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Nivalis Nights
Game
Game2019
Dawn of Man
Developer Madruga Works
Dawn of Man is a survival and city-building video game which was developed by Madruga Works. The closed beta started the week of October 17, 2018 and the game was released on March 1, 2019. From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
242 reactions from 4 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky, Mastodon, Lemmy) · newest Nov 4, 2026 · last updated Nov 5, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
80
LovedLoved
175 positive · 45 negative
95% range 74–84%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 175 | 45 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 12 | 1 | 5 |
| Mastodon * | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| Lemmy * | 0 | 0 | 1 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Very Positive
8,807 of 10,272 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
79% recommend · 163 yes, 43 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 206 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Very Positive (15,525 of 17,890 positive).
Players find Dawn of Man a rewarding and addictive survival city-builder with a satisfying progression from the Stone Age to the Iron Age. [1][2][3] Some players note the game has a steep learning curve and occasionally frustrating AI, but remains enjoyable overall. [4][5][6]
Liked
Representative posts
- [14]
Games unfinished. The developer suddenly claimed it was finished moved on to other project. They even have the nerve to use the games feed a couple of years after abandoning it to advertise their new game. Which they claim is the sequel to this game.....the one they never finished.
- [1]
A Thoughtful, Addictive Journey Through Human History After spending over 115 hours in Dawn of Man, I can confidently say this is one of the most satisfying city-building and survival games I’ve played. It’s a slow burn in the best way possible, watching your tiny tribe evolve from simple huts and stone tools into a thriving, bronze-age settlement never stops being rewarding. The pacing is excellent. Early survival …
- [5]
Major issues, but it's fun enough it's worth a play if you buy it on sale. The AI is painfully and unforgivably stupid, it makes what should be simple tasks stressful, and lets be real, this is a task oriented game. Villagers die from the absolute dumbest and preventable reasons, they won't pack a lunch before leaving, they won't forage on the way home on long trips while starving, they walk into predators, they …
- [3]
A beautifully paced survival-builder that lets you slow down and savor the rise of civilization. From hunting mammoths to raising megaliths, every milestone feels earned. Perfect for chill sessions and long-form strategy fans. Highly recommend if you love games that reward patience and planning.
- [2]
One of the Most Addicting Colony Survival Sims I've Played There is a lot that keeps bringing me back to Dawn of Man, even after I felt like I got my fill out of it. For starts, it's charming and grounded. The mechanics make sense, the UI is clean and simple, the presentation is beautiful, and every action, even sequence of actions, feels important. Give your people too much to do, and they'll get overwhelmed; don't …
Summarised from 34 of the 228 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
Dawn of Man sits at 80% positive across 220 opinionated reactions from 4 sources. Fresh or rotten — where do you land?
Critics, per Wikipedia
On the review aggregation website Metacritic, the PC version of the game has an aggregated score of 74/100 based on 9 critic reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Helen Ashcroft from The Gamer gave the game 4 out of 5 stars. She praised the choosing of a setting which is largely unexplored by city-building games, which are usually set in the present, the future, or the recent past. She also liked that the game menu starts with only a few sections, and others are made available later, allowing the player to get used to them. She also pointed that the game is slow-paced, and may be unsuitable for players used to fast-paced ones. Visuals and animations are detailed, and the soft…
From the “Reception” section of Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Critic context only — not part of the audience score.
Reactions
60 of 242 · most liked firstGames unfinished. The developer suddenly claimed it was finished moved on to other project. They even have the nerve to use the games feed a couple of years after abandoning it to advertise their new game. Which they claim is the sequel to this game.....the one they never finished.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Abandonware fed occasional updates to stay recommended on the Steam Store.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Unfortunate. This is one of like three or four (playable/enjoyable) games with a stone age theme and they messed it up by leaving a game that could have been more polished, by not deciding to work on a better sequel or game in the same theme, but instead went for completely overused and hyper boring, irrelevant, uninteresting space theme and now plaster every single news of THIS game with advertising for this new, completely unrelated game that about 87 % of us do not want and do not care…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Steep learning curve; first play through can be difficult. When you have a good grasp of this games mechanics it is a LOT of fun. I highly recommend this game and rate it 9.5 of 10.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →MOST unintuitive game I've ever played... can't figure out what to do and no tutorial... DON'T bother....
