Banished: it's like Civilization but good

[Bryy]

Banished is a city building sim that is so much more than that. It's basically a 'try to not kill your entire village that you're starting from scratch' sim. You were kicked out of your old group/tribe/civilization, and now are forced to rebuild your own way in the wilderness. 

 

Imagine, if you will, Civilization, but instead of just building junk in one city then moving on, you need to micromanage everything. Your citizens health, their education (which is actually amazingly important), their general happiness. Oh, and make sure they don't freeze the death. Or hoard food (they do that). Or friggin' murder one another. Or drown. Or die in fires. 

 

It sounds pretty basic, much like Sims, but it is much more nuanced and in-depth. And unlike Sim City where you are rather limited in how your towns look (after a while, they all just end up becoming blocks of houses and electric poles), you can really create some impressive villages. I was able to split Gabentown up into residential, commercial, and industrial fairly early on. I could set my coal mines to the side, away from my core settlement, and place a line of fisheries along the coast. Up to my north was town hall, and all of the crops and pastures. 

 

But in all honesty, it's as if FTL decided it wanted to be Sim City.

 

It's still on sale on Steam. Not as cheap as yesterday, but still discounted.

[Tigranes]

It's been on my list for months but cash has been short this summer. I feel like I'm holding out for sub-$10 which may not happen for quite some time.

 

How does it compare to Caesar 3? It sounds very similar to that.

[Bryy]

Never played C3.

 

By the way, guys, this may come as news to some of you, but apparently you need to keep expanding your food intake as your population rises.

 

I guess I know how to get past a population of 40 now.

 

Also, do not build more than you have people designated as Builders. There is no Que system, and they will just run around like morons.

[Bester]

It's been discussed at length when it just came out.

[Sarex]

There is already a thread about Banished.

 

Also it's a far cry from the Civ games.

[AGX-17]

Imagine, if you will, Civilization, but instead of just building junk in one city then moving on, you need to micromanage everything.

This is good... how, exactly? Does the president or prime minister of any nation personally order around every citizen (and non-citizen)? Civilization is a 4x game, it's not a micromanagement of a single settlement game. Apples are apples, oranges are oranges.

[Malcador]

Banished is nothing like Civ at all.  It's a fun game, gets kind of worn out once your system is clicking like all builders.  The fun is in the growth for me, as you can easily fail if you over-expand, fail to ensure your people are breeding sufficiently, take on filthy nomads, etc.

 

Should replay it.

 

It's been on my list for months but cash has been short this summer. I feel like I'm holding out for sub-$10 which may not happen for quite some time.

 

How does it compare to Caesar 3? It sounds very similar to that.

 

I had about as much fun with Banished as I did with C3, C3 had extra stuff like law enforcement, religion/gods and a neat abilty to shuffle goods from granary to granary    Still if you liked C3 I'd say get Banished.

[Fearabbit]

You need to work on your comparisons, Bryy. This game is nothing like Civ or FTL.

If anything, Banished most closely resembles the Anno series, except that it has more micro-managing, is less forgiving and offers no campaign and less features in general (but the features it has are more complex).

 

I prefer the Anno games, but I like some of the ideas in Banished. My biggest problem is that there's no sense of purpose really. It's similar to Don't Starve in that regard - I just don't see the point in playing the game when there's no real story or campaign behind it. At least give me an endgame where I can try to get back to civilization or something, I mean why call your game "Banished" otherwise? :D

 

If I had a say in it, I would tell the developer to think about a proper setting for his next game. I think the Wild West would have been perfect for Banished. The whole frontier spirit thing, the various religious groups who wanted to be free and create their own perfect settlements, the Gold Rush and its implications... and all that in a harsh unexplored land.

Of course, in the end you'll still get bored. But with a proper setting, the player will have several different goals to choose from before that happens. Banished right now only has one goal, which is "survive and grow". That's just not enough.

[Tigranes]

Thanks Malcador. I'll give it a try at some point, maybe next sale.

[Malcador]

Just don't blame me if you think it sucks   If you watch an LP or a preview you can pretty much get a good sense of it, I think.

[Sarex]

The problem with the game is that you have so little to do. You have a very limited number of buildings and the only thing you can do, is see how high you can grow the population. The game honestly feels like a demo.

[Malcador]

The problem with the game is that you have so little to do. You have a very limited number of buildings and the only thing you can do, is see how high you can grow the population. The game honestly feels like a demo.

Well, it's a good sandbox in that way, you can have fun setting goals for yourself. Should be able to squeeze 20-30 hours out of the game if you are into the genre, I'd wager, and that's a decent return for the game.

[Sarex]

Well, it's a good sandbox in that way, you can have fun setting goals for yourself. Should be able to squeeze 20-30 hours out of the game if you are into the genre, I'd wager, and that's a decent return for the game.

 

Idk, once I got to 200 people I found a pattern and just uninstalled the game, there was simply nothing more for me to do and it didn't seem like testing the pattern to 1k numbers was going to be fun.

 

Even Pharaoh which was my favorite builder game got boring once I built everything there was in the game. There is something to be said for a game like Civilization even with it's hit and miss AI. There is no comparing games like Banished and Civ, firstly because the are different games and secondly because Civ is far superior by any measure (scale, replayability, complexity).

[Bester]

Same here. Dropped after around 200 people. It's a small indie game with 4-5 hours of gameplay. It has potential if they continue to develop it, but they probably won't.

[Sarex]

The problem is that moders can't touch the game, no new building can be added and no existing buildings can be changed, it's pretty dumb.

[Hurlshort]

Considering one guy developed it, I thought it was a rather genius little tech demo game.  But yeah, it's not a full scale strategy game or anything.

[Bryy]

Doing a Livestream in a bit. Aspie_Lad on Twitch.tv.