Manor Lords (Game Preview)

This game is a work in progress. It may or may not change over time or release as a final product. Purchase only if you are comfortable with the current state of the unfinished game.

Manor Lords is a strategy game that allows you to experience the life of a medieval lord. Grow your starting village into a bustling city, manage resources and production chains, and expand your lands through conquest.

Inspired by the art and architecture of late 14th century Franconia, Manor Lords prioritizes historical accuracy wherever possible, using it to inform gameplay mechanics and visuals alike. Common medieval tropes are avoided in favor of historical accuracy in order to make the world feel more authentic, colorful, and believable.

ORGANIC CITY BUILDING
Manor Lords provides a gridless city-building experience with full freedom of placement and rotation. Building mechanics are inspired by the growth of real medieval towns and villages, where major trade routes and the landscape influenced how settlements formed and developed.

• Spreading outward from a central marketplace, build your residential, commercial, and industrial districts following the natural lay of the land. Establish farms based on soil fertility, position hunting grounds according to animal populations, and ensure access to adequate resource deposits and forests to provide the raw materials needed for growth.
• Assign areas for housing and watch your residents build their homes in accordance with the historical burgage plot system. Each area will be subdivided based on your roads and the allotted space, and homes will scale accordingly.
• Build extensions behind larger homes to generate resources that would not otherwise be available. Homeowners don't just pay taxes – they grow vegetables, raise chickens and goats, and otherwise supply themselves and other townsfolk with essential needs beyond what your managed farms, pastures, and industries can provide.
• Guide your settlements through the unique demands and opportunities of each season, enjoying the bounty brought by spring rains and preparing for the harsh snows of winter.

RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
From boots to barley and hides to honey, Manor Lords features a great variety of goods fitting of the era. Materials need to be transported and processed into finished products through production chains, and you must balance the basic needs of your people against the desire to produce luxury items to ensure happiness, manufacture trade goods for export, or forge arms and armor to aid in your conquests.

• Resources are littered across the map, encouraging you to expand and establish multiple specialized settlements. Extract valuable ores from your mining colonies, while villages devoted to agriculture, herding, or hunting supply the grains and meats needed to feed your growing populations. Will you spend your hard-earned influence to first acquire a rich source of iron for your smiths, or will you prioritize regions with fertile soil to serve as your breadbasket?
• Unchecked expansion will have a direct effect on the environment. Herds of deer will migrate away from encroaching civilization, lack of crop rotation will worsen soil fertility, and cutting down too many trees will result in deforestation.
• Establish trade routes and sell surplus goods to traveling merchants to enrich your population. Manufacturing and exporting a variety of goods will provide wealth with which to upgrade your peoples’ homes, import goods you can’t produce yourself, and through taxes on said wealth, fill your own coffers.

MEDIEVAL WARFARE
Yours is but a small parcel of land in a vast territory, and the competing ambitions between you and rival lords will inevitably lead to conflict. Lead your people into battle, not as expendable units to be easily replenished, but as your beloved loyal subjects where every death is a cost worth considering.

• Neighboring lords will build their own towns and grow their holdings to compete with yours, at times