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A Thoughtful, Addictive Journey Through Human History After spending over 115 hours in Dawn of Man, I can confidently say this is one of the most satisfying city-building and survival games I’ve played. It’s a slow burn in the best way possible, watching your tiny tribe evolve from simple huts and stone tools into a thriving, bronze-age settlement never stops being rewarding. The pacing is excellent. Early survival feels tense and meaningful, while later stages turn into a careful balance of…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It is a solid game that keeps your imagination going for hours. Well thought out. I wish that the author had continued the game into more ages, with late iron age inventions and weapons and the invading armies getting larger and more suffistacated. If you come across similar games that have gone on to more advanced ages, let me know. I have played others, but none have the depth of this game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Cool game with good settlement development mechanics. But it is really boring. Progression is kinda slow, tech tree is small, but requires grind. Grind to trade, grind for research points. And now looks like devs have abandoned it for new game (almsot copied from Surviving Mars), so there are no QoL updates, no content updates, and the game is still slow, boring, scarce on content. But anyway, it is almost the best experience I had with such "civilization development game". It`s a pity devs…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was going to recommend this game, or at least give it a 6/10. The game is relaxing and cute, but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, I’ve never hated a dev so much. First of all, the game is way, way, way, WAY too slow to finish, even though the dev claims it’s feasible within 6 hours, which is still way too long. And honestly, when you see that only 5–6% of players unlocked the achievement that requires unlocking all the researches within 6 hours, there’s a problem. This is supposed to be a chill game for the…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game has so much potential, but the developers got their money and moved onto new projects before polishing this up. While there are amazing moments in this game, there are significant bugs and stagnation that need to be addressed. Now the developers use this game as a platform to recommend their next game (which is apparently the same game with a space skin); therefore, I cannot recommend this game, and will not be supporting this company moving forward.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of the Most Addicting Colony Survival Sims I've Played There is a lot that keeps bringing me back to Dawn of Man, even after I felt like I got my fill out of it. For starts, it's charming and grounded. The mechanics make sense, the UI is clean and simple, the presentation is beautiful, and every action, even sequence of actions, feels important. Give your people too much to do, and they'll get overwhelmed; don't give them enough to do, and they may soon face some crucial shortfall in…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Pros: On sale for $8.00... cheaper than a movie for more hours That's it for pros. Graphics are okay/so-so Civilians are stupid (die of starvation because wandered too far from base, die of hypothermia because too busy worshipping right next to a house) Animals die in the barn because civilians don't take care of them even though both straw and water are available (and civilian workload is <50%) Civilians have to be told manually to go into a deep mine every single time. This is required for…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →the AI has no self preservation, watching my people die by the dozens to preventable issues like leaving town while hungry thirsty and tired just to walk 10hrs and die in the forest.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Mostly a good game except for the overall lack of control. Villagers will stop hunting, fishing, and farming to do any other task you give them. You can never build too much or everyone will focus on building and starve. You can't put down too many work zones or everyone will gather stone or sticks and starve. Raiders will attack your base, so you sound the alarm, then a good portion of your villagers will starve. There's no good way around this unless you just expand so slow that you might as…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I don't play a lot of games for long stretches of time. And when I do play a game for long periods, after I've done the majority of things to do, I usually don't come back to that game unless there is new content added or the game is in early access with a major update, or something like that. Dawn of Man is one of the few games that breaks this trend for me. I played it for a bunch of hours/days/weeks after its release, and fell in love with the game, its mechanics, and learning all the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I see that this game has "Very Positive" reviews, and I'm glad that people have enjoyed it but that's definitely not my experience with this one. I played for about eight hours a year ago and there was no more content so I figured I'd wait a while and check in since i thought it was EA based on that playtime. I just checked back. It turns out it was not EA, and that is just the game LOL! Like with Planetbase, this game feels like the devs got bored at some point and just decided they were…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game doesn't update anymore. Instead they use their "Updates" to advertise for their other games.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →There are far too few paleolithic/neolithic games in this world, and this one is particularly fun and cohesive even if a little small-scale or simple at times. What you get is what you get, but it's a fun RTS in a criminally underutilized setting and it may be the most functional of the prehistoric colony games available. Note: Most of my playtime was on Xbox where it works surprisingly well for an RTS
