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Builders series is primary known for crossing JPRG and block-building sandbox though. Square Enix calls this "Block-Make RPG" genre. Unfortunately, the two Builders remain the only known games in this genre. Mojang keeps taking stabs at adding RPG elements to Minecraft games, but they keep dropping the block-building stuff when they've tried - they haven't quite figured out how to combine them properly but maybe will get it right next time. Hopefully Square Enix doesn't lose control over their own genre and gets Builders 3 out the door first.
Sim City allows you to make buildings and the population will react accordingly, but you can't go out and forage for the resources to make that building whatever size and shape you want. And you don't specifically control your own character who goes out and has adventures while that city is working.
I really love crafting survival games, but I often feel that everything I build in it is just aesthetics. I could just as easily have a box building and some traps outside of it and just do the bare minimum. And no matter how cool the buildings you make look, there's usually no NPCs roaming around it and living a life in the city you've built. I think it would be so cool if a game like Conan Exiles had your thralls going through a daily routine as they do their work. Instead of just slapping them on a crafting station and putting food in a pot, you'd have to plan your base to ensure you had enough beds for everyone to sleep in, your had large enough fields to feed all the workers, maybe even outhouses and entertainment in more advanced bases (and if the NPCs weren't just slaves in this game).
I really feel that this game has something really special to it has elements that other games have had, but nothing else quite captures it the same way. And unfortunately, I think it's something that's underappreciated when this game comes up. The focus is usually on the blocks and the comparison to Minecraft, when they could apply those other qualities to the broader crafting survival genre and do something really great. In the meantime, I think all I can do is hope they make a DQ Builders 3. Thanks again!
EDIT:
Actually, now that I think about it, surprisingly Fallout 4 might be the closest to what I'm thinking about. And that's not even a crafting survival game. But you do have to ensure they have a living space with a bed and they will do a job when they wake up in the morning. But unfortunately, outside of that, the scope of their daily routine is pretty basic. And the best you can build is a bunch of junk.
rimworld maybe?
DQ Builders 2 was so good, only thing that was missing is true sandbox multiplayer content.
Are there Survival Crafting games? Oh yes!
Are there Minecraft Like Builders? Of course!
Are there Town Builders? Dozens!
Are there 'Cozy' farming games? Hundreds!
But... Is there something that combines ALL of these in the same way DQB did? Thus far... No...
Most Survival Games are all in on the 'Survival' part, and you can explore and advanture, but often any building is Limited at best, and typically you are 'alone' or have a handful of NPC's
Minecraft likes? A dime a dozen, but most often feel cold an empty. You can build to your hearts content, but there no life, no adventure in the things you build.
Most town builders focus on the 'Town' like playing SimCity, but there is no way to "interact" with the town, or have an adventure 'on your own' like in Builders.
A 'Cozy' Games... Ungh.. The majority of these are cookie cutter types were you have a Static town with a Static set of NPC's. Any 'building' is often restricted to your house, or sometimes 'upgrading' them, but not much freedom to truly 'build' something...
Thus far Builders is the ONLY game I have found where I can start with a litteral flat, blank canvas, Build a town to reflect MY likes, MY vision and MY creativity, and then populate that town with people that actually DO things!
Guards that patrol, Farmers that farm, villagers that will cook, craft.. and at the end of the day, I can watch them relax, dance, have a drink at the pub.. And I can be 'among them' I can be there, walking the streets, watching them, and building more...
And honestly, there is sadly, NO game that does all of this.
I actually could do without the blocks or art style. I’d love a game where I could do all the things I said above but in a more realistic art style that isn’t clearly aimed at children.
The Builders game art style isn't aimed at children. Its a design decision of wanting the characters to be expressive, especially in faces, but not require doors and walls to be so tall to match human proportions. If the doors and walls were something like 4 blocks tall, it would make the game harder to play. Or, if doors and walls were kept at two blocks tall, then faces would appear so small that much of the expression in dialogue is lost. With characters squashed down to chibi form and doors and walls at only two blocks tall it provides for an easier gameplay experience without sacrificing expressions.
DQB/DQB2 isn't like DQ8 or DQ11 where they can simply place the camera where they want and zoom-in on faces as needed. The camera position is typically quite a fair distance (8-block-distances or so) from the conversation, and is often given free ability to rotate around. If scaled to human proportions, that would be maybe 25-30 feet / 8-10 meters? Its hard enough to read real human facial expressions at that distance, let alone expressions on a digital model rendered at something like 720p.
And not the first time a developer has used this trick. Some other well-known examples are the Technos games back in the 80s (i.e., River City Ransom) or Zelda Wind Waker. These games wanted more extreme facial expressions and so went with larger heads. A lot of other games in the cozy-genre do the same (ie, Animal Crossing)
So whether Minecraft or DQ Builders, or some other game that follows down the same path, I think a more chibi-style form is just a natural design choice. Human-like proportions just don't work as well in these games, unless developer is willing to give up alot of the facial expressions in favor of whole body expressions, like the overacting seen in Sims games, which are more human proportion, but much less subtle in how they handle expressions. (A fire in the kitchen? Oh, better wave my arms around wildly so player knows I'm in distress.)