In Life Below, you play as Thalassa, a guardian of the deep, working to revive the struggling oceans of a near-future Earth. The game challenges you to adapt to a changing ocean environment, facing hazards like pollution and climate shifts while boosting biodiversity. The narrative, writen by Rhianna Pratchett, known for Tomb Raider and Mirror’s Edge, adds heartfelt depth to the reef-building adventure.

Megapop has also teamed up with accessibility consultant Arevya and the UK charity SpecialEffect to create helpful features. With customizable controls and inclusive interface options, they’re working to make Life Below one of the most accessible city-builders yet.

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The Demo Version Brings New Content and Improved Graphics

Let’s start by saying this is, without a doubt, an excellent city-builder game, brought to us by a genre veteran. It’s no surprise that the gameplay is smooth, simple, and fluid. There’s no overthinking about what to build or where to place things, the game explains everything concisely, making it easy to reach the end of the demo. What stands out immediately is the significantly improved graphics, not just the visuals but also the colors, lighting, and overall details. The game looks more beautiful, the people within it have their own charisma, and the environment is more vibrant with various flowers, palms, and trees. There’s also an entire sector of buildings showing the destroyed Pompeii near the volcano.

Technology has been expanded; now we can grow wheat, build an iron mine, and use bricks. At the same time, Pompeii: The Legacy feels more balanced. I noticed some buildings are cheaper and easier to construct. However, transportation in the game seems quite slow, or too many buildings depend on each other, even though we can upgrade roads and speed up flow through technology. Buildings are scattered across the map: some need to be closer to water, quarries must be built on mountains, and it’s not entirely clear how much food you gather through hunting and mushroom foraging. While it takes time for things to complete, the production process is faster, which feels much improved compared to the playtest.

An Impressive Project with a Touch of Historical Authenticity

Upon launching the demo, it’s clear that Pompeii: The Legacy offers campaign, sandbox, and creative modes, promising hours of gameplay. It also introduces new customization options for crests and a variety of families with unique perks. The demo effectively showcases what’s to come. However, some key features, like family dynamics in diplomacy and the world map, remain underdeveloped, leaving their functionality unclear. While the city-builder mechanics are solid, other features will require more time.

The demo may not reveal the game’s full splendor, but the massive theater or forum hints at the scale of future structures. It’ll be exciting to see what architecture we can create, given the game’s focus on historical authenticity. The mid-to-late game stages are still to be seen, but based on what Željko showed us at the Zagreb studio, no stuttering and smooth handling of numerous elements, we have reasons to stay optimistic. Pompeii: The Legacy remains one of the most impressive Croatian games so far, and we hope its full release later this year will be truly remarkable.

The post [PREVIEW] We Returned to Roman Times with Pompeii: The Legacy, Now with a New Demo for Steam Next Fest first appeared on IndieGames.

In the game, you will build homes, aqueducts, and markets to keep citizens happy, all while managing resources like food and stone to fuel growth. The city feels alive; every road and fountain plays a role in its prosperity with unique citizen animations. You’ll even rub elbows with emperors like Trajan and Hadrian, completing their quests to earn rewards that boost your family’s status and Pompeii’s fortunes.

Trade is your lifeline too, letting you swap goods across the Roman Empire’s bustling routes. The game’s depth shines in its Family Bonuses, Dynasty overview and research system, split into Technology and Philosophy. Tech upgrades unlock better buildings or faster transport while Philosophy tackles social challenges like religion and education, opening new ways to govern.

Life in the Roman Empire isn’t always smooth sailing either. Random events like earthquakes, volcano eruptions, fires, or plagues can devastate your city, truly testing your leadership. Solo developer Željko Kos also revealed a new trailer for Next Fest and we even had the chance to interview Željko and visit his studio in person, so you can learn more about the game here.

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You start with a rusty ship and a patch of solid ground, building homes, workshops, and bridges to create a settlement for humanity’s last remnants. But every structure can collapse. The game’s 3D physics system challenges you to balance weight, support, and materials like a real engineer, resembling a high-stakes Jenga gameplay.

Beyond building, you manage a colony of survivors divided into factions: engineers operating cranes, sailors navigating ships, and workers maintaining structures. Each faction has unique needs, forcing you to juggle food supplies, unrest, and tough decisions. Random events like storms, food shortages, or mysterious ocean structures make every playthrough unpredictable, with new locations unlocking as you learn from your colony’s successes and failures.

