A curated list of engineering-related video games rated Very Positive or higher on Steam.
Games are divided into broad categories based on the type(s) of engineering they're most related to, such as civil engineering, electrical engineering, computer science, etc.
Please feel free to suggest new games or update existing titles!
- ❤️ = "Overwhelmingly Positive" overall reviews on Steam, meaning >= 95% of 500+ reviewers liked it.
- 👍 = Curator's Choice: Personal recommendations by the maintainers(s) of this list. This is a TOTALLY SUBJECTIVE "best of" for each category.
- ☁️ = Playable on GeForce Now. You can stream this game from the cloud without PC gaming hardware (no GPU required). Works in your browser and most OSes.
All other games have "Very Positive" overall reviews on Steam, meaning >= 80% of 50+ reviewers liked it.
Click to expand Table of Contents
- Factory Management & Automation
- Vehicle Building
- City Builders & Civil Engineering
- Transportation & Route Management
- Survival & Settlement Builders, Colony Sims
- Open-World Survival Sandboxes
- Bridge-Building
- Rube Goldberg Machines
- Hacking, Computer Science, Logic & Automation
- Job Simulators & Unique Themes
This Table of Contents was auto-generated by DocToc
These games emphasize the building of assembly lines that consume input resources in order to produce output goods, often with multiple chains of inputs to intermediary outputs.
This subcategory has games that involve building an actual factory, usually by manually mining resources first and then slowly adding automation.
- (2023) Desynced: Autonomous Colony Simulator ☁️
- (2021) Learning Factory
- (2021) Factory Town
- (2021) Dyson Sphere Program ❤️ 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Factorio in space, but with much better 3D graphics and the ability to expand across planets and solar systems.
- (2020) Satisfactory ❤️ ☁️
- (2020) Factorio ❤️ 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: The game that created the genre. Base game is incredibly deep, with lots to optimize. Mods add even more.
- (2019) Space Engineers ☁️
- (2019) Mindustry ❤️
- (2015) Infinifactory ❤️ ☁️
These games distill the genre down to its core, stripping away the manual resource management and focusing on routing & automation.
- (2020) shapez ❤️ 👍
- Curator's Choice: A minimalist Factorio with an emphasis on conveyor belts.
- (2019) MOLEK-SYNTEZ
- (2017) Opus Magnum ❤️ 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Another minimalist take on the genre, distilling it down into symbols and automated pickers, sorters, and movers on rails.
- (2011) SpaceChem ❤️
These games let you create your own vehicle (whether a car, ship, aircraft, or otherwise) from parts and then simulate its driving behaviors. Some have combat, while others are peaceful.
- (2023) Mars First Logistics ❤️
- (2023) Juno: New Origins
- (2023) Brick Rigs ☁️
- (2021) Sprocket
- (2021) Main Assembly ☁️
- (2020) Stormworks: Build and Rescue ☁️
- (2020) From the Depths
- (2020) Besiege ❤️ ☁️
- (2019) Trailmakers ☁️
- (2016) Scrap Mechanic ☁️
- (2015) SimplePlanes
These games have a primary focus on city building and utilities infrastructure (electricity, sewer, water, garbage, etc.). They are a typically blend of planning and economy management.
There is a separate category, Transportation, for games that primarily deal with route-building without the accompanying city and economy management.
These take place in the modern, post-industrial era with modern vehicles and power grids.
- (2023) Terra Nil ☁️
- (2022) Captain of Industry ☁️
- (2019) Tropico 6 ☁️
- (2011) Tropico 4 ☁️
- (2015) Cities: Skylines 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Probably the most in-depth city builder available today, even compared to its sequel (Cities Skylines 2). A great simulation of zoning, routing, economy management, hydrology, and more. If you play only one game on this entire list, make it this one!
This is the pre-modern era, before open-sea shipping, trucks, and air freight were common. They have a focus on sailing craft, wagons & trains.
- (2019) Anno 1800 ☁️
Before industrialization, or in alternate realities with a typical "old world" fantasy theme.
- (2021) Timberborn 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: If beavers had civil engineering degrees and mastered fluid dynamics, what would they build? Great combo of city builder and fluid physics, plus beaver family narratives that will tug at your engineer heartstrings.
- (2020) Kingdoms Reborn ☁️
- (2020) Anno 1404: History Edition ☁️
- (2019) Foundation ☁️
These take place in the post-modern era, often in space.
- (2018) Surviving Mars ☁️
A genre started by RollerCoaster Tycoon back in the 90s, modern games still play homage to it.
- (2021) Jurassic World Evolution 2 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Build the Jurassic Park of your dreams, complete with genetically-modified supercarnivores, hyperloops, zip lines, and hotels.
