The Wandering Village

A pretty interesting game with a ton of potential. Updates late last year did ALOT of necessary core changes to make the game more robust and compelling as a builder.

However, having owned this and many other colony sims that are in EA, for years now, this one simply has the SLOWEST development progress.

There’s a lot of potential here, and it’s very unique, but they’ve been developing it so slow that I am starting to see competitors catching up with titles exploring the exact same concept of a colony on the back of a giant living creature.

It makes it a challenge to recommend when so many other titles out there, some with even smaller* teams, are able to keep the EA progress moving at a more consistent pace. Particularly when those other titles have seemed to provide me with so many more hours of play to date.

I keep rooting for this game to really take off, but the development is just so perplexing sluggish. That last overhaul was nearly half a year ago, and even the last balance pass patch was 3 months ago.

This game is phenomenal and the dynamic of having to take care of the beast as you take care of your civ. is unique and makes you feel "one with the land" that you build upon. Its the perfect blend of a chill vibe with a touch of stress to ensure all is well with the civ & beats. 10/10 would recommend keep up the good work!

For such a game im surprised its barely know. Its concept is quite unique being a city builder that takes place on the back of what is essentially Sauroposeidon (tallest Dinosaur recorded). Good mechanics, only critque I have of it is a personal one of its artstyle and 2D choice for villagers but hey its still fun!

This is a great, fun little game. It's fairly chill but gives you enough challenge to keep you on your toes.

The Wandering Village is a cute and casual village builder with beautiful art, interesting mechanics, and a solid soundtrack.
This game easily became one of my favorites due to its casual atmosphere.
This game is simple enough to pick up quickly but offers enough of a challenge without becoming overwhelming.
This game is the perfect entry point to the genre and a fantastic addition to any library.

The world has become toxic and uninhabitable.
The few remaining survivors have found refuge on the back of a giant wandering beast, the Onbu.
Together you will wander the world as you attempt to rebuild a symbiotic civilization on the back of the Onbu.

The Wandering Village is a beautiful game with many moving parts.
I recommend you play a few runs without looking up guides.
I believe most of the fun is trying to figure out how to grow your village properly, failing, and doing it better the next time around.
I am sure there is an optimal way of running through this game, but I had as much fun failing as when everything was running smoothly.
This game is casual enough that guides aren’t necessary.

The Wandering Village is one of the more casual village builders I’ve played.
Worker, resource, and resource management are challenging enough to keep the game engaging without becoming overwhelming.
There are settings you can tweak that makes the management mechanics more difficult, but I never felt like it lost its casual vibe.
What does create a challenge is adapting to the random encounters throughout the Onbu’s journey.
The types of scouting missions that become available, the types of biomes it walks through, and the Onbu’s health all affect the growth of your village.
Players will often have to readjust quickly to changes. I lost a few villages because I wasn’t planning properly.
You will eventually be able to have more control of the Onbu, but I enjoyed the random nature of the journey.
It makes every run unique, giving the game lots of replayability.

I had a lot of fun with The Wandering Village, and recommend it to anyone in the market for a new game.
The art is beautiful, and the mechanics are fun and interesting.
The game just got an update that added a new biome, buildings, and encounters.

Making a little town on the back of a large dinosaur-esque beast, with the complications of such an endeavor. It's a really good time, in my opinion.

The game is out for over two years, but it's still lacking so many quality of life changes and contents. I think the biggest problem with this game is that it lacks potential. Reading the roadmap, there's nothing on the horizon that makes me look forward to and believe it will become interesting in the future. I would like to compare it to games in similar genre such as Against the Storm and DotAge. Both of those games have an interesting core mechanics, and notable improvement from patch to patch. I just don't see it in this game, and it's not for developer's lack of trying. They are also indie game developers with a small team so there is no excuses.

