It’s been a big year for surprise hits – Black Myth Wukong, Satisfactory, Once Human, and Palworld number just some of the biggest games on Steam in 2024. One such delight is Manor Lords, the medieval city builder and strategy game from Polish developer Slavic Magic and indie publisher Hooded Horse. Making a big splash at launch, it’s continued to grow, and has just passed another huge sales milestone. To celebrate that, a new Manor Lords update is here packed with fresh features, quality-of-life improvements, an engine upgrade, and sausages.
The new Manor Lords patch makes plenty of changes, but perhaps the most beneficial, if not the most exciting among them, is the switch to Unreal Engine 5. Lead developer Greg Styczeń says this should “fix several bugs and crashes that were tied to legacy UE4 issues.” That’s just the beginning, however, as there are lots of new features being introduced to one of the biggest city-building games of the year.
The first of these is fishing – you’ll find new fishing ponds that you can employ your peasants to take advantage of. Along with the new fisherman job comes the corresponding Fisherman’s Hut building. There’s also the ability for butchers to turn surplus livestock into meat products such as sausages.
You’ll need to consider how you handle your food more carefully now as well. New food spoilage mechanics mean that the types of food you’re keeping and how you’re storing them matters. Foods such as fish will spoil faster than the likes of bread, and some weather events can also accelerate or lower the rate of spoilage. Using salt deposits to make sausages will therefore offer you a nice way to reduce potential waste.
Crossbows have now been introduced – these can be crafted at the Bowyer’s Workshop. Once made, they can be equipped by militia or new ranged mercenary units called Huntsmen. Rounding out the update is a new ‘trade overview’ panel that lists all previous transactions made in a region, and CPU optimization for late-game scenarios that should help large cities run more smoothly.
As it launches the update, Hooded Horse notes that Manor Lords has now sold more than 2.5 million copies since its launch in April 2024. That colossal milestone hasn’t stopped it from holding onto an impressive 87% Steam rating either, with more than 47,000 user reviews delivered since early access began. With a Manor Lords sale currently running, now’s a great time to consider jumping in to try it out for yourself.
If you’re not up to speed on how Manor Lords trade works, we’ve got a quick catch-up, along with all the best strategy games on PC in 2024.
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