Cities Skylines 2 - BIG Game Patch & Important News UPDATES

Cities Skylines 2 updates return after a month of relative silence from Colossal Order, who've shared some info on the next patch update (the economy patch), updates on the Creator Pack DLCs, Colossal Order & Paradox Interactives summer holidays, future patch updates for cities 2, progress on CS2 Console release date, and broader player feedback and ideas. This is the first major news update
Contents:
0:00 - Cities Skylines 2 Updates
0:27 - The Economy Patch
2:26 - Creator Pack DLC Delays
3:15 - Summer Update Blackout
4:47 - Post-Summer Patch Updates
6:58 - Console Release Date News
8:48 - Communications slow-down
9:28 - Player Feedback & Intimate Meetings
11:08 - Wrap Up Review
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Source
forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/...
[Upcoming Patch & Content - Cities Skylines 2 Official Forum, Paradox Forum]

[@OpinionatedHuman]

It sounds like they're still on my schedule. A re-install somewhere mid 2025 to see if it is anywhere near what I expected a year ago.

[@MrBillclintin]

This is not patching, it game development, the problem is that the game has been released during development. It also worries me when the devs say the 'patches' has to meet their standard. The standard has been very low so far. The same standard was behind the release of beach properties. Asset pack is also just game development since there is so few assets in the game. Colossal and Paradox havent convinced why i should buy anything from any of these companies in the future.

[@anlumo1]

You're not wrong, but you're talking about game design "fun game" standards, while they're talking about technical "doesn't crash too frequently" and "doesn't corrupt the savegame" standards. They're completely different things.

[@MrBillclintin]

@@anlumo1 they are talking about a more economics system, thats very much about fun

[@anlumo1]

@@MrBillclintin Yes they're changing it, but that's not the job of QA before a patch release. Fun is tested before QA ever gets a build to test (in usual game dev setups).

[@opinionday0079]

They shouldn't be called patches

[@devondevon5294]

Paradox has been making masterpieces with this model tbh. They take some cooking time tho. Playing their earlier game versions feels like playing prequels because of all the layers of quality they continue adding over time. And a lot of the improvements they make are based directly on player feedback too, which you don't get without players. I'm stoked for the future of this game. Definitely needs more content, my chief complaint is just my lousy 4 tourist buildings.

[@Hattori_Fujiyama]

remember when games used to launch with all their features and basically no bugs? good times.

[@Aliktren]

Has that ever happened ?

[@ama6487]

more like there were no social media back then so no widespread of negativity. and some game bugs were benificial to players so it became a feature like canceling in fighting game

[@ItWasSaucerShaped]

@@Aliktren no, not really

[@teacherella1338]

@@Aliktrenyes! Games in the 80s and 90s!

[@Aliktren]

​@teacherella1338 yeah no, issues in games back then just never got fixed or fixed by fans

[@SimCityEA1989]

Sweden: "You have four consecutive weeks of paid vacation" America: "You get two days of vacation, they are called the weekends. That's if you're not called-"

[@ZingZingNZ]

Global economy don't care like skylines

[@molybdane7240]

For me, a properly working economy will make or break the game. Let's hope this turns out as good as it sounds.

[@jordank1986]

I feel like by the time this game might be brought to a playable state another company will make their own competing game. Like how cities skylines originally was the answer to sim city.

[@JerzyBaksinski]

Except sim city was never made playable. CS2 was a rushed release. Sim city on the other hand was a dumpster fire.

[@MrMpa31]

I really really hope so. We need a new team with a more ambitious vision to take the city builder to the next level.

[@kromeboy]

When C:S came out there were a lot less indie developers and competing publisher for the city builder market. I think that today we will have multiple games and multiple flavors to replace C:S2 Manor Lords and Soviet Republic are both good examples

[@panzer_TZ]

@@kromeboy I disagree. There are more city builders, yes, but none cover managing a modern city. Skylines 1 and Sim City 2013 were direct competitors. Despite its obvious issues, Skylines 2 is still in a league of its own. There are zero competitors covering modern city building/management to the scale and detail of Skylines 2. I'm not defending CO's mess, but it is what it is.

