I love Caverna. The sense of control you have over customizing your particular homestead is great. Are there other games with a similar feel, where you're in charge of building a small settlement and have a lot of freedom to choose how it develops? And I want to keep the focus small: not looking for a civilization- or even city-scale game, but rather one that focuses on a small group of people, a village or town at most.

Mechanics-wise, it's not really important. Worker placement like Caverna is great, but I'd also enjoy tile-placement, area control and so on. Not too interested in card games.

A survival mechanism could be good. Caverna sort of has this, with you needing to feed your dwarves every few turns, but I'd enjoy something even more in-depth. I like the idea of gaining/harvesting/finding resources, constructing buildings or upgrades that let you focus on a particular victory strategy.

Not particularly interested in combat or direct player conflict, though some could be okay.

Player limit is not really important, but 2-6 would be ideal.

Theme-wise, I'd love something fantasy or even sci fi if such a game exists. Barring that, I'd prefer ancient-to-medieval eras. A zombie setting would also work.

Thanks!

EDIT

I own Above and Below and realize it fits into a lot of what I'm looking for. If I could find a game with Above & Below's theme, ease of play, and kind of "personal" feel each game, PLUS a survival mechanic, I think that'd be the bullseye of what I'm craving.