The Unexpected Delight of ‘Cities: Skylines’ YouTube Videos

The city of Verde Beach is sprawling and interconnected, with an impressive bicycle highway running through its center, a powerful skyline, and a large nature reserve and zoo that borders downtown. Visitors of the city arrive through either the city’s massive downtown train terminal or its airport, set on a picturesque manmade island.

The city seems an idyllic place to live, outside of the near-constant wildfires that plague Verde Beach. But, sadly, it only exists in a video game — Paradox’s 2015 title, Cities: Skylines.

Verde Beach designed by a YouTuber who goes by “City Planner Plays,” an actual trained and employed city planner from Wisconsin who admittedly has spent an inordinate amount of time playing the game on the side. He started his channel about 10 months ago, and since then has gained over 142,000 thousand new YouTube followers.

The YouTuber has several catchphrases which quickly become familiar to regular viewers. “Respect the topography,” or “water pipes go under the road, where they belong.” Talking about “roadway hierarchy,” and noting that while pedestrian tunnels may seem functional at first blush, they’re hostile to use by women and children, and sometimes noting how right of way and easements would come into play in his decisions, City Planner brings an element of realism to a game which frequently allows you to reimagine what can be real.

City Planner Plays is part of a relatively small but dedicated group of content creators who build cities on Cities: Skylines for a growing online audience. Each creator has different strengths, from the amazing eye for detail by Overcharged Egg, to the traffic-fixing brain of Biffa, who is sort of an elder statesman of the genre.

With the pandemic winding down and a relative dip in new media content of late, I find myself spending more and more time watching these builders work through topographic and city services challenges. I find myself wondering what it would be like to live in a place like Verde Beach.

Beyond the wonder, however, is an intensely satisfying viewing experience. Each builder has their own style, from the almost ASMR tone of Overcharged Egg, to the wonky, soothing dorkiness of City Planner, to the excited British exclamations over “horky borky” happenings in Biffa’s builds.

And then there are the roads. I’m a rank amateur on Cities: Skylines, with just under 200 hours played. When I make streets and roads, they end up looking like the worst conglomerations of urban spaghetti. I end up jamming in pedestrian connections and bike lines after the fact.

My current build, Springfield, is hopelessly choked with cargo train traffic, and my downtown grid is too compact to place large attractions or buildings. I don’t have the foresight yet to plan for such things.

But these pros frequently build their cities around pedestrians and future uses, planning out intensely interesting and interconnected worlds in increasingly unexpected and delightful ways. It reminds me of watching timelapse videos of artists, who go from sketch to finished work in very satisfying-to-watch content.

Imagining myself in the world of these city builds is one of my favorite ways to consume Cities: Skylines content, especially living in a country with crumbling infrastructure and squabbling politicians.

If you find yourself looking for new game content to consume as the pandemic lifts, check out Cities: Skylines creators. Their videos are filled with unexpected delights.