Looking for an (economic) empire builder

[Monarchy]

I'm looking for a game where you can start from nothing and slowly build up an empire, preferably one where you start in the economic sphere but then branch out into military and/or political spheres. I tried X3 a while ago and I found the user interface somewhat frustrating and the universe too static - you could build a fleet and send it into a sector to destroy everything, but soon the economic AI would repopulate the sector with new stations.

 

Any advice?

[clyde]

I'm going to make a bad recommendation, Mount & Blade Warband.

 

 

You start out as a single person with some weapon training but you can do work for various people in the world. As you earn money from those jobs (and from selling clothes from looters or buying low and selling high), you can hire farmers and mercenaries to create a gang. Eventuallly you will want to affiliate yourself with a nation after doing some missions for their generals. After that, if you do well, they will give you some land and maybe even a castle. You may find yourself leading the nations army and I've heard that you can eventually become the king of that nation and take over the whole map. 

 

It's very combat focused, but I think the combat is fun. Also, once you use a game-system once or twice, they can feel very repeatitive. This is probably not the game you are looking for, but your description reminded me of it. 

[Gaizokubanou]

Anno series fits the bill game mechanics (economic start with military sprinkled in at the end) wise but you build few cities in those games and the game is... well pretty much a city builder.

[riadsala]

Distant Worlds would fit the bill wouldn't it? (I haven't played it myself, it's on "the list"). I hear there's a lot of scope in what type of game it can be depending on how you want to play it?