Manor Lords is a building strategy game, with RTS elements a la Total War, and even before the first Early Access release, the developers have been doing a lot of tweaking to the hotly anticipated City Builder. In a recent update to Manor Lords, they spontaneously adjusted the entire artstyle, building mechanics, warfare and much more.
What's it all about? Guided.news now tells you what to expect in Manor Lords & how you can already play it. A first alpha phase is already available, but only under later named conditions. But how will Manor Lords play after the developers' extensive renovations?
Residents live more realistically: The developers of Manor Lords use a realistic model for the construction of the cities: In Great Britain, Ireland and also in large parts of Europe, the allocation of land and house ownership was adapted in the 13th century. From isolated plots of land that had been staked out themselves, the more uniform "Burgage Plots" or "Lehnsgrundstücke" were formed. This allowed for the placement of many more houses along a street. Burgage plots are narrow, but long! Along the road is the dwelling house, behind it stables, workshop or warehouse -- just everything that brings income.
This is exactly how you are supposed to assign plots in Manor Lords. You drag an area along a street with your mouse, and the inhabitants settle there. You can determine the orientation of your burgage plots yourself.
How the market changed: The developer team also re-designs the center of a medieval city. Instead of a market consisting of many individual tents, your city center now consists of a well. You can then set up your market around the well. This market is now made up of various modules, instead of placing each merchant individually.
Fields-Economy adjusted: A town is created from a village, which must be self-sufficient. In the Middle Ages, the two- and later three-field economy appeared. In Manor Lords, too, you have to think about it with the new update. You need to look carefully which soils are suitable for which crops. In addition, you should manage your cultivated areas in annual rotation with other crops, so as not to overuse the soil.
You have to weigh that up: The economy is also to be more profound than originally planned. For example, you now buy sheep and livestock at the market and even have to pay attention to their age. Do you buy a lamb or a full-grown sheep? Do you urgently need wool and take the risk that your sheep will soon go hopps? Or do you buy a young lamb that will live longer but won't immediately satisfy your wool needs?
This is how you get rich: your settlement in Manor Lords can grow from a small village to a mighty city. But for this you need money, which only comes through trade. Depending on the location of your town, its attractiveness and the goods on offer, your town will become richer and richer. The more goods are traded on your marketplace, the more money you get in taxes into your treasury. Houses in a certain -- as yet undefined -- sphere of influence can rise in this way. In the end, this should give your city a more organic look.
The developers must have hit a nerve with this announcement. Originally, wars and conflicts in Manor Lords were supposed to be rather small. Soldiers were mercenaries you buy and brought their own weapons. Battles were limited to a few dozen soldiers.
Now, however, things look quite different: Instead of a few dozen, you may now lead several hundred soldiers into the battlefield. Moreover, your army now consists of your own townspeople and your personal guard. You can even customize the latter with insignia and coats of arms. When you send your own people into the field, who are actually better off in the field or in the workshop, you take a risk in every war. If you have lost 20 peasants in battle, they are really gone and the empty farm produces less to no resources!
To secure the life of your city militia and guard, you can upgrade their weapons and armor. By the way, a character artist from Kingdom Come Deliverance is responsible for these. This leads us directly to the next big item in the list.
The concept of Manor Lords has never intended to be exactly historically accurate. The claim is rather: "Inspired by history". Accordingly, the team has also been loose with the time frame of the game and the architectural styles of the buildings. They simply used what they liked. However, feedback from the first testers made it clear that Manor Lords needed to be more realistic. So the time frame was limited to the 14th century and the building style to Southern Germanic.
How can you participate? If you want to participate in the alpha test of Manor Lords, you have to follow these instructions:
When will Manor Lords be released? The closed alpha phase of Manor Lords has only recently begun. So a release is still a bit away. The community is assuming the end of 2023 or the beginning of 2024. That means you would have to wait around another year for the building game.