[@kromeboy]

​@@panzer_TZ that is currently true: the most played modern city building game today is still CS 1. In my opinion the player base interested in city building could switch to other similar products if better (personally right now I prefer Soviet Republic for the mix of city building and economy/logistic management). And now we have a lot of nuances in the genre

[@MrMpa31]

Game might be decent in a couple years. Sadly, it will never look like a modern game and will never come close to what we saw in the teaser trailers.

[@opinionday0079]

When I look at the video above it's hard for me to tell that there is much of a difference even between City Skylines one and two

[@BlackNomad1]

I don’t understand why they are stringing along console players. End of the day, even if a console version came out tomorrow it would be horrible because the pc version is horrible. If they said we are focusing on getting the pc version to be its best then we’ll bring that to consoles, that would just make sense. Console delayed indefinitely until pc version js ready.

[@Bambeakz]

Because the game isn't selling (great) on PC untill the reviews are up again on Steam. And most console players don't look at Steam reviews and (imo) accept bugs and bad performance much faster. So there is a high potential for a lot of sales = money.

[@MrMpa31]

As a console player, there is no way I’m buying this until the PC version is in prime condition. It’s also looking like the console version will be heavily downgraded, not as they promised.

[@Ken15643]

IMO they are definitely moving in the correct direction. Creator packs will re-ignite this game, eventually.

[@infiniteVidz]

will they be free??

[@Vandassar]

​@@infiniteVidz not likely. Hence the reason they are prioritising making the game work first.

[@infiniteVidz]

@@VandassarFalse advirtisement then? they said they would be free when they teased it...

[@Vandassar]

@@infiniteVidz maybe I'm mistaken then. I thought the free stuff was the region packs.

[@infiniteVidz]

@@VandassarOhhh, my bad! i mixed them up😂 What is the content creator packs then?

16 gb amd radeon rx 6600 xt, 16 gb ram, amd ryzen 5 5600 6 core, lowest settings, my pc is crying after 10k pop. The game is nowhere near done, needs at least 2 more years to get stable enough. That is, if they don't get frustrated and abandon the project.

[@Vandassar]

I feel they would need a complete overhaul on the game engine to fix the performance problems. This isn't something I could imagine them doing.

[@mygetawayart]

the performance slowdown is this game's biggest issue for me. I can't get to 100k without a significant slowdown.

[@EustaH]

​@@Vandassar It's not that bad probably. Performance issues are most of the time caused by less than 10% of the code anyways - it's not that of a big deal to rewrite it if necessary. I suspect that they will have to optimise the hell out of it to run it on consoles and after console release they'll probably add all those improvements to some PC patch. The bad news is - it'll be at best Q1 2025.

They use Unity for the game. Its compiler handles the code, so if the game does not make millions of calls every frame, there is no code-wise problem. But problems arise if you render every single tooth on every ped, or peds in vehicles (since vehicle windows are dark, we can not see them, therefore no need to render). If they fix rendering issues, the game would be fine.

[@EustaH]

You’re right, the draw calla are bad. On the upside, they are really well multi-threaded. For my 300k city draw calls take 80% out of 15 CPU cores and the one logical core doing everything else can run the sim on 25% speed - which isn’t bad, if it took half the time spent on draw calls it could run 200% speed 🤣

[@universecreep]

Thanks for the update. And good to have you back.

[@cirugo7042]

Are they talking about those region assets they teased months ago? I thought they said they weren't DLC and were going to be free.

[@mygetawayart]

creator packs and region packs aren't the same thing. Creator packs are paid content, region packs aren't.

[@Lueluekopter]

I think they mean the creator packs that were promised for Ultimate buyers when beach properties was refunded

[@mygetawayart]

@@Lueluekopter yes, the Urban Promenades and Modern Architecture packs.

[@RLJSlick]

Welcome back, great video!

[@epicsnake21]

Thanks for the update Jumbo!

[@michaelc3656]

Good on them for being transparent. Mustn't be easy. And welcome back. :)

[@uzijn]

What makes you trust them as being transparent now over previous updates?

