Greetings, settlers!🏛️🛠️
I am excited to share big strides made in shaping the heart of your settlement: the people who live, work, and grow within it. The world is no longer empty—your villagers now have names, faces, stories, and needs!
👪 A Living Population
Villagers are now born, grow up, age, and eventually pass on. Your settlement is no longer static—it’s alive with generations.
🍼 Children go through distinct life stages: baby, toddler, teen, and adult. Each stage affects their appearance, behavior, and abilities.
🧒 Only adults can work, while teens may help in limited ways in future updates.
📸 Every villager has a unique hand-drawn portrait that reflects their age and identity, helping you connect with the people you’re guiding.
These life cycles add depth to your village, and you’ll start to feel the story of each family unfold over time.
❤️ Relationships & Families
Villagers now form couples and start families, allowing your population to grow naturally over time through generations.
💑 When two adults pair up, they may eventually have children, beginning the next chapter in your village’s story.
👶 Pregnancies, births, and birthdays now trigger meaningful changes—from new villagers entering the world to children aging into useful members of the community.
🧬 Family ties also influence legacy traits, such as inherited profession tendencies, making lineage a core part of long-term development.
As families grow, your village begins to feel truly alive—woven together by bonds of work, survival, and heritage.
💼 Work and Skills
Your villagers now learn by doing. As they work, they gain experience tied to the job they perform—whether it's gathering, farming, building, or crafting.
🪓 Experience accumulates over time, and once a threshold is reached, the villager is granted a profession title such as Apprentice, Journeyman, or Master.
⚙️ Each title level brings an increase in job efficiency, making skilled workers much more valuable.
🧬 Professions can also be inherited as legacy traits from parents. A child born to skilled workers may begin life with an innate talent in that profession, giving them a head start.
Over time, you'll develop a population of highly specialized villagers, shaped by their experiences—and their bloodlines.
😊 Happiness and Needs
Villagers now have basic survival needs—specifically food and water. These are essential for maintaining their health and happiness.
🍎 If food or water is missing, villagers will become unhappy.
The system is already built to support more needs in the future, such as clothing, shelter, and social fulfillment.
While only the most essential needs are active right now, this lays the groundwork for a deeper simulation of village life, where wellbeing becomes as important as work.
📸 A Village of Faces
I've added a large variety of hand-drawn villager portraits, tailored to each life stage. Babies are swaddled in linen, teens sport youthful looks, and elders wear the years with pride.
These portraits will grow with your people, making your community feel alive and personal.
I’ve laid the foundation for deeper simulation and emergent stories. In the coming time, I’ll be expanding on:
Housing & living space systems
Individual equipment and clothing
Social dynamics and personal preferences
Thanks for following development and being part of this journey.
Stay tuned — there’s much more to uncover in Rise of the Settlement.
🎮 Please consider joining our community:
👉 https://discord.com/invite/WSdrFVX9Ys
See you in the next update, — Luki