The End of Suburbia, Suburbia 2 Update (11/18/17)

Finally, after all this time, Suburbia has been shut down. From my knowledge it isn't from the questionable actions either, but as they quote, 'technology changes on Facebook'. They might of had to actually update the game. As of October 7, 2017 (without alerting players to what I know) the game was shut down.

Now, going to the game brings up this page. Along with a link to the 'new' Suburbia 2.

So... The game was going to go out eventually. After years of no updates, farming rubies off of people, it quietly killed itself in the night... Which means those who wasted rubies have lost everything. Up until the last day people probably could have purchased rubies for nothing.

Even in the last leg of its life, Suburbia managed to scam someone. Now that's drama!

Since I'm here anyway, I decided to do an update on Suburbia 2. Who knows, maybe they got the spice situation under control.

My experience:

I started the game to find that virtually nothing has changed on first viewing, except for a newspaper to watch videos for rewards. I'm then asked to buy a bread maker, which I do, and to make bread, which takes four flour and ten minutes of my time. I fill a few orders... But there's no chemical feedback.

See, games like this are made to stimulate you chemically. You get the hormones pumping, the dopamine kicks in, and you feel like these mindless things are worth something. Apparently Suburbia 2 is broken, because the gameplay isn't enough to bring that feeling around. If anything, it's even less rewarding than it was the last time I played it.

There is a new display to sell extra product, but I don't know how this works. I assume it's something that goes through friends or is time sensitive, which would make it worthless to me either way. Estate Expansion is still 'coming soon', which seems like a bad sign already. Though there is a new, maybe, Gazebo that unlocks at level 20.

I then notice that I'm being called for 'Mine Disaster'? I head to Carrie's house for a designated portion of story. We talk for two or three seconds and then the 'quest' is over. I wouldn't really consider this a quest.

Then, as though this can't get any better, the game glitches out on me. An arrow point to 'Return Home', but won't let me click it. Clicking anything else says 'Please complete the task first', so I am in a relentless loop. At this point I just gave up.

In short:

If Suburbia 2 has been updated, it's with small, meaningless trinkets that don't fix the gameplay or story in any way. Though I didn't play too long, because the game also managed to bore me to tears and then glitched out. That itself is nearly unforgivable for a game that's been out this long.

Though there are new episodes... But with episodes like this, they aren't anything to be proud of. Literally two paragraphs of typed conversation accounts for 'story', so I'm not going to praise them for not abandoning their game. (Yet)

The game is also fraught with bugs that I didn't see. Common complaints have involved the inability to log in, the mail box, not getting rewards from videos, blank screens, and yes, I saw a few people still complaining about the spice. In short, Suburbia 2 is just as broken as before, just in different ways.

It also still lacks a real backbone and rewards with petty cash that is virtually unusable. It also begs for rubies. It also is going down the same road as Suburbia. While it's updating now, I wouldn't be surprised if in a year or so the game goes on a prolonged hiatus, which may only be broken by a possible Suburbia 3. These things come in cycles.

This is my warning: Don't go into Suburbia 2 thinking they learned from the first game. Companies don't 'learn' when it comes to making money and it's clear that they have already started cutting corners with content. The content itself isn't rewarding in the slightest, so unless you like wasting your time without any form of enjoyment I recommend looking elsewhere.

It's only a matter of time before the episodes slow down and stop. Then we'll get either a Suburbia 3 or a Suburbia spinoff, like "Suburbia in the Big Apple" or something. Then Suburbia 2 will probably be left to molder like its predecessor.

Look at what they've left us with...

"Leave it be, I say!"