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The first update, dubbed the “Major Economy Update”, is just around the corner and overhauls the game’s core mechanics. Previously, players could dive into Pagonia’s world with a fully equipped settlement, ready to conquer the land. Now, there’s an option to start small: a handful of Pagonians, no supplies, and a whole lot of ambition. This new mode lets you slowly craft resources, goods, and buildings from the ground up, offering a more gradual and rewarding challenge.

Beyond the new starting options, the update tweaks and balances settlement development. Eight new buildings join the roster, giving players even more tools to shape their medieval hamlets. A shiny new economic overview screen keeps track of your progress, so you can see your village’s growth at a glance. The world itself is getting a visual glow-up, too, with optimized map generation that introduces dramatic, winding landscapes and steep cliffs.

Later in 2025, the second update will shift its focus to creativity and community. A map editor will let players design their very own worlds with extensive customization options, and you’ll even be able to share and play community-created maps directly in-game. While details on the story campaign are still under wraps, Envision promises it’s coming, and it’s sure to add a narrative depth that fans have been craving.

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In Horizonite, you’ll be setting sail for all sorts of different islands, and each one is packed with resources to grab, puzzles to solve, and treasures just waiting to be found. Getting out and exploring is a big deal, because you never know what challenges or rewards are tucked away, and they’ll help you build up your island. When things get a little wild, you’ll jump into turn-based battles against some interesting creatures. And when you want to chill out, you can dive into managing your own resort, customizing it and making it bigger for all the visitors who show up.

The colors are bright and there are tons of cute little details, kind of like you’d see in Stardew Valley or Moonlighter. What’s also neat is that the seasons and weather actually matter. They change what resources you can find and how battles play out, which makes exploring and planning your moves more interesting. Plus, you’ll run into all sorts of characters, each with their own stories and things they need you to do, which gives you new stuff to work towards.

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The latest update, detailed in patch notes on Steam, focuses on long-term performance improvements, delivering a significant boost in frame rates, especially for larger cities and the world map. The update also includes a visually overhauled world map. Player feedback drove additional changes, such as enabling the Copy Tool to include building upgrades and allowing queued movement orders for Navy Units.

Kaiserpunk stands out by combining the creative freedom of city-builders with the depth of grand strategy games. YOu shape your city-state from scratch, building housing, infrastructure, and industries while maintaining citizen morale and economic growth. On the global stage, you can trade, form alliances, or wage war across 100+ regions, balancing diplomacy and military might in a dynamic world inspired by Anno and Europa Universalis.

Launched on March 21, 2025, Kaiserpunk has earned a 68% positive rating from 385 Steam reviews, with praise for its logistics depth and unique premise, though some players noted performance issues now addressed in the update.

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Now fully released after nearly a year in Early Access, Synergy offers a fresh twist on city-building and survival genres. Set on a harsh alien planet with a solarpunk aesthetic, you guide a settlement of stranded settlers. Your task is to balance resource management, environmental harmony, and the well-being of your citizens. Despite its cozy vibe, the game introduces challenges like health management, weather cycles, and seasonal shifts, though these never feel overwhelming.

Engaging gameplay loop

Gameplay revolves around building nine unique districts around central squares, with structures like homes, infirmary, and forges to support your settlers’ needs. You gather essential resources such as food, water, and materials like sticks or rocky amalgam through two approaches: sustainable harvesting, where workers prune plants for future yields, or destructive ripping, like uprooting plants for quick gains. A recurring challenge is the the dry season, which drastically reduces resources, requiring you to careful stockpile during milder seasons. Overharvesting can also harm the ecosystem by depleting flora, but sustainable practices, such as seed farms or composters, help restore it.

While Synergy’s gameplay loop is engaging, some aspects can feel frustrating. Early on, progression is slow and tedious due to the small population growth. With so few settlers, it’s hard to assign workers to all tasks while keeping some free for transportation. You’ll speed up the game constantly. Technology advances quickly, but finding survivors is so rare that it becomes annoying. Exploration events are quite repetitive, either you’ll find some resources or trade options. However, once you push past this initial hurdle, the game picks up, and things flow more smoothly.

