The popularity of city builders with a survival bent has seen the genre become quite a bit more stressful in recent years, but while Airborne Kingdom occasionally throws you a curveball, like your floating city is tilting too much and everyone is rightly fleeing in case they plummet to the ground, it’s more of a leisurely journey across the sky. And one that’s about to take players to new places, as some DLC is on the way. Good news: it’s free.
While Airborne Kingdom has revelled in its reputation as a more relaxing city builder, The Lost Tundra is designed to be a bit more challenging than the rest of the game. If you want to push your city a bit more than usual, or you want to add an element of risk to your skyfaring holiday, this might be up your street.
Food, water and coal can’t be found in this chilly place, and the weather heightens the danger, freezing parts of your city and generally making it harder to maintain. There are new components you can add to mitigate this, but at the cost of resources and extra weight.
For those who can survive in this inhospitable region, developer The Wandering Band promises “great rewards” and hidden locations where you can discover new cosmetics and customisation options.
In my Airborne Kingdom review, I called it a “smart, hypnotic city builder that won’t leave you tearing your hair out,” and while that last part might no longer be true when the tricky DLC arrives, I’m still eager to return—if only to repaint my clockwork city and make it even more striking.
The Lost Tundra is due out on September 19 via Steam and the Epic Games Store.