- (2018) Jurassic World Evolution ☁️
- (2020) RollerCoaster Tycoon® 3: Complete Edition ☁️
- (2018) Parkitect ☁️
These games turn the roads and rails of city builders into its own genre, with a focus on route-building, traffic alleviation, and "traveling salesman" problems (finding the best route between points A, B, C, etc.).
- (2021) NIMBY Rails
- (2019) Train Valley 2 ☁️
- (2015) Train Valley
- (2018) Railway Empire 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: A great track-building and route management simulator, with detailed terrain-track interactions and different kinds of locomotives.
- (2004) OpenTTD ❤️
- (2020) STATIONflow
- (2020) Overcrowd: A Commute 'Em Up
- (2023) Station to Station ☁️
- (2023) RAILGRADE
- (2022) Railbound
- (2021) Mini Motorways ❤️ 👍
- Curator's Choice: Minimalist but addictive take on transportation networks, with roundabouts, highways, and traffic galore.
- (2020) Unrailed!
- (2016) Turmoil
- (2015) Mini Metro ❤️
Similar to city builders, but with a stronger focus on surviving harsh conditions and managing limited resources, heat/cold, food, etc. In this genre, individual citizens are often more important and impactful, and the simulation is more about the micro aspects of daily life than big-picture population growth.
- (2023) Stranded: Alien Dawn ☁️
- (2022) Farthest Frontier ☁️
- (2022) Dwarf Fortress ☁️
- (2022) Against the Storm ❤️ ☁️
- (2021) Going Medieval ☁️
- (2020) Space Haven ☁️
- (2019) They Are Billions ☁️
- (2019) Oxygen Not Included ❤️ ☁️
- (2018) RimWorld ❤️ ☁️
- (2018) Frostpunk 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Tough survival simulator in a frozen wasteland, with enough resource, route, heat and energy management to make it interesting to the engineer-minded.
- (2017) Kingdoms and Castles
A sibling genre to colony sims, here you take direct control of one person (or a small group) to try to gather resources, craft, and survive. While they don't all have the strongest engineering focus, most have at least building & resource management aspects.
- (2020) Empyrion - Galactic Survival ☁️
- (2018) Subnautica ❤️ 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Build your own underwater homestead on an alien planet, with lots of exotic flora, fauna, minerals and machines.
- (2021) Subnautica: Below Zero ☁️
- (2013) Project Zomboid ☁️
- (2013) 7 Days to Die ☁️
These games focus on building semi-realistic (or not) bridges over cliffs, rivers, etc. with physics simulation and load management. Different material strengths and stressors test your ability to build bridges that hold up under heavy use.
- (2023) Poly Bridge 3 ❤️
- (2020) Poly Bridge 2 ❤️
- (2016) Poly Bridge
- (2017) Bridge Constructor Portal
- (2014) Bridge Constructor Medieval
These games replicate the "Incredible Machine" games of the 90s, where you build crazy contraptions out of everything from lasers to ballons to cats, then use them in humorous ways to complete puzzles.
- (2022) World of Contraptions
- (2016) Ultimate Chicken Horse ❤️ 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: A competitive, multiplayer reimagining of the genre, where your contraptions become traps that foil other players (or yourself, if you're not careful)
- (2016) Crazy Machines 3
- (2014) Contraption Maker
These games have a focus on programming and automation. Unlike factory games, they focus on optimizing repeatable sets of actions rather than resource inputs. Some are graphical, while others require some light scripting/coding.
- (2021) Bitburner ❤️
- (2019) while True: learn()
- (2018) EXAPUNKS ❤️
- (2016) TIS-100 ❤️
- (2015) Hacknet ☁️
Similar to programming games, but at a lower level in the machine. Wire circuits instead of writing code.
- (2021) Turing Complete ❤️
- (2016) SHENZHEN I/O ❤️
This is sort of a catch-all category for games that don't neatly fit anywhere else, usually with a creative take on some mundane (or exciting!) job.
- (2023) Void Crew ☁️
- (2023) Barotrauma ☁️
- (2017) Star Trek: Bridge Crew
- (2013) Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator
- (2021) ΔV: Rings of Saturn
- (2015) Kerbal Space Program ❤️
- (2022) Instruments of Destruction ❤️
- (2022) Construction Simulator ☁️
- (2023) SimRail - The Railway Simulator ☁️
- (2017) MudRunner 👍 ☁️
- Curator's Choice: Simulated mud physics and deformable terrain make for a unique experience driving large logging trucks through the wilderness.
- (2021) SnowRunner ☁️
- (2021) Airport CEO ☁️
- (2019) PC Building Simulator ☁️
- (2001) Car Mechanic Simulator 2021 ❤️ ☁️