150 Hours of Bugs, Crashes, and Homeless Parks
★☆☆☆☆

Ah, Cities: Skylines 2, the game that proves even when you spend over 150 hours on something, it can still feel like you’re trying to fix a house with duct tape while it’s actively on fire.

Let’s start with the crashes and poor optimisation. You know how in city planning, you have to account for disasters? Well, this game has made catastrophic crashes a feature. Want to adjust your city’s landscape? Crash. Trying to save your progress? Crash. Breathing near your PC? CRASH. It’s like the game’s motto is, “What if your biggest challenge was getting it to run?”

But wait, it gets better—or worse, depending on your tolerance for absurdity. The homelessness bug is the cherry on the top of this disaster. If a building gets condemned or destroyed, the displaced Cims don’t leave the city or find new homes. No, they all gather in parks like it’s some sort of endless homeless festival. Delete the parks, and they’ll just stand around as if they’re collectively refusing to move on from their eviction trauma.

Then there’s the city itself. I hit 30k population, expecting my city to finally feel alive and thriving. Nope. Thanks to the zero zoning demand caused by the homeless CIms, my city became a glorified desert of empty lots. New buildings refused to sprout, leaving vast swathes of my city looking like a failed real estate project. The devs actually released a patch claiming to fix the issue. For a moment, I thought salvation had arrived. But then came the new regional packs—especially the UK one—and the bug came roaring back worse than ever. Now not only does zoning demand stay dead, but the game doubles down on making sure any hope of growth is well and truly buried.

I’ve poured over 150 hours into this game, trying to love it, trying to look past the flaws, hoping it would get better. Instead, every patch seems to just mask the actual problems with new assets while the game itself is plagued with bugs. For now, Cities: Skylines 2 is less a city-building game and more a case study in what not to do. I’ll be waiting for the devs to actually fix this disaster, but until then, I’d suggest steering clear unless you enjoy testing your patience more than building cities.

150 Hours of Bugs, Crashes, and Homeless Parks ★☆☆☆☆ Ah, Cities: Skylines 2, the game that proves even when you spend over 150 hours on something, it can still feel like you’re trying to fix a house with duct tape while it’s actively on fire. Let’s start with the crashes and poor optimisation. You know how in city planning, you have to account for disasters? Well, this game has made catastrophic crashes a feature. Want to adjust your city’s landscape? Crash. Trying to save your progress? Crash. Breathing near your PC? CRASH. It’s like the game’s motto is, “What if your biggest challenge was getting it to run?” But wait, it gets better—or worse, depending on your tolerance for absurdity. The homelessness bug is the cherry on the top of this disaster. If a building gets condemned or destroyed, the displaced Cims don’t leave the city or find new homes. No, they all gather in parks like it’s some sort of endless homeless festival. Delete the parks, and they’ll just stand around as if they’re collectively refusing to move on from their eviction trauma. Then there’s the city itself. I hit 30k population, expecting my city to finally feel alive and thriving. Nope. Thanks to the zero zoning demand caused by the homeless CIms, my city became a glorified desert of empty lots. New buildings refused to sprout, leaving vast swathes of my city looking like a failed real estate project. The devs actually released a patch claiming to fix the issue. For a moment, I thought salvation had arrived. But then came the new regional packs—especially the UK one—and the bug came roaring back worse than ever. Now not only does zoning demand stay dead, but the game doubles down on making sure any hope of growth is well and truly buried. I’ve poured over 150 hours into this game, trying to love it, trying to look past the flaws, hoping it would get better. Instead, every patch seems to just mask the actual problems with new assets while the game itself is plagued with bugs. For now, Cities: Skylines 2 is less a city-building game and more a case study in what not to do. I’ll be waiting for the devs to actually fix this disaster, but until then, I’d suggest steering clear unless you enjoy testing your patience more than building cities.