Little Kitty, Big City
Little Kitty, Big City
Game
Game2022
GearCity
Developer Visual Entertainment And Technologies
Do you find tycoon games too simplistic? GearCity is a complex and in-depth business simulator. It focuses on a realistic economic simulation of the global automobile industry. The game takes several hours to grasp and hundreds of hours to master. Can you succeed where many other CEOs have failed? From the Steam store page
178 reactions from 2 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky) · newest Sep 28, 2026 · last updated Oct 8, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
93
LovedLoved
165 positive · 12 negative
95% range 89–96%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 165 | 12 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 0 | 0 | 0 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
1 newer reactions are still waiting for a label.
Steam's own rating
Very Positive
1,360 of 1,516 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What people are saying
Summary pending — the reactions are listed below.
Reactions
60 of 178 · most liked firstI like to say that as a rule, I try to play games thoroughly before reviewing them. Well, at 1,011 hours, it's time to finally review Gear City, a game created by a lone developer who is extremely engaging with the game's fans. I absolutely love tycoon games/ management sims, and I'll say this bluntly: Gear City is my very favorite of them all. The depth is insane, from creating cars to managing your empire throughout almost all of automotive history. There's a stock market, complex banking…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →My first experience of Gear City. Its 1930, I have opened a factory and a branch in London. I have 6 million dollars in the bank. I check out the competition and whats happening in 1930's London. Seems Coupes are popular and getting more popular so I get my RnD team on designing a chassis, engine and a gearbox. Almost a year passes with me haemorrhaging money as I pay these guys to slave away behind drawing boards. Eventually they get back to me with some results. We slap it all together and…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's good. It's very much held back by the financial and technological limitations inherent in the game. This is most noticeable when it comes to the UI. For example, you design a car. You, as a company based in North America, don't want your factories shipping to Australia and incurring huge costs. So you open a new sub-brand for Australia. Your new car is branded for NA, but you can manually redesign the vehicle to re-badge it in Australia, allowing both companies to produce and sell the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →As someone who enjoys spreadsheets a little more than is probably healthy, this game is fantastic. It made me forget that my employer laid off everyone(including me) recently. I'm enjoying my unwillingly, but hard earned, unemployed evenings thanks to it And if I were to describe it in one sentence, it would be something like: "If you've ever looked at a spreadsheet and thought 'this could be a game,' you'll probably love GearCity too."
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →with the amount of hours i have in this game i have definitely gotten my moneys worth out this diamond in the rough. I picked this gem up way back in 2015 and i have played it for years. from being a teenager to being a grown man having children this game has delivered untold amounts of enjoyment to me. i highly recommend this game
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →this is real hidden gem, i believe dev wasted thousand hours for bringing it to this level. one of the best game I've ever played. (I'm an engineer and a manager in a car manufacturer in real world)
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Despite its flaws, I really enjoyed my time with the GearCity, and I'd say it's one of the best, if not the best, business simulators on Steam. And in this (long?) review, I want to share my experience with this game and talk about its pros and cons from my point of view. First of all, here's what I like about this game: 1. Strategy personalization: Believe me, this game offers an incredible amount of personalization in all layers of the game, even in the strategic layer. Some of these…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is for the old "Detroit" ms dos game lovers. I've played in it a million of times and dreamed about something new like this. The guy made it and I'm really happy. You are my hero, man! Thank you! I could say about bugs and issues but I won't because the game really looks like made with love to "Detroit" and cars in general. The guy made a huge research how things should work in the industry and I can say it's going in a very and very realistic way. It might look better maybe but it's…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is the perfect example of "just because you can do something, does not mean you should." What I mean by this is that the dev(s) that put this game together should never have published this game with this UI. Sure, the UI is clean, and reasonably well organized, and I realize this game was made on a budget. Unfortunately the UI gets in the way of what could be a really good car building/selling game. Innumerable clicks, lack of scaling, and the inexplicable omission of hotkeys really…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is possibly the most in depth and polished industry simulator ever created. The attention to detail is incredible and shows how passionate this developer is. The stock market aspect of the game alone is miles ahead of anything else and this is a game about making cars so that should tell you how much work and attention to detail this developer put into this game. I haven't been this addicted to a game in years.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Started playing this car company tycoon game "GearCity," where you run a car company from 1900-2020, and there's a gun in the safe so that if you're out of money you can just shoot yourself to delete the save file lmao. Anyways, I'm -$60,000 in the hole.
