This is a comprehensive index of city-building games, sorted chronologically. Information regarding date of release, developer, platform, setting and notability is provided when available. Information regarding date of release, developer, platform, setting and notability is provided when available.
Do you like City Builder Games where you can design amazing cities, communities and settlements?
These type of games are the perfect way to express yourself and be creative, sometimes without restriction. City management games or general management games on the other hand let you manage everything, whether it’s a city, a business or any kind of system.
It is also very similar to strategy games, but the main difference is that in city builder games or management games your success is not physical survival, but more financial survival.
The main goal is to make money and reach your goals. Most city building simulators have a sandbox mode meaning you can build with an unlimited budget and don’t have to worry about balancing your finances.
These type of games also give you problems to solve, whether it is traffic related or managing your resources, it is always fun to come up with a solution. Build bigger, better and become virtually rich! Here is a list of the best City Builder Games and Management Games you can play!
What is your favorite city building game? Tell me in the comments. If you like this post, please share it with your friends.
The Best City Builder Games
1. Cities Skylines
Cities Skylines is the ultimate city builder game you can play right now.
It has so many possibilities and features for players to create their dream city.
Cities Skylines challenges the player’s management and creative skills, whether you play with money or in sandbox mode.
In the beginning of every city create you will experience the need to expand quickly and get more people to move there.
Until… traffic becomes a problem!
That is one of the main challenges in the game, to find innovative way to solve traffic and expansion problems.
Traffic management, policies, taxation, infrastructure planning, resources, city connections ect. are only a few things you’ll manage during the game.
It also has massive modding capabilities and a big community with a number of awesome DLC content, so customization is virtually unlimited.
What are you waiting for, the people want to move in.
Don’t miss the latest DLC, Industries, which is definitely one of the best!
Find it here – Industries DLC
Get building!
Buy Cities Skylines
2. ANNO 1800
ANNO 1800 is a real-time city building game and it’s the latest edition into the series.
The ANNO Series has the ultimate blend between being a city builder and a city management game while you play through some super interesting campaigns.
The setting is focused around the 1800’s of the Industrial Revolution highlighting colonial trade with a touch of Victorian Era style.
You will have to manage many different aspects to conquer ANNO 1800, like production, supply chains, trade routes, political management and keeping your people happy.
You will ultimately decide what kind of ruler you will be.
Will you be an innovator or an exploiter?
Are you a liberator or a conqueror that rules with an iron fist?
Whichever you choose, be ready for an epic journey. Enjoy this city builder in singleplayer, multiplayer and sandbox mode.
ANNO has visited a few different eras, both historical and future, each giving you a rich storyline which will give you hours of playtime.
My favourite so far was ANNO 1404, but the new ANNO 1800 will definitely be one of the best. What is your favourite?
Buy ANNO 1800
3. Tropico 6
When you are looking for a fun city builder game that is not too serious, the Tropico series might just be perfect for you.
Tropico 6 is one of the latest city building and management games for the genre, with a list of new features.
You are taking the role of “El Presidente” the mayor on your very own little island, build a community from the ground, manage resources, politics, trade and much more.
Playing the main campaigns takes you through 4 time periods all with unique ways to build your settlements:
- The Colonial era
- The World Wars era
- The Cold War era
- The Modern era
Tropico 6 is a super fun game and you can play it in a variety of ways with several outcomes by implementing different policies, making decisions based on various factors and growing your rule in across your islands.
A new feature allows you build on various small islands throughout the 4 time periods and later connect them together, which was not the case in previous titles.
Even enjoy some multiplayer city building games with up to four friends.
Will you manage to keep your people happy, balance your production and supply, grow your empire?
You are the major and the choice of how to build, manage and rule is up to you.
So go and create an economy that your virtual people will be proud of!
Buy Tropico 6
4. Banished
Banished is a city building strategy game that lets you build and manage an isolated society. You literally start with nothing except a few people to control.
The main goal of this village building game is to develop a sustaining settlement for your people to survive through the various conditions.
It sounds easy enough right, but the thing is people will die if they are not fed or warm enough in the Winter.
You should order them to build, gather, farm and mine to keep your people alive. Banished has all the seasons where you will face challenges during each. For example, in Spring and Summer you need to grow food and gather wood to build houses and have enough firewood.
During Autumn and Winter, people will die if they are not warmed from fire and starve if they run out of food. The game has a few complex systems to understand and overcome before you can really build a large town, but it’s worth every minute.
