I still don't know why Eco should not be mentioned. Please give a tldr reason. Haven't played it. Negative steam reviews seems to mostly highlight technical issues. And while that should be noted, does make it a reason not to mention the game when discussion games teaching ecology models.
I thing i did hear about this game a while back and apparently decided it wasn't something for me, even though i liked Factorio. But cannot remember why.
I agree Eco should be mentioned, my point was it was already mentioned in three another comments in this discussion (outside this thread) at the time I wrote the OP.
In any case, I think a game with first-person focus (like Minecraft or Eco) and a game with civilization focus (like Civilization or Sim City or Transport Tycoon or even Factorio to an extent) are very very different style. They might touch same topics, but the challenges are different.
If anything is similar to what I propose, it would be Block'n'Hood (which also has global warming, I believe). But again, the scale is different. What I would like to see is something that would really put, for example, Vaclav Smil's books into a game.
I thing i did hear about this game a while back and apparently decided it wasn't something for me, even though i liked Factorio. But cannot remember why.