Make the ground / and in a program called Anim8or, using simple textures, and to make buildings ALL you have to do is download that google 3D thing, and you can make 3D buildings / models, export to 3ds, then load the 3ds file in anim8or, put them all together, and you can get stunnying results like this! 
You can use your own textures to make it look more realistic if you want to, but combining that with anim8or for making environments, dude its amazing
! I will use this in the upcoming yolumb demo 2 :3 (Hopefully) And I want to make yolumb 3D 
But yeah combine those styled houses (or custom) with this :3
Download Google Sketchup: http://sketchup.google.com/
Download Anim8or: http://www.anim8or.com/
