Foundation

Foundation is a medieval city-building game without a rigid building grid. A small settlement grows into a town whose buildings and paths respond to the needs of its residents. The design of churches, castles and other monuments is largely modular.

Polymorph Games combines free city building with economy, social classes, trade and supplying growing populations.

Foundation was released on Jan 31, 2025 as version 1.0 for Windows PC. Before that, the game was available in early access for about six years. The full version reworked progression, residential houses, the military system and building tools, among other things.

Foundation is a Windows PC game and is sold on Steam, among other places. A native release for PlayStation, Xbox or Nintendo Switch is not part of the confirmed offering.

New residents need housing, jobs, food and social facilities. Production buildings procure and process raw materials, storehouses distribute goods, and traders create connections to other places. The settlement grows with the player's decisions and the behavior of its residents.

If you shorten supply routes and distribute workers wisely, you can fund additional businesses and more demanding buildings.

Harvest Festival was released on Oct 8, 2026 and adds farming, animal husbandry, orchards and a customizable harvest festival. Guivre Garden is a smaller decorative add-on. The soundtrack is sold separately.

With the Harvest Festival release, the base game also received a free reference guide and an additional tavern variant.

Foundation requires at least Windows 10 64-bit, an Intel Core i5-4460, 8 GB RAM, and a GeForce GTX 960 or Radeon R9 290 with 3 GB VRAM. For larger settlements, the developer recommends an Intel Core i7-6700K, 16 GB RAM and a GeForce RTX 2060.

Residents move along paths that form themselves between homes, workplaces and central buildings. Use zones can be marked without having to lay each road segment individually. For more developed districts, there are also paved paths.

Monuments are built from combinable components rather than a single fixed model. Walls, towers and roofs can be adjusted. Castle building was expanded with version 1.0, including fortifications, watchtowers and patrols.

The economy is based on jobs, production, storage and trade relationships. Residents supply raw materials to processing businesses, whose products in turn meet the settlement's needs. Some workplaces can be expanded with additional storage or worker spots.

Workers, clergy and kingdom each set different priorities. The three estates unlock, among other things, taxes and city supplies, religious buildings, and military duties. Development can focus on one area or combine several paths.

Military units can be organized into companies and sent on missions outside the settlement. Watchtowers and walls protect districts. For certain residential areas, reliable patrol coverage plays a role.

Different rule sets allow relaxed or more demanding games. If you want a specific direction for development, you can pursue an aspiration. In freer playstyles, the focus is on designing the city and building monuments.

Foundation supports modifications and offers many ways to change buildings and the city landscape. A photo mode lets you take pictures of the settlements you have built. With larger game version changes, older mods may need an update.

As the settlement grows, different housing tiers emerge. More demanding houses need better-equipped districts and a reliable supply. Residential zones and workplaces therefore affect development just as much as the design of individual buildings.

Foundation uses stylized medieval graphics and procedurally generated landscapes. The full version reworked lighting, buildings and animations. Later, dawn was added as an extra time of day, among other things.

Foundation is designed for single players. Building and managing your own medieval city takes place without an official co-op or competitive multiplayer mode.

The game offers German menus and text. City building is done with mouse and keyboard, supplemented by building tools for roads, zones, buildings and monuments. A compendium explains key systems and production recipes.