Manor Lords is a newly released real-time strategy based on a medieval city builder developed by Slavic Magic. What sets it apart from other games of the same genre is the addition of many impressive features, including captivating combat. You start small with just a bunch of homeless people and ultimately build your village, which you can then upgrade to a big town.
Key Takeaways
- Manor Lords is a medieval city-building game available on Steam.
- The game stands out from its competitors in terms of in-depth building and immersive combat and war strategies.
- Manor Lords is the best 2024 medieval town builder, thanks to its incredible features.
Immersive Building Mechanics
First and foremost, while playing the early access version of Manor Lords, one thing that stood out the most to me was its building mechanics. Surely, you start small, but with only just a few hours of gameplay, you can increase your settlement level and build yourself a small village.
What impressed me the most about this solo-developed game was that it really tested your city-building skills and your strategies as you created more and more buildings to avoid running from food and fuel for your villagers. You really have to plan it all out, especially if you are playing in hard mode.
From burgage plots that house your homeless to your very own Manor, which will help you tax all your villagers, there are a lot of buildings that you will get to construct in your village as you increase your settlement level.
Resource Managing
When I first started out in Manor Lords, I realized how difficult it is to manage resources and how both overproduction and underproduction can lead to problems in your village. In Manor Lords, if you don’t pay attention to your villagers and your approval rating decreases, they will eventually abandon you and move out.
There are a handful of options, even in early access, when it comes to producing food. Setting up the hunting camps will allow you to meat. Any building that you set up must have a family assigned for it to work.
You will get to assign families to collect berries or even bake bread. But that is not all that can keep your villagers happy as you will need some clothes as well.
Building a tannery and collecting wool will help you set up clothing stalls in the marketplace. Lastly, only food and clothes won’t be enough, and you will need a source of entertainment as well, for which you will get to build the Tavern, where you will have to supply a lot of beer as well. I won’t get into details of each and every building to avoid spoiling the fun, but there is nothing you can’t do in Manor Lords.
Wargaming And Combat
Manor Lord is a great city-building game, but what makes it stand apart from its competitors is the amazing combat it offers. However, before you can start a war, you really have to develop your village first and create a large enough army.
When I first started Manor Lords, I made the foolish mistake of getting into combat early. With just 17 Spearman earned 5 retinue, I decided to take on a group of bandits, which did not end well. So, it’s not just about setting up your military units; you will also have to upgrade them and give them strong weapons through blacksmiths available in Manor Lords if you want to take on the bigger armies.
Once you have upgraded your army enough, you can go ahead and claim regions around you as well by challenging the leaders of that region. The combat itself is similar to Total War, and you will have to consider everything, including the stamina and fatigue of your military units if you really want to excel in wars.
So far, many players enjoying the combat and the war mechanics Manor Lords has to offer.
Should You Play It?
After spending around 25 hours in the early access version of Manor Lords, I can safely say that its popularity in Steam is worth it. For a solo-developed game, Manor Lords stands out, and it is just everything you need in a medieval city builder.
It’s pretty diverse in nature, too, so if you don’t want to engage in combat, you can go through the trade route, where your only priority will be building a big enough town that has all the resources your villagers need.
But if you enjoy war and combat, then you can set up different military units, from pole arm militia to mercenaries that you can hire by spending treasury; Manor lords really have everything for everyone.
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From writing short stories in his room to finding true enthusiasm for video game and computer hardware journalism, Huzaifa plays video games and write all the latest and greatest news about them. Currently pursuing a Bachelor of Science degree in Data Science, he dives deep into the news, authenticating every tiny detail to serve his audience. When he’s not breaking news, he becomes a master storyteller, conjuring up captivating tales from the depths of his imagination. With a wealth of experience as a Video Game Journalist. He has also worked with Publishers like eXputer, The Nerd Mag and Gamesual making him an expert in Gaming News Industry.
