Ziggurat (demesos)

Ziggurat is a Hammurabi-style resource management game for the Commodore 64. Your goal is to build your ziggurat to its ninth and final phase before time runs out. You rule a small city and must balance your people, grain, and land across many years to reach this goal. Each round begins under a constellation whose omens silently shape the year. You can consult the astronomer once per round to learn what the stars foretell for irrigation, construction, or the health of your people. Use this knowledge wisely when making your decisions. Assign workers to farming to grow grain for food and seeds. Assign workers to construction to build your ziggurat. Every worker assigned to one task cannot work the other, so think carefully about how you divide your people. Buy or sell land to expand or contract your farming capacity. Each acre needs one bushel of grain as seed and ten workers to farm it. At the end of each round you feed your people. Underfeed them and they die. Feed them well and new births follow. Random events such as raiders, plague, or rotting grain can strike at any time and grow more likely as your ziggurat rises. Reach phase nine before year forty or your city falls into ruin.