Frustrated dev of misunderstood city-builder changed his game’s name to remind players that it’s “a bloody creative sandbox not a f***ing strategy game”

The developer of one of this year’s most hotly-anticipated city builders says that they’ve changed the game’s name over confusion about its endgame.

Earlier this year, Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles launched to positive reviews. Expanding on the world of its developer’s previous game, 2019’s critically-acclaimed air combat game The Falconeer, there was some substantial buzz around its release. But as players have dug deeper into the game, some have found the experience lacking, much to developer Tomas Sala’s chagrin.

In a tweet this morning, he announced that he had changed the game’s name to better reflect the gameplay experience. On Steam, it’s now known as ‘Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles, a creative building sandbox’, but Sala says that his unofficial full title is “Bulwark : Falconeer Chronicles, a bloody creative sandbox not a fucking strategy game, build some cool shit expect no endgame cuz a sandbox.”

Sala goes on to explain that “Bulwark is a chill builder that just looks like it would be a cool deep strategy game, but it’s not.” Veering away from the ‘cozy game’ ideas that approach might suggest, Sala says that the game is simply a “chill sandbox” where “you make some cool fortress with some light resource and strategy gameplay to make it feel alive. You do that for a few hours then build something else.”

Despite Sala saying that his “artistic intent” is “a sandbox to play in,” it seems that’s not the way that Bulwark has been interpreted by all players. Currently rated ‘Mixed’ on Steam’s recent user reviews, the vast majority of negative reviews acknowledge the impressive visuals or novel ideas, but say that they ran out of things to do too early. As Sala mentions, visually Bulwark looks like it might have greater strategic depth, but the aim was to make a sandbox experience that encourages players to build – like in this 20,000 piece construction that took one expert builder 32 hours to create.

For a wide range of town planning experiences, check out our list of the best city-building games.