I've seen a lot of fancy full realistic 3d simulation games this past decade, but they can't hold a candle to a well thought out 2d simulation with solid controls.

Take a look Parkitect. It's very much a modern RCT, complete with grid layout. As a fan of RCT1/2, I found it very enjoyable.

I have mixed feelings about that one. The building is much better than RCT (1-3, the ones that I've played) both coasters and buildings, however I don't like the art style at all and the terrain is mostly flat and much less interesting. Also the additional goods movement and service building hiding aspects that they added somewhat detract from the fun in my opinion. In the first RCT only the entrance (and possibly exit, I don't remember) had to be above ground, so with a bit of coaxing you could build rides that are underground except for a hole above the entrance, which was neat. Also, unlike RCT3, Parkitect doesn't let you move the camera to a path view (grid layout and isometric view are not really related), which is something I like to do.

One thing RCT does better than other sim games I've played is having a ton of customization options (Parkitect does this too). I like Timberborn also and wish it would have more customization possibilities like the RCT games. There are some limitations in the RCT games, like setting up a free monorail system doesn't cause anyone to use it to get to the next ride they are heading to, but in terms of decorations there is quite a bit you can do with it.

I don’t think the original RCT would let you build underground at all? Seem to recall that starting (or becoming practical?) from RCT2 onwards.

You could definitely build underground in the original game.

I only ever had the original one when growing up and did stuff underground a fair bit. One of the early campaign parks came with a bunch of rides and stuff underground off the bat.

I think there were some practical changes to make it a bit easier in RCT2, but it was never hard.

Original RCT most definitely had underground building, both for paths and attractions. I think 1 or 2 parks in the 'campaign' was even centered about being mostly underground.

Nice, this seems very much like what I was talking about. I will keep an eye on it, thanks.

Check out 'Against the Storm' my friend!

I played about 80h of that game and you bringing it up in this context is quiet strange. I mean is not even a city builder...? The whole stick is that it's rogue-like and each game lasts at most 30-40 minutes, which is antithetical to the game loop of building a city

Sorry I should have elaborated, but I was on my phone and I wanted to make sure parent poster didn't miss out since I like that game that much.

He likes building games that use an isometric view and simple grid so I figured Against the Storm is a nice modern option although I can see why one would dislike it because of the roguelike elements.

> I mean is not even a city builder...?

What defines a city builder? Steam describes it as one. Game description: A dark fantasy city builder where you must rebuild civilization in the face of apocalyptic rains...

Yeah, the game loop seams quite different, but the game looks interesting regardless. I'm putting it on my wishlist. Thanks for the recommendation.

Steam tags are often questionable.

I'd consider a city builder to actually... Build a city.

Against the storm is more of a strategy game, with caveat that your strategy needs to center around the pure chance RNG for what building you're allowed to unlock.

It’s one of the big reasons why Satisfactory was never quite as, well…satisfying as Factorio for me.

You can hold down a key (Ctrl I think) to force snapping to the "world grid" now. That makes everything you place line up even halfway across the map.

Or just place foundations and build on top of that

The world grid snapping is only for foundations. But it allows you to have separate factories far away that eventually meet nicely together once expanded to meet.

The later games that were 3D were dreadful in comparison. I don't know why, some people really enjoy them but if you've played these old classics you can never really understand how they made 3D so bad.