Cities: Cities: Skylines 2's first post-launch DLC, Beach Properties, was released in March, and it did not go well. Already frustrated with the state of the game, players felt that the DLC, an asset pack with no new features, was not worth the $10/£8.49 price tag, and as expected, a new wave of negative reviews washed over Steam.The Beach Properties DLC itself was "overwhelmingly negative" and only 4% of user reviews on Steam were positive.

Three weeks after its release, Colossal Order CEO Mariina Hallikainen and Paradox Deputy CEO Mattias Lilja issued a joint statement apologizing and promising to redo the Beach Properties DLC. Players who obtained this DLC as part of Cities: Cities: Skylines 2 Ultimate Edition will not be eligible for a refund, as partial refunds require a "very complicated process."

"Going forward, we want to make immediate and meaningful changes in the way we approach game development and in our communication with you," said Halikainen and Lilja. First, this means focusing entirely on improving the base game and mod tools, and second, we want to better involve you, the community, in choosing our priorities going forward."

To that end, Paradox and the Colossal Order will hold an "advisory meeting" with a small group of player representatives "chosen by the amount of support within the community to represent as many people as possible" to discuss plans for the rest of 2024. The Colossal Order and Paradox Interactive team will provide them with full transparency and answer any questions or criticisms that are put forth. Our hope is to work with you, our community, to ensure that we do not repeat the same mistakes we have made in the past and lead this game into a bright future."

In a way, Cities: Cities: Skylines 2's promise to influencers could be seen as a kind of turnaround for Colossal Order: in January, Hallikainen said that if harmful behavior among players increased, developers would warned that they would be forced to "pull back" from engaging with the community. At the same time, Hallikainen expressed the hope that "all of us can work together to keep developers going," and perhaps her warning was heeded.

On a more practical note, this change means that the upcoming "bridges and ports" expansion has been postponed until sometime in 2025; Cities: Cities: Skylines 2 was also delayed, but for an unrelated (but familiar) reason: developers are "struggling to get Cities: Skylines 2 to the required level of optimization": the developers are "struggling to get Cities: Skylines 2 to the required level of optimization" and are aiming for an October release instead of this spring. Hallikainen and Lilja said that the console development team is separate from the PC development team, so problems with the console will not affect their plans for the PC.

"Finally, we would like to reaffirm our dedication to making Cities: Skylines 2 the best city builder ever. 'We appreciate your support and feedback. It is our responsibility to earn your trust and we hope that this step is a step in the right direction."

It concludes.

Early reactions to the statement have been generally positive; on Steam and Reddit, Paradox and Colossal Order have been the most vocal in their support for Cities: On Steam and Reddit, Paradox and Colossal Order have so far been the most vocal in their support for Cities: Skylines 2 ), there is anger at how they have failed, and an understandable feeling that they are cheap talkers, but there is also a clear hope that maybe this is where everything will finally turn around.

The big challenge facing Paradox and Colossal is that they absolutely botched Cities: Skylines 2: Skylines 2 was terrible. In October 2023, the day after launch, the Colossal Order stated that the game's performance problems were "not deeply rooted in the foundation of the game" and promised a few weeks later that it would not release paid DLC "until the performance issues are fixed." But these problems persist: a post-launch patch has improved performance, but it is still not good enough for many players.

Worse, however, is the incredible loss of goodwill that has resulted: Cities: Cities:Skylines is an acclaimed city builder with a dedicated community that continues to attract thousands of players a day. But the sequel has been a mess from the start and seems to be getting worse. The numbers speak for themselves: Cities: Cities Skylines 2 peaked at over 104,000 concurrent players, almost double the number of its predecessor, but the current number of concurrent players is just over 6,000, less than half of those currently playing Cities Skylines: Skylines Obviously there were many people who wanted to play the new game, but that number has dropped sharply and significantly.

This will make it even more difficult for "Cities/Skylines 2" to rewind: it will be even harder for "Cities: Skylines 2" to do a 180 degree turn in the style of "No Man's Sky" or "Cyberpunk 2077". There is still room to make it happen, but there is no doubt at this point that the hole to get out of is much deeper than it needs to be.

FAQs about refunds and future Cities: Cities: Skylines 2 content are posted on the Paradox forums.