Playing city-building games almost never ends quickly. Getting immersed in building entire structures and catering to the residents makes for long sessions. Many city-building games have mechanics that go even deeper, with different situations sparking based on things like politics and the residents' happiness.
TheNintendo Switchis great for long gaming sessions, since you can take it anywhere with you to play. Not only do long rides not feel as long, but being outside while playing can give you a lot of inspiration for your own cities while you build them.
Updated July 29, 2025 by Jacqueline Zalace:City-building games can be played endlessly, with each run looking a bit different. Of course, we understand the appear of this genre, so we’ve added a few more city-building games that you can play right on your Nintendo Switch.
Forget about city-building; what about building around a whole planet? Terraformers is a turn-based building game that lets you start from scratch on the planet of Mars. There are different characters, each one taking turns to build new structures, develop established ones, and discover areas that will be either useful or simply beautiful to look at.
As your civilization grows, so will your responsibilities, so you’ll have to manage the population’s demands for it to flourish. Along with the things you construct, the planet has its own natural landmarks that you can bring to their full potential, replace with your own thing, or just ignore. And, since the planet’s landscape is procedurally generated, it’s a fresh start every time.
If you’re looking for something a little bit different while still getting some building done, Dorfromantik mixes village building with some strategy. The land and structures come in the form of tiles, and how you decide to put them together raises or lowers your overall score. You also get quests from certain objects within the tiles that, when completed, give you more tiles to use.
As long as you have tiles, you’re able to keep playing and raising your score. The further you get, the more tile types and colors you unlock. Dorfromantik offers some challenge in its puzzle-like gameplay, but it’s not an intense game by any means. Its art style and atmosphere make for a soothing experience, so you can kick back, relax, and combine some tiles.
12Project Highrise
In Project Highrise, you’re an architect who’s in charge of pretty much every nook and cranny of buildings, along with the happiness of the people living in them. You get to decide the kinds of buildings you build, from offices to restaurants. The people who come with them act differently from each other, giving more weight to your building decisions.
And if you’d rather leave the creativity to the game, there’s a campaign mode that provides you with different instructions to follow for building your skyscrapers. Balance constructing, keeping tenants satisfied, and procuring funds to make your buildings as good as they can be.
Just because Prison Architect’s art style is simple doesn’t mean its gameplay is. Being in charge of a prison filled with some of the hardest criminals means you’ll have to stay vigilant if you want to keep them all contained while taking care of their needs. The prison has to be reinforced, but doing so incorrectly can result in a variety of hazards or even a prison riot.
There are also a few other fun modes, including an Escape Mode where you’re able to be in the prisoners' shoes and attempt your own escape from a maximum security prison. The game has so much to do that you can spend hours in just one round.
Technically, you can build more than just cities in Minecraft. It’s the sort of game where the sky really is the limit. Its open-world nature means you get a lot more variety than most other city-building games in terms of locations, building materials, and designs.
Different resources you mine and gather allow you to do more things, and you may even have pets to take care of, like cats, chickens, and pigs. Some creatures will attempt to harm you at night, though, sobeing well-equipped to defend against themis imperative. One of the major pulls of Minecraft is that it can be as chill or chaotic as you want it to be,especially when you get friends involved.
The more expansive city-building games are, the better. Cities: Skylines is huge, but also incredibly intricate, just like real modern cities. It’s not just about making the infrastructure look good; you also have to think about the basic needs of your citizens. Balancing aspects like water, electricity, and healthcare is your job as your city’s mayor.
You also have to manage the traffic, which the game’s day and night cycles realistically affect. Needless to say, Cities: Skylinesgoes quite in-depth with the city-buildingand is a must-try if you like detail and a challenge.
You can also check out Cities: Skylines 2 if you have a PC (as it’s not available on Switch yet). There is not as much polished content in this one, but it can still be fun.
City-building games can be relaxing for a lot of people, but if you’re looking for something with a little more kick, Civilization 6 has that. You aren’t just playing by yourself; you’re up against the AI in a turn-based game of strategy.You start with a small group, but the goal is to eventually expand that group to the entire world.
You makeboth enemies and allies in this game, and the more progress you make, the smarter the world around you becomes. As you build around you, it becomes rich with different groups with their own ways of doing things. How you adjust your territory’s policies affects how your people and other territories react to you.
Townscraper is probably the ultimate low-stakes city-building game. If the pressure of managing everything in your city tends to overwhelm you, you don’t have to worry about that with this game. There’s zero urgency here, only blocks. You place those blocks into the water and watch them become buildings. How you place them determines what buildings they become.
Of course, this isn’t a game you play if you want tension and challenge. It’s a tranquil experience that you can keep going for as long as you want, coupled with eye-catching, colorful art. Townscraper is particularly good if you need something to keep your hands busy while idle.
Islanders is a simple, relaxing game that works a little differently from other city builders. Instead of using resources to build things on islands, you get a set number of those structures already in your inventory. How you place them determines how many points you get. For example, placing a fountain in a park or near a house nets you some points.
It starts off easy and becomes more challenging as you unlock more objects to place. There are different kinds of islands, like desert-like or snow-filled ones, that have different items and point distributions. The game is over once you have no more objects in your inventory, so thinking about where to place things is essential to keeping the game going.
There’s a lot of fun to be had in Tropico 6 because it lets you be as kind or nefarious as you want to be when creating your own paradise. You get your own archipelago to either make the hottest tourist attraction or tear down and build a whole new city from the ground up.
Political management is also important in this game, and you have to keep your residents happy—or silence the ones who aren’t, whichever you prefer. you’re able to literally steal the seven wonders of the world for your own city and make grand speeches on your balcony, so you can live out your cartoon villain fantasy while building the best place to rule over.
