City building games have long been a lonely affair. Yes, you’ll have hundreds, maybe even millions, of city residents to look after, but you’re most often out there alone. A god looking down on a realm you can never truly touch. Thankfully, The Whims of the Gods is here, to give you a fellow god to share the burden in the form of a co-op partner who you’ll work with in order to survive.
Set a long time ago, a really long time ago, The Whims of the Gods is a co-op city building game that sees you team up to construct a huge metropolis while beset by danger. Most city builders that dip a toe into co-op play tend to make it an abstraction or have you develop your city in isolation, limiting the co-operation to sharing resources. Here, developer PJ Games promises that players will truly work together to defeat foes, make decisions that affect the future of the game, and survive against natural disasters.
It’s an intriguing idea and, if pulled off, should add a new ingredient to the city building soup. In addition to working together, the thematic background and how this influences game mechanics plays a heavy part in making sure The Whims of the Gods stands out in the field.
Part of its setup are those titular whims with a mystical calendar system giving you auguries about what’s heading towards your city, from crop failures to plagues, sent to you by capricious godlings. Please the gods and you may be able to stave off the worst of what the future holds, or you can simply face up to the oncoming storm and prepare accordingly.
You’ll also be fending off danger found in the form of human invaders. Playing similar to an autobattler with special attacks and abilities you can trigger with your technological advances determining what you can deploy, warfare looks to be a little more hands-off compared to the city building meat of the game.
Overshadowing everything, however, is the threat of a volcano that is forever on the edge of exploding, destroying your civilization forever. The wise player may be able to avoid destruction altogether, with PJ Games suggesting there’ll be a few different ways to win in the final game.
The Whims of the Gods will be entering Steam Early Access later in 2024 and you can add it to your wishlist right now.
If you’re looking for more co-operative action, our guide to the best co-op games you can play will have you teaming up in no time. Conversely, if you want to take your time a little bit and indulge the logical part of your brain, our best strategy games guide will get the old gray matter humming.
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