Simcity 2000 on GOG is the DOS version, not the Windows version, and it is major suckage. I've uninstalled and reinstalled several times and mine is still missing one of the densities - I forget which one, but of the 3 densities (light, medium, heavy) there are only 2. It's broken.

Look at Simcity 3000 instead. It runs fine on my Win7 machine.

And I have thus far avoided Settlers because it is my understanding these include a combat system. I would much rather not bother with combat.

Banished was too flawed for me. I found it just frustrating, not fun. And it wasn't the stupidly unbalanced early game that was the issue. It was not being able to place buildings and fields unless the land is totally 100% flat - and then generating maps with tons of hills and mountains. Freakin' annoying, LOL!

As someone who owned this back in the day, here's a surprise: There are only two densities. Triple density came in 3000 and later. I still have the manual too. I'm glad you tried reinstalling it as if that would magically change what file you were dowinloading. Perseverance in the face of the same result rather than consulting documentation is always welcome.

For a gentle city builder with no combat (well.. I believe you can get rebels but I never have yet when I've played it) then I'd recommend Tropico too. It's not too tough and there are sandbox modes where you can turn off any bad stuff and give your self unlimited money if you really want.

Minecraft

Then build your own city - that's fun... trust me! Just don't let creepers in.

What about some Theme Park, Theme Hospital or Rollercoaster Tycoon, even if they are more park builder than city builder ? Or even the Populous saga ?

Same as Falci said. Skylines is a slow game to play. You need to build up your housing, industry and marketing zones slowly and supply them with needed services. Don't forget to connect the utilites right, etc. Every start in Skylines is hard but you need to be patient and wait until you start getting profits from upgraded zones, etc.

Just check some gameplays. I was the same in the beginning when I wanted to do everything at once which you can't since you will bankrupt your city budget soon. Very important is how you plan you infrastructure aka roads so that as many zones as it can be get access to service buildings.

Eitherway hope you revisit it soon and give it another shot.


As for the OP - do try Lethis: Path of Progress - a good game that got a new update not long ago.

Took a quick look at Micropolis and the install requirements seem a bit... restrictive... Doesn't really help that I'm running an AMD processor, I suppose. And that I'm running Windows instead of Linux

As someone who STILL owns the Windows version of this on disk, I'm here to tell you there WERE three densities in that version. Also the associated manual that you download with 2k also states there are three densities. Maybe there weren't in the DOS version, which I never owned. But there were in the Windows version.

In either case, the version available on GOG of 2k is far inferior to the 3k version.

...Simcity 3000 and 2000 are entirely different games. This is 3000. This is 2000. Not to mention, I also have the 3000 manual somewhere.

The SimCity 2000 manual I distinctly recall using pictures from the Mac version because they specifically point that out.

Well, there's Emperor: Rise of the middle kingdom, which is basically Pharaoh/Zeus/Caesar but in China, and which is unfortunately not on gog or anywhere for some weird reason.

Then there's Tropico 4 which is great. The whole series is tons of fun but I like 4 the most.
Or you can try Space colony in which you're not exactly building a city but it's a fun game.

They're really not that different as far as the mechanics go. And again - regardless - the 2k version is DOS only and does not work the way it is supposed to. And AGAIN again - the 3k version (which IS a windows version) - is much better than the older DOS version that is the only version of 2K available on GOG.

It really doesn't matter how different anyone thinks the 2 games are or are not. One works well on modern Windows machines and one is so bad it is unplayable.