unlabelledView post →Spreadsheet Simulator. Exceptionally deep and immensely gratifying to make the money printer go brr. I love the way the sales engine works, giving me flexibility to make fewer (much) more expensive units that I can still sell, if my vehicle quality is higher. You can take many different approaches to growing. The breadth of systems is very impressive. For my first playthrough I made a sedan from the tutorial, it was fine, it made some money to design something better. I designed a 2+2…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Five stars. It ruined my life and my marriage.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The game offers exactly what it promises. If you find tycoon games too simplistic, this is the way to go. It's one of very few management games that try to go really deep into the actual management. Taxes, loans, bonds, stocks, splits, branches, marques, sub companies, dividends, unions, competition and everything else you can imagine. Running the company is really fun. You will definitely learn to read the montly reports to find things hidden between the lines. The competition is real and not…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I knew nothing about cars, nor did I care to learn, and yet this game made me sink countless hours in creating designs, managing the production lines and distributing my finished cars all over the world. I still don't understand much about cars, but I can make a very profitable phaeton design :) It is in my opinion one of the best business sim around.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of the better business simulation games. Even if you don't care about cars is a good management game that rewards planning.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is pretty great if you're into management games. It's really got everything you could want in an auto-company-management-sim. I'm absolutely this games core demographic, and I've bounced off it's peers covering this industry, but this one keeps me coming back. I can tell this game was a labor of love. And yes, the menu system is retro, but navigating is simple and becomes second nature very quickly. For me the menus even a bit nostalgic. What's more amazing is Eric. I've peeked…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I like looking at graphs.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The spreadsheet game to rule them all! This game is amazing if you love big scale management games. The level of detail that you can go into is absolutely insane so for all you giant business/car nerds out there, lose yourself in the expansive pages of gear city!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is one of the most in-depth tycoon I have ever seen. The tutorials were helpful. I highly recommend you to follow the tutorial if you don't understand how the game works. If you're playing this, then you shouldn't care about the graphics. his game actually scratches my itch for a tycoon game that's well made. Thank you VENT for making this game. ---{ Graphics }--- ☐ You forget what reality is ☐ Beautiful ☐ Good ☑ Decent ☐ Bad ☐ Don‘t look too long at it ☐ MS-DOS ---{…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Do you enjoy tycoon games but think they're too simplified? Do you find the realism of business management games underwhelming? Do you enjoy looking at charts of numbers in order to tease how what's happening in the game without the game giving you strategic advice? This is the game for you! This is the most realistic business game I've ever played. It's low instant joy, but very high satisfaction.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I found this gem from another review of completely different "automotive tycoon" game, decided to give it a chance and now I feel I'm hooked for 100's of hours to come You see how it looks, but gameplay is the true meat of this rough gem of a game and honestly I wish there was more strategy games like this one, not some dumbed down garbage with no replayability value. I am this kind of player who likes to get my money:time ration to at least 1:1 after I buy something and I honestly feel I'll…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I know almost nothing about cars. I drive a Honda. It gets me from point A to B in relative comfort and safety. That didn't stop me from building a car company that survived the Great Depression, World War II, and rode the post-war boom to international dominance. A+ game. Very addicting once you figure it out.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I am literally Henry Ford, Bruce McLaren and Elon Musk, all at the same time.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Very excellent and in-depth game. I really recommend supporting developer through FBS fundraising since they are still updating the game and you gain access to unreleased DLC. Waiting for their future AeroMogul game :)
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Please work on the UI and Translations ! The game makes kind of fun but you will be fast tired because of the ui!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I've come to realize two things. If you want a game where you run a car company, with easy to learn-hard to master features and tech, with a feeling of success when you FINALLY get that one thing right, you buy GearCity. If you want an in-depth car designer, again with easy to learn-hard to master features and tech, with a feeling of pleasure when you make something you're genuinely proud of, you buy Automation. This game BEATS OUT Automation in the tycoon aspect in almost every way…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Good game with deep economic gameplay.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I've been playing this game since Eric was in the alpha/beta testing back in 2014/15. It has been a long road to a true successor to the 90s game Detroit. Those who played it know what I mean!! GearCity is a game that puts you in charge of a mfg car company that needs to address production, sales, mkt and the most fun part is to design your own cars!! Give it a try if you like simulation games; this one has been one of my favorites since forever!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Started out wanting to be a American super car company and ended up selling 1.25 million minivans last year..............10/10
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I understand why so many people like this game. Its because it contains very advanced knowledge in business management and economy. But personally it made me feel very tired. I wanted to play a game not to feel like i am working.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I very rarely give a review even if its a goat-ed game but i have to take the time to leave one here. Really only 2 other games compare to this one for me, Capitalism Lab and Software inc. Less so for the latter. The biggest difference for me with GC is that i can solely focus on the economic synergies and not have to deal with building and managing a city or an office. Don't get me wrong, I love those game aspects when I'm in the mood for it but sometimes you just want pure economic management…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is insane, I got put off by the ugly UI initially but once you understand it (takes 1-2h) it all makes a lot of sense. Runs beautifully on Steam Deck although the text is small and the on screen keyboard doesnt work, sadly. Will have a lot of fun with this one, love it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Quickly tried the Demo. Less than 24 hrs later I bought it. I am on my 10th attempt in normal mode. There is so much here to deal with that you simply have to play it dumbed down and then dig deeper as you learn; Layers. Similar to Rule the Waves in that you have almost 100% design control over every spec. (no, you do not have to know the history or the actual mechanics of the cars but it will help. Comes off as an idler.... I don't see it as such since you are required to interact at so many…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If the production company sees this, please translate it into Korean It's hard to play games because there are a lot of parts that haven't been translated
