Train Valley World
Train Valley World
Game
Game2025
Let Them Trade
Developer Spaceflower
Build a network of cities that produce and trade resources, upgrade your castle, and protect the cities from cheeky bandits. Tinker with the economy at your own pace, and watch the charming wooden world grow into a lively and thriving kingdom. From the Steam store page
222 reactions from 2 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky) · newest Nov 4, 2026 · last updated Nov 4, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
82
LovedLoved
168 positive · 38 negative
95% range 76–86%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 168 | 38 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 3 | 0 | 13 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Very Positive
499 of 588 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
82% recommend · 168 yes, 37 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 205 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Very Positive (1,026 of 1,196 positive).
Players find Let Them Trade a relaxing and charming city-builder with a unique economic system. [1][2][3] Many reviewers note the campaign is short and replayability is limited. [4][5][6] Some players criticize the lack of late-game content and poor optimization. [7][8][9]
Liked
Representative posts
- [15]
To be honest, I find this review hard to write as in it's essense this is a good game that is done poorly. The idea and mechanics are very fun to play with, the excecution is just bad. Some examples: - Every mission is basicly 'do litteraly what the quest says, do not think'. You don't need to plan ahead, anticpiate stuff or build out a bit stronger economy to deal with stuff. It's perfectly planned out for you, …
- [1]
Summary: Excellent Game. A small city builder / economic simulation with a board game feel. Graphics: Cute - wooden toy style. Mechanics: Interesting if you are into production chain games. The mechanics (incl the self adjusting market prices) are deeper than it appears at first glance. There is a bit of a puzzle element here as you have limited number of towns each of which having limited slots for production …
- [2]
A relaxing game that actually feels relaxing - I've had enough of those games where they have RNG that just kills you at random that makes the games actually feel stressful that this is actually a nice surprise. The game is basically like if Factorio or lesser-known games like Factory Town or Sweet Transit just gave you a road system and said that the peasants would figure all the logistics stuff out for you. You …
- [3]
Let Them Trade is a city-building and economic simulation that deliberately steps away from the intensity and micromanagement typical of the genre, choosing instead to emphasize calm planning, organic growth, and the quiet satisfaction of watching systems work together. From the outset, the game communicates its intentions clearly: you are not an all-powerful ruler issuing constant commands, but a guiding presence …
- [4]
Fun game but campaign is a little short and free play is not interesting enough to play for verry long
Summarised from 34 of the 224 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 10, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
Let Them Trade sits at 82% positive across 206 opinionated reactions from 2 sources. Fresh or rotten — where do you land?
Reactions
60 of 222 · most liked firstTo be honest, I find this review hard to write as in it's essense this is a good game that is done poorly. The idea and mechanics are very fun to play with, the excecution is just bad. Some examples: - Every mission is basicly 'do litteraly what the quest says, do not think'. You don't need to plan ahead, anticpiate stuff or build out a bit stronger economy to deal with stuff. It's perfectly planned out for you, just do what the quests tell you. In the last missions it's a little bit of…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →First I’d like to point out the strengths of this game: the graphics are great, it is a really cozy and relaxing game just as advertised. The core concept of the game -a self-regulating economy- works well and is genuinely interesting to experiment with. The UI makes a lot of sense and quickly points you towards issues in your cities. However the game has two major drawbacks in my opinion: 1. No late game whatsoever: After the ‘Congratulations’ - message there is basically no incentive to…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →To use another review's language, this is reluctantly negative. It's a good game at the core, but it doesn't really do anything with that core. The Steam page says it's not about a story driven campaign, which is true, but it says it's a sandbox, which isn't true. Usually that means some kind of scenarios to play through, or randomized maps to keep it fresh, but that's not the case. You have a six hour campaign. Sure, that's fine, but...that's it. You don't get additional maps to play on, or…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The premise here is really great. As the king you gain gold by taxing trading, therefore instead of building an efficient design of self contained city production lines you are instead trying to create inefficiency to force towns to trade as much as possible with each other. You also want to avoid overproduction or prices will fall, meaning that turning off production to raise prices and thus raise taxes is also a real strategy. Unfortuntely I found the gameplay itself to be quite boring. It…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Sad to have to give this game a negative review. The concept of a game where towns have independent economies and money is made on taxing trade between them is interesting, and there's a lot to love about the game in terms of how well it is designed. The unfortunate problem for me though is that the logistical puzzle it presents is fundamentally broken. You are attempting to build and balance your towns so that they trade enough to make money but their traders aren't overloaded. The Trader AI…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is a reluctantly given negative review but it is simply a matter of content versus price. I think this is a brilliant little economy game but there is really only the main campaign which is about a 6 hour experience. There are no maps available beyond what the Steam workshop has generated which are interesting on the surface but playing in Middle Earth or a mini Europe doesn't actually mean anything in this context and the 'challenges' that a customized map add to the game are entirely…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Odyssey has me hooked. We're about to raid an ice vault to get more ship parts! Later, we'll take a look at the new Let Them Trade, a resource management game with hexagons 😃 ❄ twitch.tv/2dkiri