[@dailyrider6330]

They created and released a perfect game. They deserve planning allready for summer vacation with our money

[@opinionday0079]

Exactly I'm waiting for them to announce that they've started work on cities Skylines 3 try and get even more money

[@MultiOwnag3]

Perfect game? The game is horrible no offense. I bought it, still come back to it for an hour or so to discover the performance is still bad, the resolution with DLSS looks still awfull af, to see the simulation still being bourged. Such a shame that all the latest paradox releases are so bad, including Victoria 3... This will probably my last paradox game, big change I will pirate the rest, this is just not worth my money anymore.

[@yessirgg]

@@MultiOwnag3 Just so you know he was sarcastic :)

[@bobsemple9341]

It's nor a matter of deserve. You're clearly only American. They don't earn those holidays . It's a right, don't be so American

[@ItWasSaucerShaped]

the people getting the vacation had nothing to do with the decision making get out of the fckn crab bucket

[@simonlees2848]

I guess its a good thing that I bought Sim City for the SNES while i'm waiting for the new asset packs to start playing.

[@daimonien]

June 21st is Mid Summer fest in Finland. The patch is gonna be before that, otherwise it will drop in sometime late autumn because of the vacations.

[@S0NlC1]

Love your update videos

[@dumaskhan]

12:03 I see a building with a very strong shape!

[@daimonien]

Playing Manor Lords. Having fun.

[@erwinhun]

Is the problem with land value fixed yet? I remember them changing that a while ago but not what I was after. When I stopped playing it was in part because mixed R+C zones refused to build near other mixed zones and a patch of residential skyscrapers because the land value was too high.

[@EustaH]

I was able to build a 330k city out of 99% medium density, with a good 200k living in mixed zone. So maybe it was fixed in the last patch, but I cannot by 100% sure cause I used infinite demand mod early on (and removed it instantly).

[@erwinhun]

@@EustaH Maybe I should revive my old save file and let it run for a while and see. Thanks!

[@nonpatriot8863]

I can't see this coming out of early access by the end of this year at least.

[@Mini_xbox]

As a console player I completely given up on this studios promises of spring and now October

[@robert-73]

Personally I would not buy anything from CO or Paradox. They nothing but fraud and liars.

[@sambrown5976]

By the time the game is in a more acceptable state, it's already playing catch-up with innovative features and graphics of genre definings games like Manor Lords. It's behind the curve for city builders, and it's not about to leap frog the competition. I think by the time this is working, there is a good chance there will be a better modern city builder with innovative features like irregular shaped plot sizes that detail themselves, and getting rid of square zoning, with better visuals. I just can't see myself going back to this, when it's years behind the state of the art. I mean this formula of city builder is the same as SimCity 3000 from 1999; zone in square shapes then use an RCI demand bar to determine what to build (the RCI bar which they didn't even get right in this iteration). 25 years they couldn't think of anything else to improve on the formula?

[@ItWasSaucerShaped]

the thing for me about console release is it is just such a good barometer for when the game overall will be in an acceptable state unlike on steam, you actually have to hit minimum quality thresholds for console stores - and if you don't hit them, your product gets de-listed. so what colossal order is saying when they announce that they can't yet get C:S2 to 'hit the stability and performance targets that we want to reach', what they really mean is that they can't meet the minimum standards set by Sony/MS to be listed in their console stores if/when C:S2 actually gets there, then the game might be worth playing. if/when they continue to fail to meet minimum console release standards, the game will not be worth playing

[@Wood-Block707]

They did the same thing earlier in the year an announcement of an announcement then apologized to the community because they knew it was a bad idea. I see they haven’t learned from their lesson. They announced possible date ranges for release but nothing concrete.

[@foolchecker123]

Was so excited about this game but I refuse to play it until it’s fixed

[@Novers]

Im not mad about the summer break im just fucking jealous

[@msand2396]

If the economy rework is good I might be interested in playing the game again

[@mle7231]

when they finish all this patching maybe I'll try the game again. Playing the base game of CS1 is still a much better experience.

