Villager

 

Game: Villager

Developer: partnano (Twitter: @partnano)

Platform: Windows, Linux, macOS, Android

Play in browser here: https://partnano.itch.io/villager

Gotta love crafting games. They're almost like the zeitgeist in regards to gaming mechanics in both big-budget games and microgames such as this one. Some of the best craft games out there are still played to this day, such as Minecraft, Forager, and Stardew Valley at the peak of its popularity. But let's say you're a poor college student, like me, who is short on cash and don't want to spend too much money on your vidya gamerinos, and just want something bite-sized to take-in. Well, if you want that, you can definitely give Villager a shot.

Developed by small game dev partnano, and playable in-browser via pico-8 software, Villager is like if you took Stardew Valley and Forager, and compressed them down to the size of a marble with graphics reminiscent of a SEGA Genesis game. Your goal in this game is to essentially take the resources around you, via wood and stone, and create a village to appease villagers that spawn randomly as you build. It's kind of like a city builder game where you build a town with available resources, though this feels more hands-on than say SimCity or Cities: Skylines.

There are multiple resources to keep track of:

-Wood and Stone: Building materials.

-Food: Feeds you and villagers.
-Population: Count of villagers that are present.

-Happiness: Essentially the status of your town which helps keep people staying around.

Buildings require materials and certain prerequisites to fulfill. Doing so allows the player to build more structures, create more storage for supplies, and boost the happiness of the townsfolk. Happiness gets too low, people will start leaving. So despite its simple premise, there is a little bit of depth to crafting. It's not exactly Minecraft or Forager levels of deep, but it works nonetheless.

It's a pretty simple game with loads of charm that above all is free to play. Since it's presented via pico-8, it also comes with partial controller support. So if you don't want to cumbersomely play with a keyboard, just plug your controller in and have some fun... and realize fulfilling work and mundane chores is considered self-fulfilling. Humanity is weird.