WARDOGS
WARDOGS
Game
Game2014
Banished
Developer Shining Rock Software LLC
Banished is a city-building video game developed by Shining Rock Software. It was released for Windows on February 18, 2014. The game focuses on careful resource management and survival as an isolated and growing society. Its gameplay can be compared with economic theory on sustainability and optimization. From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
314 reactions from 4 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky, Mastodon, Lemmy) · newest Nov 4, 2026 · last updated Nov 5, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
90
LovedLoved
218 positive · 25 negative
95% range 85–93%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 218 | 25 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 8 | 2 | 47 |
| Mastodon * | 3 | 0 | 8 |
| Lemmy * | 2 | 0 | 1 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Very Positive
26,563 of 29,415 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
90% recommend · 202 yes, 23 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 225 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Very Positive (39,233 of 43,380 positive).
Players praise Banished as a genre-defining city builder that remains engaging after many years. [1][2][3] Many note the game's simplicity and challenge, with a steep learning curve and unforgiving survival mechanics. [4][5][6] Some reviewers criticize the game for being shallow and lacking depth after the early game. [7][8]
Liked
Representative posts
- [7]
I'm sorry, but I just cannot recommend this game, no matter how I look at it. I mean, it's not like it's inherently bad or anything like that, but beyond a solid foundation it's just incredibly shallow. After a few hours you've seen it all and done it all. None of the twists and turns (sudden house fires, crop field infestations, sickness, nomad arrivals) are particularly clever or designed to be anything more than …
- [2]
Incredibly entertaining and immersive, the graphics style aged very well, the music is enchanting...no wonder this is a genre defining legend! Your typical "How is it 4AM already?" game, my first 14 hours played was in one sitting and I skipped sleep altogether. Wanted to write some more but my village needs me..
- [4]
Gameplay: 1. Build a fishing dock 2. Expand Storage 3. Make Gatherers Hut. 4. Winter came 5. All civilians died without houses 6. Start a new game 7. Make the same mistakes 8. Civilians died from starvation. 9. Start a new game 10. Quit the game. Absolutely worth the money if you do the right steps to survive with more than 100 people.
- [5]
Pretty good town/colony builder. Early game is rather nail-biting. Never quite know whether you got the balance of people vs food right, could go wrong quickly. The feedback cycles are fairly long: didnt grow enough food? well regrowing some takes 6 months so watch your people starve. There is not much of an endgame, so once you made it past the early difficulty it's smooth sailing and nothing much happens then... …
- [1]
Solo dev creates a genre defining game, sells over a million copies, disappears. This is the way.
Summarised from 34 of the 286 public posts collected about this game; every point cites the posts behind it ([n] opens the post) and the split is counted from the posts’ own ratings. Updated Oct 11, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
Players who liked Banished talk about highly addictive and immersive gameplay; those who didn't talk about lacks depth and becomes repetitive after a few hours. Which matters more to you?
Critics, per Wikipedia
Banished received "mixed or average" reviews upon release, according to review aggregator Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average score out of 100 to reviews from critics and gave the game a score of 73 based on 32 reviews. Charlie Hall from Polygon scored the game 7.5 out of 10.0, noting that Banished felt more like a "survival simulation" than a city-building simulation. Hall also praised the game's graphics and animations but noted that the game struggled with giving players solid feedback on the results of their actions. Paul Dean from Eurogamer gave the game a score of 6/10, noting that the game was a "survival sandbox. It's harsh", agreeing with Hall that it was difficult to get…
From the “Reception” section of Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Critic context only — not part of the audience score.
Reactions
60 of 314 · most liked firstI'll be talking about a lot about a new project soon so there won't be much space for The Banished Vault - a strategy game of endurance in space travel, mathematics, and gothic monasteries. If it interests you or someone you know, please share or check it out! store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/...
neutral · AI labelView post →Oh hey The Banished Vault is on sale now! Explore and survive solar systems in a gothic monastery, with analog game inspirations and presentation. Also a whole manual to read if you want! store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/...
neutral · AI labelView post →Is there a newer city/colony builder game in the style and difficulty of Banished with tech trees etc that I am missing? Any reccommendations?
