Tlatoani: Aztec Cities

I'd just been getting interested in the Aztecs again, so I really found this game at the perfect time. It's hard to find good games about them, especially sim/strategy games. Tenochtitlan was described as a wonder of the world, so a city builder is a perfect choice. I especially like the focus on irrigation and land reclamation, that really helps it feel distinctly Aztec. The limited military and diplomacy elements add just enough more to do without being annoying, and the isometric style helps it feel less overwhelming. My only criticisms are that rotating the camera is extremely disorienting, and that this game really should have a Spanish localization. A Nahuatl localization would be amazing, but that's probably harder. I'd also really like to see more flowers! Flowers were culturally important and a big part of tribute to the temples, that's actually why it's called a Flower War. An easy recommend. Might be what finally helps me "get" city builders.

I really love city builders and was super excited to have an old-school one set in meso-america. But this game feels underbaked. The tutorials are underdeveloped for the number and complexity of different systems. The first couple missions are not too bad. By the fourth campaign mission, the game is providing additional mechanics (trading posts & docks, levies as tribute, religious management, land reclamation via chinampas, water distribution via cisterns and aqueducts) with barely any explanation of how they work. I also wish the game had a better in-game encyclopedia. For example, in one mission I was trying to upgrade housing to improved housing types. But there is no where in game to reference what the tiers of housing are (do I need to get through 2 upgrades? 4 upgrades?) and which resources each tier requires in order for that upgrade to happen. EDITED: Initially, I believed the missions did not have difficulty levels that could be adjusted by the player. The developer responded that this was a feature of the game. I confirmed this. The UI in mission set-up could use some work to make it more obvious which aspects of mission set-up are customizable.

I really want to like this game, because it feels like the underlying systems are solid and the setting is really interesting... but the presentation is just awful. Why are all the UI assets tiny and blurry or jaggy? It looks like this game was made in 2005 and I'm supposed to be playing in 480p or something. But then the icons are also really complicated, so it's hard to tell what they're even supposed to be, even with the UI scaled up I keep having to lean close to my monitor and squint. The whole game feels like it lacks solid UX design. Opening the Settings menu reinforces this, it really felt like the game just said "yeah, we couldn't decide what our game should be like, so why don't you choose?" The fact you can just change color correction or sprite coloration and scales, and entirely change the look of the game is WILD; I appreciate settings that give you freedom, but this seems like too much... The tutorial is, somehow, both too restrictive and doesn't explain things well enough. It goes over step by step what you need to do, but only briefly; and then it tells you to read an encyclopedia to learn more, which is not ideal. But then the actual tutorial steps are sometimes oddly restrictive: "Yes, we told you you can use porters to move resources around, but you HAVE to put your kilns next to your clay pits, and no you are not allowed to progress unless you do!" But on the flip side I feel like a lot of players will just do exactly as the game instructs, blindly plopping buildings down where the arrows are pointed, and not learn much about how things actually work. Frankly this should still be in Early Access. It feels like they just released a beta that has all the systems in place, but still needs like 6 months work to get polished up.

Faithful recreation of Sierra city builders experience in mesoamerican dressing with more modern mechanics. Gameplay is captivating from the start and not too obnoxious on the logistics like Nebuchadnezzar, actual Sierra games or other games of sort. Most required information and mechanics to actually produce a good looking and functioning city is present. Certainly a commended game.

Bought early access to support the devs and waited for 1.0 release before starting to play. Three months later it's abandoned. Well played.

YES! I was just on an Aztec history binge when I saw this game, and I was also a HUGE Caesar III fan. This marries those just like you'd expect! If you remember and enjoyed it, have a soft spot for Aztec history and lore, then this is the game. It doesn't try to reinvent the wheel. The graphics are simple but very clean. It feels like playing a modern remaster of a win95/DOS game, and I mean that in a very good way. The only marks I have against it are minor. Probably my least favorite thing is Chinampas are not historically accurate. The first blind city I queued up, I was dropping them down thinking they were going to feed my people. Chinampas are not used to grow food like the Aztec did. The game uses them to reclaim swamp land. Hint hint... add some more chinampa types in addition to the "reclaim chinampa" All you need is to make the existing crops placeable on shallow water, and modify the sprite so it looks like a floating rectangle that can be locked together. Make the sprite of people managing them a person in a canoe. You don't know Aztec history well enough to make something like this and that not be an intentional design choice, but it would level up the immersion SO MUCH MORE if there were chinampa crop options. I get why we don't get to be Tenochtitlan, but if we can be Xochimilco, we NEED real chinampas. 😉 Also let citizens use the canals and lakes for faster travel by canoe would be AWESOME. Two more minor things that I also understand from a design perspective that would help move this game from "great" to "godhood." It recycles the same sprite for every direction the camera turns. I never rotate, but if I ever do, the buildings not rotating with the camera is disorienting. I understand this means 4x the sprites for literally everything and a substantially larger install size, but it would be worth it. Again, minor. On that same note of immersion vs file size, one thing I miss from Caesar III is the character voiceovers. You click characters here and it is just silence. Again, would make the game a lot bigger with hundreds of lines of voice, but as long as it was with a decent TTS model, I wouldn't mind some Nahuatl words, phrases, expressions run into AI if it gave me the immersive feedback from my citizens like Caesar III did. There are people who still speak Nahuatl. It is not a dead language (the Spanish tried). They would probably record great authentic voiceovers for nothing.

Really great impressions-style city builder. Campaign can be very difficult at points but love the artwork and atmosphere. Has a bunch of cool mechanics that seperate it from other Impression-style games.

As it is now, Tlatoani exists in a stable, yet very basic version. And since the devs do not get any more funding from the publisher, there will be no additions to that very basic game. As it is now, you get about 6 hours of gameplay out of it. If that's enough for you: good. I would love to have at least 10 or 20 hours, because I really like what I see. It is just not enough.

Tlatoani is still being developed but I'd be happy to say yes and recommend this game to anyone that enjoys city building/management style games. There is already a wealth of content in game, and although the graphics are quite simple that has been great, runs well on pretty much any hardware, and still looks great. Also, big fan of the fact it includes a map editor, I haven't made my own map yet but did experiment with it to see what features are available and can definately see myself coming up with some fun/interesting maps in future. Would highly recommend this to anyone that enjoys city building with a focus on Aztec's, and I'll certainly be updating my review once the full version plus any DLC get released.

I'd give this a solid 8/10. Overall, a great game, plenty of minor bugs and tweaks to work on, but plenty to applaud. I'd really like to see more buildings released, especially more of a variety in terms of building styles, such as alternate pyramid and housing designs/styles/colors, perhaps a deeper focus on the ballcourt and ballgame, maybe even embedding a mini-game to simulate matches which could for example, grant temporary farm production boosts if a victory, or incur some form of penalty like temporarily lower combat strength.