Let Them Trade

This game is a good entry point for anyone new to economy simulators. The presentation is solid, with pleasant graphics and clean audio that make it easy to get into. The gameplay is simple to learn, succeeding as an accessible and enjoyable introduction to the genre.
However, for experienced players, the appeal might be short-lived. The main campaign is quite brief, and the game unfortunately lacks meaningful endgame content or compelling mechanics to encourage multiple playthroughs. Once the campaign is over, there isn't much long-term challenge, which will likely leave genre veterans wanting more depth.
It's worth noting this opinion is based on the final playtest, as the 1.0 release, i bought, didn't introduce significant changes to these core areas.

bought all of the potatoes from my peasants for cheap. kept buying until price skyrocketed. sold them back to the peasants for huge profit as my peasants started to starve. 10/10 would manipulate the market again

Its a great game - if you know what you can expect or will get.
What you will get: A very relaxed, laid-back, and somewhat easy game. You have a board-game type map. Found your citys, create production chains and buildings, connect them via trade routes. Thats basically it. Just, relax and observe how everything unfolds, how the merchants do their job, how the trade flourish.
What you will NOT get: A challenge, a deep and complex simulation, a fascination story, difficult enemies, or whatever.
Sounds boring for you? Than its not your game. For me, after a long and exhausting day of work - just building some cities, watching how your little wood-empire prosper, without challenges, without action or "save the world"-scenarios is just exactly what is sometimes needed.
However, it took me about 6 hours for the full campaign, so decide yourself if 18$/€ is reasonable for you.

A Promising City Builder with Unique Trade Idea
I played the demo and full game for about 6 hours—almost completed it. The trade-focused economy is a fresh idea and makes earning money more strategic than in many other games. The detailed art and unique level designs are also a highlight.
However, the pricing system needs serious work. For example, tools sell for less than the materials needed to make them, making production unprofitable. Auto-trade struggles to balance prices. Maps are fixed (not procedural), only 4 cities can be built at the beginning, the tech tree is very basic, and traders are too slow—especially across long distances. Faster transport like trains or planes would be great in the future.
In short: a great concept, but the core trade and economy systems need a major redesign.

Ignore the negative reviews. This is literally described as a cozy economy builder - and that's exactly what it is. Little campaign to get you up to speed with the game, and then some inbuilt maps to refine your techniques. Plenty of opportunity for further updates, and a growing amount of custom maps on the Workshop.
This is a cheap game, and you'll definitely get your money out of it!

Summary:
Excellent Game. A small city builder / economic simulation with a board game feel.

Graphics: Cute - wooden toy style.

Mechanics:
Interesting if you are into production chain games. The mechanics (incl the self adjusting market prices) are deeper than it appears at first glance.

There is a bit of a puzzle element here as you have limited number of towns each of which having limited slots for production buildings.

There is a minimalist combat element where you defend against NPC thieves that can intercept your traders and steal your goods. But this is more of an annoyance and adds little to the gameplay. Probably meant to keep you busy while you are waiting for some required resources to accumulate.

Replayability:
Medium. After the campaign/tutorial (which is well done) you can play on several different maps in a sandbox mode. The winter update introduces a slightly more challenging map. User created maps can also be downloaded.

Variety comes from the fact that you need to adjust your town layouts (i.e. which production buildings go into the limited slots of each town) based on the resource distribution available, Since each map needs to be explored first you don't have upfront knowledge of the resource locations when you start planning which adds more challenge.

However - in sandbox mode your goal is always to get to the highest tier of citizens and then run the "party tent" successfully (Have lots of high end goods) . So that is a bit repetitive after a while.

Price: I feel fair for the amount of content provided. Good for 30-50 hrs. Then you have seen it.

Already played the demo and I must say this game rocks!
I've always enjoyed these types of games, especially when they don't get too complicated in the endgame. This game is very chill and scratches my itch for building stuff and watching the world unfold.
Props to the devs, great work!