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There are so many degrees of scope when it comes to the city building format. The genre, that first flourished in the early ‘90s with SimCity 2000 has consistently delivered intricate excellence, with series like Tropico, Frostpunk and Anno, building to the triumph of 2015’s Cities: Skylines. But it’s also offered more esoteric takes, with the brilliant Surviving Mars, Before We Leave, and Dorfromantik. But you know what they all lack? A magic light being with a story to tell. So welcome Dawnfolk, a glorious distilling of the genre that streamlines and simplifies, while weaving its own spellbinding narrative.
Dawnfolk is a wonderfully fresh approach to town-building antics, with small, goal-orientated tiled worlds on which you must create miniature, rural communities, with successful farms, mines, and increasingly more complicated buildings, alongside trade agreements or conflicts with local orcs and elves, all while battling against the forces of darkness. And it’s all with a refreshing, deeply engaging simplicity. And no, that’s not a contradiction, because Dawnfolk‘s genius is to make a huge array of systems extraordinarily approachable, and then doubly-fun by having battles, hunting, fishing and various other aspects play out as the teeniest minigames, taking place literally within the tile.
These are very simple, but it adds a surprising amount. You might have a tiny game of catching falling fruit when picking berries, or need to spin a sword in the middle of the tile to fend off invading pixels. There’s a teeny hunting minigame of firing arrows to hit passing deer, or perhaps to save your folk from invading wolves. And no, they don’t grow frustrating, as at a certain point into any level you can put resources into a building that will play them for you.
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Each level begins primarily in darkness, and it’s by gathering light that you’re able to illuminate new tiles. These will dimly reveal what’s on orthogonal tiles that are yet to be lit, giving you an idea of in which direction you might want to expand. There might be a plain field on which you can build tents, the crudest form of home for your people. Or there could be some wild sheep (incredibly irrelevant tangent: did you know that there are wild sheep, called mouflon, and as the dog is the domesticated wolf, the sheep is the domesticated mouflon! Cows, since you ask, come from aurochs), which you could then kill for food, or farm for supplies. Build a farm, then some crops nearby, and perhaps set up a mine on a mountain tile. All through this, it’s about balance. You need homes to have people, but homes need supplies and people need food, and you need people to get supplies and food. Which is standard city-building stuff, other than the threat of the darkness.
Dawnfolk has a narrative running through the thematic levels of its story mode. You are guided in your game by a little flame character called Lueur, who has no memory of who he is at the start of the game. His antithesis is a similarly-shaped creature of darkness called Nuit, who will occasionally invade your little town with dark storms. You know one’s coming when it starts to rain, at which point you’re going to want to conserve as much light as you can to battle against them. These storms spread onto tiles you’ve explored, and need to be combated with light through more of those little arcade minigames, until eventually the storms weaken enough for you to destroy their cores. Each level has this happen a number of times, another thing to keep in balance.
Then, beyond this series of scenarios, the game also offers puzzle levels (including daily puzzles), an endless mode (and indeed you can continue playing any scenario for as long as you want after the goals are achieved), a sandbox mode, another series of levels called Curious Expeditions where unique changes are made to how the game plays. Then there are various difficulty levels, easter egg modes, and all of these elements are unlocked by spending a currency accrued by finishing levels and achieving a billion little goals. Oh, and this is the work of one guy.
This is just fabulous. I cannot tell you how much fun I’m having, each level taking just fifteen minutes or half an hour, and each uniquely rewarding as it ups the ante, introduces new elements and new dangers, has me battling ogres or befriending dragons, all while ensuring that core mechanic of balancing light, people, resources and food is maintained. This is properly delightful, with so much to do, and all so satisfying to complete. Also, given it’s best played with a gamepad, this is a perfect Steam Deck game too.
If you’re not into city builders, play this. It’s nothing like them. If you do love city builders, then you should play this too, because it distils the most pure concepts into a gorgeous, chunky, meaningful game. Which is to say, if you currently exist, I really do recommend playing Dawnfolk.
Dawnfolk is out now. The best place to buy it is on Itch, where most of your money will directly reach developer Darenn Keller. It’s also available on Steam.
This is a version of a review that originally appeared on Buried Treasure, a site dedicated to unearthing indie gaming excellence. You can support its endeavors here!
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Kurt Indovina
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