That said, the heavy focus on micromanagement, requiring you to manually assign or remove workers for every building, might turn off players who prefer less hands-on control. Additionally, meeting your citizens’ needs in Synergy can also be a tricky task. To keep them happy, you’ll find yourself placing countless benches, decorations, and cultural buildings, but these all feel repetitive and look too similar. This “spammable” and uniform approach to satisfying needs can detract from the fun, making the process feel like a chore.

“Heavy focus on micromanagement might turn off players who prefer less hands-on control.”

The technology in Synergy steals the show

The “studying” mechanic is Synergy’s best thing, setting it apart from traditional tech trees. By assigning citizens to research centers or halls of wisdom, you analyze plants and minerals to expand your Knowledge Book. This unlocks new buildings, irrigation methods, or cultural practices. For instance, studying a plant might reveal safer harvesting techniques or new crop types, reducing risks like poisoning. With a research tree spanning 60 branches, the system adds depth, but its poor explanations can leave you confused, especially when stuck on vague objectives like raising Well-Being from 12/20 to 14/20.

Campaign scenarios deliver unique challenges, like surviving specific disasters, while sandbox mode allows free building. Without combat or direct enemies, the game leans on environmental challenges, as mentioned, for tension, such as extreme weather like heatstrokes during dry seasons, which threaten settlers’ health and demand strategic planning. Also, the emphasis on cooperation and ecosystem harmony, such as restoring wildlife through composters, is rewarding, but it’s hard to feel truly connected to your citizens.

While it has some frustrating aspects, its technology progression feels amazing. The system offers multiple tiers, and you don’t need to grind endlessly to move forward, as small upgrades unlock even more minor features. However, the cluttered UI can be overwhelming, making navigation tricky. Grinding is mainly needed for food and water to establish proper farms, but with steady gathering huts that continuously collect from replenishing resources, it’s relatively easy to manage.

“The game leans on environmental challenges for tension.”

Solid city-builder

In my playthroughs, I encountered no bugs, but Synergy’s graphics truly stand out. The pastel colors, organic shapes, and intricate details in buildings, plants, and landscapes give everything a sci-fi illustration vibe with a lived-in, otherworldly charm. Citizens’ dynamic animations, whether working or exploring, also breathe life into the settlement. However, the locked camera perspective, tied to the 2D art’s fixed angles, prevents rotation, preserving the aesthetic but making navigation tricky. Taller structures too sometimes obscure smaller ones, which can complicate planning.

As you reach Synergy’s later stages, the game runs smoothly without lag or performance drops, and the late game is just as engaging as the mid-game, unlocking a wealth of possibilities. Honestly, this game is solid, really solid, but its frustrating elements are hard to ignore. The early game feels like a slog, and the lack of meaningful events, mostly tied to exploration that doesn’t feel rewarding, holds it back from shining in the city-building genre. Still, its eco-conscious studying mechanic, deep research tree, sustainable gameplay, and solarpunk aesthetic create immersive world that’s perfect for fans of these types of games.

“Visually gorgeous game.”

Review copy provided by the publisher

3.8

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I never imagined I’d watch a game evolve so much, from spotting Wizdom Academy at last year’s Nordic Game Spring Event, to playing its demos, and now diving into Early Access. It’s like a city-builder mashed with the Harry Potter world, where you’re the head of a wizarding academy, building it from scratch into a fun, magical place. It’s still rough, with plenty of content to come, but if you want a chill city-builder without intense challenges, this one’s worth checking out.

Harry Potter-Inspired School City-Builder with Potential

Wizdom Academy is a single-player management sim where you oversee the construction, operation, and growth of an academy, balancing resources like mana, gold, and fame while nurturing students into skilled mages. The Early Access build offers a playable experience with core mechanics such as building, teaching, and defending against magical threats, but lacks a complete campaign and suffers from bugs and balance issues. The game’s loop involves designing your school, managing staff and students, and addressing challenges like mana droughts.

No matter the starting location – whether sunny, vibrant lands or moody, dark places – every beginning in Wizdom Academy feels pretty much identical. You kick off with a brief “warm-up” tutorial, then dive into quests. I don’t mind the structure, but there’s no free exploration right away; you’re locked into the first part of the tech tree before the world opens up. The game does a solid job teaching you the mechanics, but it can feel a bit dull if you’re craving a true clean-slate adventure from the start.

