Cities Skylines 2 is the answer to every traffic, road-building, and general vehicle management problem we’ve ever faced in the city-building game. Formerly the reserve of Cities Skylines mods, constructions such as roundabouts, split highways, and perfectly parallel residential blocks will be available from the go, as Paradox and Colossal Order reveal a totally overhauled system for managing cars and traffic. Ahead of the Cities Skylines 2 release date, if you’ve ever been frustrated by the fussy, fiddly road building of the past, or practically wanted to blow up your entire creation because people just wouldn’t drive the way they’re supposed to drive, rest easy. Cities Skylines 2 solves everything.
Ok, first up we have roundabouts. In Cities Skylines, making a roundabout means actually, physically constructing a circular road. You can do it, but it’s time-consuming, always ends up a little jagged, and ultimately confuses the heck out of your motorists. Not anymore. Cities Skylines 2 comes with a dedicated roundabout tool, so you can just select one from the menu and drop it into the center of a main Cities Skylines 2 road.
Next, split highways and on-off ramps. In the original Cities Skylines, we needed mods to make these work, or, again, we had to spend ages trying to properly align tiles and lanes, and even then, we’d usually end up with something skewed and ugly that didn’t quite work right.
Now, in Cities Skylines 2, you can pre-made intersections to your highways, and also create entry and exit ramps with dedicated lanes for acceleration and deceleration. All you have to do is build a highway type that has an additional lane, then connect the additional lane to a single-lane highway, and that’s it – instant ramp.
In terms of building city blocks, rather than manually creating the road layouts yourself, there’s a new tool that automatically arranges roads into neat, symmetrical block patterns. All you do is click, drag until the blocks are at your required size, and drop. On top of that, every single road you build (except highways) will already be equipped with water, electricity, and sewer lines, so you don’t need to add these yourself.
You can also build new roads over existing roads, creating your own intersections with ease. Also, as we have previously reported, there are now parking lots, adding a whole-new dimension to how you manage and optimize inner-city traffic. If roads gave you a headache in Cities before, Cities Skylines 2 is the remedy.
Check out the full Cities Skylines 2 system requirements, so your PC is ready for launch day. You might also want to try some of the other best management games, as we wait for CS2 to finally drop.