Cities: Skylines 2 recently released the Beach Properties Asset Pack DLC with an overwhelmingly negative reception from players.
Released on 25 March 2024, the DLC includes 2 new zonings, 4 new palm trees and 6 new signature buildings.
Players who purchased the DLC were extremely upset with the $10 USD purchase, stating that the beachfront properties included in the DLC did not have any mechanical interactions with the rest of the game. In addition, many buyers believed that the pack did not contain enough content to justify its price tag.
The DLC soon became the lowest rated game on Steam and had only a 5.56% positive rating, according to SteamDB.
In response, publisher Paradox Interactive swiftly removed the DLC from the Steam page. But in the process, players have reported that attempting to load their save files in the base game will instead load blocks of white cuboids in place of their city.
Cities Skylines 2 rushes to delete “Worst Rated DLC on Steam”, proceeds to break base game.
byu/erbdylo ingaming
Following this incident, Paradox released a post on the game’s official forum on 18 April 2024 apologizing for the disappointing release of Cities: Skylines 2 and its DLC. In addition to making the Beach Properties Asset Pack available for free, they also promised to compensate all players who have bought the DLC with either full refunds or 3 Creator Packs and 3 Radio Stations (worth $39.99 USD) for Ultimate Edition owners who will be unable to receive the refunds.
In the forum post, Paradox explains that they will focus on additional free patches and game updates in the coming months which will delay the release of the Bridges and Ports Expansion to 2025. Meanwhile, the console release of Cities: Skylines 2 will be delayed from Spring to October of 2024.