Block'hood

About

"Block'hood" is a single-player simulation game with stellar gameplay, awesome visuals, and outstanding music. As a city planner, you'll create unique neighborhoods from over 200 blocks, while managing resources and avoiding decay. The game encourages experimentation and understanding of ecological city dynamics, but can be bogged down by bugs and requires grinding to unlock new blocks.

Genres & Tags

Play Modes

Single-Player Play through the game's story or campaign solo

+22

69%

Audience ScoreBased on 1,181 reviews

gameplay44 positive mentions

stability51 negative mentions

Beautiful graphics and a charming aesthetic that enhances the gameplay experience.
Unique gameplay that focuses on resource management and balancing inputs and outputs, providing a refreshing take on city-building games.
Relaxing and meditative atmosphere, making it enjoyable to play for extended periods.

Clunky user interface and camera controls that can make building and navigating difficult.
Frequent bugs and glitches, including issues with saving and loading, which can disrupt gameplay.
Limited content and features, leading to a lack of long-term goals and replayability.

gameplay
216 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
20%
72%
7%
Gameplay reviews highlight a mix of unique concepts and significant flaws. While some players appreciate the intricate mechanics and aesthetic appeal, many criticize the unintuitive controls, slow pacing, and numerous bugs that hinder enjoyment. Overall, the game shows potential but feels unfinished, with a need for better balancing and clearer tutorials to enhance the player experience.
- “Would have loved to see this game taken further; really unique concept and interesting gameplay, along with simple yet still nice graphics and a good amount of replayability!”
- “Great city builder with enough resource balancing to keep gameplay interesting without becoming daunting.”
- “The gameplay and its complexity is really good and sets the game somewhere between a puzzle game and a build-up management simulation.”
- “Gameplay isn't intuitive and the campaign is too slow to bother with.”
- “However, the gameplay and the game mechanics are just truly bad.”
- “The actual gameplay could use some balancing and tweaks to address some issues.”
story
212 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
11%
82%
8%
The story mode is generally viewed as a lengthy tutorial rather than a compelling narrative, with many players finding it tedious and lacking depth. While some appreciate the heartwarming elements and the effort to convey themes of sustainability, the inability to save progress during missions and numerous bugs detract significantly from the experience. Overall, the story is considered decent but overshadowed by gameplay issues and a lack of polish, leading many to recommend playing it only if on sale.
- “The story itself is quite interesting and showcases two really interesting characters.”
- “I finished the wholesome story, a few of the challenges, and about one third of a sandbox playthrough in nine hours.”
- “That said, I just completed the story, which is a cute 5-part intro to the game that isn't as dull as a tutorial and helps orient you to the various symbioses and balances you need to find between your different blocks and resources to create a little ecosystem in a 'hood'.”
- “The story mode is fatally bugged.”
- “The story line is very boring, and it's basically just one super long tutorial with a bunch of really monotonous dialogue.”
- “Currently, if you play a level in story mode (the levels can take 2+ hours to complete) you have to do it in one shot - no saving.”
graphics
205 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
44%
54%
2%
The graphics of the game are widely praised for their unique and aesthetically pleasing art style, characterized by clean, minimalistic visuals and a charming blocky design that enhances the overall experience. Many players appreciate the soothing soundtrack that complements the visuals, creating a relaxing atmosphere for gameplay. However, some critiques mention that while the graphics are beautiful, they can appear low-quality when zoomed in, and the game lacks depth in mechanics, leading to a somewhat repetitive experience.
- “The graphics are really the best part about the game and this game shines when you play as intended - on a small surface area block with a lot of vertical building.”
- “The art style is fantastic.”
- “Coupled with its soothing soundtrack and simplistic, yet beautiful visuals gives you a sense of serenity as you are playing.”
- “Crude graphics and meaningless game mechanics.”
- “I wish I could give this game a thumbs up, but it just doesn't come close to a thumbs up, and it is really sad this game had such great potential but the devs abandoned this game, leaving it barely finished, lacking polish that other well-made early access games have. The graphics are okay as well but tend to look low quality when zoomed in.”
- “The game lacks any type of graphics configuration utility, leaving you with whatever you get from the default configuration; I cannot get a satisfactory frame rate.”
music
101 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
47%
46%
8%
The music in the game is generally praised for its soothing and relaxing qualities, complementing the minimalistic visuals and enhancing the overall atmosphere. However, some players find the soundtrack repetitive and obtrusive, with issues such as volume settings not being saved and occasional glitches. Overall, while many appreciate the calming effect of the music, opinions vary on its variety and engagement.
- “Furthermore, there is marvelous music that you can listen to and enjoy outside of the game.”
- “Comes with a fantastic soundtrack that I'm pretty sure lowers my blood pressure.”
- “The music perfectly suits the gameplay and you can get lost for hours.”
- “Also, I ended up muting the music (which seemed to unmute itself at some point?). I found it pretty repetitive and not at all soothing and relaxing as other reviews have said, again that's potentially just me.”
- “[*] The 'relaxing background music' is way too obtrusive.”
- “Yet, the game is early access and still has many issues to be fixed such as bugs (many are fixed but), beautiful but unvaried music, uncomfortable UI, and dull optimization.”
stability
51 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game is widely criticized for its instability, with numerous reports of bugs, glitches, and freezing issues that significantly hinder gameplay. While some players appreciate its unique mechanics and potential, the overall experience is marred by incomplete features and frustrating design flaws, making it difficult to enjoy. Many reviewers suggest that the game feels unfinished and recommend caution before purchasing.
