/begin rant
Agreed as I ate up all the pre-release info we were told and now having built a few cities with friends in a region it feels mediocre at best. The chat is just boring with uninformative notifications, I mean they could of included some sort of voice chat and proper notification system rather than "text" chat.
The regional interaction is limited where everything is faked when cities are connected, I can send resources or simoleons sure but with all the damn lag issues we still face has there's no point, even building a great work seems like a hassle.
We’ve created a dynamic supply and demand model for trading by keeping a Global Market updated with changing demands on key resources. -- nice try Maxis.
I feel like I'm just in a silo while my friends are in one too and all we can do is chat and not really do much beyond that and not have a proper impact on each other and since everyone's buildings pretty much are the same, I don't feel unique at all. How about each city can be themed a certain way? Naming bridges/highways, regional events, seasons, etc. Yes, I know boat loads of DLC *sigh*
If Maxis actually spent more time testing their game I probably wouldn't care about the server issues but we're at patch "1.7" yet it still feels like I'm playing a Beta build while Maxis at turtle speed spits out tweaks leaving other game breaking bugs for "another" time. I mean SimCity is a basically an MMO right? So I expected more frequent and larger patches post-release, you know like a serious MMO.
As for the whole cloud saving thing, it is horrible with all the rollbacks and cities I've lost and plainly rage inducing. I went from loving Maxis to now extremely skeptical of their motives and wary of what they say and release from now especially with their GM showing truly how they operate. The whole free game thing, I couldn't care less (classic smoke and mirrors PR move) -- just fix your damn game Maxis and stop making excuses like a normal game developer would.
/end rant
