SimulationStrategy
Highrise City
Give it 1 hour
Gets good by 1h almost every game dips in hours 2–3
Started playing 59% of owners
Steam reviews 77% positive of 1,305
What the data shows
- In the first 2 hours 1 in 2 reviews are negative (46%); after 7h it's 1 in 6 (16%).
- Only 59% of owners have even the first achievement — the rest barely played.
When it gets good
Share of positive reviews by how many hours the reviewer had played when writing the review.
before it gets good opening up fully opened up
Based on all 1,315 Steam reviews in every language. Median playtime in a sample of 297 reviews: 13.4h for positive, 10.9h for negative. Almost every game is rated lower in the first 2–3 hours: that window includes refunds and quick first impressions. What matters is how deep the dip is and how fast the game recovers.
Where players quit
Share of players who started the game and reached each story milestone. 100% is the most common achievement (58.6% of owners), so people who bought the game and never launched it don't count.
Story milestones aren't labeled yet; all achievements are listed below.
All achievements (47)
- New Sheriff In Town Build a small police department 100%
- Reach Population Lv1 Reach a population of 10000 61%
- Blacksmithing Building the tool factory 61%
- Your Own Residence Building a mayor's villa 56%
- Scientifically Proven Lv1 Unlock a research 55%
- Playtime Lv1 Games 2 hours 53%
- Scientifically Proven Lv2 Unlock 10 researches 51%
- Law And Order Enactment of a law 37%
- Wealthy Lv1 Achieve a small wealth 34%
- Reach Population Lv2 Reach a population of 50000 33%
- Playtime Per Game Lv1 Be mayor of this city for 10 hours 29%
- Scientifically Proven Lv3 Unlock 25 researches 29%
- Total Loss Explosion Driving into the water by car 29%
- Decorator Place a decorative object 26%
- Playtime Lv2 Games 4 hours 25%
- Highrise Creation of the first Level 5 residential building 24%
- Capital Lv1 Earn some money per week 22%
- Reach Population Lv3 Reach a population of 200000 20%
- FishFriday Construction of 20 fishery 19%
- Big Landowner Purchase many urban areas 19%
- Economic Boom Own 3,000 buildings in a thriving city with a positive balance sheet 16%
- Gold Rush Building a gold mine 16%
- Wealthy Lv2 Achieve a medium level of wealth 15%
- Playtime Per Game Lv2 Be mayor of this city for 20 hours 15%
- Rename Street Rename a road 15%
- Semper Fidelis Enact the Police Special Unit Law 14%
- Playtime Lv3 Games 6 hours 13%
- Capital Lv2 Earn a lot of money per week 9.6%
- Reach Population Lv4 Reach a population of 1000000 8.9%
- Fusion Build a fusion power plant 8.0%
- Wealthy Lv3 Achieve a great wealth 6.7%
- Playtime Per Game Lv3 Be mayor of this city for 50 hours 4.4%
- Country Roads Construction 100km of 2-lane roads 4.1%
- Counting Sheep Build 100ha sheep farm 3.4%
- Wealthy Lv4 Achieve a very large wealth 2.6%
- Capital Lv3 Earn very much money per week 2.0%
- Cowboy Build 100ha cattle farm 2.0%
- Reach Population Lv5 Reach a population of 5000000 2.0%
- Create Your Own Building Create a new building in the building editor 1.5%
- Wealthy Lv5 Achieve a wealth with which you can enjoy retirement 0.9%
- Population Growth 1 million inhabitants under 10 hours playing time 0.7%
- Trade Mogul Trade with 10000t goods per week 0.7%
- Energy Change Produce all the electricity in a large city with environmentally friendly power plants 0.5%
- 500 Miles Drive the car 500 miles 0.3%
- Reach The Top 3 Reach the final milestone 0.3%
- Tough But Fair Reach the last milestone on the Hard difficulty level 0.3%
- Industrialisation 0.2%
Steam page Updated: 2026-10-20.