SimCity™ 3000 Unlimited

SimCity™ 3000 Unlimited

Fair · Strategy · 2024

Steam Deck Playable

The verdict

NO RUSH.

Fair at $4.99. Buy it if you want it.

Length
3.5h 34h to 100%
Value
$1.43/hr
Reviews
84% of 789 positive
Reviews or length hold it below the tiers even at a deep discount.
Watch this gameOne alert at a price you pick.

Buy now or wait

Discounted in each of its last 8 seasonal sales. Last cut ended 9 days ago.

Next sale
Winter Sale, Dec 17 to Jan 4

Sources: IsThereAnyDeal, Valve.

What drives the score

How to read this

Grades run S to D, read from the buyer's side. ▲ marks a lift, ▼ a drag or a dock, ? an input we do not have, • a fact this genre's score does not use. How the grades work

Holding it back
Value$1.43/hr
Price per hour of game. It moves the score inside the ceiling reviews set
Reviews84% positive
Gates the score. Weak reviews cap it, and nothing reaches BANGER without strong ones
For context
MonetizationNot known
No monetization record for this game, so nothing is assumed either way
Refunds10 of 420 reviews
Steam-purchase reviews sampled whose writer refunded the game. Nothing is docked
AI contentNone disclosed
From the developer's own Steam disclosure. No disclosure is not proof of none, so it does not move the score

About the game

SimCity 3000 Unlimited brings you the classic strategy gaming of SimCity 3000 with all-new scenarios that open up a whole world of city planning and building possibilities! The thrills of the classic SimCity 3000 are here again!
Description from the Steam store page.
Minimum specs

Minimum on the Steam store: 512 MB of memory, 3D graphics card compatible with DirectX 9.0c, 502 MB of storage. Windows only.

The value story

19 discounts in the 3 years on record, a median of 50 percent off across all of them, roughly 7 weeks apart. Today it is at full price, and its last discount ended 9 days ago.

Against its own genre it lands in the top 6 percent on value. It is cheaper than 67 percent of its genre, and better reviewed than 86 percent. Among the games that feel like it, Two Point Campus ($29.99, scores 69) beats it on value, while it beats Pizza Connection 3 ($1.99, scores 0).

More about SimCity™ 3000 Unlimited

This site sampled 420 of its Steam-purchase reviews; 10 were written by buyers who refunded it, sampled from reviews written March 2024 to August 2026. That is more refunded reviewers than 8 in 10 paid games this site has sampled to the same depth, and among the 2,597 games in its genre sampled this deeply, 519 have a larger share. Inside the two-hour refund window, 70 percent of the 273 reviews written there were positive, against 84 percent overall, and those are 36 percent of everything written about it.

Finishing takes 3.5 hours; clearing it takes 34, which is 9.7 times the campaign.

Players

Players online
40 when we last checked, on Oct 5, 04:53 UTC

Player counts from the Steam Web API.

What players say

The warm, charming graphics, the absolute masterpiece of a jazzy soundtrack by Jerry Martin and Marc Russo, the charismatic advisors and petitioners, and that classic era Maxis humor. This game feels like a Saturday afternoon sun kiss. SimCity 4 may be the best city builder ever made, but 3000 is the most charming one. If you ever feel like relaxing in a garden of nostalgia, give this one a try.
AkyitaRecommendedafter 14h1 found this helpfulRead on Steam
2 more reviews, 1 not recommended
Oh man! This takes me back over 20 years! I remember playing simcity 1 on the computer in HS while i was supposed to be doing work lol. SC 2000, SC3, and SC4 cost me countless hours of fun back in the day! Im very happy to relive the moment and play this again! EA ruined Maxis and then ruined the game. Im happy other creators made different ones, but the nostalgia playing this one is really great!
LordVinnyRecommendedafter 12hAug 2026Read on Steam
Far too many bugs that never got resolved. "You can't get there from here" gets spammed despite everything being completely connected and accessible with 20+ roads to other cities. Spend 30 minutes with a new city only for the power station to randomly disappear forcing you to either cheat to get a new one or completely restart. Camera still is FAR too sensitive. Hours of nostalgia only to be filled with frustration.
loszapatos42Not recommendedafter 25h2 found this helpfulRead on Steam

Steam reviews, mixed to its ratio and rotated daily. Opinions are theirs.

No data upstream: critic score (Metacritic), achievement curve (Steam global achievements).

Cite this score

BANG Score badge
SimCity™ 3000 Unlimited scores 66/100 on the BANG Score (fair value) as of Oct 19, 2026. The BANG Score rates what a game is worth for the money. Via Steam BANGERS. https://steambangers.com/game/2741560/simcity-3000-unlimited
Embed the live badge

Reviews set the ceiling, and price against real length moves the BANG Score inside it. How it works, and where it is weak → Steam reviews as of Sep 28, price as of Oct 19. A number here look wrong? Tell me and I will check the inputs.

Tags

Steam user tags as SteamSpy recorded them

Details

DeveloperMaxis
PublisherElectronic Arts
GenreStrategy
Released2024
Players150Kowners, SteamSpy estimate