If you like a real challenge and want to build your own little settlement, Banished is a great game to play.
It’s time to gather some firewood for the Winter!
Buy Banished:
5. Surviving Mars
From the same publisher’s as Cities Skylines, Surviving Mars is another challenging builder.
It is more focused around colony building and survival the different conditions than your usual city builders. Your mission is to build a sustainable settlement on Mars and survive the challenges that is thrown at you.
Being on Mars, there are a lot of factors that can affect the way you build your city which is really fun when you start to understand what needs to happen.
Surviving Mars has a lot of exciting gameplay, challenging environments and many customization to enjoy.
If you like a good colony builder game, this will be perfect for you.
Buy Surviving Mars
6. Frostpunk
The end of our civilization as we know it came fast during the 19th Century, which was supposed to be the peak of human achievement.
Frostpunk is a survival city building game that puts you in charge of managing the last city on earth. With a great story and many different ways to play it, you are fighting to survive while its your duty to manage both the people and the infrastructure.
There are many things that plays together, from workers, resources, building strategy, politics and much more.
What decisions will you make to ensure the survival of the human race?
You must do whatever it takes, just survive!
Buy Frostpunk
7. Aven Colony
Aven Colony is a city building game for PC, Xbox and Playstation. You find yourself on Aven Prime, an alien planet several light years from earth, where you need to build a new human colony and survive the conditions.
Like many city builder games, Aven Colony has a lot of challenges in store for you to overcome like the management of resources, environmental factors and the aliens themselves. It can be quite a hard game at first, but when you get into the phase where you know how to balance everything it can be great.
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In order to keep your people alive, you need to mine resources, set up defenses and do research in order to overcome some of the challenges you may face. One moment the sun can be shining and the next moment a giant sandstorm approaches to blow everything away.
There are also a variety of different aliens that can attack your colony, from plague spores, hovering guardians and cultist airships. You can defend against attacks by building defensive buildings and do research to improve them.
With all that going on, you will also have to deal with and balance the morale of the people in your colony, as they will hold elections and can vote you out if you don’t take care of their needs. These can be things like crime, food supplies, living conditions, social policies and more.
There are also the option to expand your colony into sub-colonies and grow your population. That is a whole other challenge on it’s own.
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Aven Colony can be really challenging at times, but offers you the satisfaction when you keep going.
Go save your people and build your settlement on a totally unknown planet.
Buy Aven Colony
8. Life is Feudal: Forest Village
Life is Feudal: Forest Village is extremely similar to Banished I listed earlier, just with a few more advanced features like the management systems and graphical enhancements.
The key is to build your settlement from nothing with a few peasants, by gathering, harvesting, mining and a lot more.
The setting is in the medieval time with a realistic world, famine, disease and harsh winters. The game has a dynamic ecosystem with changing weather and the world you play on is randomly generated which gives you a unique experience for every town you build.
Life is Feudal is a great game to relax and not take everything too serious, so do you have what it takes to build your own medieval settlement?
Mac Builders & Design
Buy Life is Feudal: Forest Village
9. Rise of Industry
Rise of Industry is a complex strategy game in which you are the CEO of your own blossoming company – building an industrial empire that produces and delivers essential products to a growing population
Gather resources by building farms, mines, oil and gas wells and many more.
From the most basic materials there will be a wide range of products you can manufacture and ship to towns.
Keep the economy moving and keep the masses’ needs fulfilled.
Facilitate the transportation of both raw and finished products at every stage of production with the help of roadways, trucks, trains, ships, and even zeppelins.
Each mode of travel has its own advantages and drawbacks, and it’s up to you to sort the logistic puzzle.
Rise of Industry is complex enough to keep you entertained for hours and the development team seem to be very active and trustworthy.
So if you love complex strategy game and building your own successful business sounds good then Rise of Industry is a game for you!
Buy Rise of Industry
10. Simcity Complete Edition
Buy Simcity Complete Edition
11. Stonehearth
Buy Stonehearth
12. Kingdoms and Castles
Buy Kingdoms and Castles
13. Urban Empire
Buy Urban Empire
14. Cities in Motion 2
Buy Cities in Motion 2
Conclusion
What is your favorite city builder game?
Did I miss one?
Share it in the comments!
Now that you have a long list of great city builder games to choose from, you can be sure to have hours of fun! I listed the best city simulation games you can still play in 2019.
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