How did Manor Lords become so successful? It’s no slight against developer Greg ‘Slavic Magic’ Styczeń to say there are a lot of medieval games, a lot of city building games, a lot of strategy games – a lot of medieval city building strategy games. Just look at Bellwright, which launched three days before Manor Lords, and has many of the same conceits. Speaking exclusively to PCGamesN, Tim Bender, CEO of publisher Manor Lords’ publisher Hooded Horse, reveals how Steam’s most-wanted game came to be, and how wishlist numbers, no matter how dramatic, can possibly be misleading.

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