dotAGE

Fun game for what it is, but be aware that a single run is like 2-3 real life game days even on max speed with animations skipped. You won't be able to win your first run, and you'll likely end up soft blocked by "memories" aka building recipes that are locked behind length of game play. That being said the dev is working (or has worked) in speeding up their unlock speed. If you like strategy this is a good game, but don't expect it to be like any traditional city builder. It's almost closer to cult of the lamb without the exploration or light heartedness.

Very fun game. There's a lot to it, easy to get overwhelmed but it plays very well

Charming city builder/survival loosely borrowing the worker assignment subgame from Colonization and expanding on it. All around good effort, graphics does what it needs to, story feels like it takes inspiration from the Cookie Clicker era of meta narrative, music sets a tone, and if you enjoyed Colonization or other worker assignment games like Dwarf Fortress (obviously significantly more complex) or Oxygen not Included this might scratch an itch.

The production value is excellent. The art style is good. The animations are solid. The variety is wonderful. The UI and the way it displays the information, while not perfect, is still quite close to superb. The turn-based aspect of it all I like. The lightweight story is even something I found engaging. But, all that said...

At its core, fully half of this game is about constantly micro-managing structure placement on a grid. Your structures must be in fairly limited places to satisfy hard adjacency requirements and what may as well be hard requirements for necessary bonuses. As your tech level increases, you can build stronger buildings with a more and more complicated network of dependencies, which may conflict with what you've already built. So you have to plan ahead, decide which terrain to destroy and maintain, maybe pop out some graph paper and come up with a plan on turn one. You (usually) eventually need to tear down at least some of your previous set-ups and rebuild them, just because you don't have time to build toward your grand dream while effectively defending yourself from negative events. Each map the structure options and available resources are largely different, so there's a lot of rote memorization or lots of looking stuff up, and more graph paper, and... It all gets really _tedious_.

The other half of this game is worker placement into the structures you've already built and resource management, and that part is the much better half. No real complaints there.

The random events are sometimes entertaining, but sometimes it's just a gigantic F U totally subject to RNG. One time you play and the earthquake knocks down a signpost next to a berry bush. The next time you play, it hits one of your major production areas and levels crucial buildings three turns before a reckoning. Okay, roguelike elements, I get it, I get it.

I get it. I can do all of that. I did do it for 15+ hours (~10 hours of my playtime was AFK time), but the tedium builds up over time like an aftertaste that just doesn't go away. I played the last few evenings to finish the mission I was on to see what it would have to offer, and because mama didn't raise no quitter. By the very end it was a tired slog.

There is _a lot_ to enjoy here for certain types of players, of that I have no doubt. I hope you are one of those players. This tiny dev shop took an idea and did extremely well with it, and they deserve to reach as many interested players as they can. I am not mad at all at this game--for the money i spent I had one good evening of fun and a few more that at least occupied my time.

I just can't call it a game with a satisfying core loop, and therefore I can't give it a thumbs up.

>find out the apocalypse is going to happen
>do very well making a town until then
>literally dodge all bad situations on a good map roll
>"How bad could it be?"
>apocalypse starts
>one pip stabs another to death
>nature causes a sink hole that eats 80% of town
>everyone dies to the plague all at once
>oh.jpg
...clicks new game

Wow I love this game so far. I'm obsessed. I remember a year ago (maybe longer) I used to be on twitter and I would like and comment on almost every single of the developer's posts it's great to see the full game be so awesome.

The game manages to wrap so many different things together in to a gem that is somehow stressful and relaxing at the same time. Every issue you run into has a solution and most of time time you can tell what went wrong and how to do better next run.

The different synergies that are available make building the village a delightful puzzle of trying to plan for the future while also trying to not die at the next event. The turn based nature also gives you all the time you need to carefully plan what you are going to do while making the events seem even more daunting. Great game!

I am an avid boardgamer and I kept in touch with my friends by inviting them over to my place for some games and wine. Since this game, I realized I no longer need to go through the hassle of inviting people who keep breaking my wine glasses. Come join me in becoming friendless :)

I first played the demo finding the art style and game mechanics captivating, I didn't have high expectations for this game but after finishing the demo I was HOOKED, I immediately bought the game and played it obsessively for 4 days straight

If there's anything that grabs your attention BUY THE GAME, It's so addicting and has so many different random events that make it refreshing to play run after run. Definitely worth the money!

Loving this so far. Easy to start but gains complexity the more you play. Between this and Against the Storm, roguelike city-builders seem to be a new fav genre for me.