positive · AI labelView post →Meh. There just isn't any _challenge_. If you're short on something, you can do clever optimisations, or you can just wait. I've played through the entire campaign hoping the game would blossom as the new mechanics were added, but it never did.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The economy in this game makes no sense; goods are consistently sold at a lower price than it takes to produce them which is just. so. incomprehensible. money is produced out of thin air from taxes, with no wages or mints or any of that, and it almost made me cry from how it flaunts in the face of supply and demand.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Summary: Excellent Game. A small city builder / economic simulation with a board game feel. Graphics: Cute - wooden toy style. Mechanics: Interesting if you are into production chain games. The mechanics (incl the self adjusting market prices) are deeper than it appears at first glance. There is a bit of a puzzle element here as you have limited number of towns each of which having limited slots for production buildings. There is a minimalist combat element where you defend…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →And another announcement! Let Them Trade will release on JULY 24th 🥳 We're so excited to finally bring the finished game to your PCs ❤️ In the meantime, you can still check out our newest demo in Steam Next Fest! store.steampowered.com/app/3465460/... #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame #steamnextfest
neutral · AI labelView post →I was really excited for this game, as I love simple economy management games that I can play without having to think about decorating or micro-management. But this game is too simple. Instead of telling you to "build a successful fishing trade with goal X fish per minute" it tells you "send your explorer to these two tiles, build exactly two fisheries, and wait for trade to become X per minute". You even get the achievement for "discover all tiles" in a tutorial where all tiles are unlocked…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Late mission has a quest to defeat 2 bandit camps but only spawns 1. Completely blocks up the campaign and it's not fun enough to restart the map.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Good Morning Mechanics!! Weekdays are hard but we can always wind down hanging out in the evening 💚 Got some awesome new indie games lined up this week: city builder "Let Them Trade" tonight, nuclear war sim "Kiloton" on Thursday, and @exodrifter.bsky.social 's new game "no signal" on Saturday ✨
neutral · AI labelView post →Okay, okay, get this: They trade, and you let them. In short, it's a casual strategy game with all of the pieces present. Since the best way to combat low potato prices is to cause a brief tiny little famine, it's even got the Geneva Checklist aspect of any good strategy game covered! Why I'd pick this up: The game succeeds at its goal of turning the traditional production model on its head. Underproduction is bad, but low tax revenue is worse! It's calm and slow-paced with no real way to…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Fun game but campaign is a little short and free play is not interesting enough to play for verry long
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's easy to figure out and start playing. With quite a bit of prior experience with sim/trading games I was able to max everything out fairly quickly and earn the achievements. My son is nine years old and has never played a game like this before but he is enjoying it quite a lot, he loves hunting down bandits! We plan on making custom maps to challenge each other once he finishes the campaign.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The game is cute and fun in the beginning. However, the mechanics seem to be too repetitive. The UI is not good - controlling the knights is hard, and they don't add much value to the game in the first place.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Positives: >Encourages you to starve out your population for monetary gain(fun campaign). >Simple to understand mechanics but nonetheless interesting. >Very relaxing, a game where you can drink tea and mindlessly watch as your workers mine coal 24/7. They replicate by eating coal. I think. >You can exploit cities for cash. >You can “cultivate” bandits and “arrest” them when their bounty goes up. >Teaches you how the rich purposefully manipulate the market for their personal gain and how you are…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Another game to add to the "meh" category - its good, not great - get on sale.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is a relaxing city-building and logistics game. It's difficult to completely fail, and the game is generally enjoyable if you like watching production chains grow and resources move across the map. The main challenge comes from adapting to each map. New maps offer less space, worse starting conditions, and more complex economic requirements, forcing you to build a more diverse economy rather than relying on specialization. There are interesting trade-offs: monopolizing production can…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The game's concept is pretty cool, especially with how it handles money and taxes in medieval trade. However, there’s very little challenge, and the further you get, the less there is to do. From the mid-game toward the end, it gets really boring
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Not recommended if you want to play this on your steam deck. No Controller support at all.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Early concepts, character designs as well as card illustrations I did for the game “Let Them Trade” by Spaceflower!
