Build and expand your very own settlements in high mountains! Carefully plan production chains and satisfy various needs of your three-caste society while dealing with mountain hazards such as weather breakdowns and avalanches. Are you skilled enough to make your town thrive?
Developed by: Quite OK Games
Played on: Steam
Length: 17 hours
A review key was provided by Future Friends Games.
There is a niche genre of games that not many people are interested in as they are not as flashy and somewhat involves an excel sheet, which are simulation games. Laysara Summit Kingdom is one such game, specifically a city building game with resource management that rewards efficiency over aesthetics.
What I meant by efficiency is that the game takes inspiration from factory games like Factorio, Satisfactory, and Dyson Sphere Program but applies it to a city building simulation instead. The premise of the game itself led me to try out the game, to much of my surprise in its depth and beauty.
Laysara Summit Kingdom will have you build a city on various mountain tops, trying to balance food, commodity and population while trying not to run out of money. This balance of resources will have you figuring out the floor plan of each building and resource complexes to find the most efficient delivery of each resource to the population, while maintaining distance from each other to collect taxes.
The game has two modes: Campaign and Sandbox, and both prove to be challenging in its own right, where Campaign Mode builds up the difficulty gradually while you can set your own difficulty in Sandbox Mode.
The game tutorial in the campaign starts off simple where you are given a food centre, some houses, farms, and a few commodities to be built while explaining the function of each building. The campaign then progresses with lessons on distances between buildings. as well as the efficiency of each produce by the buildings. Thus, starting the planning and resource management phase of the game.
All of this happens while trying to build on a closed space on the mountain top, with each area of the mountain top containing limited resources, and trying to maintain a positive gold amount. The challenge of the campaign then gradually increases by introducing new area layouts, disasters to overcome and commodities that are needed to be traded.
What I Like
The first thing that sets this game apart from other city building games is that you are required to build on the mountain top instead of the typical flat lands. This in itself poses quite the challenge, as the layout of the mountain top is small with slopes and cliffs to be built on, and bridges have to be managed between mountain tops.
The positioning of the resources also has to be spatially apart from one another, making the task of determining the most efficient and effective distance between the resource, gatherers and storage a fun challenge. This is where Laysara Summit Kingdom truly thrives, city building meets efficiency, where placement of each buildings matter more than you initially thought to be.
There is also the strategy of placing the logistics and production buildings, thus having the player create a system that works best for the mountain top. Managing transport routes, workforce, and production chains becomes an ever-evolving efficiency puzzle that is both rewarding and satisfying when everything clicks in place.
This simple city building game seems to have an unfathomable depth, considering the types of population, commodities, resources, logistics and space that one requires. Even the balance of building placements requires thought, where a mistake in the system may prove fatal and might require a restart of the map. It is a puzzle that can be solved at the player’s own pace and design, and thus, there is no urgency towards it except for the dwindling gold.
The sound design and graphics of the game is deeply alluring to both the eyes and the ears, creating an immersive experience that elevates the gameplay. Each mountain peak is meticulously crafted, with intricate terrain details, shifting weather, and carefully placed structures that make every settlement feel alive and unique.
The visual beauty is complemented by a rich soundscape of gentle winds sweeping across ridges, distant echoes in the valleys, and subtle ambient music that enhances the sense of isolation and grandeur. Together, these elements draw players into the world, making every moment on the mountain feel both serene and captivating. Each building also has its own unique design, although after awhile, it does prove to be repetitive without any way to customize or to create your own identity for the city.
What I Didn’t Like
As mentioned, due to the depth of the game, it also has a very steep learning curve where one mistake in the system could prove to be fatal. The placement and distance between buildings can sometimes take meticulous planning that some might find too difficult.
Although the game gets better once your understanding of the game gets deeper, you are then faced with the repetitiveness of the game where the solved puzzles seem to repeat itself from one map to another. Once you have determined the best system, then the game does not offer anymore challenge nor does it feel rewarding for completing the map.
The UI as well as the gameplay itself does have limitations, with the buildings unable to be rotated and it must be placed as it is. I had hoped for better quality of life features that are present in older games, such as being able to restart a map when I have made a fatal mistake, or being able to have a blueprint for the system that I have created, thus making city building much easier.
Games like Factorio and Satisfactory seem to have a better grasp at these quality of life features as they are inherently efficiency games rather than city building games. As a result, the game is fun to play but does prove to be frustrating as you are trying to figure out the game system rather than the game itself.
Verdict: 6/10
Laysara Summit Kingdom is a great efficiency-based city builder with a lot of depth to its simple premise, delivering a unique and visually captivating city-building experience. However, its steep learning curve, occasional repetitiveness, and some interface limitations hold it back from reaching its full potential. With a heavy heart, I have to give the game 6 pies out of 10 due to the limitations it presents.
