My biggest issue with modern Simcity-likes is this blind focus on traffic simulation. I want a realistic simulation of a city, the traffic is a secondary effect of everything else, and that's where games are dropping the ball. It's crazy we haven't seen anything surpass Simcity 2000 even now.
Wil Wright did research into city dynamics and turned that into a series of games. And even if the sources he used weren't perfect (even questionably neoliberal), what he did was unique and nobody seems to be trying to replicate what he did with better information, better research and a better understanding of people/psychology/sociology.
Wil Wright did research into city dynamics and turned that into a series of games. And even if the sources he used weren't perfect (even questionably neoliberal), what he did was unique and nobody seems to be trying to replicate what he did with better information, better research and a better understanding of people/psychology/sociology.