I never bother to write reviews because by the time I get them theres usually thousands of people saying exactly what I think more eloquently, but I am SHOCKED by how few people seem to know about this game! I love a strategy town management, I love a Rimworld, I love a Timberborn, give me pleasing art style, little guys to get attached to, and a load of pressure and I'm happy. This game is truly addictive, Stardew Valley addictive, and the turn style play is both very unique to me and very enjoyable as the game feels suitably difficult yet without being a panicked frenzy. I'm really happy the developer managed to find that ground, as it feels like a colourful chess match. I look forward to exploring the other levels, highly recommend if you like any of the games I've mentioned, and look forward to seeing what the developer comes up with next!

I don't post many reviews, but I had a problem, posted in the discussion thread, and received a message from the dev with a solution to my problem.

And the game is really good too.

cute little resource management game, lots to do which is nice, progression is at a reasonable pace, pretty unserious and silly, good fun

It's an amazing game and I'm absolutely loving it. What I expected to be a game to play for a few hours on the side has a very satisfying gameplay loop that keeps me playing for "just a few more (ingame) days".

Additionally the Developer is currently very active and involved in the game, which is always nice to see.

Give this one a try, you'll be coming back for more again and again!

Easily one of the most fun and tight resource management games I've ever played. The aesthetic is super charming, the game-play is incredibly varied, intuitive and the amount of mechanics you can unlock is crazy. There's like 6 games nested in one.

FIRST OF ALL: I DON'T THINK THIS IS A **BAD GAME**.

I think this is a cute, enjoyable and quite worthwhile game, but it suffers from many time consuming and downright frustrating issues. Issues which are indeterminable whether they are bugs, gameplay design choices, or just unfortunate coincidences.

I wanna highlight some of the issues I have come across:
- **I have put 10 hours into playing the "tutorial" (the first village) and am still not finished** - I still have a prompt about skipping the tutorial. I am closing in on Doom VIII, but having a tutorial of this (supposed?!) length is ridiculous.
- In my 10 hours of playtime **not a single achievement unlocked for me** - even one's that I meet the requirements of (play 100 turns and I am on day ~200)
- **KEY ESSENTIAL WORDING of buildings is INCONSISTENT** and therefore leads to frustration and possible game ending errors: I got stuck not being able to produce the "next level" of tools, because the toolmaker said it needs to be close to an Ingotmaker - so I assumed that meant the furnace/smelter, but that said it was something different - THE INTERFACE EVEN TOLD ME: "THE BUILDING IS NOT BUILDABLE ANYWHER", so I thought: NOT AN INGOTMAKER THEN, but guess what - it WAS. So I wasted 10-20 turns getting all different technologies, trying different things, unlocking memories to find the flaw, but then it just... worked. Could have ended my run right there. Not cool or fun.
- **RNG IS KING AND CAN RUIN YOUR RUN EVEN BEFORE IT HAS TAKEN OFF**. I consistently beat all events, but still got "punish" events - one of them a sinkhole which could have ruined the ONE BUILDABLE SPOT OF THE TOOLMAKER I talked about earlier. Also there was an event OUT OF THE BLUE that just took over 200 of my food - so I had to restock my ENTIRE FOOD RESERVES just before WINTER - a game ending thing to happen... and that goes on and on. I don't think that is a fun thing, if you spent 10 hours on a run, fumbling your way through and then you get NUKED OUT OF NOWHERE, with NO POSSIBLE PLAN TO AVOID IT.
- **You unlock new stuff, but it feels same-y**, especially since I play the same run for 10 hours in a row now. Important technologies and alternatives are locked behind HOURS worth of just grinding at the game, making Map RNG, Event RNG and the like even more punishing and demoralizing
- **At a certain point every turn feels the same** and the game feels more like a chore to get done, than a joy to play

board game + rimworld + wanting to die every time i realise i messed up my run + one trillion different events and routes = amazing game

Amazingly delightful city management roguelite that will slap you in the face many times for not being 100% prepared. With many difficulty settings, this slap can come from a wet pool noodle or the hand of god and can be the light deterrent or powerful abusive sting people desire to keep playing.

Feels like the best parts of worker placement board games and colony sims wrapped up in a roguelike experience. Losing the game feels fair and it looks like there's a lot of content and replayability. The villages feel alive, but the game being turn-based means the stress feels... relaxing?

Definitely recommend this game for anyone who wants a turn-based, board game version of Rimworld, Dwarf Fortress, or Banished.

It's cute, it's deep, but most importantly it's been getting steady updates and has a good dev behind it -- worth much more than anything else these days in the era of unfinished games being the norm.

