Recent reviews by [Delta ²k5]

In general I like the game, even if it has some flaws right now.

Performance for me, after the first 3 patches which arived weekly, is fine for a slow city builder:
Using a RTX 2080ti, i9 9900k with 64GB of DDR4 4000 I manage now to get ~30 FPS (limited) in most situations on 1440p on most high and some medium settings which is basically better than what I had on modded C:S1 with the same population (despite assets lower in quality back there). Performance on pretty large cities (300000 citizen test) led the simulation speed to drop to "full stop" up to around 0.75x speed depending on time of day (CPU bottleneck). The simulation now utilites all threds the CPU can offer which is good to see.

What's unfortunate is the lack of mods this time as the asset editor is not yet scheduled for public release with no date set. This unfortunately leads to buildings and vehicles to be repetitive, especially in the base game version without the SF pack as there will be no mods for some time to come. Other things need polishing but for me I did not find really game breaking aspects coming from 2500h+ of C:S1. What's good is that many DLC aspects from C:S1s DLCs are now included in the base game, like trams, taxis, helicopters and EVs. Other aspects are coming from popular mods like placement of traffic lights and crossings, altering of road positions after placement, per district services and working hours for citizen which can create rush hours. Some other aspects are entirely new like seasons, citizen stories and upgradeable service buildings. Everyting else is basically on par with C:S1 without mods or DLCs while some new buildings and services are included to make the virtual life of citizen more comforting.

If you are coming from C:S1 don't think you can build like back in the days! You'll likely running into traffic related issues as virtual citizen now consider costs of travel, time of travel and comfort instead of just the shortest route. For example: if your population is pretty old you may see them ride more personal vehicles than busses, especially if you only use bus signs instead of shelters. If one route has more traffic lights in place than the other, they may ride on the route with less traffic lights. So complexity in general is way more advanced and doesn't stop there. If you are more a "city painter" type of person you should probably stick to C:S1 or other titles: currently you are able to run in infinite money and "unlock all" mode but progress of demand may be pretty slow for "painters". If you don't plan to use these modes you may find the unlock tree interesting which to some extend replaces the old milestone approach (still some milestones are in place). Right now you can unlock specific buildings using XP while advancing through the game. These buildings are not a "must" so you can decide when and if you place them down. These buildings also don't relate on other buildings - just on money and XP. Network building is also more fun as there are improved tools and lane splitting in place.

If you expect a perfectly polished title including more than the basegame currently offers better wait some time until the console versions (as at this point they finished polishing the performance) and the mod editor are released. If you are fine with 30 to 50 FPS on your high end gaming computer and just want to have a good time dealing with the content in place feel free to buy but keep your expectations in check! When buying this title also keep in mind that C:S1 had long term support for 8 years which transformed the game from some 2015 CTD, slow loading fest to what it became a year or two later: the most successful city builder after SimCity.

The developers may need some time to squasch every bug and improve performance further, but I as a player am sure they will also polish this game to be the successor it deserves to be :) - Anyway I won't blame anyone who is going to wait until everything was polished, that's a personal decision in the end.