Industries Of Titan

Steam Rating: 6/10

It looks like Industries of Titan is just another grid-based city builder game set in space at first glance. But this city sim has more to it than meets the eye. As part of Industries of Titan, players are asked by the mysterious Council to start a city on Titan. As players move on, they must now keep a city corporation in check while also searching for the ruins of an ancient society that may help their city grow.

Players in Industries of Titan need to keep track of supplies through factories and other buildings, just like in any other city sim. But what makes Industries of Titan more interesting is its internal minigame feature. Structures have grids inside them that players can change and grow to find new ways to make their production process more efficient.

Flotsam

Steam Rating: 74%

The sheer color and life of Flotsam may appeal to players who want to try a city builder that isn’t as serious about looks. Even though Flotsam has some vibes in common with Sim City, its water-based gameplay makes it instantly different from city builders. At its core, Flotsam is about building a society out of trash in the ocean. The game takes place after the end of the world, and players are in charge of the Drifters, or settlers of these sea towns. They have to make sure that their people escape the dangers of the sea.

The setting of Flotsam on the water adds water-based features that make the city-building gameplay more fun. This time, players have to get supplies at sea and let them dry before they can be used for building. Drifters need to rest more often because their work is more intense at sea, and players have to filter seawater for them to drink because there isn’t any. These improved features give Flotsam an active survival element that stands out against its cartoony graphics in a compelling way.

Going Medieval

Steam Rating: 81%

People who like medieval-themed games might want to give Going Medieval a try. Especially if they want a simpler colony sim. In this game, which takes place right after the Black Death, plague survivors need to build a new town that they can finally call home. As they slowly build settlements for players, many of the survivors have their own stories to tell.

Going Medieval is a lot like RimWorld in how it works, but with fewer quirks. Going Medieval is a very interesting colony sim because you can build structures in a more freeform way and you can even build castles and towers. In addition, the active colony part of the game gives it a feel similar to RTS/4X. Which makes it more interesting than other games of the same type.

Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic

Steam Rating: 88%

Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic is a good choice for people who want a realistic city simulator with historical roots. The game asks players to run a city from the point of view of industrial and urban planning setups. It plays with economic ideas that aren’t usually explored in games. For example, players can turn on or off very specific situations, like setting the fuel needs for cars or turning on or off the electricity and heating needs for buildings.

The players also have power over the school system and how that can affect how parents do their jobs. For building, players can use real money or use construction offices to make the game feel more real. For production, players can send goods to the Warsaw Pact or use them in their own city.

Cliff Empire

Steam Rating: 93%

When a nuclear war makes the planet’s surface unlivable, Cliff Empire imagines a future where people who are stuck on a space station decide to finally come back and try to change society. The Earth’s surface is not suitable for living on. So they must build their new home on mountain tops (or smooth cliffs). Even though the loop in other city management games is a lot like the loop in Cliff Empire, the game is harder. Because players have to carefully handle the relationships between the colonies they build on three nearby cliffs.

A lot of the game’s unique problems have to do with managing space. Which is something that usually only comes up at the end of Cities: Skylines when players “fill” their city. Here in Cliff Empire, this issue is dealt with right from the start. So players have to carefully consider which rocks cater to their needs. Players can also do this with the help of the game, since Cliff Empire’s future buildings can be placed in different ways and grew in different ways. The fact that mathematics is also used to build cities makes Cliff Empire a very different game in its genre.

Dyson Sphere Program

Steam Rating: 95%

If you like strategy games and want to play something more futuristic, you might want to check out Dyson Sphere Program. Dyson Sphere Program players are told to go to a random star system and start making parts that will eventually come together to make a structure like the Dyson Sphere. This is based on the idea of building a machine that can constantly collect power from the sun. They’re not helping a group this time; instead, they’re helping societies in virtual space that need a lot of computing power to stay alive.

Dyson Sphere Program is more like a production simulator than a city simulator with real people because of how it is set up. In order to make parts for the Dyson Sphere, players have to build different buildings, like factories and manufacturing stations. During the game, players must build different supply lines on a planet so that they finally reach all the planets in the system they are given.

