''Nebuchadnezzar'' is a

city-building game A city-building game, or town-building game, is a Video game genres, genre of simulation video game where players act as the overall planner and leader of a city or town, looking down on it from above, and being responsible for its growth and man ...

developed and published by Nepos Games for

Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

and

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

on December 3, 2020. The game takes place in

Ancient Mesopotamia The Civilization of Mesopotamia ranges from the earliest human occupation in the Paleolithic period up to Late antiquity. This history is pieced together from evidence retrieved from archaeological excavations and, after the introduction of writ ...

. The game has been compared to

Impressions Games Impressions Games was a British video game developer founded by David Lester. He sold the company to Sierra On-Line in 1995, who was then bought out by Cendant and eventually, Vivendi Universal (now known as Vivendi SA). Impressions speciali ...

' '' City Building'' series, especially the fourth entry, ''

Pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...

''.

Gameplay

The game's campaign tasks the player with building some of the cities in ancient Mesopotamia like Ur,

Nineveh Nineveh ( ; , ''URUNI.NU.A, Ninua''; , ''Nīnəwē''; , ''Nīnawā''; , ''Nīnwē''), was an ancient Assyrian city of Upper Mesopotamia, located in the modern-day city of Mosul (itself built out of the Assyrian town of Mepsila) in northern ...

and

Babylon Babylon ( ) was an ancient city located on the lower Euphrates river in southern Mesopotamia, within modern-day Hillah, Iraq, about south of modern-day Baghdad. Babylon functioned as the main cultural and political centre of the Akkadian-s ...

Release

''Nebuchadnezzar'' was announced on November 2, 2019, for release in 2020. On November 19, 2020, the game was delayed to February 17, 2021. A DLC campaign, ''The Adventures of Sargon'', was released on February 7, 2023. In 2025, Nepos Games entered into a partnership with

Astra Logical Astra Logical is a video game publisher, based in Torrance, California, that specializes in indie puzzle and strategy games A strategy game or strategic game is a game in which the players' uncoerced, and often autonomous, decision-making ...

to further promote and support the game.

Reception

''Nebuchadnezzar'' received "mixed or average" reviews according to

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

. ''

PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games m ...

'' summarized: "''Nebuchadnezzar'' isn't lacking for class, but needs to dial up the fun factor." ''

Rock Paper Shotgun ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' is a British video game journalism website. It was launched in July 2007 to focus on PC game, PC games and was acquired by Gamer Network, a network of sites led by ''Eurogamer'', in May 2017. History ''Rock Paper S ...

'' criticized the lack of content: "There are temples, but there's no religion. There's no entertainment. No war. No disease. No taxes, even." ''

Eurogamer ''Eurogamer'' is a British video game journalism website launched in 1999 alongside parent company Gamer Network. In 2008, it started in the formerly eponymous trade fair EGX (Eurogamer Expo until 2013) organised by its parent company. Fr ...

'' praised the historical accuracy but described the campaign missions as repetitive. At the 2021

Czech Game of the Year Awards Czech Game of the Year Awards () are annual awards that recognize accomplishments in video game development in the Czech Republic. The awards began as part of Gameday Festival in 2010, but became independent from the festival in 2017. In 2010– ...

, ''Nebuchadnezzar'' won the Best Technological Solution award.

References

External links

*{{official website, https://nepos.games/nebuchadnezzar/ 2021 video games Ancient Mesopotamia in popular culture City-building games Indie games Linux games Single-player video games Video games developed in the Czech Republic Video games with Steam Workshop support Windows games Nineveh Works set in Babylon Ur Astra Logical games