/vr/ - Retro Games

>>1755269
Most of the basic buildings are built automatically by the game's AI, but it's your job to place specific kinds of buildings (offices, entertainment, &c.) wherever you feel there'll be the most economic benefit, either in bringing up real-estate values or simply maximizing profit from subsidies. So there's definitely an active role in building a city; just remember, the transit system you build takes priority, even though trains themselves take a long time to make a profit in any game. If money's an issue for you, try tinkering around in sandbox until you understand the interface and can get to a point where placing buildings is both practical and enjoyable alongside the rest of the game.

>>1755214
My quick and dirty suggestion is to check out Artdink's product page (https://www.artdink.co.jp/products/)) and see if there's anything you'd like to play. I'm guessing that, since this is a city-builder general we're posting in, you want more of Artdink's sim games. The Tokio series of games is much closer in concept to SimCity, albeit in a sci-fi setting that has limited geography to work with (making it more about urban planning than SimCity 4's terraforming). Of course, only A-Train's gotten English translations, so that's out of the ballpark for now.

Other Artdink stuff worth playing, in general: Lunatic Dawn series (Western-style CRPGs), How Many Robot games (AI-centric puzzle-sims), Carnage Heart/EXA (amazing series of robot-battling sims based around programming your bots), The Atlas/Neo Atlas (historical exploration sims), Far Side of the Moon (space strategy sim, wish this was translated).