A good part of this game is about micromanage your buildings, but not in an interesting way. There are currently 6 biomes in the game (including the starting default biome), but most of these biomes don't play out too differently. The events along the way is uninteresting, most of them would be described as annoyances rather than challenges or rewarding experience. There is a little difference in strategy and building layouts, largely due to the fact that there is only two kinds of tile you can build stuff on, grass and mud.

Given it's been in the development for this long. I just don't see it become a game that will be fun and that I can recommend to others.

Very polished with clear mechanics and difficulty that scales properly. Art and animations are also very fun and match the game's overall aesthetic.

Love this game. Wish there where more like it. I just feel so bad for the critter I have my people on. I always try to be nice to it but eventually I have to take its blood or pinch it because its stubborn. Save the onbu's!!!

If you like farm simulators and are good at multitasking then you will love this game

Long live "Big Chonker"

Biggest thing for me was the vibe, I absolutely loved the themeing, the music especially is very playlist-worthy.

Main areas of improvement imo:
- Lack of multi-select which slowed things down a fair bit, ctrl+click would be nice, and even better would be doubleclicking an entity to select all other entities of that type, a lot of other RTS games do this
- Scavenging feels more like a chore later on, I'd like to have some kind of automation, maybe an upgrade after the scouting tower that lets you filter by the resource(s) you want to collect
- The fish farm is pretty useless, as you can't reserve a set amount of fish to be used by the farm, so your villagers will eventually eat them all unless you micromanage them, at which point you're better off just focusing on berries or wheat
- After you finish mining the large rocks, you are forced to pingpong using the drill which hurts your trust with Big Chonker, even using the high nutrition food, birthdays, and pets doesn't recover it when running the drill. I'd like for there to be another (less efficient) means of gathering stone
- Clay deposits can't be relocated - I never ran low on clay (I think I have about 5k) but the mess it added to the layout didnt feel good
- Big Chonker almost died! I was playing on the casual difficulty, and while I'm not good at RTS games, I can see people that haven't touched the genre before end up losing their Chonker, it'd be nice for for the casual mode by default have a hard minimum of say 25% health.

The idling/active system felt **really** good for me, a few other games I've tried that had this always felt too clunky/involved wayy too much micromanaging. Having set workers and free workers made it really satisfying/effortless to move people around/free up workers.

It is a cute and easy little game. Did not play on harder difficulty, but on default settings there is no challenge.

Oh I love this game so much!
With every update it just keeps getting better! Can’t wait for the full release (even tho I don’t want the content to stop).
If you play on the lowest difficulty the game becomes absolutely cozy and relaxing. I like playing both ways but I gotta admit the „cozy mode“ makes it easier to appreciate the art and all the little details.

I love the art design. Coming from Factorio, this was a fun experience. Very laid back. I also like the challenge system. Give it a try you're interested in city builders.

hahaha yay!!! yay !!!

wandering village is one of my go-tos when i need a game to play while watching youtube. it's cute and relaxing, but challenging enough on normal mode to demand your full attention. i've only ran into one game-breaking bug as of writing, and it was resolved quickly!

i <3 onbu

With the newest game ballance update I am for the first time able to actualy get further than a 100 survivours. The game is easier to balance, as well as adding more fun challenges. I am absolutly hooked again. And it looks like I might get far this time.
Good update!

Fun addictive city builder with a nice twist. I kinda want a sci-fi generation ship game in this style now.

Whimsy maxing by playing this game, listening to Cosmo Sheldrake, thinking about Caduceus Clay from Critical Role, and also fairies, toads, and becoming a druid, and also drinking tea all at the same time!
But for real thought, this game has seen me through some tough times. Its like a warm natury hug, and I wouldn't trade it for all the stars in the sky. Thank you devs, you have made such a beautiful and fun game, keep up the great work.
And to those thinking about getting it, do it. Its addicting in the best way, the aesthetic of the game is gorgeous, and its just so so so fun to play. If you like Stardew Valley, Palia, or are interested in the things I mentioned in my above joke then get this game, its got those vibes.