neutral · AI labelView post →Let Them Trade does exactly what you'd expect of its genre, and little else. It is a pleasant little city builder with an economy sim that's easy enough to manage. It is simple, short and sweet but not at all that filling when compared to its peers. Pleasant and inoffensive is the perfect descriptor of it; there's nothing outwardly bad but other games in the genre have more to hook you with for the same asking price.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I think I've gotten just about every minute out of this game that I can, and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. But It's quite shallow in regards to replayability or total campaign length. Not really sure it needs to be more than it is, it's just a good relaxing experience made by people who clearly care about what they've made.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Very fun 20ish hour campaign worth every penny. Nice concise little game in the style of a simplified Anno-type game with different tiers of citizenry that require different goods. I'm not sure that there will be much replayability past one sandbox game after the campaign as there isn't a whole lot to do or variability to add complexity but for the price of this game it was a really fun way to spend a weekend!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I think the game is pretty low on replayability (due to a lack of content), is remarkably poorly optimized, and I generally don't agree with how the economy is structured. Your townsfolk generate "taxes" out of thin air, which is used by the towns to purchase goods from other towns. It would be way cooler if your castle had a bigger role in the economy aside from purely being consumptive. Like printing money. BUT, the game is overall a very fun experience, and I think it's worth its current…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Hello everybody! Today we checked out Let Them Trade by Spaceflower & @byterockers.bsky.social! It's a strategic yet relaxing trade empire builder with a wooden board game aesthetic! Video: youtu.be/55KMf1HOjbA Steam: store.steampowered.com/app/1313290/... #LetThemTrade #indiegame
neutral · AI labelView post →A relaxing game that actually feels relaxing - I've had enough of those games where they have RNG that just kills you at random that makes the games actually feel stressful that this is actually a nice surprise. The game is basically like if Factorio or lesser-known games like Factory Town or Sweet Transit just gave you a road system and said that the peasants would figure all the logistics stuff out for you. You generally have a goal of trying to build your way up the tech tree from…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game surprised me during a Next Fest by being simply delightful. I didn't expect it; It was just one of very, very many that I'd never heard of and tried without much expectation, but it truly stood out for being well made, with many great little details to fill it out, a good sense of humor (but not overwhelming), and freedom to be creative while still providing meaningful gameplay. Release has absolutely lived up to the enjoyment of the demo, and beyond. It's relaxing, it's fun, it's…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Developed by Spaceflower and published by ByteRockers' Games, Let Them Trade is a big success for both companies. In an interview, Benjamin Reichel (Community & Marketing Manager) talks about the launch of the game as well as ByteRockers' Net.Attack(). www.gamesmarket.global/business/str...
