This is my favorite building-with-resources sort of game. It plays great both solitaire or two-player, but with a slightly different feel each way. (The expansion adds a third player but there is a LOT of game here before you need to add it.) This is an open sandbox of a game of building a village and producing goods. There are MANY options to try, and much of the joy is trying something different each game. Most options are always available, with only a subset of the buildings being random each game. Some parts (draining peat bogs and expanding the dikes) will happen pretty much every game, but how and when that happens can vary.
For contrast, I very much dislike Agricola. In this one, there is no "growing your family", you have the same number of workers throughout. In the two player-game, actions can be blocked, but there are actions that allow you to use a blocked action! (No more inability to use your own oven!) And most importantly, Agricola forces players to do a little of everything. Fields of Arle allows you to focus on doing one or two things well. In fact, trying to do everything will only hinder your score.
If you like games of resource gathering, conversion, and building, this has fast become my favorite.