Winter being the season par excellence for “cocooning”, why not take the opportunity to build the house, the city or even the universe of your dreams?
Let’s start with the universe with the last “Anno 2205”, the sixth title of a very good franchise. After having developed the blue planet, you go towards the Moon to establish bases there. A planning game, this “Anno 2205” is distinguished by the quantity of buildings, the quality of the graphics and the objects – including flying cars – which inhabit your virtual home. And fans of this Ubisoft franchise can immerse themselves in the 1800s with the sumptuous “Anno 1800” and its many expansion packs, including … the holiday one.
A little less far in the future, but further in space, “Imagine Earth” transports you to unknown worlds. As an employee of a small company, you must colonize new planets and create a pleasant environment. You will also have to make sure that the corporations that already have control over natural resources do not overshadow you too much.
Now is the time to put our feet back on Earth. The first destination is “Minecraft”, a game that offers a completely free mode in which you can, thanks to the characteristic blocks of the title, build what you want, the way you want. To give you an idea of the possibilities, know that Denmark, through its agency Geodata, has recreated the country in its entirety there and that Reporters Without Borders has put online a library containing works censored in various countries around the world.
If you prefer to be guided in your adventures or to have fun with real places, “Cities in Motion” offers you the possibility to improve the transport network of Vienna, Berlin, Helsinki or Amsterdam for 100 years, from 1920 to 2020. Expansions offer to transport you to Tokyo, Munich, Cologne or Leipzig, and even London, San Francisco and New York. In the same genre, but with a very different game dynamic, “Cities Skyline” takes you out of metropolises, expansion packs being available for natural parks and even green cities.
Still on the same principle, but with a nice “twist”, here is “Banished” (which literally means “Banned”). You control a group of people who have been banned and have to start their life over. To develop your village, you must use your imagination, creativity and face the elements and nature, because remember that you only have a cart with provisions.
Fed up with planets and cities, but you feel like an owner? Here is “Project Highrise” in which you have to manage buildings all over the world. Tokyo, London, Las Vegas, Berlin or Miami await you.
If you just want to be back in the comfort of your own home, without having to deal with anything, head over to Animal Crossing Pocket Camp for the phone. In the middle of nature, you can build your camp by choosing among the thousand objects and the hundreds of clothes and accessories.
Still for the phone, “Design Home” allows you to have fun making the rooms of a house all the more attractive than the others. On the side of “Home Design Story”, the graphics are more childish and it is possible to build a house (or a castle) in its entirety.
And finally, there’s a game we haven’t talked about yet, but which is establishing itself as the perfect destination to meet all of your virtual living needs. It is obviously about “The Sims”, the reference in the matter. The “Cottage Living” expansion for “The Sims 4” will take you to the countryside where you can build yourself an adorable farmhouse.
The week’s waste of (useful) time
We were talking to you last week about black and white games. How not to succumb to “Calvino Noir”? Because this film noir-like title, in which you control three characters, invites you to discover magnificent places from the 1930s as you explore. The dream of any aspiring architect!
The link book
“Anno 2205”: https://store.steampowered.com/app/375910/Anno_2205/ for Windows via Steam
“Anno 1800”: https://www.ubisoft.com/fr-ca/game/anno/1800 for Windows
“Imagine Earth”: https://store.steampowered.com/app/280720/Imagine_Earth/ for Windows via Steam
“Imagine Earth”: https://www.xbox.com/en-us/games/store/imagine-earth/9nplw3tfsvh0 for Xbox One and Xbox Series X | S
“Minecraft”: https://www.minecraft.net/ for Windows, macOS and Linux
“Cities in Motion”: https://www.paradoxplaza.com/cities-in-motion-collection/CMCM01CSK0000001.html for Windows and macOS
“Cities Skyline”: https://www.citiesskylines.com/ for Windows, Xbox One, PS4 and Nintendo Switch
“Banished”: https://shiningrocksoftware.com/game/ for Windows
“Project Highrise”: https://www.kasedogames.com/projecthighrise for Windows
“Animal Crossing Pocket Camp”: https://ac-pocketcamp.com/en-US for iOS and Android
“Design Home”: https://www.glu.com/games/design-home/ for iOS and Android
“Home Design Story”: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/home-design-story/id547861844 for iPad
“The Sims”: https://www.ea.com/games/the-sims for Windows, macOS, PS4, Nintendo Wii, Xbox One, iOS and Android
“Calvino Noir”: https://mcro.org/calvinonoir/ for Windows, iOS and PS4