As a rimworld fan I can heavily recommend songs of syx.
That said, I stopped playing it cause I couldn’t keep track of time with it. It’s the kind of game where you play “just 5 more minutes”, and next thing you notice it’s 3am.
It’s also a beautiful labor of love by a single developer, as far as I know.
In other words, very recommended, but with a caveat.
It’s really cool to see this pop up again. I did some of the sound design (not the music, which is done by an incredible multi instrumentalist who specializes in nyckelharpa) for it a couple years ago. The dev behind it is brilliant and made the whole engine from scratch. It has great support for modding too.
Same, just 5 minutes to balance something out so i don't have to think about it tomorrow...2 hours later...
It's also really nice that you can download a free "Demo" that is the full game, the demo is just a older version then the paid one, plus the soundtrack is just phenomenal.
Say what you want, but "Demo" is still the best way to market a game. If I can test if the game will run decently on my system before buying, and if there are no obvious bugs right from the start - you have made a sale.
You can effectively do that with any game on steam, as you can return any game if you both 1. played it under 2 hours 2. bought it in the last 14 days.
In addition to being a great game, I also find Syx technically impressive - in a genre where it's so common to start running into serious performance problems with just two or three digit populations, Syx still zooms along effortlessly as you approach five. I believe its pop cap is 40,000 units.
I'm sure they're greatly simplified in comparison - it isn't trying to simulate complex interpersonal relationships or painstakingly track everyone's hair growth, but they still have a decent amount of detail to them given the scale.
The demo is just an older version of the full game (usually lagged behind 3 major releases, not sure where it is now, I think it's more up to date?) - and far from making it feel like I didn't need to pay for the thing to enjoy it, it instead made it an easy buy.
Big of a tangent, but I really enjoy when I see games pop up on HN. I think there’s a certain tinkerer’s profile for people here, and if a game is highly upvoted here I’m almost always likely to enjoy it. If only steam could be so topical with its recommendations.
That said, I stopped playing it cause I couldn’t keep track of time with it. It’s the kind of game where you play “just 5 more minutes”, and next thing you notice it’s 3am.
It’s also a beautiful labor of love by a single developer, as far as I know.
In other words, very recommended, but with a caveat.