[@Hattori_Fujiyama]

i want my money back but i cant get it... maybe i can try on the basis that i was promised dlc this year and its not coming anywhere close to that time...

[@zephaniahgreenwell8151]

I hope that they developers enjoy their summer vaction!

[@bobsemple9341]

I hope this isn't sarcasm

[@shanghaiultra]

Really enjoy the light-hearted tone of Jumbo's Cities videos. Which is magnanimous of him, considering the developers' frequent ineptitude. Nevertheless glad to see the game heading in the right direction.

[@Macronaso]

Yep. Just like I said at launch, the game was and still is 2 years away from completion. But seems like they dropped pretenses and started moving in the right direction after that horrendous dlc.

[@MisterMotel]

I still have no idea why they even teased those creator packs so early. When everything went to sh.t

[@DUTCHGAMERNL2]

So console went from October 23 to 25 already?

[@Vamatt99218]

I am american and very jelly over their vacation times.

[@opinionday0079]

I have yet to see a city builder with any kind of a logical economy in its framework the closest thing is probably from anno

[@christianprivat4624]

is the Game still not playable with old hardware (RTX 2060) with accaptible visuals? I Stopped 2 Weeks after the launch after CS2 and i want to start again when playing is finaly possible in grafiks like CS. Any expirience on that in the last month?

[@Vandassar]

I'm still running my trusty old 1080 and will only consider upgrading once GTA6 comes out. That's assuming they also don't take the route of companies like Unisoft.

[@AverageEstonian]

Alternative for mods on steam is missing the steam workshop so i am stuck using 3rd party mod sites because i simply out of principle aint gonna use walled garden what paradox and collosal are trying to use as a pigeon hole to move players into.

[@joshuam20]

Oh no 🥱

[@rasenche4562]

if i had to put money on it id say the console version wont come out untill the DLC is ready.

[@Palpatine001]

Oh bollocks all my Mixed Use mods are going to break 🙁 Nah it is great with the patch coming with the economy to move this from Cities Painter to Cities Skylines is going to be great. And no doubt with some patience the mods will catch up as always just as in CS1 and Stellaris

[@SIR.KITSUNE]

I need smaller service buildings.

[@incubus_the_man]

They say that they are still working on the simulation, economy etc. i do think they are going to get there patch by patch. Not all at once.

[@opinionday0079]

You know honesty they shouldn't be working on these things now these things should have been done before the game was released

[@incubus_the_man]

@@opinionday0079 whining over spilt milk won't make the game better or give you your money and time back. They should have finished the game before releasing it. And now they are making the game what it should be using community feedback. I think they should have labeled last year's release a pre-release open beta. With that said, all isn't lost and it may benefit from the additional community input.

[@lkp7481]

I hope they are really trying. Since the March release I cannot play the game for more than 20 min without crashing to desktop. I also, despite my better judgement, bought the ultimate edition pre release and to date have got nothing for my money. I have to say that my FPS is much higher with the last few updates but, the crashing makes the game pretty much unplayable. Antialiasing is still ridiculous and looks like crap.

[@KarterBigs]

Just a reminder for everybody here, don't blame the devs, these Publishers are becoming more and more of a problem and we can see what happens when Studios don't fall in line, just look at ksp2. While it sucks that it got released in this state, let's be thankful that Paradox has finally backed off and giving colossal order some breathing room to actually operate and work with the community

[@Palpatine001]

The Great Summer Lock aka the Great European Naff off where if you need anything done by your EU clients between June and September then absolutely FORGET IT 😂 Drives us absolutely nuts in the Southern Hemisphere Then again the great SANZAR (South Africa, New Zealand, and Australian) Naff off is December 15 until March 1 so 😛

[@Khotetsu]

Meanwhile, in the US: "You guys are getting vacations??" 😧

[@tomaskner9537]

They should have released the game as a BETA... Subnautica was in beta for several years and it turned out to be a great game..

[@peronohaynada]

I'm looking forward to the feedback request

[@lukejams]

i think they should hold off on the console release till all the fixes and improvements are first implemented on the PC release. Why should console players be eager to play a game that is yet to become a hit on it's primary platform.

