How to play

Getting started

You begin with a single parcel on an open meadow. From here your city grows entirely at your own pace – there is no countdown, no defeat and no penalty for taking a break.

The loop is simple: draw roads, zone districts, let buildings grow, collect taxes, buy more land. Each step builds on the last – and the better the parts work together, the more alive your city becomes.

Roads & networks

Buildings only grow and pay taxes when they sit on a road network. Draw a line with the road tool across your land – swipe on mobile, or a straight line on desktop.

One key trick: each road network shares workers, customers and goods only WITHIN itself. Two separate networks do not help each other. So connect your districts into one shared network, and everyone benefits from everyone else.

If a road is overloaded, upgrade it to a main road: simply drag over an existing road a second time. Main roads have 2.5× the capacity against jams – they cost more, but in the late game they are the most important lever against gridlock.

Zones: residential, commercial, industry

You don’t place individual houses – you zone areas, and buildings appear there automatically based on demand. Three zone types interlock:

🏠 Residential brings residents (and therefore workers). They need jobs and places to shop. 🏢 Commercial brings shops and jobs; it needs customers and goods. 🏭 Industry supplies goods and jobs; it needs workers.

Buy the land first (in cursor mode), then zone the area. No sector grows on its own – each one thrives only when its needs are met.

Demand & balance

The demand card in the HUD shows, for each sector, what’s needed right now: R (residential), C (commercial), I (industry). ▲ means “wants to grow” (▲▲ strongly demanded), ▼ shrinking, • balanced.

Build what’s currently in demand. Too much residential without jobs leads to unemployment; too much industry without residents finds no workers. Keep R · C · I loosely in balance, and the city grows most smoothly.

Money, taxes & land

Your income comes from taxes – but only connected buildings pay, and they only pay in full when their needs are met. The ⚡ symbol in the money card shows this tax efficiency: needs covered = full income.

With money you buy new land (tap empty land in cursor mode) and fund roads and zones. Net income per second sits under your balance – if it turns red, you’re spending more than you take in.

A good rhythm: bring one district into balance, collect taxes, then use the surplus to open up the next patch of land.

Traffic & jams

Turn on the traffic view to see how heavily your roads are used: teal free, amber tight, red jam. Jams slow the affected buildings – they deliver and earn less.

To fight jams: create alternative routes (more roads spread the traffic out), place homes and workplaces closer together (shorter trips), and upgrade your main axes to main roads. In the late game, the main-road upgrade is the strongest lever.

Pollution & parks

Industry and dense traffic create smog. The smog view shows air pollution per tile (yellow light, orange noticeable, violet heavy). Where smog is thick, quality of life and location value drop – and with them the appeal for residents.

🌳 Parks are the antidote: they clean the air around them and raise the location value of every building nearby. A few well-placed parks between residential and industry work wonders.

Challenges & landmarks

Challenges give your city goals: complete build-focused tasks (like “connect 5 buildings” or “create 20 jobs”) and earn cash rewards. When one is done, the next moves up – a gentle thread running through the game.

Landmarks are the big late-game goal: ten world-famous monuments from the Eiffel Tower to the Sydney Opera House. Each beautifies its surroundings over a wide radius and raises the location value there. The first costs 100M, each further one double – a monument for a full treasury. Choose the spot carefully: demolishing refunds nothing.

Account, cloud & languages

You can play right away without an account – your save is stored locally and also lives in the cloud via a city code. With that code you can load your city on any device.

A free account (name + password, no email needed) ties the city to your account across devices. When you register you get a recovery code – keep it safe, it’s the only way to reset a forgotten password. You can delete your account yourself at any time.

Tildown comes in six languages (German, English, French, Italian, Danish, Spanish) and detects yours automatically. When signed in, you can switch it anytime from the menu.