- “What a broken, buggy mess.”
- “I really want to like this game because of how unique and clever it is, but the fatal design flaws and glitches are serious issues to consider before grabbing it.”
- “Game was never finished and left in a very buggy state.”
grinding
20 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
Players find the grinding aspect of the game to be excessively tedious and frustrating, often hindered by glitches and a complicated interface that requires meticulous micromanagement. The lack of resource search functionality exacerbates the issue, making it difficult to progress without feeling overwhelmed. While the game has potential, many reviewers feel that the tediousness detracts significantly from the overall experience.
- “The game has potential, yes, but at the moment it just feels extremely tedious.”
- “A great premise ruined by a tedious interface that's needlessly complicated and requires way too much micromanaging of individual tiles.”
- “Tldr: glitchy, irritatingly tedious at times, and resource-balancing has zero margin for error.”
replayability
16 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
50%
31%
19%
Overall, the game is praised for its high replayability, particularly due to its unique concept, engaging gameplay, and the inclusion of challenge modes that encourage exploration of different city layouts. While many players find the replay value to be infinite, some express a desire for fewer limitations in sandbox mode, which is noted to have less replayability. The developers' plans to add more structures in the future are expected to enhance the game's longevity even further.
- “Block'hood is a hidden gem with infinite replayability.”
- “The way this puzzle aspect is implemented into the city-builder also makes you want to explore different layouts, so the replay value is massive if you want to build a nice city.”
- “A neat little game at a small price with good replay value.”
- “The sandbox mode has very little replayability.”
- “Decent amount of challenge and replayability.”
- “Replayability increased with challenge/sandbox modes.”
emotional
12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game features a heartwarming story mode that evokes strong emotions, particularly in its touching conclusion, despite being short and somewhat simplistic. While the initial chapters are engaging and emotional, some players found the overall gameplay to be repetitive and lacking in depth, which detracted from the emotional impact. Overall, the emotional experience varies, with some moments resonating deeply while others feel flat or uninspired.
- “There is also a very cute story mode, which is short but heartwarming.”
- “Although the main point of this game is the sandbox mode, the main story is really touching at the end.”
- “This game made me really emo and emotional in the quick 5 tutorial-esque chapters it provided then threw me out into the world to get creative on my own.”
optimization
10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
20%
60%
20%
The game's optimization is currently lacking, with players experiencing significant lag and low frame rates (10-30 fps) even on decent hardware. While it is still in early access and some bugs have been addressed, there is a consensus that further improvements are needed for smoother performance and a better overall experience.
- “Overall, everything will run smoothly and nothing is 'too difficult'.”
- “Yet, the game is early access and still has many issues to be fixed such as bugs (many are fixed), beautiful but unvaried music, uncomfortable UI, and dull optimization.”
- “Oh, and also the reason why I said earlier about a performance mode being added is because I have a decent computer and I still have a serious lag issue with the game, getting around 10-30 fps most of the time.”
- “Yet, the game is early access and still has many issues to be fixed such as bugs (many are fixed but), beautiful but unvaried music, uncomfortable UI, and dull optimization.”
humor
10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
60%
40%
The game is generally perceived as humorous, with some enjoyable elements like unique sounds and witty input/output interactions, such as kids laughing when a school is built. However, many players feel that the humor is overshadowed by repetitive gameplay, a lack of emotional depth, and unresolved interface issues from the alpha version. Overall, while it has its funny moments, the game struggles to maintain consistent engagement due to its clinical feel and gameplay flaws.
- “Plus, when buildings are placed, they make unique sounds and voices, like kids laughing when a school is built.”
- “Input/output is funny, but witty.”
- “It's a nice and funny game.”
- “That's not funny, and it's pretty easy when you get the hang of it.”
- “Sometimes too easy and sometimes too hard; the graphics are fine, but the gameplay is unimaginative and repetitive. The soundtrack is short and repetitive, there is no story, and the overall experience feels clinical (not funny, not scary, not dramatic, not many other emotional things). The controls could be better (placing/replacing tiles is tedious), making it a time waster.”
- “Sometimes too easy and sometimes too hard; the graphics are fine, but the gameplay is unimaginative and repetitive. The soundtrack is short and repetitive, there is no story, and the overall experience feels clinical (not funny, not scary, not dramatic, not many other emotional things). The controls could be better (placing/replacing tiles is tedious), making it a time waster.”
atmosphere
8 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
50%
25%
25%
The game's atmosphere is consistently praised for its calming and relaxing qualities, enhanced by aesthetically pleasing design, soothing music, and dynamic background elements. Players appreciate the soft transitions in lighting and sound effects that evoke serene natural settings, such as sunsets and foggy nights, creating an immersive experience.
- “The atmosphere created by this game with the aesthetically pleasing design and calming music really sucked me into trying out this game.”
- “The background, lighting, and sound effects slowly change in tandem, giving soft and atmospheric impressions of sunsets, foggy nights, grey rainy days, etc.”
- “The atmosphere created by this game with the aesthetically pleasing design and calming music really sucked me in to trying out this game.”
- “This game has a calming atmosphere and pretty colors.”
monetization
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The monetization strategy for this title primarily relies on advertising, as users have discovered it through platforms like YouTube. This suggests a focus on attracting players through promotional content rather than traditional in-game purchases or subscriptions.