Kingdoms and Castles Review

City building is complex, no? Stupidly detailed, the depths of management you need to dive into with any city builder is enough to put off any mere mortals. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Case in point, Kingdoms and Castles. 

Don’t get me wrong, Kingdoms and Castles is far from basic, but as a cosy city builder which lets you kick back with a bit of an addiction, it really does the job. 

Without actively hunting them down, I seem to be drawn to the releases of BlitWorks Games. And without fail, I always seem to come away impressed, most recently having found joys in Train Valley 2: Console Edition. It’s that which is again the case with their cosy little medieval city builder, Kingdoms and Castles. 

Playing out across a number of randomly generated isometric maps, Kingdoms and Castles tasks you with building up the medieval city of your dreams, gathering up a population, plying them with jobs, fighting off oncomers. And the nice thing about it is that you can pretty much set up Kingdoms and Castles as you see fit. 

Prior to engagement, difficulty levels can be altered, ensuring that this can be as easy as pie, a city builder that lets you build without issue, or capable of being ramped up to extreme levels; harsh winters last longer, environmental hazards more frequent. It’s really up to you to dictate how you wish this one to flow. 

For the most part we’ve been kicking around on what we’d consider a ‘normal’ difficulty, happily building away, batting off dragons and viking invaders every few in-game years. But move up from there and Kingdoms and Castles really does become a much trickier affair. More tense, requiring an even deeper knowledge of the systems in play, if you want to test your city building skills, this is a game that does it with aplomb. 

However you play, it’s you and your god-like tendencies that dictate. Starting off small, you’ll be left to place some farms, an orchard perhaps. Complement those with some small hovels as an early place for your townsfolk to live and slowly but surely citizens will start to arrive. And of course, you’ll need to drop some pathways and roads in too, ensuring that the little guys under your control can get where they need to be, fast. 

Wood chopping enables further job opportunities, as does mining for various rare commodities. But you’ll also need places of storage, ensuring that nothing goes to waste; in the winter months, as the cold air blows in, your citizens will be left to rely on the food stored away. From there, the world really is your oyster – churches, libraries, theatres and the like will provide entertainment, whilst larger homes and bigger, wider varieties of jobs will keep people busy. 

Those roads will need to be upgraded and wells will need placing as a source of water; not just to keep your folk watered, but for use by your fire department in hope of ensuring that fires don’t rage. And talking of the wet stuff, hopping onto a ship and journeying out to new islands, scouring additional lands, setting up new home bases are all opportunities that shouldn’t be dismissed. Just remember, they will all take up your time, all requiring various resources and levels of gold. 

And of course, you’ll want to ensure you have defenses suitable for your kingdom. It’s here where castle structures come into play – building high walls, equipping them with archers or ballista towers, building moats, even creating sea gates and more is possible. 

And yes, we know we said Kingdoms and Castles was not a complex game. 

Thankfully the UI which allows for all this is on point. Aside from occasional isometric oddities – we’ve accidentally ripped down some structures when we weren’t paying full attention – the menu systems and chance to go flicking between building, demolishing and overseeing works really well. It’s an utter cinch to see at a glance where you need to inject some much needed resources, or when you should reassign certain jobs. And raising and lowering taxes in order to get some much needed coinage in, can be done in a flash. But how high should you tax your peasants when you’re looking for city growth? Perhaps you’ll need to forgo some cash in return for people…

With yearly updates – a year passing in mere minutes if you speed up time – keeping you on top of things, and advisors to hand for the most basic of instruction, this is a city builder that really can thrive. 

And frankly, it both sounds decent and looks the part too. Granted, these are the least of your worries as you build up your kingdom or castle, but at all times you’ll find a quick visual glance over things is capable of delivering all the info you need – whether that be a house on fire, watching your little fire brigade fight it, or seeing the odd tombstone pop as your flock die of old age. 

Include a Creative sandbox mode, the opportunity to amend any starting map as you see fit, chucking in AI kingdoms to run alongside yours and this is a game that really does open up about as much you will want it to. 

As an easy-to-handle entry to the city building scene, it’s hard to fault Kingdoms and Castles too much. It may be limited in the very long term, but the opportunity to breathe life into a new kingdom as you get to the point where one feels exhausted, allows for new strategies and tactics to come into play. With a decent UI and some easy to understand gameplay, if you’re intrigued by the genre but are put off by the complexities, you’d do well to walk through the gates of Kingdoms and Castles.