game.
Cooking and alchemy will be in game, too. Cook over 50 different dishes, each one giving its own buff to help you. When cooking isn’t enough, though, there’s alchemy! You’ll learn how to make potions that can also help you. For example, you can learn to make a potion that increases the duration of your clairvoyance.
With all of the crafting and cooking that can be done in Meetlight, it is only natural resource harvesting is a feature. Much like everything else, you’ll have to work on your gathering skills too in order to gather a higher number of resources and higher quality resources. You’ll have to craft tools to help you harvest, too.
Kickstarter Stretch Goals
Meetlight and the Secrets of the Universe is currently only for Steam. However, should the Kickstarter meet certain stretch goals, the game will become available for Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and Playstation. What’s perhaps even more exciting, are the other stretch goals. One goal is for MORE map areas, expanding the already big map. There’s also a goal for total character design control where you’ll be able to choose gender, the name, and the shape of the character’s face and body. And the one I’m most excited about is the goal for co-op. If that stretch goal is met, Meetlight will have co-op for up to 4 players AND cross-platform play. How cool is that?
Coming 2023
The game is successfuly funded on Kickstarter with multiple stretch goals met, which also means it’s not yet available. Unfortunately, we’ll have a while to wait as Meetlight and the Secrets of the Universe only lists 2023 as the release date. You can also wishlist it on Steam. Meetlight will come to Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and Playstation.
Chek out Kitaria Fables for another beautiful farming sim, or even Aka, where you play as an adorable red panda.
