I've always been a big fan of the Anno series, pretty much played all of them!
Recently tried the Steamworld Build demo, and it was great. Looking for something to scratch the itch until release though. I've heard Farthest Frontier is good, any opinions on that, or other recommendation?
I've been a big fan of cities: skylines, but, big but here, it's kinda janky. That being said there's great mods out there for it. The biggest issue I always run into is managing traffic, but I have also gotten better at managing the stock traffic, it's kind of a fun challenge. Cities: Skylines 2 is supposed to be coming out at some point, but I don't know an exact date. I'll also say I got the game free from epic so fee is always the right price.
The problem I have with this game is there's no challenge. I like games where losing happens frequently. I can't be entertained without challenge. This, to me, falls under the class of sandbox games which just don't engage me. Too many of these games focus on graphics and flavor without really nailing down the core simulation. I'd rather manage a tiny town with deep simulation and high difficulty than paint a metropolis that feels empty to me.
I would love a city builder that was truly challenging. I don't care to spend hours painting my beautiful city for screenshots.
It would be great if there was a middle ground between city skylines and mini motorways. Something where the city you build is the result of the constraints imposed on you.
Mini motorways offers a challenge, but is too simple (and too easy to cheese). City skylines is complex, but rather pointless. You could self impose challenges, but what’s the fun with that?
Maybe there’s a mod, but I haven’t looked into it.
Tropico 6 is the newest and the most joke-like, but all of them are extremely tongue-in-cheek. The addition of Carmen Sandiego-like "Steal the Whitehouse with Hackers" mechanic is going a bit too far with the joke IMO, but there is a solid city-builder here.
Tropico is somewhere between Sims and Sim City: a "Large" Tropico is ~10,000 people, and every person has their food/rest/religion/job/entertainment/political scores tracked individually (much like in Sims where food/hygine/etc. etc. scores are tracked). You cannot control anyone on the island except "El Presidente". But you do have orders that probably get followed, such as arrests, assassinations and the like.
If you lose an election, you instantly lose the game. If you piss off "the Superpowers", you instantly lose the game (In earlier games, USA and Soviet Union are the superpowers. In Tropico 6, the superpowers change from age-to-age).
I'd say that Tropico is "unstable" after reaching high populations. Its more designed as a scenario where you play until the point of instability, and then you end your save. Its still many months of real-life gameplay before you reach unstable points, but its really designed to play different scenarios rather than perfecting a singular island chain. Think "Roller-coaster Tycoon", or "Ceasar 3", or Cleopatra.
Which btw: Cesar 3 and Cleopatra are also excellent citybuilders, albeit aimed towards the "scenario" slant rather than the infinite slant... and also 20+ years old. But these oldies are a goodie for a good reason.
I vouch for Tropico! Tropico 4 is my favorite. It captures the original spirit of the series but feels modern enough that it's not difficult to play mechanically. There's fun and rewarding scenarios to play through and just sandbox mode if that's more your speed.
Tropico 4 definitely had some instability problems with regards to traffic.
Because Tropico 4's traffic was somewhat realistically modeled, you'd grow and grow until your roads got congested, and then your entire island collapses economically (and you'll likely be deposed as a leader, or piss off the Americans / Soviets enough that they invade and you lose since your politics with them likely relied upon trade deals that you're failing). And unlike Cities: Skylines (or Tropico 5/6), there weren't as many options for fixing (or preventing) traffic problems.
But if we ignore the traffic problems with very-late state islands, Tropico 4 is probably my favorite too.
Against the Storm has you play the most challenging part of industry builders - starting up and getting the production lines going - but gives you a limited selection of what buildings to build and a ticking timer to keep the pressure on.
Not for people who want to sit back and watch their city flourish, but if you really enjoy the process of scrambling to set up production lines to meet the needs of your people (and I do), then I highly recommend it.
Cities: Skylines is a great game, although traffic can be a struggle to master.
I mentioned Timberborn in a recent conversation about colony sims, but I'd consider it a fun city builder as well. It's in early access and has received regular updates, and imo it's already worth the money with what's currently available.
Personally the traffic control is my favorite part of City Skylines. The second one is set to come out later this year as well, really looking forward to that.