Ostriv

Steam Rating: 96%

Some people may enjoy Ostriv if they want to build a cute 19th-century town that looks and feels like a real village. Ostriv is an independent game made by a single developer. It asks players to build and take care of a town from before factories were invented.

Ostriv is different from other city simulators because it is very small. This gives players a lot of power over even the smallest parts of their city. For example, building structures needs complex materials like clay and wood, which are each processed in their own buildings. This level of difficulty is matched by relaxing graphics that let players watch their people gather and carry things by hand. On top of that, players can enjoy the smooth shift between moving things from a tent to a house and packing them up.

OpenTTD

Metascore: 8.8 (User Score)

Even though it came out in 2004, OpenTTD still amazes players with how complicated it is as a business modeling game. OpenTTD is not like other tycoon games that focus on special industries. Instead, it is all about providing transportation services. The goal of the game is to make money by moving different things, like goods or people, around using different types of transportation. There are a lot of parallels between this game and Transport Tycoon Deluxe, but this game is more difficult.

One cool thing about OpenTTD is that it has an online mode where up to 255 players from made-up transportation companies can work together or against each other to rule the overworld. The game is also free to play on Steam. Which makes it a must-try for Sims fans who want to play older games.

Townscaper

Metascore: 63

Townscaper is one of the more interesting city builders because it’s not about running a city. Instead, it’s about the fun of making a city and watching it grow. Because of this, Townscaper is more of a relaxed, casual game than a very hard one.

Townscaper is more of a project than a game. Players are given an uneven grid that they must fill with blocks of different colors from a range. Just put the blocks down and wait for the game’s system to “grow” them into different parts of a city, like bridges, stairs, arches, and houses, based on how they looked in the grid.

Aven Colony

Metascore: 65

In Aven Colony, players are in charge of the trip to Aven Prime, which is the first place where people have lived outside of the Solar System. There are different types of environments and landscapes on this alien planet, from jungles to tundras to deserts. People who play Aven Colony will start with a small village and grow it into a big city, just like in other sci-fi colonization games.

It is up to the players to make sure that their colonies have the right buildings to stay alive on a strange world. Players also have to micromanage things like the happiness and jobs of the people, crime, the commute, structures and utilities, and how the drones help keep an eye on the colony. The game’s adventure system might be more interesting. It lets players plan trips with explorers to see Aven Prime’s more unusual and unknown places.

Banished

Metascore: 68

What makes a place unique: its location or its people? In Banished, people are the city that players are making, which makes sense since they are the game’s main resource. Banished is a command economy simulation game where players control the lives of a group of nomads. As normal people, these travelers work, get old, have kids, and die. It’s up to the players to make sure their cities grow and do well in these situations.

Banished doesn’t have a tech tree like some other games do. Instead, all buildings can be built as long as players have the means to do so. Here comes the hard part: players have to make sure they have enough food and resources to last a long time while also getting the resources they need to grow from farming, mining, and trade. People are very important to running the city in Banished, which adds a unique factor that makes it even more fun to play.

Surviving The Aftermath

Metascore: 69

When an event that ends the world changes the way people live, Surviving The Aftermath is about what happens after life. In this game, players have to rebuild a colony from the ashes of a destroyed society and make it a place where people can find hope and start over.

In addition to building cities, players must change their plans because resources are limited and come up with ways to protect their colonists, such as by building walls with gates and weapons or fighting other groups that want to take control.

Cities XL

Metascore: 69

Cities XL lets players not only build the city of their dreams, but also multiple cities that they can connect all over the world. In terms of general gameplay, it may be the most similar game to Cities: Skylines. Cities XL isn’t as complex as Cities: Skylines, but it does have more than 1,000 projects and buildings to choose from on more than 60 maps. So you can make cities as big as the ones in real life.

