Skip to main content

‘Civilization VI’ player pushes game to its limit with dystopian megalopolis

One of the beautiful things about complex games with passionate communities like Civilization VI is that it now takes very little time after release for players to start pushing its systems to the limits and going far beyond the bounds of normal play. Reddit user Procblocked built his capital city of Rio De Janeiro up to a 200 population, or roughly 2.7 billion people in real-world terms, according to Kotaku. That is more than 58 times larger than Delhi, the current most populous metropolitan area on Earth, or twice the population of China.

Procblocked built this monstrosity through a savvy use of its specialized districts, which have stacking effects that benefit nearby cities in addition to its own. After resetting the map several times to ensure he had enough space, with all of the victory conditions turned off except for points, Procblocked ringed his capital with 20 cities that each have entertainment districts providing the amenities necessary to keep such an enormous population from going stir crazy and rebelling. Rio itself is almost entirely filled with neighborhood districts to house everyone. All in all, it requires 30 neighborhoods, 20 stadiums, 80 trade routes bringing in 750 food per turn, two wonders, and the efforts of a variety of great merchants and engineers to make the city work.

Recommended Videos

More: Master ‘Civilization VI’ with these starting tips for new players and veterans

In previous Civilization titles, players made a distinction between tall and wide strategies, i.e., building a few very large cities or a sprawling mass of smaller cities. This shows how that breaks down in Civilization VI, using urban density to prop up an enormous city. Where Civilization V had harsher penalties for settling more cities, throttling your science and culture production, the newest game has lifted a lot of those restrictions, opening up the field for players to experiment with wide strategies like, for instance, taking advantage of the district adjacency bonuses to interlock more diverse arrangements than Procblocked’s neighborhood spam.

rio-civ-plan
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Procblocked muses in the Reddit post that this is not even quite the largest they could go. On a map that has all of the possible luxury resources you could get the population score up to 230 before housing maxed out. It took nearly 1,000 turns to reach 200 population in the year 2289 — we do not recommend trying this at home unless you have a serious tolerance for tedium and the time for it. Its geometric regularity and efficiency bring to mind other great works of virtual urban planning, like Magnasanti, a Koyaanisqatsi-inspired 6 million people city that claimed to ‘beat’ SimCity 3000 in 2010.

Will Fulton
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Will Fulton is a New York-based writer and theater-maker. In 2011 he co-founded mythic theater company AntiMatter Collective…
Start scheduling time off: Civilization 7 is releasing in February
Two world leaders, Cleopatra and Caesar, going up against each other in front of their flags.

Civilization 7 - Official Reveal Trailer | gamescom 2024

People hoping to take off time from life thanks to Sid Meier's Civilization 7 can finally start making some plans. At Gamescom Opening Night Live, 2K Games announced that the 4X strategy game staple will be releasing on February 11, 2025.

Read more
Prepare for Civilization 7 with this $3 Steam Summer Sale deal
Three Civilization 6 leaders standing above a board with the Eiffel tower on the left.

One of the most exciting announcements for PC gaming fans during Geoff Keighley's Summer Game Fest live stream this year was for Sid Meier's Civilization VII. It's the next entry in a long-running turn-based strategy game series about building up and thriving as a civilization from scratch. Although Sid Meier's Civilization VII does not come out until next year and doesn't even get a full gameplay reveal until August, this year's Steam Summer Sale provides players the perfect opportunity to catch up on the series.

Navigate to the Featured Deep Discounts section of the Steam Summer Sale and you'll find that Sid Meier's Civilization VI from Firaxis and 2K is available for just $3, a 95% discount from its typical $60 price tag. If you've never played a Civilization game before or want to familiarize yourself with the core tenets of the series ahead of its next entry, this Steam Summer Sale deal provides an optimal opportunity to check it out.

Read more
Civilization 7 finally announced, but you’ll have to wait for more info
The banner for Civilization 7, with highlighted text on a dark background.

Sid Meier’s Civilization VII - Official Teaser Trailer

Civilization 7 will conquer your game time soon. The latest in the iconic turn-based 4X strategy franchise was announced by developer Firaxis Games during Summer Game Fest on Friday.

Read more