Lampholm

Lampholm is a calm idle game with a real ending. On a bare rock in a grey sea, gather driftwood, hire beachcombers, cut stone, build a harbour and a row of cottages, press kelp into lamp oil and raise the tower stone by stone. Every worker you hire walks onto the island, up to a busy crowd of each kind, and every improvement stands there as a building of its own: a turning water wheel, a crane, a lime kiln, a kelp farm, a signal mast. Gathering is calm: hold the button, the island, a key or a gamepad button to haul a steady four armfuls a second, no button-mashing. Once the harbour stands, boats call at the jetty with offers: a trader with what your goal is waiting on, or settlers who join your crews. When the lamp is lit, the Swallow sails home under the beam, to an original waltz, "Ada's Light". The first island takes a calm player about half an hour. Then the sea opens up: every new island is drawn for your game alone, and each kind looks like itself, a pine isle under a forested ridge, black basalt stacks under a smoking volcano, a coral lagoon inside a ring of white sand, a frozen skerry among icebergs or a storm cape with a high cliff, each with its own weather, music, twist, landmark and three feats. Every lamp you light earns Sea Charts for Keeper Ada's log, twelve lasting helps with real choices. Save slots, settings for sound, motion, contrast, text size and keys, and mouse, keyboard, touch and gamepad controls. Time away counts, and your saves stay in your browser. No ads and no payments. It plays in the browser on desktop and phones.