Manor Lords sold a million copies on launch day, set new Steam player record for strategy games

Manor Lords, which became the most wish-listed game on Steam during its development, is now out - and day one sales reflect its most-wanted status.

For those who missed it, Manor Lords is a medieval-themed city builder that mixes constructing a settlement with a side order of tactical battles - and some seriously nifty visuals.

As publisher Hooded Horse declared in a post on X (formerly Twitter), on the initial day sales topped 1 million copies on Steam. Manor Lords also managed to achieve the highest ever concurrent player count for a city builder on Valve's platform, with some 173,000 PC gamers indulging in being a Lord at the same time on launch day.

Indeed, that's the highest tally including other strategy genres too, such as 4x affairs or grand strategy games (GSGs).

Pretty good going then, but as noted, we aren't exactly surprised that Manor Lords managed a massive launch given all the build-up and favorable early peeks at the game.

What makes this all the more remarkable is that the developer, Slavic Magic, is actually a lone indie dev (Greg Styczeń).

Naturally, there's work to be done - the game has received positive reviews on Steam, but there are certainly niggles from critics. Remember, though, Manor Lords is in early access, so it's not technically finished yet.

Fortunately, we already know what the first patch will do, as Styczeń has told us - namely the following:

• Fix all the weird homeless bugs
• Tune the archer damage
• Tune the trade oversupply mechanics (it's too harsh and punishes regional specialization)
• Slow down the rate of the AI claiming territories
• Improve the sawpit efficiency / storage

For those addicted to Manor Lords, the publisher has provided a handy sicknote template that we're sure you'll find very useful... see below!