I'm a massive fan of Ishtar games, even go as far to say you's are my favorite indie game dev as of late. Dead in saga is something I'll forever cherish. Last spell was a ton of fun (even though I dont own it, I had the pleasure of playing it through alternate)

Lakeburg Legacies I was definitely hugely looking forward to and I feel like alot of the critique was unfair, because it is a thorough management game, its not meant to develop liking characters, or relating to them, its not meant to really be a dating sim, or anything of that nature.

You're basically "god" and you try to put together the best civilization possible, the matchmaking aspect is how to recruit people outside of using money that will nestle perfectly into your little city and become a productive member. This game does have downtime, management games always have downtime. It takes time to acquire resources and such to make things happen, thats okay. It's meant to be cozy and relaxed.

The only TRUE problems with the gameplay, was people were cheating on their partners, divorcing and enslaving children way too often, almost instantaneously off meeting someone, no endless mode, and character balance RNG.

To break the three down
Soon as someone met another person, they would have a near 50-70% chance to develop interest in them, which lead to cheating and breaking households, which can put alot of pressure on gameplay loop due to having to rehouse people, the slave relationship with children being mentored also just incredibly drove morale down which lead to even more problematic situations with cheating, marriage problems, etc. It became pretty stressful fast.

Endless mode - We all want an endless mode, we cant really go into too much detail on this, just 100 years isn't very long for gameplay and we wanna see how much we can keep a civilization thriving and last in the endgame. It's a feat of strength for sure and tends to keep us interested rather than constantly restarting runs.

Character RNG - This is a general problem with any game with RNG, but you would get floods of characters with negative traits, and negative offspring traits, low stats, etc. I have went through over 3000 hearts trying to get a character decently matched up with someone at @15 per next (nearly 200 left swipes) This is just something that will get better overtime I'm sure, and also just heavily RNG to begin with, theres no way to control it for the player, but it does suck.

Now, the thing is, Ishtar is already handling all three of those things. (except slave trait I think) which is great, it shows active balancing, they've made meeting romances less often, better character traits and already had plans for & are working on an endless mode thats accessible in an alpha state.

With all that out in the open, the game is great, I would love to see it expand and grow, more unique buildings, more resources, more endgame management, etc. Which I imagine we will get some of if not all of. Lakeburg legacies is a cozy game with a bit of stressful management but its cute, its in a nice artstyle, it has a lot of funny moments, it allows a person to feel challenged, and has a great management system that is mostly lost in modern gaming, as it was a thing of older games. I continuously look forward to Ishtar's games and I'm already excited for the next chapter to come.

People may write my review off as fanboy-ism but I promise I would be even more harshly critical of the game if I didnt enjoy it because I have high expectations from this dev. So in fairness, I'm not being incredibly biased, I do genuinely think theres potential and that the game is a lot of fun. I would put a lot more time into it, but fortunately games of these types are pick up and go whenever, rather than just rushing through them and never playing them again. So I can relax and play it as I want.

I'm a massive fan of Ishtar games, even go as far to say you's are my favorite indie game dev as of late. Dead in saga is something I'll forever cherish. Last spell was a ton of fun (even though I dont own it, I had the pleasure of playing it through alternate) Lakeburg Legacies I was definitely hugely looking forward to and I feel like alot of the critique was unfair, because it is a thorough management game, its not meant to develop liking characters, or relating to them, its not meant to really be a dating sim, or anything of that nature. You're basically "god" and you try to put together the best civilization possible, the matchmaking aspect is how to recruit people outside of using money that will nestle perfectly into your little city and become a productive member. This game does have downtime, management games always have downtime. It takes time to acquire resources and such to make things happen, thats okay. It's meant to be cozy and relaxed. The only TRUE problems with the gameplay, was people were cheating on their partners, divorcing and enslaving children way too often, almost instantaneously off meeting someone, no endless mode, and character balance RNG. To break the three down Soon as someone met another person, they would have a near 50-70% chance to develop interest in them, which lead to cheating and breaking households, which can put alot of pressure on gameplay loop due to having to rehouse people, the slave relationship with children being mentored also just incredibly drove morale down which lead to even more problematic situations with cheating, marriage problems, etc. It became pretty stressful fast. Endless mode - We all want an endless mode, we cant really go into too much detail on this, just 100 years isn't very long for gameplay and we wanna see how much we can keep a civilization thriving and last in the endgame. It's a feat of strength for sure and tends to keep us interested rather than constantly restarting runs. Character RNG - This is a general problem with any game with RNG, but you would get floods of characters with negative traits, and negative offspring traits, low stats, etc. I have went through over 3000 hearts trying to get a character decently matched up with someone at @15 per next (nearly 200 left swipes) This is just something that will get better overtime I'm sure, and also just heavily RNG to begin with, theres no way to control it for the player, but it does suck. Now, the thing is, Ishtar is already handling all three of those things. (except slave trait I think) which is great, it shows active balancing, they've made meeting romances less often, better character traits and already had plans for & are working on an endless mode thats accessible in an alpha state. With all that out in the open, the game is great, I would love to see it expand and grow, more unique buildings, more resources, more endgame management, etc. Which I imagine we will get some of if not all of. Lakeburg legacies is a cozy game with a bit of stressful management but its cute, its in a nice artstyle, it has a lot of funny moments, it allows a person to feel challenged, and has a great management system that is mostly lost in modern gaming, as it was a thing of older games. I continuously look forward to Ishtar's games and I'm already excited for the next chapter to come. People may write my review off as fanboy-ism but I promise I would be even more harshly critical of the game if I didnt enjoy it because I have high expectations from this dev. So in fairness, I'm not being incredibly biased, I do genuinely think theres potential and that the game is a lot of fun. I would put a lot more time into it, but fortunately games of these types are pick up and go whenever, rather than just rushing through them and never playing them again. So I can relax and play it as I want.