Transport Tycoon is good for that. Sit back and watch the money roll in.

Not sure if to thank you sincerely or sarcastically. I've downloaded the lite/demo versions of some and will be trying them out at some point. I have been trying to find some good mobile games, but these look like they might be a "miss your stop because you get too engrossed" games.

If you're into adventure and cinematics, then definitely The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us. With minimal gameplay, the player agency is reduced mostly to dialogue choices.

I found this game to be totally stressful even with "pause" . Somehow I associate it not all all with passive gaming. Reload, adapting the configuration... and again... and again ... stressful and pretty active (hammering on my keyboard):P

I'm not sure if it fulfills the criteria, but have you checked Frozen Synapse?
It's the only title that comes to mind, apart from the excellent SpaceChem, that you already mentioned.
It's probably off the mark, but what the hell...

Well, it could happen ;-)

Hasn't happened to me yet though. But yes, try the lite versions of some of the games, and buy the ones you like. I think all their games are management sims of one sort or another. I've only played Game Dev Story and Dungeon Village, but I've enjoyed both of them thoroughly.

As for The Sims, I can imagine they're not your kind of game, I found it rather mweh (got Sims 3 in the Origin Humble Bundle) to play a game in which people go to work, talk, do shopping, make their home comfortable JUST LIKE EVERYDAY LIFE IS LIKE. kinda wtf feeling.

But Sims: Medieval is a very laid-back game, though you do have to give orders once every few minutes, to watch people go about, that is, if you don't mind them talking 'Simmish' or whatever the invented language is called. I got annoyed by it by the time I started my second character (the first is always the King, afterwards you can choice to follow the blacksmith, the physician or other occupations).

Watching a "Let's Play" on Youtube? :P

And yelling something like "you bleeping slowpoke, what the bleep are you doing, bleeping bleep! My hamster plays faster, and he beaten mass effect trilogy on insanity blindfolded!"

Of course you can can imagine you're watching your team's flawless performance on Football Manager, where you created old Rainbow Six-grade perfect plan. I think recent Netherland-Spain (5-1). But make haste - do that before this game has been removed from publics and transferred to 21+ only category, because of sexual content.

Creatures
Setting up a world takes some time as you can (and should) download lots of extra stuff from the internet.
So, you make the world as comfortable or as difficult as you like, put your creatures (=Norns) in, and watch what happens. With modern systems you can have quite a lot of Norns btw.

If I'd read tis earlier I'd hastily pointed you to Children of rhe Nile's Flash Sale. It's not a game where you can stay totally passive for the town will quickly deteriorate to unhapiness if needs of the populatiom are mismanaged but it's gorgeous to look at for itzz's time and the people go about their lives in very detailed fashion: you see weavers weaving, bakers baking, children being taught and going home ehen it get's dark.

(excuse my typo's, tablet-typing is hell).

May I suggest the "Neverwinter nights" games?

this is so funny and awesome

If you are ok with Steam, The Walking Dead 1 or 2 sounds like something you're looking for.

Actually i agree that space rts have some give-orders-and-watch aspets at times. I don't remember Nexus well (i completed it ages ago), but I remember Homeworld having some very contemplative moments. Especially during resource gathering phases, but also sometimes during combat, to some extent.

Howso ? I've played it a few times, and it was a standard "permanent input" kind of borderline-diablolike RPG...