It feels like the music is a part of the environment itself, that it is blowing on the wind, through the trees, and only grows stronger as the world comes back to life. Then, as you begin to heal the wasteland, the soundtrack slowly builds and builds as the expanse of grass covers more and more of the land. In each new region, the game starts off entirely silent, and then a small beat of music plays with each new building placed. The soundtrack of Terra Nil is also brilliant in its subtlety. With that being said, the difficulty is clearly not the game’s focus it’s no Frostpunk. Terra Nil also offers three different difficulties which affect how much it costs to place objects and what is required in order to grow the correct flora for the area. Far from being a problem, this just means you can always go back and do levels again but better, something that is incredibly rewarding. The game does an outstanding job of introducing players to new devices and methods of restoring the environment so it never feels confusing, but it does take a little bit to understand how to use each building to its fullest. After moving through each stage, I decided to go back and try them again with my new knowledge, finding them even more fun now that I had a keen understanding of how each building works. Finding the perfect way to rebuild the landscape with the resources you have available is incredibly satisfying and the more you play, the more new buildings you unlock, allowing you to find new ways to restore the ecosystem even more effectively.

This is where the management systems come in, as each building requires power and must be connected to a windmill or other suitable power source.

That isn’t to say the game lacks the potential for difficulty though.

The gameplay loop is highly meditative with each placed object giving you satisfying visual and audio feedback, making it so easy to get lost in a rhythm as you watch the world turn from grey to green. A simple premise, but so satisfying in practice! Using various machines, you can purify the soil, grow grass, clean water, and then bring the land back to life with gorgeous flora and fauna. Your goal is to create the perfect environment for the region, and then encourage animals to return to the area. Each region in Terra Nil begins as little more than a grey-coloured wasteland where both water and earth are completely incapable of sustaining life.

Terra nil gameplay