The core mechanic is constructing your academy on a tile-based grid, starting with a mana-oozing tree as the magical hub. You place prefab rooms such as classrooms, dormitories, exam halls, and utility spaces which are connected by hallways, with the ability to build vertically across multiple floors. The building system is intuitive, with rooms snapping into place and auto-adapting to creative layouts, allowing stacked or sprawling designs. Customization includes 39 unique rooms and 23 decorations, with a tech tree unlocking new structures and upgrades as you progress.

“The building system is intuitive.”

Wizdom Academy’s Quirky Yet Flawed Systems

However, the construction system has issues: builders occasionally fail to start projects, and there’s a lot of issue with upper floors, requiring manual fixes, and the starting grid feels cramped with obstacles limiting expansion. It’s wild how many obstacles clutter the map’s center, it’s a hassle since the bricks you get from them are key. A simpler layout would’ve helped, as it feels overwhelming at times.

You recruit students and teachers, each with 91 unique traits affecting their skills and personalities, shaping their growth from apprentices to mages. Students develop through classes, with their education quality impacting their skills and behavior, but neglected students can become troublemakers. The game’s vibe really shines here as mana fuels all the life and happiness in your academy, and even the council can turn against you if you don’t treat everyone well. It’s a cool touch that ties your choices to the world’s mood.

Teachers are assigned to classrooms, and their success hinges on resources and your management skills. The focus on meaningful education over profit feels fresh, but I wish there was more depth in customizing the curriculum. My biggest gripe is the imbalance, students and teachers have way more negative traits than positive ones. If you don’t stay on top of things, you’ll end up with a pile of troublemaker students. Plus, the best teachers cost a fortune, while the cheaper ones are so bad they’re barely worth hiring.

“Neglected students can turn into troublemakers.”

Balancing Resources and Goals

While mana is crucial, frequent “mana droughts” force you to shut down facilities, throwing gameplay into chaos. Gold, earned from student tuition, pays for building and hiring, while fame boosts your academy’s prestige. Early on, resources are tight, gold trickles in slowly, and mana shortages hit hard, making it tough to hire teachers or fend off magical creatures. If you don’t manage your gold carefully, it can seriously mess you up, especially since early-game gold sources are limited. You can store resources, but those droughts are honestly more frustrating than anything else.

Research points, earned through education, unlock tech tree upgrades, but the game barely explains how it works. You can upgrade anything, yet there’s little info on what each upgrade does or what to prioritize, leaving you guessing. On the plus side, there are 29 explorable locations such as villages, dungeons, and rival academies which sound exciting, though half feel like teasers for future content. The real issue kicks in after the first part of the game: with no clear goals to guide you, continuing feels tedious and directionless.

When it comes to the graphics, they bring classrooms, dorms, and trial grounds to life, with a magical art style that feels like Wizard101. Students and teachers bustling through halls create a lively vibe, and zooming in to watch them work is fun. From a “God mode” view, it looks great, but character models get rough up close. The big letdown is the AI-generated character headshots, which stand out poorly, though the devs plan to swap them for human-drawn art.

“Graphics bring a lively, Wizard101-like magical vibe.”

Ending Thoughts

In the end, Wizdom Academy is a charming but rough wizard school sim that nails a Harry Potter-inspired vibe with fun building mechanics. Its flexible construction and evolving students lay a solid foundation, but bugs, AI-generated art, unbalanced resources, and weak onboarding drag down the Early Access experience. For now, it suits patient city-builder fans who can handle glitches, while casual players should wait for updates or check out the demo.

“Charming but rough wizard school sim.”

Review copy provided by the publisher

3

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For those unfamiliar with the game, you are tasked with rebuilding civilization in a world devastated by apocalyptic rains. Lead diverse races, including humans, lizards, foxes, and harpies, with the goal of restoring the wilderness’s splendor while managing resources and securing a future for the last survivors.

What makes the game unique is its blend of city-building with roguelite mechanics, focusing on multiple campaign playthroughs filled with challenges and varied starting conditions. Console versions will feature a tailored user interface to ensure a smooth and accessible gaming experience.

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