Does anybody else get unreasonably annoyed at the vast majority of rpg games that are feudal societys on a surface level but are actually capitalist societys under a thin vineer. I was trying to play pillars of eternity but became incredibly annoyed at the frist quest of the game revolving around a mill which is in a lord's domain but is privately owned and operated and which the townsfolk sell their grain to in exchange for currency (to later buy back with the same currency). I had to put the game down right there.
I think a lot of the time it's an outgrowth from developers feeling the need to have a commonly circulated currency. Although the answer in my opinion isn't to faithfully recreate feudalism but to create a unique social formation for the conditions of the world, I've always loved the eberron campaign setting for that reason.
The caste system they had was inherently exploitative, but it worked until they had to fully centralize in their larger cities and capitalists began to infiltrate the society through trade.
I agree it could've been done better, but the worse parts of their society only pronounced themselves post-colonization which is, yeah I agree, at least a sort of an interesting thing to explore.
It's above average world building at the very least, if by what are obviously lib writers lol