Banished

A polished and enjoyable but somewhat aimless survival focused city-builder that slowly loses its appeal once you figure out how to survive the initial starting-up...

But as soon as I had a handle on it, as soon as I'd started to see through some of the fog of its complexity, I wanted to grasp for something bigger, something greater. Banished is satisfying, but never spectacular. That's not quite enough for me.

An admirably steely focus, but it's an uneven experience which requires a hell of a lot of work for, ultimately, not grea pay-off. But if you're a fan of better living through suffering, this is the city builder for you.Tags:GamesBest prices...

The first thing you'll learn while playing Banished is that children are worthless. They sit in the corner like fleshy bins, black foodholes that exist for no other reason than to consume all your food, all your money and all your youth, and they give...

There's brilliant concepts and a core that shines, but a troublesome interface and a general lack of breadth of content is clearly an issue. With all that noted, there's still something strangely and subversively compelling about it in the end. Knowing and feeling all I do, I still want to go back and play some more - and that is likely telling.

If you put the lack of missions aside as a consequence of the budget price tag, Banished is still a flawed game. There's brilliant concepts and a core that shines, but a troublesome interface and a general lack of breadth of content is clearly an issue....

Banished goes the other way: Promoting careful, methodical approaches with thought-inducing game play. A fantastic game, developed by one person (yes, just one person). Go and buy it. I know we’re only in February, but GoTY, I’m telling you.

SimCity's influence, both on the strategy genre and on gaming in general, is immense. Still, the past few years have seen an explosion of clever city builders taking some huge steps toward developing personality and becoming more than their progenitor....