I’ve been playing FF since a week Wednesday and thought it was about time I put my thoughts down on the forums. I’ve played city builders in some capacity for over 20 years. I have hundreds of hours in Cities: Skylines and dozens in city builders of the likes of Banished, Kingdoms And Castles and Foundation, to name a few. I feel qualified to offer my insights in to what I feel may need tinkering with in FF.
Firstly, I am very impressed with the game. There is scope for a wonderful experience here when the early access period is over. The game can run a little sluggish but that is to be expected.
Grahically, the game is beautiful. The world art is outstanding as is the art style for the town buildings. I would like to see some more variations to the look of the homes though I love the flowers that grow in the gardens. I’ve seen different gardens in T2 houses.
Challenge
I was a little amazed to see it said that people had reported the game to be a little too challenging when I read the update on early access yesterday. I find the start far easier than Banished ever was. Food is very easy come by in the early days and only slow down after one reaches about 50 pop.
Wood and stone are also very easy to get. Where the game does diverge is when it comes to clay, sand, iron ore. This is very much ependent on your seed but I find clay to be incredibly abundant, iron ore to be in hilly areas but sand to be rather rare. I’ve not seen a lot of sand on any of the maps I have started.
Deaths can be very prevalent in the early days but I see no harm in this. We’re in the middle of nowhere with nothing but the clothes on our backs and any gear we have left from the journey here. I’ve had people die mostly from animal attacks at this stage and infrequently from illness. I would actually like to see accidents appear in game. I feel this would represent a real world scenario. “Leo has died in a rockfall whilst mining stone”, for example.
Where I think challenge appears early in the game is with regards to economy. I’ll go in to this next.
Economy
I find the economy punishing in the early game. This is chiefly centered around the healer. The healer is far too expensive. Without having the game open I believe it is something like a yearly cost of 30 gold that always puts me in the red. I need the healer at this stage so I am then having to rely on selling wares to keep me in money.
You could solve this by either dropping the yearly cost of the healer but I don’t think that is the way.
I would like to see a precursor to the healer in the form of a building that could be called a herbalist or an apothecary. This could be a very basic service that offers rudimentary medicines to combat some ailments. The service could then be upgraded to a healer with a town center upgrade or perhaps some other building use.
Perhaps some sort of system of training centered around the school could be included to train a pop to be a more advanced healer. This may be adding a bit too much complexity though.
An earlier healing based building could be staffed without educated persons too.
Woodland Management
I saw in the update that Crate want to find some way to add in woodland management. That is great. I feel it is very much needed.
In my last save I took to planting rows of trees for the 1 gold each. I feel it is fair to expect players to have to cost this but why not let us coppice trees we have planted instead of merely chopping them down.
Coppicing was a common practice is history and the after effects of the practice are still evident in England today. Perhaps it could be a learnt skill based around the school or accessible with an upgrade to a building - the work camp or a new building that could be called something like a Lumber camp.
There could even be a building similar to the arborist but called a plantation/coppice, or similar. This building would plant chosen trees that could then form a small managed woodland that is coppiced for wood.
The only thing I might say with regards to possible limitations of this is that any wood would be thinner branches and so probably not suitable for building. Perhaps just firewood or willow for baskets.
It’s a thought.
Carts
I was reading someone say that carts don’t go to foragers, hunters or other industries. I don’t have the game open but I suspect this is the case. I get a lot of good use out of carts and I think they should be used to move goods around from all buildings. Either that or have the wagoner building produce hand carts. Maybee have a carter building too that solely produces hand carts? Maybe it’s a bit of a confusion with baskets but maybe not. The more tools the merrier for me.
I haven’t gotten past 100 pop to date but I can’t say I have noticed a lot of issues with regards to stock being moved around.
I agree with the need to be able to move stock manually from storages.
Iron Production Chain
I find it a little strange to have a need for iron in T2 buildings but not be able to produce iron ourselves until T3. Perhaps this needs to be swapped around and have the foundry in T2 and buildings using iron in T3.
Or maybe just have varying levels of iron working in some way.
One hiccup I did notice is barrels. Barrels are able to be produced in T2 but require iron. As I said above, gold can be a bit of a stalling point early on because of the healer, so could early barrels be produced without the iron but be less efficient? The barrels building could then later be upgraded to have iron rimmed barrels.
Seeds
I know this is straight out of Banished, and other games, but why not have us get different seeds via the merchant. The basic crops we have in game could all be those brought with us but I see no reason we can’t acquire new crops later. We have to acquire animals, so why not seeds?
Could we maybe even have a building that stores seeds/plant types? Just a thought.
Church
I saw Crate’s thoughts on a church and them wanting to have the building have some meaning, but could we have a basic church without a mechanic behind it now, one that merely provides desirability?
I think I’d really just like to see something else, other than the school and the healer, as a building for desirability early on. There is, I suppose, balance to be considered.
Variable Sized Houses
I’d like to see some variation when it comes to the size of house. We have 3x3s. I’d like to see 2x2s and maybe even a 4x4. I just think it would make the layout of the town a bit more variable and allow us to fill is small gaps of land with a house.
Perhaps even have triangular or circular footprint houses. I have no idea how easy or hard this would be to code in. It’s just a random idea that popped in to my head.
Fences And Walls Needing Space
Could we have the option to build a farm with a fence or wall already built around it? Obviously I am not advocating it be a free dence or wall.
Maybe it’s a coding thing but I don’t like how we have to have a space around farms, and before the road, to fit in a fence or wall.
I do like the way wild plants grow around the edges of the field.
My Favourite Thing So Far
I may have been quite negative so far - I can’t help but feel like I am. I find it hard to be negative about this game though. So I will add that I just love the ability to move the work area circle for buildings. This is not somethign I have seen a lot of in city builders of this ilk. I think it’s a wonderful idea and adds a whole level of management to the game. Those greens out of season? Just move the work area to those berries. 
A lot of ideas here but in no way do I feel any of it is critical of choices. I like what’s in so far and just feel like there could a bit of jiggery pokery with regard to tiers. There were hints of new buildings in yesterday’s update and I’m eager to see what we see next.
I’d love to see people’s thoughts on what I say here. Tell me I’m being mad or feel free to expand any ideas I have had.