Skip to main content
PC Gamer PC Gamer THE GLOBAL AUTHORITY ON PC GAMES
UK EditionUK US EditionUS CA EditionCanada AU EditionAustralia
Sign in
  • View Profile
  • Sign out
  • Black Friday
  • Games
  • Hardware
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Guides
  • Video
  • Forum
  • More
    • PC Gaming Show
    • Software
    • Movies & TV
    • Codes
    • Coupons
    • Magazine
    • Newsletter
    • Affiliate links
    • Meet the team
    • Community guidelines
    • About PC Gamer
PC Gamer Magazine Subscription
PC Gamer Magazine Subscription
Why subscribe?
  • Subscribe to the world's #1 PC gaming mag
  • Try a single issue or save on a subscription
  • Issues delivered straight to your door or device
From$32.49
Subscribe now
Don't miss these
A low-res city
City Builder This 'brutally honest' city builder features greedy landlords, cutthroat corporations, and a newspaper that gives you 'a constant reminder that your citizens' bad luck is perhaps your fault'
An image of a 3D map of Manhattan, including highlighted subway routes.
City Builder The sleeper hit of the Fall might be this mad lad's hyper realistic traffic management sim that uses real census data and a 'distance-based gravity model' to produce millions of NPC commuters
Windmills
City Builder Cities: Skylines 2 latest region pack heads to the Netherlands, 'the land of windmills, clogs, and stroopwafel,' and includes new hospitals, fire stations, and hyperrealistic cemeteries
Citizens on a first date in Cities: Skylines 2
City Builder After the bungled launch of Cities: Skylines 2, Paradox Interactive and Colossal Order part ways as development moves to a new studio
A medieval city
City Builder Farthest Frontier review: Crate Entertainment's survival city builder is both challenging and chill
A Mediterranean city
City Builder September is absolutely stacked with city builders: Here's 8 releasing this month
A row of parked bikes lines a pavement in Cities: Skylines 2
City Builder Cities: Skylines 2's bicycle update adds a lot more than just bikes, as Colossal Order prepares to hand over development to a new studio
Cities: Skylines 2 Bridges and Ports expansion screenshot - drawbridge standing open
Sim After more than a year of delays, Cities: Skylines 2's big Bridges and Ports expansion is finally almost here
Humus walking around
Strategy I jumped into the management god game Sintopia, only to have all my devil workers go on strike because I spent too much money on punishing sinners
Two children on ridge overlooking futuristic arcology colony city.
City Builder 'The human body is equivalent in mass to 50,000 crickets': In city builder Generation Exile, humanity's last hope for sustenance is cricket mush
A flying turtle with a pallet of packages strapped to its back flies alongisde a gigantic tower of buildings.
Strategy Stario: Haven Tower is yet another vertical city-builder, but this one has magic, space whales and flying delivery turtles
A city shooting out flames in Monsters Are Coming.
Roguelike This brilliantly strategic roguelike challenges you to build a whole city on wheels and keep it one step ahead of an unending horde of monsters
A medieval town
City Builder One of my favorite survival city builders is leaving early access this month, so here's your chance to buy it before the price goes up
Crusader Kings 3: Corornations key art - dude getting coronationed
Strategy Paradox apologizes for botching yet another DLC release: 'It hurts so much when we f**k up like this'
D-topia screenshot
Puzzle D-topia is about a city where 'life is curated by artificial intelligence to maximize happiness,' which actually sounds like something the tech industry is on the verge of pitching
Popular
  • Black Friday Live!
  • Best PC gear
  • Arc Raiders
  • PC Gaming Show
  • Quizzes
  1. Games
  2. Sim
  3. Cities: Skylines

The worst places to live in Cities: Skylines

Features
By Christopher Livingston published 6 April 2015

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

City of Fright

City of Fright

We've seen some of the best things the players of Cities: Skylines have to offer, but not every city is a paradise on earth. We scoured the game's Steam community page and subreddit to find cities run by most dubious and irresponsible mayors around. Here are some of the worst places to live in Cities: Skylines.

Page 1 of 15
Page 1 of 15
Rollercoaster City

Rollercoaster City

There's a time and place for the fun and excitement of a roller coaster, and Mayor MaxC has decreed that the time is always and the place is everywhere. The citizens of Rollercoaster City might want to bring a barf bag along on their morning commute.

