Well, the game was made in 1997/1998, so graphically realistic it's not.
The economic systems however are realistic. There can be wars, alliances, trade treaties, etc.
The economic systems are simply the mining of ore, and building factories to make that ore into products. You can then build markets to transport that ore to other villages in your nation, or to villages in other nations whom you have a trade agreement with.
Set nation aggression to low or none if you want to play fair, because what happens is, eventually, when another nation gets too big, they are liable to end any alliances and such, and simply declare war on you, unless you are big as well.
I'd say give it a try. It's currently open source, and completely free, and can be downloaded from the site here.
If it bores you, or you simply want to be like a god, download cheat engine here. Don't worry about the malware warnings, they've been there for 10+ years. If you're on Linux, get GameConqueror + scanmem.
