A really good game. More complex version of majesty with a little touch of dwarf fortress. It is very fun to play, and I cannot believe how this game will look after all the updates when it is already this good. Love to watch my people run all around and doing their daily jobs, it is so relaxing and somehow addictive.

I don't see the fuss with this game. The controls are great, sure its not the *best* graphics, but its not supposed to be, and is fine. This is EXTREMELY playable, and its stupid of reviewers to give it a bad rating for being in alpha - which is still extremely enjoyable. The second i started playing, I've played for 5 hours straight and plan to play more. I give it a great score!

This game is super fun! The game, sure is still in alpha, but there's tons to do and I've yet to run into a bug (aside from a misspelling of happiness :P)
Its everything its advertised to be, and more. I have no complaints!

Why are people complaining? There are games that are sold as finished games that aren't of this quality (mostly indie). This game is being sold as playable, and is fun. The devs commented as to why did they not mention the dev phase, they said they are selling it because it is playable and fun. It is too. I've played it for a good 6 hours, and it's fun. The tutorials work, though aren't very polished. They teach you the basics, you have to go learn the rest. The graphics look fine. I havent run into any bugs (other than random crashes) every hour or so.
There is even a demo, go to the games steam forum and it is stickied at the top of the page by the dev for where to download it.… Expand

Fun and addictive. Having bought the game before Steam release I have no issue with it's release. Missing some features and has some bugs but fully playable. Not as buggy as Skyrim on it's release thats for sure. Features will be added in the future and they'll be free. Not milking the customer for existing content like ME3 did. Having said that, I find the tutorials pretty bad and the digging into lower levels a bit awkward. The pathing bug is also annoying.… Expand

I too was initially disheartened by this game. After viewing a live stream of how to play the game, I have done a complete 180.

This game is excellent. The learning curve is steep initially, but the UI layout and game functions work perfectly. It is incredibly easy to get sucked into and it has very high replay value. Please, before voting this game into oblivion, have a look at some online tutorials to understand what it is you have to do. Anyway, I'm off to slay some goblins.… Expand

AWESOME game, successfully combines city building, RPG, survival, and mining aspects. Still in development atm, but already more than playable. Definitely worth the purchase price, I've got much more enjoyment and spent longer playing this game than on a number of AAA, big budget games that were 10 times the price.

A good town building game. Not easy, takes some getting used to. Isn't as difficult as dwarf fortress, nor is it as in-depth. Hopefully they continue updating to make it more difficult. "Dying is fun!" :D

Although this game is in beta, it has great potential. Game still needs some work though. It

I bought this game a few days ago after playing the demo for hours. At start it did crash (as did the demo) but looking at there forum I quickly found a solution. (Updating my graphic card drivers and my java version) . After doing so it ran like a charm. The game itself has a pretty steep learning curve to start with. And you need to get along the AI. But once you know what you are doing (give or take a few hours into the game + reading some wiki´s) it´s so addictive and great to play. The gameplay is as followed: You start out with a few settlers and you need to build a basic infrastructure. (food, wood, stone). Once you have this going you can really start building houses, forts or whatever you can imagine. (Minecraft like). But your ubergoal is to build a tavern where you can host hero´s. Those are needed to clear underground dungeons that are situated under your town. The bigger your town -> the more hero´s. The deeper you dig, the stronger the opposition. Also other materials can be found in the dungeon where you craft other things with. My conclusion, Are there things that need to be improved? a big yes. But there stil working on it. Is it an alpha game? Well, it runs stable, its great fun playing. Needs to be improved and polished. But I think that if you are in (city) building games and are willing to invest some time to learn you are going to have a good time with it. Play the demo before you buy @ www.townsgame.com… Expand

The game is great, while some it is mainly apparent only in potential (which may or may not ever be realized) The negative reviews based on it's alpha state clearly aren't able to do 10 seconds of research. The concept is excellent and very appealing to those of us that desire town management style games. The graphics are fine. The audio could use some overhaul and there are various awkward places in the UI arrangement, but neither were enough to lower my enjoyment of this game. I've probably played over 30 hours already in this game, although 5-10 were probably just letting the game run itself while I was otherwise occupied. If you are worried about the developers or Steam not mentioning the state of a game and are unable to do simple research on your own to find out this info, please avoid this game, and also avoid leaving a negative review on what is already a great game, with so much potential.… Expand

While I didn't know that game has some minor issues when I bought it on Steam, after playing it for some while, I must say it IS indeed playable in the current state. You just need to get used to its gameplay elements.

Where "get used to" means same as "getting used to" RTS, FPS, RPG or any other genre or subgenre (like JRPG or CRPG). What is genre of this game? I'd like to call it "Sandbox town-building game with RPG and RTS elements". While I would never, ever touch Dwarf Fortress because of its graphics or lack thereof (seriously, ASCII? Are we in 80s? Even Nethack, rogue-like with originally ASCII graphics has graphical clients such as Falcon's Eye or Vulture's Claw), Towns are pretty fun to play with.

Those who say interface is non-intuitive, probably never played game such as Age of Empires 2 or other old RTS games like first editions of The Settlers or Civilization. In case of the latter THAT'S confusing and non-intuitive interface.

For me it is pretty simple after few (2) hours spend with it. At left you have production automation tools which let you make food, produce items, etc. At right - town building tools (setting up walls and placing utilities/furniture/decorations, etc.). And finally at bottom - order menu - here you can give massive orders, e.g. mining/chopping down trees/gathering wheat/apples/pears/bananas/etc. and set up stockpiles (magazines) for each type of resource, and zones (if you ever played Evil Genius zones are roughly equal to room types).

Now, final words.

While that game isn't completed yet, I'd say it's pretty close. If I would need to compare it to level of polish of some version of Minecraft, I'd say SMP is at level of Minecraft Beta 1.6. AI is a bit wonky, but it'll work in time (heard on official forums that AI will be main focus in Towns v9, a.k.a. 0.90)… Expand

Great game, can not get enough of it. Tutorials could use a update though, but you can learn how to play without them.
With the promise to continue to work on it more.
- JackPS9 (Towns Modding Master)