Beautiful, relaxing, and perfectly paced. Once I figured out the mechanics everything went smoothly with enough issues to keep things interesting for a prolonged amount of time. If you like city builders and farming sims, you'll like this game. (:

Was so fun and enjoyable to play and was definitely a great way to occupy the brain while also enjoying yourself! Love that it has different modes of playing and every single play through always is a little different! The developers are really good at listening to what the people want and consistently updating the game which has made it really fun to keep playing. I can't wait to keep playing and see what else comes along!

Can't wait for this game to leave early access. Relaxing city sim that I absolutely love to play when I want to relax. And can easily switch on said difficulty for a more intense-ish play through. The art style is great and I love the concept of venturing across the ocean to different lands. The devs know what they are doing and never miss with the updates.

I LOVE this game. It's a great resource management sim and a really cool premise of your village's survival depending on the creature you're living on and what's going on with it. I love the change of biomes based on the creature traveling. I started playing this during Early Release, so I'm looking forward to how the game grows. I'm hoping more plot will be added to the exploration aspect of the game, but the management of the village has definitely kept me entertained and occupied for many hours by itself. I'm a bit sad that I can't get all the achievements without hurting my Onbu! I want us to be best friends.

cute city builder, with a lot more than meets the eye. Excited to see what the devs have in store for us next.

great game you get to live off a dino's back and get to pet, feed, and heal onbu. 10/10

A fun and unique game, crafted with love. Great soundtrack too

Lovely game! It's challenging fighting elements and hunger of both your people and the creature carrying the village. I love the graphics and the music(especially the music)!!! It feels nostalgic and magical at the same time.

the learning curve was a little steep. but once you get the hang of it it is enjoyable. wish there was way more story to it though.

played this back when it first became live on cboxgame pass. Happily bought it on steam afterwords.
this game has such charm. Such a unique city builder.

It's good, but for the amount of stuff in it 25$ is a bit much. Either get it on sale or wait til they flesh it out a bit more.

Lovely chill game that still keeps you on your toes trying to meet the needs of both your villagers and your pet Onbu!

My villagers refused to move fertilizer from the farming tiles and almost all starved to death 10/10

I really like it. The art style is amazing and I just love the animations for the giant beast. Some buildings take up more room then I feel they should and the way storage works is a little weird, but other then that the game is perfect.

Great game in Early Access. Lacks some polish and some quality of life features, but hopefully they'll come soon.

what a delightful little game! it has a very pleasing hand drawn look and is heavely inspired by nasica and the vally of the wind (another plus). i highly recament this game

Its a fine city builder with the addition of the Onbu maintenance as its hook

The developers have done an amazing job with this adorably vibrant and chaotic city builder! It's very hard to put down. You've been warned...

By far one of the most relaxing rts games ever, great animation style, and with the story campaign coming up soon, this will be one hell of a game. 10/10!

An enjoyable little indie survival game. There's a relax mode for when you want to chill out (was perfect when I had the flu) and survival modes that are varying levels of challenging. Looking forward to when the game is fully finished :D

not bad game interesting consept, but its still lacking, can't expan onbu or switch to bigger one, that would be cool.

If you enjoy world building/survival type games with super cute/cool graphics then this is the game for you! I really enjoy it!

Where do I start with this one? Well... if you like little city building games with elements of survival, and branching pathways, this game is for you. I found it difficult to master but incredibly easy to play. The tech trees offer at least 10+ hours of content, and you'll be losing quite often as you figure out how to counter each type of disaster. The good thing is the game scales back pretty quickly to where you were before, maybe 2-3 hours if you lose on a save.

I beat this game, getting to the final monument, and I can say it was a pleasantly surprisingly fun journey filled with little nods to the creators, some fun lore, and some interesting mechanics. I would highly recommend this game to anyone who has played and enjoys games like...