Also, this early game is a great way for players to become in charge of big city economies that deal with difficult issues like housing, jobs, recreation, and even taxes. Fans who want a cool option to Cities: Skylines might enjoy Cities XL, which is very much like the original game.

Medieval Dynasty

Metascore: 73

You could say that Medieval Dynasty is a “best of both worlds” game. Because it has parts of both city-building and role-playing games. You play as a young man who ran away from a war in Europe in the Middle Ages and set out to make your own way. He could not only get better at many things. But he could also lead a group of people to power and start a family line that would last for generations.

But because the game is so open-ended, it’s up to each player to decide how to handle these situations. The story gets more interesting as you play through the main chapters, and exploring can help players not only build a family, but also decide what will happen to their community and build buildings that can turn a small settlement into a big village or maybe even a city that players can both run and explore.

Railway Empire

Metascore: 74

Cities: Skylines’ rail system changed what it means for a game to have a railroad level. City model fans may have spent too much time planning not only their perfect town but also how traffic works. But Railroad Empire is a good choice for people who only want to focus on traffic. Like the name says, players don’t actually build cities. Instead, they build railroads that connect different towns.

Railway Empire’s best feature is that it shows how simple tasks like “putting tracks together” can become hard when you think about how traffic works in a world ruled by trains. Players should not only offer short trips from city to city. They should also think about adding pit stops to help move resources and even colleges to bring more people (and passengers) to different destinations.

Dawn Of Man

Metascore: 74

When players come across people at the very start of society, like in the Iron Age, the games that usually come to mind only have humans in the very beginning of a game that spans multiple time periods, like Civilization. Dawn of Man, on the other hand, flips this idea on its head by making the whole game loop center around the Iron Age. The game’s amazing graphics and soothing sound design go well with its natural look. This is especially true when players see their settlers move from building tents to huts and use the few tools they have to make a wide range of tools and furniture.

The controls in Dawn of Man are what make it a must-play. Players who like to keep a close eye on their settlers can tailor their orders to each individual member, assigning them specific tasks. In the same way, players can easily give people jobs and tell them how to do them within certain limits. This level of freedom also helps players get ready for different dangers, such as bad weather, dangerous animals, and even robbers from other camps.

Surviving Mars

Metascore: 76

In Surviving Mars, players will have to figure out how to make a permanent city on Mars, just like scientists do in real life. After picking a space agency to pay for the trip to Mars, players go to the Red Planet to start their first colony and do whatever it takes to stay alive. Surviving Mars is different from other sci-fi settlement games because it manages cities in a very realistic way. Infrastructure and citizen buildings are mixed together, and just the right amount of resources are distributed.

More importantly, the game does have some unique features that make it fun to play, like strange black boxes that can be explored and even a tech tree that is generated at random. Also, each colonist in the game has their own simulated wants and strengths, which adds another level of excitement to managing them.

Anno 2205

Metascore: 77

If you like the way the Anno games are usually played but want a sci-fi twist. You might like Anno 2205, which is set in the year 2205 in the far future. For the next part, players become executives of a company and have to fight with other companies to create new technologies. To do this, they are in charge of different cities on Earth, each with buildings that players can move around and rearrange however they want.

Anno 2205 is different because its geography changes over time. In the future, players may be able to do study and build towns in the Arctic. Players reach the Moon at the end of the game. But they still have to race against other companies to build a safe settlement there.

Tropico 6

Metascore: 78

Managing a city isn’t always a bed of roses, though. Playing Tropico 6 is the same as playing other Tropico games: you are El Presidente, and your job is to help the country of Tropico get to the top, starting in the colonial age and now. Tropico 6 is like other games in that players have to focus on trading, renovating, researching, and exploring. But this time, players also have to handle a dynasty, which changes how they lead the islands in the long run.

Tropico 6 is amazing because it has unique strategic features that will help players become the best at the game. Doodle Jump players can be in charge of more than one island and even send their own secret spies to other countries to steal their secrets. Since Tropico 6 is a satirical game, it puts players in funny but awkward situations where they have to be leaders. For example, players have to complete tasks where they have to get rid of housing or deal with political enemies.

