CitySim

CitySim - The Rules

CitySim puts you in charge of a hamlet where a highway crosses Main Street. As mayor you decide where homes, shops, factories and offices may be built, lay the streets, supply electricity and services, and keep the city’s books balanced. Residents and businesses do the actual building, but only where you have zoned land and only when there is demand for it.

The four demand bars at the top of the screen are your zoning indicators: Residential, Commercial, Industrial and High tech. A bar above the line means builders want more of that zone; below the line means there is already too much. Zoned lots also carry badges when they cannot grow: no road within two tiles, no connection to the highway, no power, or land too cheap for the density you chose.

Every week the city collects property and business taxes, state aid and electricity sales, and pays its five departments (streets, schools, public safety, parks and sanitation, City Hall), its power plants, its debts and the recurring commitments you agreed to. You can change the tax rates and each department’s funding, issue bonds, repay debt early and end commitments the city can no longer afford. If the cash runs out, the bank lends at a high rate, and too much of that debt forces austerity on every department.

Requests arrive in your inbox: programs, contracts, emergencies and opportunities. Each choice shows its costs and effects before you decide. As the city grows you unlock four special rewards - the Mayor’s House at 2,000 residents, a new City Hall at 5,000, a Statue at 10,000 and a Stadium at 15,000 - and you collect keepsakes, mementos of memorable moments in office.

There is an election every four years, and you need half of the vote to stay in office. Approval depends on taxes, services, jobs, rents, pollution, power cuts, debt and your decisions; the Approval panel shows each cause for low, middle and high income households. If you lose, you can start a new city or keep governing without elections. The game has no final goal: build the city you want and stay in office long enough to see it.

CitySim - How to Play

Choose a tool in the toolbar, then click or drag on the map: drag a rectangle to zone land or to bulldoze, drag a line to build a street, click to place a power plant, a service building or a reward. With the Inspect tool, click a lot to see its details and drag to move the map; the right mouse button moves the map with any tool and the mouse wheel zooms.

Keyboard: the arrow keys or W, A, S and D move the map, + and - zoom, the space bar pauses and resumes, 1, 2 and 3 set the game speed and Esc returns to the Inspect tool. On a phone or a tablet, drag with Inspect to move the map, and use two fingers to move and pinch to zoom while another tool is selected.

The buttons next to the tools open the data views (land value, pollution, population, jobs, power and service coverage), the budget, the graphs, the inbox and your keepsakes. Click the cash to open the budget, the approval rating to see why voters feel the way they do, and the demand bars for the zoning indicators. The city is saved in your browser automatically.