Patient Gamers

As far as I can tell it was never popular.

:(

It came out in 1989 and was ported to every game system and microcomputer that was released in america and Japan for like the next 3 generations of hardware. It sold over 4 million copies. Its the game that gave peter molyneux a blank check to make whatever game he wanted for like three decades.

All these games will be lost in time... Like tears in rain...

I played this. A great game. That era and Bullfrog in particular were incredible. Dungeon Keeper is one of the best games I played. Theme Hospital and Theme Park were great. It was the golden age of strategy games. Age of Empires 2, Heroes of Might and Magic 3. Red Alert games. Railroad Tycoon. I have no idea why this type of game became unpopular.

I strongly recommend Dungeon Keeper 1 (ideally gold with Deeper Dungeons add on) and Theme Hospital. Can get them on Gog.

The obvious answer would be Black & White and its sequel, which for many is the definitive god game. You're an untouchable god interacting with your world and physically manipulating it with your hand, but you also have a giant animal familiar that you raise to also interact with the people. You create miracles and either help or terrorize the population into following you. Not much combat if that's what you're looking for, but it's a unique game that unfortunately has not seen a worthy successor in 20+ years.