@oareaso: Oh my god. Oh. My. God. I think it is! The Nations Gold edition. I didn't dream it! I remember those smileys I see on the screenshots on Google. Thank you, it's official: you are my favourite person this month.

Here is one I have been trying to find for yeeeaaars and can't and no one knows about it, and at this stage I'm worried I might have seen this in an alternate universe.

---

I have played this game between 1998-2004 on a PC, it was in English. It was a strategy / simulation game, isometric view - I think you could zoom in but couldn't turn around, in my memory the graphics were pretty. The point was to build a village and evolve as a society, I don't remember any enemies I don't think there was one. Also, I don't think there were neighbours and computer players, but I might just not gotten that far in the game.
Now, here comes the trick.
They weren't humans. But I kinda remember they might have been humanoid-ish with long and bulky limbs. Maybe muddy orange or light brownish in skin colour. These creatures were not changing in form (it is not Spore), they were improving as a society and I think they might have just gotten better dresses, better houses or something like that as they got higher and better (like Age of Empires), but I'm not sure, maybe they stayed as is. They weren't becoming biologically something else, and there was only one type of creature, it was only them.
These beings were peaceful workers, acting on their own, I was simply creating the environment for their existence, constructing buildings. These buildings, as I can recall, were orange-y or brownish and in my memory they look imperfect clay-like buildings, some taller than the others. There was a wizardry or magic or sorcerer's building which was coming up with the inventions, these affected how good their society gets and how improved they are.
The set-up was a general nature set up with low forests and planes. I remember it had a charming ambient music.

And here is what I think really makes it different from other games and might be the biggest hint:
the sun was rising in the morning, it gradually got lighter in the game, and that's when the creatures woke up and went to do their work. Then sunset came, I remember the visuals were nice when the sun was low, you didn't actually see the sun in that isometric view, just the lights and the colours and the shadows were nice. The creatures retreated into their homes, evening came and there was light in the windows of the buildings, the creatures were sleeping and you waited half a minute or so for the night to pass. Then the morning sun came up and they started working.

---

Now, if there is a single soul out there who remembers the name of this game, or at least confirms they also have played with it and I didn't just dream this game into my past I would absolutely appreciate it and you would be my favourite human for a month at least.