After finally beating normal, it's hard but really doable even with bad luck once you get a hang of the flow of the game

pica

dotAGE – A Cute, Deep, and Well-Designed Game (That I Just Didn't Enjoy)

Coming from stack lands which i beat on my first run, I came in cocky but the game put me in my place. I still haven't made it past a year but am loving every second of it. It is not a simple game by any means but you do not drown in super complex menus or anything. Good at it's price, but If it's ever on sale at $10 or less, get it ASAP.

Great game

What starts off as a cute turn-based village simulator soon ramps into mounting chaos and impending doom. The villagers, affectionately known as 'pips', have the curiosity of a cat and the survival instincts of a lemming. As the village elder, your avatar ambles around the map, cursing and berating the idiots around you as you try to prevent annihilation from malicious divine forces.

I really enjoy the subtle complexities of dotAGE. There are interlacing production chains for resources and truly staggering amount of game events - both positive and negative - which impact the world state and your pips. This can be as simple as Pips stealing extra firewood from your reserves to keep warm in winter, or as complex as a malicious divine event inflicting bleeding on 50% of your population and an earthquake just levelled the bandage station, so now half the village is going to die in 5 turns, unleashing a wave of sickness and fear.

The malicious divines toying with you are the Domains of Fear, Sickness, Hot/Cold & Nature. Each run randomises their strength and event order, keeping things interesting. Your pips generate - when correctly directed by you - Hope, Health, Temperature and Harmony to counter the divine threats.

The problem - and main gameplay mechanic of dotAGE - is you have limited pips to counter these threats whilst also trying to feed, research and build the village. There are also different Elder leaders which add a twist to the playthrough, for example the Shaman increases nature gains, but increases fear when animals die, whereas the Captain is landlocked on a tiny island and has a fish and grog based economy.

Your starting map also changes each game, and there is a slow burning meta-progression unlock system which keeps on adding cool new features to both the maps and your available technologies. It took me about 110hrs to fully unlock the meta progression tree and I still have not seen every game event.

Negatives of dotAGE: The game is very long, about 12-15 hours per run. The game is rather difficult, I lost my first two runs on normal before I got the hang of reading the prophecy correctly. Sometimes, the game can be very unfair. Finally, the soundtrack is only 6 tracks at 21 mins total, this can start to wear thin and I really hope they expand the OST in the upcoming DLC.

Overall this is a wonderful strategy game, it's as if the creators of Rimworld and Stardew Valley decided to make a turn-based title together.

"Local Old Man Screams At Burning Villagers", pretty much sums up this game in a nutshell.

Dot Age really is a lot of things at once. It's a survival/rouge-like/resource management/board game esk/city builder/way to go insane after 100s of hours of work within minutes sorta game. Which makes it equally parts fun and funny as it is frustrating and furiously fanatic. But do I like it, ya when the itch needs scratching. Though this is CERTAINLY not everyone's game, and I think a little explanation will go a long way to explaining why that is, and if being angry is for you.


So seeing everything explode and go to hell sorta just comes with the territory when your an 982 year old walking beard attempting to get younings to listen to you, and that will make you angry at how unfair this game truly can be. But hey, again you should have seen that one coming. Things go to hell fast, things you build for hours will implode or be pointless, and eventually your bound to lose. That's the kind of game your in for in the short term.

The game's mechanics in a more technical sense really boil down to the village aspect, and the strange emoji of death aspect. The world has these "events" that come around within your written prophecy you will have generated for you with every new game. This prophecy has various things you must do or manage within your small village to keep things afloat until the inevitable near end of the world. Every action you take, everything you do, will eventually lead to this moment. It's true end game at it's best and worst. You would assume you could take SOMETHING lightly here, but when you start to reach the end you realize, no, probably should have put less time into how pretty it looked and more time spent making it actually survivable worthy.

It's what I love and hate about this game, and that was only within a few of my failed runs of almost 30 minutes. The game can be brutal, confusing, and unfair. But it is enjoyable for those that like the merciless Dark Souls esk aspect of it. I mean the game even stated that in the description (no really look now it's there), so to no ones surprise you will lose and burn in a sea of lava often.


Still for all those willing to endure and persist there is a lot of replayability here, a lot of different events and prophecies to unfold, and much old whippersnapper screaming to be had. It's brutal, difficult, and demanding despite it's looks, but fairly complex for what it appears to be and does. A lot more than one little review can really do it justice to explain.

So id say try the demo, it will really give you an idea for what your in for and what the "Emoji Of Death Prophecy" is all about. Trust me, if you think i'm lying, go right ahead and play that demo, come back, and tell me if i'm wrong.

Bet you a milkshake I'm not.

very good, a bit long

slaps

This is a game, I played it for a bit, picked some berries. Enjoyed 8.5/10

This game is a 10/10 for me.

If you want to play a cute pixel-art city builder and vibe with great music, this game is for you.

