CodeBastion vs Island Colony
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
CodeBastion
Forge a city from a humble camp into a lasting bastion through strategic idle clicker and incremental city-building mechanics. Manage resources, assign citizens to jobs, research new technologies, and embark on expeditions to expand your legacy.
- Idle clicker and incremental progression
- Resource and citizen management
- Deep skill tree with research
- Expeditions and exploration
- Timed defense challenges
- Offline progress
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Build a city from its first camp into a lasting bastion in Code Bastion, a strategic idle clicker and incremental city-builder. Begin in Summary, where every tap matters. Gather wood, stone, food, and science through quick actions, manage your energy, watch your population, and keep your city moving even while you are away. Your resources continue to grow through citizen jobs and buildings, while seasons, incidents, and storage limits keep every plan under pressure. Move to Development to unlock a large skill tree across economy, construction, society, and expeditions. Each research choice opens new buildings, improves production, increases storage, strengthens manual gathering, expands your population, and prepares your city for the frontier. Turn a fragile settlement into a reliable system of farms, sawmills, quarries, mines, warehouses, markets, universities, barracks, walls, and more. Use the Resources screen to assign citizens to the jobs that matter most. Balance food, wood, stone, iron, coal, steel, gold, science, and influence. Build capacity before production overflows, keep enough workers in essential buildings, and adapt to changing seasons. Missions give every stage of the city a direction. Complete daily tasks, pursue a weekly campaign, and progress through a five-chapter city legacy: found the settlement, grow it into a city, open the frontier, endure its threats, and build a lasting legacy. When the city is ready, enter Expeditions. Train citizens, assign roles, craft preparation items, reveal a procedural map tile by tile, recruit from camps, discover points of interest, and research a catalogue of hidden treasures. Beyond the walls, every expedition can bring resources, experience, discoveries, and risks. Prepare for incursions with passive defenders and a timed defense challenge. Gather temporary materials, build defenses, create weapons, and decide how to hold the line when the frontier strikes back. CODE BASTION FEATURES Idle clicker and strategic incremental progression Quick actions, energy management, and offline progress Deep skill tree with research, upgrades, and unlocks Resources, citizen jobs, buildings, storage, and seasons Daily tasks, weekly campaigns, and city-wide goals Procedural exploration map, expeditions, equipment, and loot Treasure research, defense roles, incursions, and timed battles Five supported languages: English, Spanish, German, French, and Italian Build deliberately, explore carefully, and defend what you have created.
Island Colony
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ISLAND COLONY is an economic strategy game about keeping a colony of exiles alive on a distant, cold island. A remake of a 2003 classic: the same rules, the same buildings, the same character — with a modern interface for iPhone, iPad and Mac. March 1, 1890. You have 28 exiles, a little money, one City and an island you must hold for as long as you can. Every March 1 — taxes. Every 10 years on November 1 — the Main Tax, and it doubles every time. Fail to pay, and the colony is finished. WHAT YOU DO • Build farms, apiaries, sawmills, mines, gold mines, power plants — 33 buildings, each with its own service life, working season and running costs. • Feed your people: everyone needs food and water every day. Without water the next day does not come; without food people stop working and leave. • Trade on the market, but remember: buying costs more than selling. Only your own production pays — build supply chains. • Borrow and save for taxes: the key rate moves through debt cycles, and both loans and deposits follow it. • Repair: buildings decay every day, faster in winter. • Prepare for the governor's decrees: every five years a new rule — taxes, prices, credit or people. Decrees are announced a year ahead. WHAT MAKES IT TICK • A real calendar: seasons, leap years, winters when the farms stand idle. • Almost 40 random events: fires, floods, gold strikes, missing workers. • Exiles arrive every summer, people are born and die, and everyone needs a home. • One island and one goal: find out how far into the future you can survive. Every game is a search for the best sequence of moves. WHO IT IS FOR Players who like to count. No combat, no timers — just the economy, the calendar and your decisions. A game takes anywhere from half an hour to forever. No ads, no in-app purchases, no internet required.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: CodeBastion at none against Island Colony's 3. CodeBastion also leads on iOS requirement (15.1 vs 17.0). Island Colony's advantage is update cadence (every 4 days vs every 10 days). On price, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Island Colony sells 3 one-off in-app purchases. CodeBastion asks for nothing beyond the download.
CodeBastion ships an update every 10 days, Island Colony every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 8, 2026 and October 9, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | CodeBastion | Island Colony |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (4 ratings) — better | — |
| Positive reviews | 100.0% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 4 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 10 days | Every 4 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 15.1 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 40 MB | 2 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Gines Ortiz | Anatoly Osokin |
In-app purchases
CodeBastion
No in-app purchases
Island Colony
- Coffee for the developer$3.99
- Lunch for the developer$9.99
- Dinner for the developer$19.99









