Is this game a masterpiece? No, but it is a city builder with a few unique cool twists. Become the ruler of a fantasy kingdom! Build up your small empire right from the start by erecting the first building with a few settlers on a meadow and then adding newer and better buildings and connecting them all with roads. If necessary, your people can also walk across the grass, but it's quicker on paved roads. The more attractive your city is, the more new inhabitants (called Fablelings) will come to live and work here. So not much has changed in the essential game principle since the great-grandfather of the genre, Sim City (Maxis, 1989). What has changed, however, is the graphics. Today, the graphics are in 3D, can be zoomed in and viewed from all sides. It looks good, but my computer's fans are roaring like in Cities: Skylines II, even though my RTX 3060 graphics card is well above the minimum requirement (GTX 1060 / RX 580).

First, we build a small farmstead and assign a head of family. Heads of families make sure that the inhabitants of the individual villages have everything they need to be happy (especially food). Add to this a well that supplies the entire immediate area with water, and the first new Fablelings arrive in our developing village. Basically, new Fablelings arrive every eight days as long as you have enough living space and your kingdom appears attractive to new settlers. You then always have to decide whether you want to accept them or not. If you don't have a residential building, you will have to turn them away. As soon as you have a farm, you can decide what you want to grow there. The first industrial plants will soon be added, starting with a logging camp. So far, Fabledom plays like one of the usual city-building simulations.

One of the special features of Fabeldom that you won't find in any of the other city-building simulations are the princesses (or princes...) who would like to get to know you better so that they can rule your country together with you. In the beginning you are single, and as the game progresses you can marry a suitable partner. Of course, you can also organize a lavish fairytale wedding in your town.

Keep track of a variety of different buildings required for production chains, build the necessary infrastructure (especially a tavern) so that your fabulous people are happy and pay taxes well. With enough tax money, you can continue to expand your settlement and build a circus or a huge theater. Military buildings are also a must, because if your settlement is doing too well, there will soon be enemies who want to share in your wealth. Just building a wall around your territory will not be enough to fend off the riff-raff or vicious fantasy monsters. The administration soon becomes quite complex - many inhabitants, buildings and a balance of the necessary resources (vegetables, wood, stones, coal, money, grain) have to be managed. Fortunately, there is a very useful overview menu that shows you your inhabitants and buildings at a glance. With a little money you can buy neighboring regions, which you can then also colonize. A special resource in the game is your nobility, which you receive for particularly noble deeds (e.g. donations).

Conclusion:
Cozy city-building simulation. Build your village and watch the lovingly animated inhabitants go about their daily work, construct new buildings and manage complex economic cycles. Defend yourselves against attacking monsters, watch out for mean witches and employ noble heroes. Establish diplomatic relations with neighboring kingdoms to trade. You are king in your fantasy realm, and in addition to managing the realm, you must also take care of your own love affairs. Fabledom plays like a mixture of Sim City and Die Sieder 2 with a few dating sim elements. Suitable for players who just want to settle and build in a relaxed way, as well as for fans of more challenging city-building simulations.

Text and interface was unfortunately too small for me to comfortably play. Pretty bummed about the lack of accessibility options.

Do I recommend it? MAYBE.

It's a chill city building game, slow paced with no consequences (not in a good way). The marketing material is misleading, the witches and dragons for example are just "events" and serve no purpose but to give some debuff to the city which can be removed almost instantly. The Cyclope, you would expect to protect the city when someone invades you, but in practice it just walks around and "spreads joy" as there are no invasions and you don't really need any army or walls or fear of any danger as they are "optional". The flying pigs (which just walk around on a 2x2 square) are just a resource for the slaughter house. You can either anger or befriend the other kingdoms, nothing really happens, maybe just some price increases when trying to trade with them. Also, no end game content - the game feels somehow unfinished towards the end. For example, It tries to slow down the pace of the game itself (even more) by increasing the time you get more Fablings (citizens) which doesn't really matter as they are all unemployed because you got too many buffs, too much money, too many materials and not much space left to build production as you don't need it anymore. Honestly, I think it's a wasted opportunity to create some very good city building game as the game mechanics are well though and play great and the premise of the game is fun, Shrek style fairy tale world with much potential.

If you want to play a game for about 20 hours that's chill with nice aesthetics, try it out. Otherwise look for something else. I don't think it's a bad game, I just think it's just not what I expected.