Majesty
Traveler's Rest
Stardew Valley
The Sims
Sim City 3000
Point City
Minami Lane
Townscapper
and Gourdlets.

very fun game. been getting updates every few months which is nice too. only unfortunate part is when a big update comes you may lose ur progress which is kinda annoying. 10/10 tho

I'm not even into civ sims but this is just really good

the concept of a civilization on top of a creature that it must maintain while the creature ventures into more and more treacherous land is cool and executed exellently, I love the 2D-3D artstyle and the way that the camera moves when zooming to/from different views looks incredible.

if I had to criticize, progression definitely gets slow after a while, and your population tends to balloon faster than you can manage. Also, while it makes sense why this is the case, the area you work with is very limited. This is meant to be addressed by having building upgrades, increasing efficiency without taking up much more space, but with progression being so slow oftentimes you end up not being able to take advantage of this.

Also, basic resources like wood and stone seem to not grow back much (if it grows back at all for stone), and I can see a player getting kinda stuck with few raw resources to refine, though I haven't gotten that far so maybe it's not that bad. scavenger parties can probably assist with this, but it's not a perfect solution.

all and all great though. been extremely fun of what I've played. recommended for people who like breathing

I have been locked in to this game so after 80+ hours, it deserves a review.
The art styles are beautiful. At first I was a bit thrown by the inability to rotate the map and buildings, but very quickly got past that. After playing a short while, placing buildings and figuring things out, you forget you even wanted to rotate anything. I was also very happy to discover how easy it was to play with a dualshock controller.

Onbu is even more adorable than expected. It has been a small dopamine boost every time Onbu yawns or gets pets. I still have not had the heart to play in a way that would hurt Onbu at all, and for a while I was concerned this would limit how far I could get. After some strategy and rearranging, I figured out a system to make sure I could sustain more than enough villagers than needed (for both population badges), keeping their happiness levels very high, all still without hurting the cute creature.

I have only played the easy level, since I wanted something relaxing that I could zone out and play, and this game has been perfect. Even on an easy difficulty level, when you get to the higher populations you have to constantly pay attention to Onbu, the map, and your village. It becomes a fun, but delicate, balancing act.
Many of the questions or concerns I had throughout the game have been pretty much solved as I continued to play and figure things out, even 600+ game days in, so I highly recommend this game.

The balance is great and I find it my favorite thing to do after a long day to relax my mind and pet Onbus!

I have not been playing for long (just got the game 1.5 hours ago) but so far... the game is AMAZING, great art style, controls, story, content, realism (but not too real) and amazing UI 10/10 so far

Got pretty hooked on this game easily. I love the somewhat rogue-like elements that the different map biomes add to the game.

Relaxing citybuilder, with decent pacing and systems. Also - Eartho-saur Onbu.

Even as a early version, this game is absolutely delightful to play! The pacing for building your village is perfect, there's no pressure to accept everyone as soon as the icon light up to do so, and you don't have to take any of the research routes to harm Onbu if you don't want to (which I don't)! The sound design is AMAZING, the graphics are the loveliest mix of adorable and artistic, and they even name your villages for you if you're not creative with names (like me)!

Full disclosure, I haven't made it out of the first biome, but I am absolutely in love with this game and would recommend it for anyone who wants a calming village builder with a cute rock giant and worldbuilding lore. 5/5!

As pretty much everyone says, its a very cozy game. When it comes to city builders, this game is pretty standard. I can tell there is a lot of influence from Studio Ghibli, very Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, which makes the game very pretty and chill.
That being said, for how the game wants to talk about the danger of the spores and the vibe that the world is dying, the game isnt very hard. Granted, im only a few hours in, but collecting resources, keeping villager hopes high, and maintaining your Enbu isnt difficult. I would like there to be a harder gamemode than the survival gamemode, but the game is good, and I think there is a lot of potential from this small indie dev team. Pick it up if you like simple city builders!