The brand new gameplay trailer for ‘Citystate Metropolis’ has arrived, and city-builder fans are paying attention. With Colossal Order and Paradox Interactive still recovering from Cities: Skylines II’s messy launch, this ambitious indie project could be the game that makes them sweat. History has a habit of repeating itself in this genre. The catastrophic 2013 SimCity left a crater so large that Cities: Skylines swooped in to dominate the space. Now, if ‘Citystate Metropolis’ can deliver on the promise of its trailer, we might be witnessing the start of another tectonic shift in city-building history.
A New Approach to Building Cities
Developed by solo creator Andy Sztark, ‘Citystate Metropolis’ sets itself apart by ditching rigid grids and stat-driven sliders. Instead, it offers hands-on tools that let you shape cities like an urban planner. Buildings are procedurally generated, but only after you draw their footprints, setbacks, floor counts and even parking spaces. That gives neighbourhoods an organic, player-defined look.
This isn’t just about aesthetics. Every planning decision has consequences. Cheap, dense housing lowers costs and boosts social mobility, while luxury eco-builds raise land values and attract wealthy investors. The very regulations you impose don’t just define the skyline, they shape the socioeconomic character of your city. Income disparity, gentrification and urban decay aren’t background flavour text here; they’re part of the core simulation.
At its heart, the game is powered by a crowd-based model rather than the agent-based systems used in Cities: Skylines. That is a big deal. It allows realistic populations in the millions without choking performance or forcing endless micro-management. Instead of babysitting individuals, you are shaping systems. The game simulates households and buildings rather than commuters getting stuck at traffic lights, keeping the focus firmly on how cities actually evolve.
Roles for Every Player
Sztark has framed the game around three creative identities:
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The Architect: Total control over buildings, from height and width to colour, shape and purpose. With 40 road types, a park editor and building customisation tools, it offers unparalleled freedom to design a city that looks exactly how you imagine.
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The Governor: Behind the beauty, there is the business of governance. Will you grow fast with cheap, unregulated housing, or chase tax revenue through controlled gentrification? Every policy decision has ripple effects. Balancing budgets, keeping citizens happy and managing long-term growth will test your political instincts.
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The World Builder: The map editor blends real-world topography with procedural generation, producing vast 67km² maps. Rivers flow with dynamic water simulation, forests sprout with a drag of the mouse, and entire terrains can be reshaped in seconds. It is a true sandbox, offering thousands of unique and realistic landscapes.
A More Human Simulation
One of the more intriguing aspects of ‘Citystate Metropolis’ is its focus on socioeconomic realism. Most city-builders abstract things like poverty, segregation or social mobility into vague modifiers. Here, they are part of the foundation. Education affects income. Policies influence inequality. Neighbourhood design impacts who can live where. It is a vision of the genre that is not just about shiny skyscrapers but about the lived experience of your virtual citizens.
This has been a personal mission for Sztark. In his February 2025 dev blog, he explained how he wanted to move away from the “spreadsheet approach” of his earlier titles and build interactive, player-centric systems. That meant longer development times, since terrain, roads and buildings all had to be rebuilt from scratch with expandability and long-term support in mind.
One Man vs the Giants
Perhaps the most astonishing part of all this? ‘Citystate Metropolis’ is not being built by a huge studio backed by millions in funding. It is the work of a single developer. While Paradox and Colossal Order have whole teams, offices and marketing budgets, Andy Sztark is taking them on alone, and judging by this trailer, he might just pull it off.
That is no small feat. Each map is around 67 square kilometres, six times larger than Citystate II. The simulation can support hundreds of thousands of households at once, with GPU-assisted optimisation keeping things smooth. Road systems, terrain generation, procedural architecture — every part has been reimagined and rebuilt from scratch. For one developer to achieve this scope is remarkable, and it is already giving fans hope that the city-builder crown might not stay with the genre’s current rulers for much longer.
Why This Matters
For fans of the genre, ‘Citystate Metropolis’ feels like a throwback and a leap forward at the same time. It takes inspiration from the city-builders of the early 2000s, when experimentation and simulation depth went hand-in-hand, but layers in modern tools and technical muscle.
If the trailer is any indication, this is not just another skyline simulator. It is a game where creativity, governance and social dynamics are inseparable. And if it really can deliver smooth performance with populations in the millions, from a solo developer no less, then Cities: Skylines may finally have a genuine rival on its hands.
‘Citystate Metropolis’ launches into Early Access on Steam in Q1 2026. You can wishlist it now on Steam
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