#dotage

🥚🥚🥚🥚🥚 5/5!!

dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC is here, bringing danger, bold new systems, and a bigger indie strategy game on Steam Deck, Linux, Mac, and Windows. Michele Pirovano keeps pushing forward with fresh ideas, smart design. Which is out now on Steam with a discount. The Pips are done hiding. In dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC, your tiny village finally looks beyond the edge of the map, and what waits out there could change everything. New roads, strange resources, risky expeditions, and a few secrets make this feel like the start of a much bigger story. Solo developer Michele Pirovano has released dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC, and honestly, this is the kind of update that makes an already clever indie strategy game feel fresh again. Not just bigger. Sharper. More alive. If you have spent time keeping your village together in dotAGE, you already know the feeling. Every Pip matters and every bad season feels personal. So of course every tiny win feels like you somehow cheated fate. Now Trade Secrets gives those same nervous little villagers a reason to step outside and push further. That changes the mood fast.

The dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC Opens Up The World

For a long time, the Pips lived with fear pressing in from every side. Now they are also ready to explore the wilderness. You can send Pips out on expeditions and wait to see what they drag back home. Maybe it is a rare resource or a lost blueprint. It could be something worse, like an unfamiliar disease that turns your careful plans into a mess. Trade Secrets also adds a new layer of risk and reward to dotAGE. Exploration is not just a side activity. It feels like a gamble your whole village might depend on. You are not just clicking a button and collecting loot. You are sending someone out into the unknown and hoping they come back with something worth the danger. For an indie strategy game on Steam Deck and Linux, notably one built around planning, pressure, and survival, that is a great fit.

Coins, Roads, Warehouses, and Real Trade

The big shift in dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC is right there in the name. Trade matters now. The Goldlings have found your village, and they are eager to swap their coins for your resources. That means goods now have a new role in the life of your settlement. You can stockpile them in warehouses, move them along roads, and trade them through markets. Then comes the best part. You use those hard earned coins to trade even more. This gives the village a stronger sense of motion. Resources are not just sitting in piles anymore. They move, matter, and they connect parts of your village together. Roads stop feeling like simple paths and start feeling like lifelines. For Linux as well as Steam Deck players, who like systems that actually click together, this sounds like the good stuff. Clean strategy. Clear choices. Painful trade offs. The kind of loop where one smart decision can save you, and one lazy one can quietly ruin your week.

Pips Have Learned to Ride

The Pips also figured out something very important. Walking everywhere is slow. In Trade Secrets, you can craft boats, build carts, and tame horses to help expand your village. That is a big deal. Transport changes how you think about distance, work, and growth. Suddenly, the edge of your village does not feel so far away. A resource that once felt awkward to reach might become part of your main plan. Expansion becomes less of a headache and more of a real strategy. There is something charming about that too. These tiny people have survived so much, and now they are out here building carts and riding horses like they just unlocked a new era of village confidence.

dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC - Release Trailer

Three New Elders Bring New Ways to Play

The dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC also adds three new elders, each with unique mechanics. There is Wanna the Merchant, Darwin the Explorer, and the elusive Grandma. Even the names have that weird little dotAGE flavor. Funny, strange, and just a bit suspicious. The elder system has always helped shape how a run feels, so new elders are a serious addition. These are not just cosmetic extras. They can change how you approach the game, what you value, and how you survive when the pressure starts closing in. Add in new buildings, resources, memories, ailments, events, and more, and this DLC looks like a proper expansion of the whole village life cycle.

Strange Secrets Are Waiting Out There

Of course, the wilderness is not only about trade routes and useful materials. Some Pips whisper about lost treasure. While others mention something that sounds like a special cult. Nobody seems fully sure what is waiting out there, which is exactly why I want to poke at it. That is where the Trade Secrets gets its hook in. It is not only adding systems. It is adding mystery. The kind that makes you add one more expedition, even when you know you should stop. And that is dangerous in the best way.

dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC - A Good Time to Jump In

dotAGE: Trade Secrets to bring clever systems, and new village drama to the indie strategy game on Steam Deck, Linux, Mac, and Windows. Thanks to developer Michele Pirovano’s steady creative spark, finding new ways to surprise players. Due to make its way onto Steam. There is something special about watching a tiny village survive by pure stubbornness. dotAGE: Trade Secrets looks ready to take that feeling and push it beyond the safety of the settlement, where strange resources, lost blueprints, and a few nasty surprises are waiting in the wild. Solo developer Michele Pirovano is bringing the new dotAGE: Trade Secrets DLC to Steam on June 3, 2026, and honestly, this sounds like the kind of expansion that makes an already clever indie strategy game feel much bigger. Not louder. Not bloated. Bigger in that dangerous, “one more turn” kind of way. And yes, it is coming to Steam Deck, Linux, Mac, and Windows, which is exactly the kind of support I like seeing as a Linux player.

