Game: City Tales – Medieval Era
Genre: Simulation, City Builder
System: Steam (Windows)
Developer | Publisher: Irregular Shapes | Firesquid
Controller Support: None
Price: US $22.99 | UK £19.30 | EU € 22,91
Release Date: January 29, 2026
Review code provided, with many thanks to ICO Partners.
Finally, City Tales – Medieval Era has released. I got to play this game twice for Ladies Gamers: I got to review the City Tales Demo as well as the City Tales Early Access. So let’s see what’s new and what is still the same.
A Chill Medieval City Planner
City Tales – Medieval Era is still a chill time. In it, you start by placing fenced-in areas for people to build their homes. In each of these areas, you can place up to two non-home structures like wells, churches, taverns, weavers, and other things your people will need and want. People will fill in the extra spaces with their homes. As you build new industries, food production buildings, and other modes of gathering or transforming materials, you will need to assign one of your companions to train the location until it can run autonomously.
If you leave a companion with a building, they will gain levels in that type of production (types include farming, gathering, running a tavern, and things like that). The more they level up that type of production, the more efficient they will be later on in leveling new buildings of that same type. You begin City Tales – Medieval Era with six companions, and you gain more as the game progresses.
As you gather more materials and build new things, you can upgrade homes, your castle, and the industrial buildings in order to make better materials faster. And this is the basic layout of the rest of the game.
The vibe of City Tales – Medieval Era is very chill; it has a slow pace, nice, calming music, and doesn’t have any combat or invaders to worry about. You just keep upgrading and expanding, growing your little town and fulfilling quests for your companions.
A Bit Faster and Easier to Control
In my previous reviews of City Tales – Medieval Era, I have mentioned that I thought it moved too slowly. The companion system slows down your ability to make new buildings. This has been tweaked to make it much more pleasant to play. Now, you basically are not choosing between two new buildings that need a companion; you are choosing whether to start a new building or leave your companions to raise their levels instead. It’s a much more interesting choice, and it made the game a lot more fun.
Don’t misunderstand; City Tales – Medieval Era is still very slow, but in a good way. The gameplay loop is now a lot more satisfying, which makes playing feel better.
Another issue I had in the previous iterations was the layout system. When you plot a bit of land to start building on, people fill in the spots, and you need to plan ahead to make sure people don’t take the plots you were saving for a church, a tavern, or a well. The circles of influence from each of these items, which are needed to upgrade buildings, grew enough that you don’t need a church every two feet in order to keep people happy.
Some Other New Additions
City Tales – Medieval Era has added a bunch of companion quests, new visuals, music, new difficulty levels for playing, and even voice lines for the companions. You now have the ability to gain new companions, and there is an option to turn off tutorials now as well. There are new locations to try out with different challenges.
In my opinion, all the changes made have been positive ones. I really enjoy the new maps that are easier to build on, the added difficulties, and all the other little things that have been added. The overall gameplay of City Tales – Medieval Era is basically the same, but there have been tons of little quality-of-life changes and tweaks to the systems that make playing a ton more fun and exponentially more satisfying.
The Cons of City Tales – Medieval Era
The developers of City Tales – Medieval Era have fixed all of the issues I had with the game previously. The companion limitation has been fixed, the game’s pacing has been tweaked, and the problems I had with building, homes, and districts have been addressed in a good way.
I didn’t discover any bugs or issues with this new build either. Just solid gameplay, pretty graphics, and all sorts of very pleasant upgrades to make building your town more fun. The only problem I had was building a claypit; with all the other buildings, you are looking for that item out in the world, then you need to build a gathering station nearby.
To build a hunter’s hut, there needs to be deer, and for a stone quarry, there needs to be stone, etc. The clay doesn’t work that way; you just need to place it near water, which doesn’t make much sense considering that not all soil makes for good clay. However, this was such a small thing that the only reason I mention it is so no one else gets stuck here as I did.
Conclusion
I love all the little changes that have been made. I think City Tales – Medieval Era is a great, peaceful city builder. The music is perfect, the visuals are great, and the companion system is wonderful. I like the new pacing, the new districting, and the massive amounts of additions that were made.
Overall, I found City Tales – Medieval Era to be a pleasant time, and I applaud these developers for such a well-made game with a strong 1.0. If you enjoy cozy city builders with fun little side companion stories, this is the perfect one for you.
Final Verdict: Two Thumbs Up:
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