Lots of reviewers compare to minecraft, though not sure why. The game isn't about crafting, its about resource management and personnel allocation and the cherry on top is aesthetic of building design/customization. And well, that sounds a bit like Dwarf Fortress doesn't it? (Yes I know too many people throw the DF around a lot, even if it merely has an ASCII look) Anyway seems the emphasis on how you wish to build your village, especially in regards to the aesthetics of your huts, houses structures is kind of a unique twist to games liek this that i've seen. This game is pretty cool in how it all ties together. you can customize the default templates for houses and fiddle with what kind of furnishings you want or how to build them. I'm not sure exactly what the function of building homes is. (Bare minimal necessities include chairs and bed, and i am not even sure if a roof over their heads is required to make your dwarves more productive) This might be my only real gripe with the game in that, You really feel like you ought to customize your whole city, but it's mostly just for your own personal aesthetic appeal rather than any influence on game mechanic. Zoning areas so that your dwarves dont have to walk as far is the main element in which you can add efficiency. You can do small minimal zoning for farming and trapping and add storage areas. These storage areas Are a very unusual aspect of the game in that they ultimately would be replaced by chest storage and other things that are more efficient spatially. So a big chunk of time is in managing your upgrades from loose zoning (throwing items in lots on the ground) to chests, rearranging inventory. assigning dwarves to produce inventory that is more in need. It's an unusual management game but it reminds me of dwarf fortress more than minecraft. there is combat in it but its a bit more of an 'event' than a main focus of the game. The other thing is mining, the camera setup makes mining very tedious and difficult, Game loses a star for this as it is very difficult to bore a tunnel, and if you dig into ground by mistake your dwarves can become idle and thus trapped until you built a ladder to rescue one. In short mining isn't fun. I played a very early state of it that was unfinished. There were some CPU slowdowns with the 64bit version (figured it was on my end as i had chrome running some hard RAM-sucking jobs, but have seen other people voice other complaints as well) I would imagine it's improved a lot since then. All in all its a pretty fun game and overall well conceived. While I have played this game I am not sure if the game can be 'beaten.' Appears to be mods and some support for sharing building templates (which is way cool and might warrant a re visitation)

this game has developed a good bit since i played it and looks tempting to try again. looks more complicated with the management, and people interaction. I haven't played any of the Sims games, but looking like the weight has shifted a bit in that direction. people are still complaining about bugs, lol (both people who like the game and dont like it)