[@duckpond7856]

I don't have a lot of confidence in CO's ability to fix the game. If they could, I think it would have been done already. I'm cautiously hoping for the best.

[@Swarm509]

They are fixing it, but it really shows how much more development time they really needed. I do think CO went over their head with this game though, but Paradox still pushed it out in this state knowing full well it had major issues. I think this is why we have not seen a another real Sim City style city builder since CS1/CS2, it just way too complicated with the level of fidelity people now want in them. Some of stuff I see in CS games I could see being sold in professional design software for real city planning, and they need to incorporate this into a game for under $60!

[@joshuam20]

You think they would’ve done it already? Game development takes time bud, it’ll take over a year from initial release at least

[@joshuam20]

Land value fixed yet? Rather annoying when no one in the city can afford any of the housing

[@maszlagma]

Promises promises.... at this point I only believe results

[@ald7278]

I mean just lol. Rebuilding the entire economy from scratch is just another signal that this game was released in a completely unacceptable state and that nobody should ever buy anything from CO ever again. You just know that the dlc packs that they make in the future will be even more expensive to recover their losses from giving away ‘free content’

[@stanpikaliri1621]

The game looks nice though.

[@sunclausewitz2707]

Mindbogeling that summer vacation has to be explained.

[@bobsemple9341]

Americans never understand

[@meslud]

"work" is not that important in Europe, as simple as that. In german for example, we have the expression "it's feierabend", which translates to celebration evening, just as a term for the time of the day (any day) when you get home from work. Also, employers here will force you to consume your vacation (which is also, always, paid vacation) or overtime hours (meaning more than 32-40 hours a week, depending on country, full time) even if you don't want to. There is I think no major country in Europe with less than four weeks of legally required (paid) vacation time (for any type of work, even part-time) a year, not counting the holidays (which are also always paid time off); and if you're getting a baby, you will get up to two years off of work, with a right to return to your job, though this time it is unpaid by the employer, you just get a compensation from the government. also up to a few months before birth. Not to speak about some countries where you get a bonus 13th or 14th payment as if there were 13 or 14 months, often just right before the major holidays (christmas, summer), to pay for your vacation. So, don't ever visit France in August, it is closed.

[@Hattori_Fujiyama]

economy rework ie what they promised would be in the game from the start... probably not even that good.

[@aaron4680]

I mean.. my fps went from 30 to a smooth... unplayable 20 after the last update

[@bobsemple9341]

That's unlikely

[@jeremysheather4149]

MONEY GRAB PACKS!

[@VladimirLukele]

so I won't be losing money with positive balance? cool

[@resimarc]

It’s sad but they killed skylines 2 (very likely paradox altogether) releasing it unfinished. They lost consumers trust, they even tried selling a dlc with an unfinished game! I was going to buy prison architect 2 on launch, but seeing what happened with CS2 I won’t to avoid disappointment. In consoles it’s even worse, the game is missing a lot of things.

[@RastaWayne-di4sj]

The hubris was so real with these guys. Same as with Bethesda. The modding community is what makes some of these devs, yet the care more about making their ultimate edition even more expensive than to actually make a good game. Modders gonna fix it for free right? Except they shit the bed so hard with this one not even the modding community is having fun saving this.

[@amshermansen]

Until I see substancial performance optimization, this isn't a game for me. Even with a 3080, it's not able to stay at 60FPS with a tiny town and very low settings.

[@bobbyc5684]

summer vacation after the blunders his studio has had lately?! The cahones this publisher has.

[@bobsemple9341]

You sound extremely American. You make it sound like they don't deserve their holidays . Which are a right btw In future. Don't be so American. Stay jealous

[@KirbyPhelpsPK]

It's the law

[@xbvg]

Thats only alpha 13

[@brandonrashall9157]

i cannot play this game, i tried here recently and its performance tanked compared to the last time i played, reduced the graphics to absolute potato quality and it still had these huge stutters and frame drops. used to be able to play at about... guestimating, 25 to the 35 frames, and now im only getting 5 to 15 frames maybe less? i may end up waiting for the console release, and just buying on console... as much as i dread it however i feel itll be better than my PC.

