Big new Cities Skylines 2 update makes roads better and worse at the same time

I’m almost afraid to know how many hours I’ve spent trying to get my road and traffic network absolutely right in Cities Skylines 2. Yes, housing, commerce, and healthcare are important, too, but most of my attention is on highways and interchanges. And still – still – my beloved Cims find ways of sabotaging my perfect designs. Colossal Order and Paradox are working hard to fix the city building sequel – with Civilization 7 on the way, the urban strategy game needs to be on top form. Fortunately, the gigantic new Cities Skylines 2 update repairs a lot of bugs, overhauls tourism, and makes adjustments to how homelessness is represented. It also improves the road system, while making it more challenging at the same time.

More than a year since Cities Skylines 2 first launched and the city-building game still feels incomplete. The foundations remain strong and with every update, Colossal Order gets closer to delivering the sequel that we anticipated back in 2023. The economy and land systems have been vastly retooled, and the mod framework is finally in place. Now, the new CS2 update goes heavy on bug fixes while refining how your citizens commute.

The biggest change is pathfinding. Until now, you could build a straight, direct road but your Cims, for some reason, would insist on taking a more strangled route. That’s thankfully all changed – the new update increases the preference of buses and trams to use straight roads, cutting down travel times significantly.

There was also a problem with people parking their cars in dedicated motorcycle lots, again adding to congestion. That’s been fixed. On the flipside, vehicles will now generate more pollution in general. The new update also makes road management tougher by increasing the noise pollution created by highways – if you have a big road close to a residential area, you’ll need to build sound barriers to stop people moving out, and property prices from plummeting.

If you’ve been aggravated by the tourism system in Cities Skylines 2, Colossal Order also introduces some much-needed changes here. While hotels won’t appear in your current commercial zones, they’re now much more likely to show up when you make new commercial areas, giving tourism a vital boost. The temperature of your city will also now influence how many holidaymakers you attract – in the warmer seasons, expect a greater influx of tourists, but make sure you’ve budgeted for the colder months when the market drops off.

We previously reported on how Colossal Order was approaching one of the most sensitive issues in all of Cities Skylines 2: homelessness. Players complained that even when they had built enormous amounts of cheap public housing and implemented measures to assist the homeless population, more tents kept appearing in public parks. With the new update, Colossal Order says this will no longer be a problem, and that a thorough initiative to alleviate the problem of people losing their homes will result in a decline in homelessness.

The developer also says that it has made changes in the backend of Cities Skylines 2 to make the release and implementation of the upcoming region packs smoother and easier. The team says it is “working diligently, preparing each pack one at a time,” and encourages players to “stay tuned as they [Colossal Order] will share the roadmap with you very soon.”

From the UI to audio, landscaping tools, and a lot more, there are over 60 fixes in the new Cities Skylines 2 patch. We’re still waiting for a hard date for the new region packs, but this is certainly another big step in the right direction.

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