Remember the time when every server space suddenly got called ‘cloud’? Or when every device needed to be ‘3D’? Or every household item got Bluetooth to make it a ‘smart’ item? Or you needed the word ‘crypto’ included your software products? Or when all the products had a lower case ‘i’ in front to make them look advanced?
In a few months we’ll look back at the time a the time, when everyone suddenly called their algorithms an ‘AI’. Paradox could just call it Smart iTraffic 3D to hit more buttons.
Judging from the 1st game, it’s probably mods and player ingenuity to solve the issues with the traffic. Which his honestly a part of the experience of playing Cities Skylines. Getting around all the problems with your own solutions. Sometimes I completely (had to) redesigned parts of the city to solve one junction.
Afaik when it comes to games the way npcs think has always been called AI, so wouldn’t really say its something new or making it seem smarter in this context.
I get that it’s not ideal. My issue is just that a big part of Cities Skylines is to solve the traffic. Try to keep it flowing with a more and more complex city around it, changing main routes, changing infrastructure options. You cannot just make it Smart iTraffic 3D without removing the major challenge from the game. Fixing some bugs and not having traffic that dumb like in the 1st game would be appreciated though.
The term ‘AI’ just gets used way too loosely, only getting worse in the recent months. ‘Traffic’ and ‘AI’ in Cities Skylines just doesn’t fit together well.