Page 2 of 15
Page 2 of 15
Hullchester

Hullchester

The demise of poor Hullchester has been well documented, but I return to it often to stare in horror, because a city being completely buried in poop-water holds a certain fascination. When Mayor Filsketeer presides over a disaster, he doesn't mess around. Except when it comes to the mess. You can read part 1 and part 2.

Page 3 of 15
Page 3 of 15
Poo-power

Poo-power

Not every mayor buries his city in sewage. Mayor 5463728190 actually, literally, powers his city with poo. It's actually a pretty novel system of feeding sewage, and only sewage, into a network of dams. It really works! The city really does run on poo. But the smell, mayor! The smell!

Page 4 of 15
Page 4 of 15
Cruise control

Cruise control

We know cruise lines have been getting a lot of bad press lately, and in Mayor Turtlegains' city, they're taking some drastic steps to attract new customers, such as driving right up onto land to find them. Mayor AdvLeon is having similar issues, which you can see it in action here. Those sitting in the first few avenues might get wet.

Page 5 of 15
Page 5 of 15
Paving the way

Paving the way

I don't want to make accusations without evidence, but I think Mayor _Ganonmight be accepting bribes from a local paving company. Luckily, the citizens are so dizzy from asphalt fumes they didn't find it strange when their town was awarded "Most Attractive City."

Page 6 of 15
Page 6 of 15
Bus, stop!

Bus, stop!

Mayor Repost Research had good intentions. The city's bus lines were a problem, so he tried to delete them all and start from scratch. The buses had their own ideas, though, and quickly began breaking the laws of nature. Buses ain't care.

Page 7 of 15
Page 7 of 15
Send help

Send help

Building a working road system isn't easy, and we've all been frustrated from time to time. You shouldn't take it out on your citizens, though, but making them live in a giant message of your failure, like Mayor Stumpyoftheshire did.

Page 8 of 15
Page 8 of 15
Folks, we're looking at a slight delay

Folks, we're looking at a slight delay

Mayor HeyRevolver might want to do something about the air traffic controller strike. Just look at this air traffic nightmare in action. Hope they brought a lot of extra peanuts.

Page 9 of 15
Page 9 of 15
Stock up on gauze

Stock up on gauze

Speaking of delays, if you're a citizen of Mayor Deblobman's city, you may want to get some first-aid training because the ambulances are gonna take a looooong time to reach you if you've had an accident.

Page 10 of 15
Page 10 of 15
You had one job

You had one job

We're not sure if this is due to a lack of proper training or just an overworked and underfunded fire department, but if you live in the ironically named Mayor SomeoneWaterMyPlants' city, you might want to take fire prevention into your own hands.

Page 11 of 15
Page 11 of 15
The moving park

The moving park

It's great to build parks for your citizens: it makes them happy and gives them a chance to get some exercise. Mayor Leeisamoron might be pushing it, though, as you can see in the following animated link, by making his residents, uh... work a little too hard for some relaxation.

Page 12 of 15
Page 12 of 15
Don't settle here

Don't settle here

We love Settlers of Catan, but would we really want to live there? Mayor YeppImNaked sure thought so, designing a road system of hexes. I admit it looks cool, but imagine giving directions. "Make a right, then a right, then a left, then a right, then a left, then a left, then a right, then a left, and bingo, you're 1/10th of the way there."

Page 13 of 15
Page 13 of 15
Bad dog

Bad dog

People aren't the only ones who live in a city: there's also pets. Mayor Tuerwox's town doesn't put up with any doggone nonsense, though. They've even got a special doghouse for any misbehaving mutts. Poor Rover!

Page 14 of 15
Page 14 of 15
Now He's Bouncing in Heaven

Now He's Bouncing in Heaven

This is nobody's fault, really. But the unlucky kid who thought it would be a great day for a bouncy adventure... let's just hope Mayor Mmseng built a therapist's office right down the street.

Page 15 of 15
Page 15 of 15
TOPICS
Best of
Christopher Livingston
Christopher Livingston
Social Links Navigation
Senior Editor

Chris started playing PC games in the 1980s, started writing about them in the early 2000s, and (finally) started getting paid to write about them in the late 2000s. Following a few years as a regular freelancer, PC Gamer hired him in 2014, probably so he'd stop emailing them asking for more work. Chris has a love-hate relationship with survival games and an unhealthy fascination with the inner lives of NPCs. He's also a fan of offbeat simulation games, mods, and ignoring storylines in RPGs so he can make up his own.