Timberborn is definitely worth the money, it's like a voxel city builder, really great concept... Plus it's adorable beaver societies... Who doesn't want to be a beaver overlord?
Not a game recommendation, but I follow Nookrium on YouTube and he jumps through tons of games (and puts the genre in the titles), most of which are small indie builder/strategy games, so he may have some in his catalogue of videos that you'd dig
I picked up Kingdoms and Castles recently. It's pretty fun, in the vein of the old Caesar/Zeus/Emporer games where you can see your workers and resources moving between points. Definitely scratches that classic itch for me.
There's some great ones that have more of a survival aspect:
Surviving Mars
Made by Haemimont, the original creators of the Tropico series. You build colonies on mars with near-future level technology (at first). The "cities" you build are large, modular dome structures that you place on the map. Within each dome you place the individual buildings that colonists need to live. Your first domes will start off holding just a few dozen colonists or so each; however you can connect domes together so they can share resources and over time you can build larger and larger domes. The largest domes can hold hundreds of colonists. This game also has sophisticated resource management mechanics. You might have to try a few colonies before you get all the basics down. If you're not able to produce all necessary resources, you'll experience systematic/ripple effect failures as one problem leads to another. For example, if you're not producing enough water, your people will eventually die of thirst, but you'll also have trouble producing rocket fuel which is made from water, no rocket fuel means no resupplying from earth. Finally, the game has a technology "Breakthrough" system. Breakthroughs are unique technologies that you will discover on each different map. This ensures that each of your colonies will have some technological variation and this greatly enhances the game's replay-ability.
DLC recommendation(s): Green Planet (100% a must have) and Space Race
Frostpunk
A post-apocalyptic, survival city builder set in a steampunk earth that is experiencing the rapid onset of a new ice age. You use streampunk technology to help your city survive the brutally cold weather. There are also resource management aspects in this game, much like Surviving Mars, and the game's base difficulty is quite challenging to begin with; so again, you may have to make several attempts before you have a successful city. You play as the city's Authoritarian leader and have the option to run the place as ethically or unethically as you please. Will you build a utopia in the cold? When there are labor shortage will you use child labor? Will you allow children to only work safe jobs, or send them to the mines? When there are food shortages, will you resort to even more drastic measures? The game ships with several great scenarios these days, but I would recommend at least one DLC (see below). This game shows you a brutal, but beautiful streampunk world. It's lovingly and masterfully crafted to feel real. This game more than almost any other made me actually question my own morality after making some of the decisions you're forced into during play. A final note, the music is absolutely sublime. The first scenario has a... boss fight... of sorts and the music during this final stage of the scenario will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up.
Not sure what subgenre it would be, but something like the Anno series, where the main focus is on building city / supply lines. Less difficult / complex would be good, and military is fine, as long as not the main focus (e.g. more RTS than city builder).
Anno is very genre-crossy, that's part of its strength. It's pretty one-of-a-kind afaik. Tropico is probably going to get the closest.
If you want to branch out a little bit, I'd def look into Cities: Skylines as the real heavyweight in the entire city genre, and Going Medieval as a slimmer, smaller scale colony-builder type, in the Rimworld vein.
Workers and Resources is a great city builder/industry builder with a different focus to most. You're in charge of a socialist republic in the eastern bloc. The economy works differently and there is a lot more focus on... workers... and resources. There are also wildly varying difficulty levels so it can be as simple or complex as you want it to be.
Not sure exactly what you’re looking for, but Captain of Industry has a bit of city builder mixed with production chain stuff. Cities Skylines is pretty good as a builder/management game. Banished is one I had a lot of fun with. Timberborn has come a long way, though it’s still in Early Access. Could even look at something like Surviving the Aftermath or Endzone: A world Apart for something with a more survival/post apocalyptic feel.
Thanks for all the suggestions everyone, keeping them coming! Gives me a good list to look through, and also reminds me of some of my old favorites like Caesar 3! 😁
If you like Anno and/or Banished, you should check out Kingdoms Reborn. It's similar to Banished, but is still under development and has multiplayer! It was basically the only game of it's kind that had multi that I could find.