If you're a resource management worker placement board game nerd, this is the game for you.

If you want to ramp the difficulty have an insanely challenging survival game that makes you plan every turn meticulously, this is the game for you.

This game is for you.

One of my new favourite games ever - combines the one more turn feeling of Civ, the colony management of Rimworld, and roguelike randomness and goals of Against the Storm.

Brilliant game that I can lose many hours in without noticing the time.

Created by a solo dev who is highly engaged with the players on discord.

This game is advertised as merciless. There's a difference between merciless and downright stupid and impossible. I like this game, but some of the elders are unplayable even on the easiest, slowest difficulty. And the elders that are playable have too steep a difficulty curve, where one setting is so easy its boring and the next up is aggravating. Dotage would benefit greatly from being able to adjust and fine-tune these settings to one's liking.

Parts of the game feel unfinished, particularly the elder's dialogue. Aside from a few starting lines, they all share the same dialogue as the first. Why does the shaman start out super nice and friendly, then switch to insulting and belittling everyone like Matus?

Great game with good replayability. Game building and playing style changed by character and map every time when replay.

I absolutely LOVE this game! There is so much love and polish put into the gameplay and art here. I would recommend this game to anyone who enjoyed Against the Storm, Simmiland, Banished or Settlement Survival. It has the depth of all those games and really rewards persistence. The meta-unlock tree is much longer than one might expect from the super reasonable price point for this game and unlocking a new crop or building for future attempts feels great. The different Elders also have unique playstyles that make you change up the approaches you've become comfortable with at that point. Having the doom events and seasons randomised can be a real gut-shot at times but fortune favours the prepared! 10/10 game. Please make more

yuhh

Unhealthily addicting and quite endlessly re-playable (if you take breaks). Might not be for everyone though since turns could take minutes (or that's just me)

Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer

Wonderful little game. Can't stop playing!

Great!

After 52 hours I think I get what this game is about.

This game has 2 sides.

On one side, it looks like a cute city-builder, and the art style seems rather cute and peaceful.

On the other side, this game is very random and very violent at times.

Finally, the pacing in this game is very very bad.

Consider that a typical game is around 280 turns long. That's probably like over 10 hours.

During that 10 hours, pretty much nothing bad will happen to your village. Then somehow all at once, everyone will freeze, and a landslide will kill everyone who is frozen, and you won't have enough space to bury everyone (not even close) by the few survivors, and then that's it, It's all gone.

And you could have been doing everything right, as far as you knew. There was no time to correct your mistake, it's just all gone and it seemed stable.

I have beaten this game (without anyone dying!) so I found the right way to do things, but it is pretty time consuming.

Overall that is a trap that some roguelikes fall into. They make really long runs, and this one is probably the longest I have played. Slay the Spire, if you win it's like 50 min, if you lose it's like 30, perfect. This game, if you win it's like 10+ hours, and if you lose, it's still 10+ hours. Throwing that much randomness into something so time consuming to build is kind of not great. So consider that.

Overall despite the pacing issue, this game has cute art and music and a lot of heart went into making it. And it is fun to play and addictive. So I will give a thumbs up. Give it a try but prepare for some frustration.

Hard, but addictive worker placement and resource management game with a nice SNES visual style. Highly recommended!

Great game, but not to my tastes. Kinda in between a video and board game, while I prefer one or the other. The game length even on fastest is still 4-5 hours, which is too long for a casual session yet the chill turn-based nature of the game means that I'd rather play something more active if I had 4-5 hours to spare.

That said, I wanted to shout-out the amazing Steam Deck support, which was great time while on a flight (played offline so my hours aren't counted). I suggest you give this game a go if you want a chill game to play while on a 6+ hour flight!

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Big game with lots of unlockables, chill with turns but deep in micromanagement. Totally recommended!

Very addictive; very fun.

This game deserves way more attention. Very well-thought basebuilder with "one more turn" case

This game is pure crack cocaine and deserves more reviews. Also stinking cute.

This is such an awesome little town-sim.

You get the usual resource management. Food, materials, tools, but where it really shines is in how you confront the threat of your environment. It's incredibly simple in principle, getting points in your "Domains" to counteract a domain's threats and doom, so you never feel lost. But also challenging in process, as you have balance your growth with surviving each threat (and trust me... you eventually won't. But it's always fun trying.)

Throw in the everlasting issue that is the Elder's memory, through whom the story of your town is told, and you have a neat progression system from run-to-run that makes for awesome and replay-ability, with a rouge-like RNG system.

I don't remember last time I was consumed as much by a roguelike game, although I played a couple of dozens of them.

Brilliant, unforgiving, hilarious!

fo shizzle