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Genuinely fun survival/city builder type game. You start as a small band of nomads, and have to work your way up to the steel age. It's a fun game to play and get lost in for an afternoon, and different challenges provide different levels of difficulty so I haven't gotten bored. I've had to play each scenario a few times to get a good handle on things, but I actually like that about it. Would definitely recommend it if you're a city-builder or economy-manager type of player. No need to worry…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Dawn Of Man ”Another absolute banger from Madruga Works” If you like Madruga Works Planetbase and other survival games like Banished you will be right at home here. Raising your civilisation from the Palaeolithic era all the way through to the iron age. Rewarding but punishing, you can easily have a bad harvest or hunting season and fall into a death spiral in the winter, where food is hard to come by. Food can perish if not stored properly Disease, raider attacks and even hungry animals…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great game. Wish they would've put more effort into expanding this game, instead of planet dawn. This game is legendary. Can play it for hours.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Major issues, but it's fun enough it's worth a play if you buy it on sale. The AI is painfully and unforgivably stupid, it makes what should be simple tasks stressful, and lets be real, this is a task oriented game. Villagers die from the absolute dumbest and preventable reasons, they won't pack a lunch before leaving, they won't forage on the way home on long trips while starving, they walk into predators, they won't change into warm clothes while working because either they won't programmed…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If you like settlement building, task management, and having to provide and create your own resources, animals, and buildings to survive you will enjoy this game. Now, I will say I do not find this game "Easy". It may be easier for some than others. I have played for 197 hours, and just today marks me making it into the Iron Age. I could have progressed sooner, but I kept waiting because I was having a hard time with raiders during the Copper Age, and/or freezing, starving populations during…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A lot of love was put into this game, and it shows, I haven't played it since it launched and I was surprised how much they improved it, keep it up, can't wait to see what's to come. P.S. one tip if you're struggling mid to late game, task rotation is key, - plant and plow in spring, - harvest fruit trees (pears seem to be the best bet) in the summer, - harvest grain in the autumn, - and try building and upgrading in the winter when there's not much else to do. Cheers, have fun.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It wasn't a bad game, and I liked the idea of it. But I never was able to grasp the task management system. I didn't find it intuitive and the game is set up to run it for you. But I didn't know how to direct it to prioritize certain items correctly. For instance, even when my workers were not overworked, I was low on straw so I marked all my Cereal to be high priority, but half my fields wouldn't end up getting planted, and then at harvest, only half would be collected. I guess a better way…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A beautifully paced survival-builder that lets you slow down and savor the rise of civilization. From hunting mammoths to raising megaliths, every milestone feels earned. Perfect for chill sessions and long-form strategy fans. Highly recommend if you love games that reward patience and planning.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is one of those games that I can come back to time after time. Its a prefect balance of interesting and relaxing. I enjoy the simplicity of it. It could us more though. It would be nice to come back to the game with new things. Sadly the devs are busy and the modding community seems to be dead. The only other issue I have with the game is once your settlement gets above 200 or 250 the AI seems to struggle. There aren't really and useful tools to manage a settlement over that. Pro: Tech…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →i would enjoy it if it was free but the fact that this project seems to be abandoned i would rather refund it
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Wish there was more content, imagine all the known groups of prehistoric peoples in every continent and pre-continent pangea being playable. Shame it's a dead project now.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Its barely a game, its so limited in content, I don't understand how it's got the rating it has and why the devs are moving to another game.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I have played this game since it was in early access and it's come a long way. I have loved every minute played. The biggest downfall is that it's been abandoned by the devs. They've been working on other games and this one is begging for more. Would love if they continued improving this game instead.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If the computer deems that it is time for you to lose citizens you will lose them. Whether it be a raider party that seems to spawn just a little too close than normal, smoking all your plants with a disease at harvest, seemingly randomly increasing food intake of citizen which drain your resources faster than it should, having your livestock get wiped from disease. It doesn't matter if you have redundancies set up to avoid such pitfalls. It doesn't matter if you scale your settlement at a slow…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A Fun, well made simulator for an under-developed genre. I wish your world was more expansive though. i.e. building multiple cities with some sort of offensive military capabilities, for conquering and growing an ancient empire
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →For me it is a really fun, enjoying and slow game. Great for destressing. I do think that a lot more was possible, but wasn't fullfilled. Don't expect a deep village management. It is an honest, simple life.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →game keeps deleting progress and making me restart as tho i had never played before it is very disheartening
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Simple, but very well made game. I was hoping for more expansions and mechanics. Hopefully there is going to be a second installment of this game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →it's such a great game... BOY, I SURE DO WISH THEY WERE WORKING ON A DIRECT SEQUEL.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →the developers abandoned this game a year after release while it was buggy and unfinished. We haven't forgotten.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Much of the game is spent waiting for you to collect a milestone of a thing(ie 10 sticks, 100 sticks, 500 stick etc etc). Each milestone gives research points, which are the only thing that hold you back from developing. You simply have to wait, alot.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great game, but there needs to be some way to tone down the raiders -- or, better yet, eliminate them altogether
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →That's brilliant! I just had the same idea of taking inspiration from the cave paintings when it came to make the wild horses from our game Dawn of Man :)