Deals not to miss
A low-res city
This 'brutally honest' city builder features greedy landlords, cutthroat corporations, and a newspaper that gives you 'a constant reminder that your citizens' bad luck is perhaps your fault'
 
 
An image of a 3D map of Manhattan, including highlighted subway routes.
The sleeper hit of the Fall might be this mad lad's hyper realistic traffic management sim that uses real census data and a 'distance-based gravity model' to produce millions of NPC commuters
 
 
Windmills
Cities: Skylines 2 latest region pack heads to the Netherlands, 'the land of windmills, clogs, and stroopwafel,' and includes new hospitals, fire stations, and hyperrealistic cemeteries
 
 
Citizens on a first date in Cities: Skylines 2
After the bungled launch of Cities: Skylines 2, Paradox Interactive and Colossal Order part ways as development moves to a new studio
 
 
A medieval city
Farthest Frontier review: Crate Entertainment's survival city builder is both challenging and chill
 
 
A Mediterranean city
September is absolutely stacked with city builders: Here's 8 releasing this month
 
 
Latest in Sim
The player takes aim at an airborne fish in How to Fish.
This fishing game awards bonus XP for no-scoping an airborne mackerel, and I think that's beautiful
 
 
An orc and an adventurer having a meal in a fantasy tavern
'It wasn't fun for the first 7 years' says maker of fantasy sim Tavern Keeper, which spent more than a decade in development
 
 
Spore screenshot
In October 2025, a full 205 months after the ill-fated life sim Spore first launched, someone walked into a store, found an old DVD copy on a shelf, and bought it
 
 
Key art for Ostranauts, showing a ship pilot sitting in a cockpit before a cluster of monitors.
Hardcore space sim Ostranauts just joined the legendary patch notes canon: 'Corpses should no longer become hotter than the Sun and explode the ships/stations they are on'
 
 
A bar in Tavern Keeper, flooded with Patrons.
Tavern Keeper's early access is already a crunchy management sim, a cosy blanket, an interior decor game, and a furniture designer all at once
 
 
News Tower key art with a paperboy and a photographer
I might just play more News Tower instead of going to therapy
 
 
Latest in Features
Operator control system
Xenopurge turns Aliens into a stressful desk job and somehow manages to capture the movie perfectly
 
 
Battlefield 6 California Resistance update
Despite Battlefield 6's server browser utterly failing at its one job, good things are happening in Portal
 
 
Ella Purnell (Lucy MacLean) in FALLOUT SEASON 2 Photo Credit: Lorenzo Sisti / Prime © Amazon Content Services LLC
I'm impatiently waiting for Fallout Season 2 by calculating the odds of my favorite New Vegas characters making an appearance
 
 
Elden Ring Reforged mod
Enormous mod Elden Ring Reforged refreshes and rebalances every inch of the game, works with Seamless Co-op, and even throws in a Crackdown orb-style scavenger hunt
 
 
The hero of Moonlighter 2 running with a sword and full backpack.
Moonlighter 2 made me reckon with how 'cozy' a shopkeeping roguelite with a heavy helping of Hades can get
 
 
The trading screen in Insider Trading.
This Balatro-inspired stock-trading roguelike marks the first time I've ever screwed up in a deckbuilder by making my deck too good
 
 
  1. MSI and Asus gaming monitors on a green background with the PC Gamer recommended logo in the top right
    1
    Best gaming monitors in 2025: the pixel-perfect panels I'd buy myself
  2. 2
    The best fish tank PC case in 2025: I've tested heaps of stylish chassis but only a few have earned my recommendation
  3. 3
    Best gaming laptop 2025: I've tested the best laptops for gaming of this generation and here are the ones I recommend
  4. 4
    Best Hall effect keyboards in 2025: the fastest, most customizable keyboards for competitive gaming
  5. 5
    Best PCIe 5.0 SSD for gaming in 2025: the only Gen 5 drives I will allow in my PC
  1. Lenovo Legion 9i Gen 10 gaming laptop
    1
    Lenovo Legion 9i Gen 10 gaming laptop review
  2. 2
    Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 review – CoD at its most obnoxious
  3. 3
    LG UltraGear 27GX790A OLED gaming monitor review
  4. 4
    Thermal Grizzly Der8enchtable review
  5. 5
    Thermaltake View 390 Air review

PC Gamer is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.

Add as a preferred source on Google
  • About Us
  • Contact Future's experts
  • Terms and conditions
  • Privacy policy
  • Cookies policy
  • Advertise with us
  • Accessibility Statement
  • Careers

© Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036.

Please login or signup to comment

Please wait...