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game shouldn't be called a game! It is the most in depth simulator that I have ever played. Great program. Love it. (Once you learn how to use it) I highly suggest using the tutorial for EVERYTHING!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If you love economic sims and have an interest in automobiles i highly recommend this title, it does a lot right and what this single developer accomplished on his own after years of hard work is really fantastic.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →For many years I dreamed of a true business tycoon game, where you really can truly get into the nitty gritty of the business in question and Gearcity is that. Everytime that I mess up and go bankrupt, it's because of my own rushing for success or failure. The amount of financial chicanery I get up to would make Sherman pop a gasket, every move you make is calculated and it'll take you a long time to get good at math. The UI needs a bit of time to get used to, there's a lot of nice little QOL…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Unbelievably good game - IF you're the type who is into deep sims and accept it looks rather dated. My favourite part is that it's up there with Football Manager or Crusader Kings for "emergent stories". I never intended to expand into South America, but I had excess stock of an obsolete car that Americans would no longer buy... so I tried selling it in Argentina at bare bones prices... 5 years later I have a separate Marque for Latin American customers, with a range of hyper-affordable…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Designing components (engine, chassis, gearbox) is fun. Designing vehicles (many different styles, eg; microcar to van) is fun. R&D is rather hands-off, but fun to see what new items you can use. Building factories and branch network is interesting. Pricing and assigning factory capacity to different models is interesting Trying to balance supply and demand is a bit of pain, just like in real life.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of the best spreadsheet simulators in the game industry, played it for quite a lot of hours now and I'm still enjoying every single bit of it. Looking forward for further improvements to this already good game, I'll highly recommend it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Kyiv is Ukraine
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is a game for the motor vehicle history enthusiast, and that person exclusively.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I really love this game but it feels like it needs a remaster already, the graphics are good until you make a car then it looks like a PS1 game. The UI gives you all the information you could ever want, if you know how to find it. Overall it is very entertaining and pretty addictive if you are interested in a tycoon car business game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Terrible UI, zero feedback as you play, early 2000s level of clunk and jank. It's charming, don't get me wrong here, I really love the concept but this simply isn't playable unless you devote a lot of time into trying to decode information the game throws into messy spreadsheets. I don't have the patience to try to make sense of this, and the reward for getting it right just isn't there. The game isn't pretty enough or interesting enough to justify the level of tedium on the business side of…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of the best company management game
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I really wanted to like it. Bought it some five years ago, got it refunded in less than 15 minutes. This time, I gave it 8 hours. Maybe there's depth to this game (not even sure...) but OMG, this UI/UX... It's ugly, it's not practical, it's slow, it's bugged...
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A great business game, very underrated and a caring one man developer, I actually like the variety of menus and interfaces, and for this type of a game graphics shouldn't be a focus in contrary to what others are commenting.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Gear City is a wildly ambitions game. Starting in 1900, you lead your own company designing vehicles and their components. Being developed by a one-man team, updates can take some time to come out. The developer uses what they call the "Feature Bounty System" to fund development of the game's future DLC, Second Gear; players can donate towards goals they want to see implemented in the game, using a ranked-choice voting system to ensure that if your #1 vote doesn't win out, your funds still get…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is legitimately one of the best games I've ever played.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Great Car Company Sim! A lot of good things have already been said here, so I won't repeat all of them. Is the game flashy? No. Will the graphics knock your socks off? No. Will you spend hours designing vehicles, getting the sliders just right, marketing it to a target audience, and strategically plan your dominance as a global car company (including taking over your competition!)? YES! Here's the great thing about Gear City: you can put in as much micromanaging as you want or as little…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →One of the few games out there that actually does economics well. Spreadsheet simulator 10/10
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →solid 4.5/6 It reminds me of Software Inc, in fact it even uses some music from there. The interface takes some getting used to, but it adds to the 2000th ish graphics vibe. Speaking of the graphics, the game looks ancient, but nevertheless, it's interesting to play. In fact, it's captivating once you try it. The gameplay is great. The car editor is not so great and takes getting used to aswell.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Я купил этот неожиданно глубокий Tycoon, когда он только вышел в Steam. Приятно видеть, через ранний доступ, он успешно вышел в относительно законченный проект. Особенно приятно - что от соло-инди-разработчика. Вдумайтесь, больше 10 лет соло разработки! Пожалуй, на рынке вообще нет аналогов подобного жанра, именно по автомобилям. Браво!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It has a very open world
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is such a great game! There is so much to do, so many combinations and every game will feel different! You will find yourself playing the game for hours! Highly recommended!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →After 100+ hours on this game I have to say it is addictive. If you like retro games like Detroit this is the game for you. Look forward to any expansions this game may have in the future.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Lots of details and nuances, hell of a business sim
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Never before have I seen something to complex and in depth, in terms of overall simulation, that yet manages to be really entertaining!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →fun initially, but boring later on but I recommend this game. the developer support is fantastic. Paradox and SI should learn from this small developer
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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