The developer of Manor Lords, a highly anticipated city-building game on Steam, had to make a last-minute change to how sheep work in the game to avoid players exploiting the economy.
Manor Lords is set to launch next week and has gained a lot of attention, with over 2.5 million wishlists on Steam. As the developer, Greg Styczen prepares for the early access release, some players who got early access found ways to make unlimited money using sheep.
By breeding lots of sheep and selling their wool, players could make huge profits easily.
Personally I don’t have a game design problem with “infinite money” (as some clickbaity videos say), yes sheep make infinite wool, and “trade only” towns were part of the design. But I think the export abuse feedback came in so often that I decided to yolo a last minute feature. pic.twitter.com/GctO3gkr74
— MANOR LORDS (@LordsManor) April 18, 2024
Styczen doesn’t mind the idea of infinite money in the game, as it’s realistic that sheep can produce lots of wool. However many players pointed out that this could be exploited by exporting too much wool, so he decided to add a last-minute change.
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Now, wool is in such oversupply globally that it’s no longer profitable to export it from your city. This change makes sense historically, as countries wouldn’t keep buying something abundant everywhere.
We’re still waiting to see how this change will affect other resources and the game’s early-access players. There’s talk about whether this should be an optional feature due to the extra management it requires, but Styczen suggests it could lead to interesting events like a sudden increase in wool demand during a cold winter, making sheep valuable again.