Dwarf Fortress fans, are you there ?
From Sweden by Jakob de Laval. Early Access announced in August 2020 (not March as the trailer shows)
Announced price : 20-30$
Officiel website : Songs of Syx – The Fantasy City-State Simulator
Proto available here : Songs of Syx by Jake the Dev
Twitter : https://twitter.com/songsofsyx
In an age undreamed of, in a world far, far away you find yourself a king. Through city-building, diplomacy and war, you must lead your people to prosperity and glory and have your songs forever echo through history in the realm of Syx.
Inspired by Nordic mythology and fused with great things from the 80’s-90’s, Songs of Syx aims to deliver a unique experience on an epic scale. You start off as a colony-sim, and tend to your minions, micromanage your assets and try to stay off your neighbor’s radar. Grow crops, produce goods to trade and supply your subjects with the services they require. Then, as you grow into a city of thousands of inhabitants, you must turn your focus towards your scheming nobility, inflation, supply-lines, alliances, vassals and conquest.
The ultimate goal will be to reach a certain population, which will require you to hone your skills through many hours of playing as well as uncovering all of the forgotten technologies and artifacts scattered throughout Syx. You can choose from single-player campaigns, custom scenarios or sandbox – where each session offers a huge, randomly generated world, full of lore and secrets to discover.
Songs of Syx is in development since 2014 and early access will be available August 2020 for Windows, Mac and Linux.
Music from this artist :
[
Scale
Manage your kingdom on a world-map spanning 260.000 square kilometers with hundreds of factions and millions of potential subjects. Build your city on a 500.000 square meter map and fulfill the needs of 30.000 individual and complex inhabitants, all represented on a near 1:1 scale.
Bloody Battles
Use formations and tactics. Hire mercenaries, conscript militias, or choose to have a professional, standing army. Swell your ranks by summoning the garrisons of surrounding forts and outposts and call for the aid of your allies and vassals. Boost morale with heroes, and make sure to secure the loyalty of your troops. Just don’t forget to sit back and enjoy the carnage from time to time.
Rule With Style
Are you benevolent and loved, or a cruel tyrant? Do you resort to torture and dismemberment to punish slights against you, or do you focus on rewarding the just? Do you pay ransom for you POWs, or let them rot in your rivals dungeons for their cowardice? Do you allow cannibalism in a time of famine? Do you discard the elderly and weak, or take pride in caring for them?
Form your own unique culture and image as a ruler. Either style you choose, consistency is key, or your choices might be looked upon as weakness and weak rulers have short lifespans…
Dynamic Trade
Make your fortune on the global market where prices are governed by supply and demand. It will be quite possible to build some shitty, self-supporting village just about anywhere, but in order to excel, you need to get out there and do some good deals. It will be about controlling the production and distribution of one or more goods, as this will allow you to set its price. And if someone challenges you, you have but a few options: out-compete your rival, start a cartel, threaten them into submission or destroy them. Fail, and your income will be crippled.
Have nothing anyone else want? Consider becoming a middle man and take control over a busy trade-route. Tunnel through a mountain, or bridge a river and tax caravans as they pass through your city in order to get to where they’re going.
Justice
Subjects might steal, deceive, murder or even worse – disrespect their sovereign! Do you have enough influence to do what’s needed, or will the pleb dictate your choices? Will you bail out on an old friend, or have him sent to the salt mines? Dare thee openly flog a hero of the people? Will you succumb to your minions wish to have your most productive scientist burnt at the stake for witchcraft? Failing to deliver justice might force the mob to take matters into their own hands.
Religion
Choose from a bunch of gods and build temples and oracles. Sacrifice goods upon the alters, or why not an animal, prisoner or a virgin? Have a chat with a doped out acolyte to know what the weather will be like tomorrow. Watch as tensions rise between the different cults and beware as high priests become too powerful as they might get ideas to run the city themselves.
Technology and Artifacts
Religion alone suffices to keep subjects in check and boost your production with a few rudimentary technologies for a primitive settlement. But if you truly want to excel, you’ll need to make the difficult and often painful transition into a culture of science and art. Build libraries and laboratories, allocate your knowledge into tech trees and reap the rewards. Be waned though, educated subjects are not as easily governed and the priests won’t be happy. You can also uncover ancient tombs and artifacts, or build your own and use their abilities to your benefit. Knowledge and technology can also be traded or gifted between factions.
Maintenance
Everything you build and every technology you research will require maintenance and if you don’t provide it, things will begin to deteriorate and gradually loose its efficiency, throwing you into a vicious circle.
Court Intrigues and Schemes
If one of your subjects excels at something, you have the option to knight them and appoint them to a position of prominence in your court. But beware, even the seemingly loyal might scheme against you. Mediate the conflicts among them and keep a close eye on their characteristics, choices and possible hidden agendas, else you might be usurped, Game of Thrones-style.
Modability
So, you’ve somehow managed to do all that has been done. Fear not friend. The game is built with modding in mind and modding will be easy and encouraged. Quickly download one from the community, or create your own maps, scrips and races. Modding will be encouraged with regular competitions and prizes.
History and Lore
The lore of Syx is rich and spans thousands of years, from the birth of the stars to the fall of the Clandastrian empire. The game starts as a dark age of famine, plague and petty strifes is reaching its end, in the ruins of a golden civilization where gods walked among Men and Dondorians. The priests have their one version of what went down, but through playing you will find puzzle-pieces that just doesn’t fit, in the form of buried texts, ancient murals and the tales of strange wanderers and hermits. There are also rumors of a growing darkness. Distant villages burnt, their inhabitants vanished. Some even whispers of the return Bel, god of chaos. You must follow a strict timeline, but also shape the course of history as you go along. In the end, no one will have the same experience and no one will get 100% of the picture, but as they say – the truth is out there…
Seasons, Weather and Cycles.
Sow in the spring, harvest at autumn. Work at day, feast at night. Survive droughts and floods. The engine offers weather, seasons, a fake 3d-effect and dynamic lightening as well as shadows.
Other Sources of Income
Tourists will flock to a beautiful, or in other way famous/infamous city, and fill your coffers by eating at your taverns, buying souvenirs, sleeping in your inns or indulging in other services on offer. Similarly, scholars will flock to renowned libraries and laboratories and religious folk will want to visit your temples, monasteries and oracles. It works both ways though. Your citizens will want the chance to go on a pilgrimage or on a well-earned vacation, upon which you’ll have to give them the means to do so. There will also be travelling bands of performers, who in exchange for goods will entertain your citizens with a play or a funky tune.
Hordes, Immigration and Slaves
Harsh weather conditions and climate changes can spawn vast migrations, looking for new lands, or even just their next meal. Might be yours. A diverse city of many races can exalt trade and culture, but also feed division, prejudice and chaos. Successful military campaigns can yield slaves, whose backs you can break to build your city. They might not be happy about it though.
Champion of Chaos
If city building isn’t your thing, you can choose a darker path and become a servant of chaos, with completely different game mechanics. Raise undead hordes from your slain enemies. Turn captives into monsters to do your bidding and race against the clock before all of Syx unite against your quest for doom.