The village is not enough anymore

The original hook of dotAGE is already strong. You guide your little Pips, plan their work, manage resources, and try to survive whatever weird disaster the game throws at you next. But dotAGE: Trade Secrets changes the mood. Now the world outside matters more. Your Pips are ready to step past the familiar edges of the village and explore the wilderness. That alone gives the whole title a new sense of pressure. Sending someone out is exciting, but it also feels risky. They might come back with rare resources. Since they might bring back lost blueprints. And they might also drag in an unfamiliar disease. That is classic strategy tension. You want the reward. You fear the cost.

Roads, markets, coins, and chaos

The Goldlings have found your village, and they are not here for small talk. They want to trade coins for your resources, which gives your stockpiles a whole new purpose. In dotAGE: Trade Secrets, resources are not just stuff you gather and spend. They become part of a bigger system. You can stockpile goods in warehouses, move them along roads, and trade them through markets. Then you can use those hard-earned coins to trade even more. That sounds simple at first. Then your strategy brain kicks in. Where do you build the warehouses? What should you move first? Which resources are worth selling? What happens when the village needs those goods later? This is the good kind of stress. The kind that makes you lean closer to the screen. For performance-focused PC players, this also sounds like the kind of design that adds depth without needing flashy nonsense. More systems, planning, and reasons to care about every tile.

Pips finally get wheels, boats, and horses

I love when a strategy game makes logistics feel personal. In this DLC, Pips are not just walking around doing chores like tired little legends. They finally get better ways to work. You can craft boats, build carts, and tame horses to help your village expand. That is such a clean idea for dotAGE. It fits the world, it supports the new trading systems, and it makes expansion feel earned. There is something fun about imagining these tiny villagers slowly figuring out transport. One day they are hauling goods by hand. The next, they are riding horses like they just unlocked a new era of village life. That is the charm right there.

dotAGE: Trade Secrets - Reveal Trailer

Three new elders enter the dotAGE: Trade Secrets story

The DLC also adds three new elders, and each brings unique mechanics. There is Wanna the Merchant, who sounds perfect for the trade-heavy side of the expansion. There is Darwin the Explorer, which fits the new expedition system like a glove. Then there is the elusive Grandma, who already sounds like trouble in the best possible way. dotAGE has always had that strange mix of cozy village life and creeping doom. New elders should help push that personality even further, especially with fresh mechanics tied into the new systems.

The secrets are the real hook

The part that gets me most is the mystery. The outside world in dotAGE: Trade Secrets is not just a resource map. It has rumors. Lost treasure. Strange discoveries. Even some kind of special cult. That is exactly the kind of weird little detail that makes an indie strategy game stick in your head. You are not just expanding because the numbers tell you to. You are expanding because you want to know what is out there. And that is powerful.

Trade Secrets are a strong reason to return to dotAGE

Trade Secrets DLC is due to expand the world of dotAGE with new ways to grow your village on Linux, Steam Deck, Mac, and Windows PC. This is all made possible by the ongoing creativity of developer Michele Pirovano. And it's due to make its way onto Steam. For fans of dotAGE, this is one of those moments that makes you sit up in your chair. The quiet little indie village builder is about to get a whole lot bigger on Linux as well as Steam Deck. And the new expansion, Trade Secrets, looks like it’s about to turn your peaceful settlement into a living, breathing economy. If you’ve spent time with dotAGE, you already know the vibe. It’s that weirdly relaxing yet tense strategy loop where every decision matters. You’re guiding your tiny village through harsh seasons, strange events, and looming disasters. One bad call and everything spirals. Now the solo developer behind it all, Michele Pirovano, is opening the gates to something much larger.

Trade Secrets Is About Expansion and Risk

The upcoming Trade Secrets DLC isn’t just a small content bump. It adds an entirely new layer to how your village grows and survives. For the first time, your little Pips can head out beyond the safety of the village. Instead of just reacting to events, you’ll be actively exploring the wilderness. Send them out, and they’ll return with strange resources and brand-new buildings pulled from the unknown edges of the world. That alone changes the rhythm of the game. But the real shift comes from logistics and trade. Your village will finally have a full supply network. You’ll be building carts, crafting boats, and even taming horses so goods can move faster across your settlement. Roads suddenly matter more. Storage matters more. Planning matters a lot more. Warehouses will let you stockpile resources, markets will let you sell them, and coins will open the door to even bigger trades. It’s a proper economy layered on top of the survival systems fans already know. In other words, Trade Secrets turns your village from a struggling settlement into something that actually feels like a growing civilisation.

dotAGE: Trade Secrets - Reveal Trailer

The World of dotAGE Is Getting Stranger Too

Alongside the Trade Secrets paid DLC, dotAGE is also getting a chunky free update, version 1.9, and it’s bringing something wild: lava. Yes, lava. The new update introduces lava terrain, lava resources, and even buildings that interact with it. That alone should shake up map strategies in some pretty interesting ways. But the bigger surprise is the overhaul to the late game. Four brand-new Apocalypses are being added, giving veteran players fresh challenges when their villages reach the end stages. If you’ve already mastered the current disasters, things are about to get messy again. On top of Trade Secrets, the event system is being rebalanced with a pile of new events thrown into the mix. Expect more weird situations, more tough decisions, and probably a few moments where everything goes wrong at the worst possible time. Which, honestly, is peak dotAGE.

A Solo Developer Still Expanding the Game