neutral · AI labelView post →Banished from the board game AGAIN In an unexpected maneuver, I was plopped into my big donut ON THE TABLE so I can watch and still feel involved, as if that would even work (It worked and this might be my new favorite thing) Please respect my privacy while I process these complicated feelings
neutral · AI labelView post →💘Love is a game Cupid can only play from the sidelines, and one day he takes that game too far. Banished to Earth, he's cursed with forbidden love. A sexy cozy fantasy about modern love, ancient gods, & the mortals caught in the crossfire 👉https://bit.ly/3k86IXX
neutral · AI labelView post →THE BANISHED VAULT is on SALE for 33% off. Buy it! Buy it for a friend! Help support development on future games. store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/...
neutral · AI labelView post →Solo dev creates a genre defining game, sells over a million copies, disappears. This is the way.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →We'll be talking a lot about The Banished Vault this week, and it's on sale until Sunday. It would mean a lot to us if you shared the game among your friends! I promise a "hey check this out" message is the number one way to get a niche game in front of people who are interested in it.
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault is on sale! A strategy game of exploring proc-gen solar systems, contending with the rocket equation, and the planning & resource management required to overcome both. Give it a whirl or buy it for your friend who likes the most complex board games imaginable – they'll like it.
neutral · AI labelView post →I could research this but it's a huge genre I don't play a lot of so hey gamers: my wife loved Banished, primarily for the alive-feeling town building as opposed to the survival aspect. Her modded install of that no longer loads, and this has opened the lane for a new game she'll play for 10 years.
neutral · AI labelView post →It's been just over two years since we announced The Banished Vault! The next thing 🟠 is *almost* ready to be revealed 👀 – if you're someone who writes about game announcements and wants to get info early, DMs are open.
neutral · AI labelView post →the game is Banished currently on sale on Steam, it is 3d medieval Rimworld, its an old game
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault is out! A strategy game of exploration and endurance, guide your Exiles through hostile solar systems to the safety of hibernation on your interstellar gothic monastery, the Auriga Vault. Available now! https://store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/The_Banished_Vault/
neutral · AI labelView post →4. Banished I loved a lot of strategy games growing up, the likes of Command & Conquer, Age of Empires 2, so when I played Banished it was like a revaluation that I could do all the buildy managey stuff without combat, and had a huge influence on my taste. store.steampowered.com/app/242920/B...
positive · AI labelView post →Amberspire is very much a strategy game, even if it's a bit more forgiving than The Banished Vault. The more your city grows, the more carefully you'll need to plan your turns, manage your resources, and weather factions and terrain events. OUT NOW on Steam! 🌇 s.team/a/3350750
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault is on sale! It's a strategy game about the difficult and terror of space travel. It uses nearly-correct math to determine delta-v, resources strictly tracked in the world, and dice rolls to simulate anomalies. There's lots more but the included manual explains the rest!
neutral · AI labelView post →You will like our indie game if you enjoyed 🪵: - Settlers 2/3/4 - The Anno series - Caesar / Pharaoh - Banished #indiegame #settlementbuilder #wishlistwednesday
neutral · AI labelView post →I'm sorry, but I just cannot recommend this game, no matter how I look at it. I mean, it's not like it's inherently bad or anything like that, but beyond a solid foundation it's just incredibly shallow. After a few hours you've seen it all and done it all. None of the twists and turns (sudden house fires, crop field infestations, sickness, nomad arrivals) are particularly clever or designed to be anything more than minor annoyances if you know what you are doing - and once you have played…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Starts off great, but this thing is less of a city builder than a CONSTANT worker allocation game. Coming from Timberborn or Manor Lords, this game has only about a fraction of the options those games have and less of a reason to keep playing. After you've built the ~15 buildings there are, there's really nothing left to do except make more of them and continuously move workers around so you can build. Then it's just a matter of hitting x10 speed and waiting and waiting for things to get…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →"Some indies are successful!" 🤣 The number of indie games on steam that earn their creator a living wage is less than 5%. You're arguing that WINNING THE LOTTERY is going to fund game dev for the next three years. Banished.
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault, my strategy game of exploring space in an interstellar gothic monastery, has a release date! July 25th, available here: http://store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/The_Banished_Vault/
neutral · AI labelView post →New episode of my podcast Game Data! I sat down with @nictringali.bsky.social to talk all about The Banished Vault, making weird digital boardgames, procedural generation, and everything in between! #gamedev #unity #turnbased #indiegame www.gamedatapodcast.com/p/nic-tringa...
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault ($16.74) - a strategy game with a heart that is equal parts vicious and viscous, keeping you under suffocating pressure the whole time. keep your exiles alive however you can on the Auriga Vault, an interstellar goth monastery. store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/...