[@marekkos3513]

Why dont they make Cities Skylines 3 , instead.

[@opalyankaBG]

Cuz it would take a decade probably lol

[@ast-og-losta]

With SimCity 4, if you made bad decisions your city will fail. I'm hearing that Cities Skylines is not that way. I want a challenge.

[@TheBlueNinja04]

If they actually care about player feedback they should learn from Old School RuneScape

[@averygoldfish7028]

Console delayed a year, sounds like they should have just delayed the game entirely

[@AB-dx1co]

CS2 will have more patches than CS1 had DLCs😂

[@mosmit8648]

Your simulation is still broken, vehicles still driving on the wrong side of the road.

[@kmj-ueb2033]

In Europe you drive on the left side lol

[@mosmit8648]

@@kmj-ueb2033 I didn't know that but after you told me I tried - didn't work out too well. Greetings from the hospital in Berlin. 🤕

[@joshuam20]

@@kmj-ueb2033no you don’t

[@joshuam20]

@@mosmit8648the American mind boggles sometimes.

[@Bambeakz]

I need at least 10 more good patches before I start to think about installing this POS. I need more healing :p Maybe late next year. For now i have hidden the game in Steam.

[@partypooper8198]

what a joke. the wonky driving AI is sooo immersion breaking it hurts.... then you go look at the peds and half of them are walking an identical dog.. Also what's with the road maintenance vehicle stuttering down the freeway in the passing lane and cars are just following??? JFC! there's no way this game is going to work on current consoles. the game has barely even worked on PC, are people forgetting that!? still having technical issues with asset editors and people expect a console version to run smoothly on current consoles L A W L !!! I just cannot believe The game is so dang wonky and broken for it's native platform and people are working on a console version... they are completely disconnected from what this game made it popular in the first place and simply want to push crap out the door to make the next buck. before we know it, paradox will shut down CO and the game will be left in a goofy, half busted / half decent city painter state. lets be real here, how long is this publisher going to keep a studio with such bad management and low player numbers alive?? it's a measly 30 people to begin with. companies this size let go of teams made of thousands without batting an eye. the internet is full of bad press and bad reviews, how many years are they going to work on fixing that? is paradox willing to support these devs for the 3-5 years people expect the game to get better?

[@cheeseflannel8343]

If you think paradox isn't the reason this game is where it is I got news for ya bud-

[@Bambeakz]

@@cheeseflannel8343 Fake news. The dev team is just bad

[@bobsemple9341]

​@@Bambeakz Just to clerify. You're nor a dev and likely not smart enough either? Don't need to answer. We know

[@dougbeard7624]

Too little, too late, I've uninstalled and CO has seen my last dime. Leadership changes at CO and Paradox are the only way I'll consider anything published from them ever again.

[@aymen-lh8ro]

At this point I just wish another competitor anounce a new game

[@jad1714]

Honestly maybe I’m an idiot but I like city building games and find the game very complicated and frustrating and have no plan on playing until it’s much more flushed out

[@kjellduteweert9262]

I don't what it is but city to just looks ugly. I don't why but City one looks better. I just done see who these graphic look wel. If you look at Manor lord that what I expected cities two to look like.

[@AdornByFire]

Major disappointment looks shite

[@opinionday0079]

They shouldn't be called patches there should be called developing a game because this game was released in an awful state

[@timjaysadler3097]

Jokers. They have YEARS of improvement with this hot pile of garbage. What a laugh all those friendly pre release vids were, conning everyone into thinking the game was going to be good lol.

[@Bakarost]

Bro u still getting paid by them?

[@bobsemple9341]

Wtf are u talking about?

[@MadBert]

This game was born dead. Paradox has killed the franchise.

[@nathonbrewer7775]

Polishing a turd still means its a turd. This game belongs in the dumpster. They should spend their resources on something else or just close shop entirely. They dont know what they are doing.

[@bobsemple9341]

You've no idea what you're talking about :)

[@phexac]

Does it hurt to keep trying to talk politely about this turd?