neutral · AI labelView post →Let Them Trade is a really cozy, relaxing game. I’ve spent quite a few hours with it and had a genuinely good time. What stood out most to me was how satisfying it is when everything starts to run and you see your world actually function. Even though you already know the systems from earlier playtime, there’s still something nice about getting back into it and watching it all come together again. Over time though, that sense of discovery fades a bit. Once you’ve seen most of what the game has…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Id really like to give this game a positive review. Unfortunately it just doesnt have enough content to justify the price. TLDR without price would be 7/10, with price its roughly 4. If it cost less than half of what it does normally it would be fine. But as it stands it feels very repetitive. The campaign is short and doesnt explore much. You end up building very similar towns every time. However the game does run smoothly, the audio is good and the visuals are quite nice.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Nice chill game. Zero challenge, but works great for when you want to relax after a stressful day. Special thanks for not forcing me to do the tutorial.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Let Them Trade is a city-building and economic simulation that deliberately steps away from the intensity and micromanagement typical of the genre, choosing instead to emphasize calm planning, organic growth, and the quiet satisfaction of watching systems work together. From the outset, the game communicates its intentions clearly: you are not an all-powerful ruler issuing constant commands, but a guiding presence helping a kingdom grow through trade, connectivity, and sensible expansion. This…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →i'd rather play furmark
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Excellent trading sim, satisfying loop, progression ends a bit earlier than I would like but the dev continues to add features and content so it's only a matter of time.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Looking for a combination of Anno, Catan, and Dorfromantic? Look no farther. 10/10
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Nice and simple, you get what you expect. It's usually in bundles for a few bux or less.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Not much really to do, your goal is to reach the top of the tech tree, that’s it. First play through can be relaxing but once you beat it there is no replay ability. Most of the game is just hurry up and wait which makes it not relaxing but boring. The bandits are more annoying than anything, they are not a threat. If you lose a battle, your knight just goes to the castle to get more guards so to be able to destroy their camp. There is no challenge or critical thinking to the game. This game…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Interface difficult to navigate and unintuitive. Text difficult to read.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A superb way to spend a couple of hours. Really fun, and becoming a member of the Order of the Golden Acorn is an honour I will treasure for the rest of my days!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →As an Economist, i am shamefully addicted. I enjoy the retime balancing of micro and govt demand over resources and the retime graphs... it hit my flavor of -tism perfectly. with the 50% discount, my value to cost ratio is hi.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I'd love to recommend this game because it seems really fun, but even on the lowest settings, it keeps crashing, regularly runs "seconds per frame" instead of fps, and there are buggy shadows glitching across the screen. In its current form, it's unplayable for me, which is really a shame :(
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Let Them Trade [PC - 73] www.metacritic.com/game/let-the... "Let Them Trade blends the cozy charm of board games with city-building strategy in a relaxed, visually rich experience." - PC Games
neutral · AI labelView post →Tomorrow at 6.30PM CEST: We're gonna LET THEM TRADE! Yes, we're gonna play a nice cozy game about building cities, trade routes and bonking bandits! Depending on how that goes, we'll go full Medieval and also play Stronghold Crusaders Definitive Edition! Never played this one, so I am excited!
neutral · AI labelView post →Come for the relaxing vibes, stay for the single braincell of trader. Repetitive but addictively fun. Get it on sale!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →nice little bite sized economy game. mechanics are good but the actual amount of content is not exceptional; accept that you probably won't get more than 50 hours out of this at most and you'll be happy with it
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's cute and has lovely music, but honestly, it's a little boring. Always more of balancing production, researching the next thing, making more stuff. Add to that the fact that some things aren't explained very well, and it's just not a completely satisfying experience. I wouldn't refund it, because I feel like they put a lot of work in and it has promise, but it's just kinda meh atm.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Short, shallow, repetive, with a lot of downtime.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I grew up playing Total war game and the earlier games always had wagons showing how much trade is coming out of those cities. I always made sure i could fill every road with trade and this game scratches that memory nicely. Its a nice puzzle if you like to watch increase trade and make graph lines go up.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Played on Linux/proton without any issues for about 50 hours now. So far I only played the campaign/tutorial and a seasonal map. I did not necessarily play fast since I just enjoyed building my little resource chains and developed my cities and the tech tree. There is nothing new to this game that you haven't seen in another game or ten. The reason why this game is special is that it does come together nicely and it concentrates on a few core mechanics and does those well. It is easy to get…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Really nice game, easy to play, very fun but also highly engaging. Kudos to the devs for this as it really is worth the price
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Fun game that's not too complex, use it to scratch the 4X genre itch when you don't have the time or brainpower for a bigger game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →simple, cozy, short but sweet management game. Low replayability but high charm!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Delightful little game, good time killer if you need something adjacent to but ever so slightly more involved than an idler. Very comfy. Only real critique is that there's little to actually swap things up on maps and the campaign while well written and cute is effectively just a tutorial for the main mode in all honesty.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →"Let Them Trade" relatively low touch (if you don't use high game speed) economic simulator game
neutral · AI labelView post →It is an interesting take on an economics game. It has some interesting mechanics, an anti-monarchist sense of humor, and a nice tutorial learning curve. Worth the price, even better on sale.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Update at bottom. Short campaign and that's it. It's fun while it lasts but the campaign being so short and so lopsided really hurts. It feels like an Early Access game. Assuming they either come up with new campaigns, or they find someone making Steam Workshop campaigns and officially add them to the game, this will be worth a non-sale purchase in 6 months or so. I need to check the roadmap, and so should you. If it's on sale and you want a city builder that reminds me of Against the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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