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault ($16.74) - a strategy game that has a heart pulsing with a vicious, and viscous, desire to put you under suffocating pressure. keep your exiles alive on their journey with t he Auriga Vault, an interstellar goth monastery. store.steampowered.com/app/2341070/...
neutral · AI labelView post →The Banished Vault getting 8th (!!!) on game of the year lists is not something I'm prepared for
positive · AI labelView post →Incredibly entertaining and immersive, the graphics style aged very well, the music is enchanting...no wonder this is a genre defining legend! Your typical "How is it 4AM already?" game, my first 14 hours played was in one sitting and I skipped sleep altogether. Wanted to write some more but my village needs me..
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I have been playing this game for 10 years. It still challenges me and the mods all infinite variety. Great game 10/10
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I've been playing Banished for years. Don’t let my listed hours fool you, I’ve got hundreds more that aren’t logged. What keeps this game alive for me is the modding community. The amount of content out there and the possibilities it unlocks are insane. I only wish the developer had made a sequel or updated it to bring it into the 2020s with modern optimization. Even so, Banished remains one of the most satisfying city-builder/survival hybrids out there. If you want a challenging,…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Unironically if and when the flood return to Halo, I hope there's no mention of them in the marketing for the game they're in. Give me a Halo CE style reveal Investigating a Banished facility. We hear some gunfire then silence. Maybe earlier in the game we see Banished infighting too to mislead us
neutral · AI labelView post →If you want a tabletop inspired strategy game to tide you over until Amberspire releases on Wednesday, perhaps consider a completely different game by the same team in The Banished Vault:
neutral · AI labelView post →This game is digital crack. I thought I was going to bed at a reasonable hour last night only to discover it was already 2:00 am so I just wanted to wrap up what I was doing only to realize it was suddenly 3:00 am. Someone suggest a support group because I'm obviously an addict!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Boss monster illustrations: 'Banished Bandages' 🤕 'Laser Mouse' 🐭 'Calamity Gammon' 🐹 'Prophet of the Profit' 📉 all taken from @lostincult.co.uk's trivia card game 'Do You Know Gaming?'
neutral · AI labelView post →Great city building / survival game - Just make sure you also download Colonial Charter mod, which is basically like huge free dlc for it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Banished Vault, Cyberpunk 2077, Helldivers 2, Hexen Remaster, another No Mans Sky playthrough, Disco Elysium, another Elden ring playthrough - look how burdened I am with entertainment, each game will take me 6 months to play
neutral · AI labelView post →Gameplay: 1. Build a fishing dock 2. Expand Storage 3. Make Gatherers Hut. 4. Winter came 5. All civilians died without houses 6. Start a new game 7. Make the same mistakes 8. Civilians died from starvation. 9. Start a new game 10. Quit the game. Absolutely worth the money if you do the right steps to survive with more than 100 people.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I got this game about 10 years ago. to this day I still boot it up and lose myself in it. If you enjoy town building you will love this game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →dev man be like -Come outta nowhere -drop indepth, long term city management game -simple readable art style -game keeps your attention the whole time. Mismanagement could lead to economic collapse at any moment -Disappear into the f*%king ether.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →1 guy made this game and major props to him. Banished was great for what it was, a small, tightly orchestrated set of gameplay loops weaved together and presented in a classic, tried & true style. The game does struggle with its UI, late game difficulty, and overall complexity. I think that's more a result of the genre than the game itself, though.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's a day for being sad in space as Cado and I play Banished Vault and Telltale's Expanse Game. twitch.tv/remapradio
neutral · AI labelView post →The platonic ideal of a city builder. Small, simple, and enjoyable.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I'm trying to get into Manor Lords but I keep finding myself coming back to Banished. I really wish someone would remaster this game and make it run better on modern systems but other then that it's a great city builder.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →So I've owned this game for about 10 years now, and before I say anything else; I can not express just how much I loved this game the first time I ever played it. To me it was the perfect city/society building game, or at least the start to one. Regardless of this game having been abandoned by the dev/devs (not sure the cause, I have had so much fun with this game, and very well may again in the future. But, that is exactly why I am writing this review. I was scrolling through my library and…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The golden standard for city builders. Simple and entertaining for hours.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Started a new game on easy mode, built up my food sources and got my settlement established with a population starting to boom. 30 minutes in and half of the settlement and population gets flattened by a tornado. 10/10 Banished experience.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is my comfort game. I always come back to this game whenever I'm not sure what to play, in a bad mood or if it's a rainy fall day. Or all of the above. I do like to play it with the Mega Mod, as it adds so much more variety and types of villages to build. Expansion is near endless. Love it. :)