Anno 1800

Metascore: 81

The popular Anno series takes their famous city-building game to the 1800s, right in the middle of the Industrial Revolution. At its core, Anno 1800 asks players to build a city that will last through the Industrial Age. Which now focuses on factory work against a background of Victorian-era architecture. Citizens can work as workers and artists, and their involvement is a key part of keeping supply lines stable.

People also have to find a balance between life in the Old World and the wonders of the New World. Which brings many wonders to towns. There are also new features in the game, like blueprinting, tourists, and even showing how industrialization has changed the lives of people who live on islands. Anno 1800 has great graphics, and players who really care about those things will love how they look. They can see how their city changes from the tiny houses.

Islanders

Metascore: 82

People who want a different take on the city-building genre might want to give Islands a try. Especially since it has a simple look, soothing sounds, and fun gameplay. The main idea behind Islands is procedural creatio. Which means that players have to build a city from scratch on an island that the game gives them.

In Islanders, players must “unload” buildings from their inventory onto the island in order to move forward. As they do this, they win points. There are more new buildings they can get when they place more buildings and win more points. They can move to a newer island at some point to keep the event going. When they run out of points or room to put new buildings, the game is over. This unique take on building cities instead of managing them gives players a lot of ways to play again and again without having to sit through long, boring sessions.

Frostpunk

Metascore: 84

Frostpunk is different from other city models because it calls itself the first “society survival game.” Players don’t just choose how to build their city; they also choose what happens to the people who live there. In a world where it is winter, people start using old steam-powered technology again. The player is in charge of rebuilding the world’s last city and making sure it stays alive. In these desperate times, humanity would often get in the way of making smart choices. Because the outside world is always calling people to explore and poses a threat through the unknown.

Frostpunk is a game that combines city-building and managing a civilization. It lets players make their own rules that affect almost every part of daily life, like jobs, food, and even health care. There are hard times when decisions are important.

SimCity 4

Metascore: 84

Even though SimCity has been around for a while, SimCity 4 may have been the game that really set the standard for what city models should become in the years to come. That’s why it makes sense that such an old game would still be a fan choice. People can start terraforming as early as 2003 and then build their dream city from there.

SimCity 4 was also the first game to let players set up different zones instead of building buildings one by one. This way, players can handle different areas for residential, industrial, and commercial purposes. People who want to be mayor need to be consistent when it comes to offering public services and managing their citizens’ finances, utilities, and quality of life. Even though it’s old, SimCity 4 is still a fun city simulation game that fans will enjoy.

Farthest Frontier

Metascore: 85

Farthest Frontier is not a normal city builder game. Instead, it is a city simulator set in the simple and beautiful Middle Ages, a time period that has some of the worst risks ever. In Farthest Frontier, players start from scratch to build a medieval town, taking into account standard city-building tasks like gathering resources, processing materials, and slowly putting together settlements and buildings. Although Farthest Frontier doesn’t have a story, it makes up for it by being very difficult.

For example, Farthest Frontier swaps out the normal method for collecting and storing resources for one that wastes resources when they are stored too long. In the same way, diseases, bad weather, and even raids can make the town less strong. But along with this realistic method come equally interesting visuals and details. For example, each resident seems to have their own routine, and the houses and buildings are built in a realistic way.

Against The Storm

Metascore: 92

Unlike some other city builders, where weather adds to the fun of managing resources, Against The Storm makes rain a key mechanic. In this game, players become the Viceroy of the sassy Scorched Queen and have to make deals in her name in a world where it rains all the time. Getting the settlement’s Reputation higher before the Queen gets the most irritated is important for the game. You can do this by finishing quests (Orders) and events, exploring the map, and making workers more determined.

Unlike most city builders or 4X games, where bad things happen randomly or because of enemies. Against the Storm only has one element that players need to be ready for: rain. Along with normal defenses, players must make the most of helpful Drizzle times while also being ready for dangerous Storms. A lot of resource management is based on figuring out how to best handle these situations.