Medieval history is a key part of our world and is a constant backdrop in numerous gaming titles, both big and small. The team at Reverie World Studios desired to make a unique city-building strategy game that would go against the grain of what came before, and they made City States: Medieval as a result. The title has been on Steam Early Access for a while, but on July 24th, its Version 1.0 build will drop for everyone to play.

So, what makes this game so unique? Simply put, it’s NOT about you starting out as a lone city and leading it to become an empire. Instead, you play as the leader of a literal city-state, and you must govern and grow it in respectable ways while dealing with the empire-sized influences all around you:

“Spanning from Tripoli and Granada to Novgorod and Genoa, the game focuses on establishing a trade empire while defending against powerful neighboring kingdoms. The objective is to shape the history of one such city- state, bringing it to glory or watching it disappear into obscurity.”

How will you survive? Can you survive? That’s up to you. The challenge won’t be easy, but managing a city-state isn’t easy either, so in a way…it’s all par for the course. Here’s what else you can expect in City States: Medieval:

• Build a Mighty City: Grow through economy, military, faith, trade and building chains, and defend your wealth with
  fortifications and an all-new siege system featuring real-time tactical combat.
• Command Through Heroes: Historic leaders grant full control of your city and armies. In their absence, you govern
  with limited orders, turning a hero’s location into a constant strategic calculation.
• Chart Trade Routes: Establish outposts across the known world to trade twelve commodities, backed by a refined trade-balancing economy and a Global Market for emergency deals.
• Shaped in Early Access: Six community-driven updates added systems like Lord’s Armies, Academy-gated research limits and city-happiness productivity, plus a fully reworked tutorial, overhauled trade and resource interfaces and major performance gains.
• A Single-Player Campaign: Play solo with adjustable difficulty, accessibility options and support for five languages including English, French, Italian, German and Spanish.

The game will also be available on the Indie.Io Store. Both versions will be $19.99, but at launch, it’ll get a 20% discount.