positive · AI labelView post →I have logged 1,982.8 hrs. of playtime. It's my comfort game. The earth tone palate and the simplicity of the mechanics are fantastic and keep me coming back. It's the only game that I never uninstall because I know that I'll be back soon.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Its a good game, I played it before. However, the menus on PC are not that great. And mostly its shocking to me how such a good game receives so little support and continued development, this could be as big as Stardew Valley and GTA6. So I have to rate this negative.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The game has a horrible interface which makes it much harder to manage resources. When an item reaches 0 it just disappears off the goods panel instead of showing the good at 0, you end up looking up and down the list for the good because you don't see it on the list at 0, that wastes real time and makes the goods panel more confusing. This is one of the few panels that does this and I have never seen another game that does that, for good reason which is obvious once you play the game for a…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I really enjoyed this game when I first started playing it. Unfortunately, with time I've come to realise the AI is questionable at best, the ability to truly control the actions of your human settlers just isn't there and some of the basic concepts (unrealistic predator to prey ratio in the wild as an example) mean that it's really lacking in too many important areas. If you can get it cheap, then it's probably still a decent enough purchase - but I can't say that I would recommend it…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great little resource mgmt development game. Try to go slow and not race through the tech tree and it'll prolong the play time.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Banished always gets a recommendation from me. It's a labor of love from a solo dev and it's my comfort game just about every time I'm sick. Dawn of Man was fun for a while, and Nebuchadnezzar is a modern love letter to the old Caesar/Pharaoh generation of games. Speaking of, I've loved and played Caesar 3 for decades, and it's not even $4 right now so you should 100% grab that if you have even the slightest interest in the genre.
neutral · AI labelView post →i wish there would be more updates to go deeper in that game, its really nice and calming, sadly the engeneers wont do anything anymore..
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →i like the pace - you can completley pause or speed 8X, but also just let it sit like a normal sim at 1X speed and come back if you're sure they have food and clothes for the season. i like the tech progress not too complex. trader comes by sometimes with tech advances and yo ujust need to trade stuff for that tech knowldge. i like watching the wild animals migrate adn survive, that's a whole other world within this human centered world, as well as trees and plants that grow with the seasons…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Good game but sadly, devs abandoned it so no more updates in the future.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great game, it gives you exactly what it advertises. It is well grounded on historical aspects of the early human civilization. You can learn from this game a lot. You may call it an interactive history book, The arts, music, sounds are quite entertaining. Graphics won't amuse you today, of course, but it is good enough as for a history centric strategy game. Pros: this might be a unique game in this genre on Steam Cons: it is not updated and it does have bugs
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →i cant find any other game like this, sad devs dropped the game
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Fun and relaxing sim you can come back to over and over.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A charming and rather addictive game, where you begin with a handful of tribesmen and women and work your way through expanding your village and your knowledge by way of points in a skilltree earned by hunting, gathering, expanding, and building. The task system is entertaining to micro manage, but also very easy to automate as your village grows. The lack of in-depth statistics makes it very easy and attractive to pick up and play without it getting too exhausting. While planning and building…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Dawn of Man is an outstanding prehistoric city-building and survival game that combines historical authenticity with engaging gameplay. The level of research is remarkable, with realistic food sources, clothing, buildings, tools, and weapons that make each era feel genuinely believable. The art style is beautifully crafted, avoiding the overly saturated, cartoon-like graphics common in many modern games. Instead, it creates a natural and immersive world that feels true to the period. The…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Dawn of Man is one of those games that quietly becomes a six-hour session because you told yourself you were “just going to stabilize food production” and suddenly your Bronze Age settlement is collapsing because everybody is wearing straw in winter and half the village got mauled by raiders. What I appreciate most about this game is that it understands progression at a human scale. You don’t feel like an omnipotent city-builder god immediately dropping megastructures everywhere. You feel the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This seems to have been released in 2019, and I would say still very fun in 2026. I've always loved primitive/survival stuff and I hope to finish more accomplishments and challenges. Lots of potential for creativity in this game, and you have the opportunity to develop your own strategy. The levels of Techs/Ages in this is well done and researched. What was a bit disappointing for me about this sim survival, is that, it does not let you move the items you have already placed (so you'd have to…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Garbage controls on a dead game, so there is no chance of them fixing it. How difficult is implementing mouselook when you hold a button down in these sorts of games? Do not recommend.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A challenging but fun game. Good performance on my hardware, base gameplay is pretty simple to figure out but hard to master. One of only a couple games I have gotten all achievements on.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Everything is going well until the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ raiders start showing up! And they keep coming, and they keep coming at you until they kill all your people! And even if you saved, there is still a bitter taste after hours of playing. Because the game isn't balanced properly, you never have enough people to gather resources to build your defenses.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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