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Pretty good town/colony builder. Early game is rather nail-biting. Never quite know whether you got the balance of people vs food right, could go wrong quickly. The feedback cycles are fairly long: didnt grow enough food? well regrowing some takes 6 months so watch your people starve. There is not much of an endgame, so once you made it past the early difficulty it's smooth sailing and nothing much happens then... Played on Steam Deck.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →game is way ahead of its time probably one of the ground breaking games of its genre. Absolutely love it can sit here for hours and play it with no issues.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →entertained me for 10+ years. always fun to come back to it for a little building session. still worth buying in 2025. runs on everything.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Still amazing in 2026, a sequel would be nice though. Get this game on sale. Has steam workshop, go grab an extra large map mod. People still play this. Bare to no bugs, except a mouse scrolling bug that can be easily worked around.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The beauty of this game is the simplicity. Survival city builders can be overcomplicated to the point of annoyance, but Banished keeps me coming back. Do not confuse simplicity with lack of challenge, this sim can be unforgiving. I highly recommend this game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Banished was one of the earliest and most important games in the "Survival town builder" genre that has flourished over the last decade. If you play more recent games in the genre like Foundation, Timberborn, Kingdoms and Castles, Manor Lords, Farthest Frontier and more you'll see the core of all those games in Banished. It spawned many poor copies and many great copies. If you love the genre already I highly recommend it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I love Banished. It is one of my favorite games that I accidentally stubbled onto, when all my other games get boring i pull this guy out and enjoy the simplicity of it. No hard mechanics to understand. Just a classic. would love to see the owner create a new version with a bit more of a era growth.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Ever since release and to this day Banished remains my favorite city builder out there. There's just nothing quite like this one for me. tl:dr It's a solid 8.5/10 from me The game drops you in with a few recently exiled people and some supplies, maybe some houses and livestock depending on your difficulty setting, the objective is to build a thriving town in the wilderness you've been dumped into. It's complex to start and has a fairly steep learning curve, your first towns aren't likely to…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The challenge is to choose 20 games that greatly influenced you. One game per day, for 20 days. No explanations, no reviews, no particular order. Day 5 Banished #GameChallenge #Games #GameDev #PromoSky #IndieDev
neutral · AI labelView post →Every so often, some dope posts on the Banished forum that the developer has abandoned the game. We have to explain that the game is finished. Done. Complete. Not “abandoned”.
neutral · AI labelView post →I wrote for @graysonmorley.bsky.social's Backlog about The Banished Vault, a game that made me feel some kind of way. Read on for some thoughts about gaming, loss, and the things we leave behind. Rarely have I felt such a visceral emptiness upon finishing a game. www.backlogmag.com/the-banished...
neutral · AI labelView post →🎚️ Difficulty 🔲 My grandma could play it 🔲 Easy 🔲 Normal ☑️ Hard ☑️ A challenge to be reckoned (at times) 🔲 In the heat of confrontation, (Only PVP games) 🗺️ Graphics 🔲 MS Paint 🔲 Bad ☑️ Meh 🔲 Normal 🔲 Very Good 🔲 An original artistic direction 🔲 Beautiful 🔲 Masterpiece 📚 Story ☑️ This game has no story 🔲 Basic element of the contractual requirements 🔲 It's there for people who want it 🔲 Well written 🔲 Leading to more in-depth researches/thoughts 🔲 A model to get inspired…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Lots of new folks who may not know me: The Banished Vault is a strategy game about the scale and horror of space travel, wrapped into a gothic monastery. It is quite hard! But there is a whole game manual (in game or physical) and tutorial video series to help at www.bithellgames.com/the-banished...
neutral · AI labelView post →Played 10+ hours on a separate account, bought it for myself when it was on sale Feels like the developer added "strategy" to the description to avoid working on the games balance. Your colony will be flourishing and then all of a sudden, without warning, your colony will collapse. The entire game is about changing colonist's jobs constantly because they either dont do their job, get too old and die, starve and die, freeze and die, or just die. When theyre not dying, theyre not working…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of the best game I've played. The modding community is incredible
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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