Regions - Feedback

Like a few other players, I was really excited when I first saw the update. The new regions were visually appealing, had a small fun story attached to them, and I liked the idea of starting a new area over. I was so intrigued by the region I picked that I wanted to spend most of my time/energy/resources on that region instead of my main one. I now simply become sad every time I go into my region to try and collect that region's measly few coins in the effort to someday maybe be able to play the region effectively. While I like the thought behind the regions expansion, below are my main issues with the latest update.

The game has become heavily skewed towards existing large players and makes being a smaller (and learning) player even more difficult. As someone who is level 25, I feel that the amount of real-world money I would have to drop at once in order to ease my level of frustration with this regions addition is insane. It just does not feel worth it.

This is due to the following:

• Simolean cost of opening a new region.
  • There is a huge upfront cost to establishing the new region, in the form of immediately needed utilities. These are all immediately needed, unlike when one starts the game for the first time and each new utility is introduced at a separate level. This is much easier for a larger/more established player to pay than for a smaller/newer player. I have not had the simoleans to dedicate to all brand new utilities in the region, contributing to the reason why I abandoned my region. Even if I had the simoleans, I am doubtful if it would be prudent for me to spend them at this juncture in the game. New players who have newly reached level 25 and lack access to the wisdom of more established players (perhaps because that player opted to not join a club) would very likely open the new region as soon as they reach 25 and run into this same problem. This is simply not fun and is highly discouraging. I don't think this regions update was actually well suited for level 25
  • Something to ease the pain: Phase-in utility needs, just like they are phased-in at the beginning of the game
• Utility/service buildings cannot be transferred.
  • It's nice that landmarks/education/parks/etc can be transferred (which I did during my initial excitement), but I have leftover utility/fire/police items that aren't being utilized in my main city that would be useful in my region city that I am not allowed to use in my region. This increases the cost of running the new region and feels wasteful.
  • Fix: allow players to transfer utility/services buildings.
• An investment in a player's region means leveling faster than a player probably ought to.
  • A couple people in my club had gotten caught up in the excitement of the new update and started creating/updating residential lots in the new region, not realizing how much faster this was pushing us to level up. New levels unlock additional content which add a strain on a player's resources, particularly in the form of storage. I was already aware that I needed to increase my storage prior to the new region opening up. The new region adds additional storage issues, which actually increased the threshold of storage availability I need in order to be able to handle the additional items that will need to be stored at the next level. Pushing players into leveling up before they're ready just adds frustration to the game. For the current setup, it would be very easy for a player to hit level 25 and then get wrapped up in the new exciting region and end up leveling up to storage constraints they're not prepared for.
  • Fix option 1: Don't have region buildings contribute to leveling up
  • Fix option 2: Have region buildings contribute to leveling up at a slower rate than the capital
  • Fix option 3: Have region-specific levels that only unlock region-specific items. This would keep the regions much more independent from the main city and ease the pain of smaller players leveling up and getting flooded with new items to manage.
  • Fix option 4: Significantly raise the level that regions are available (sometime post OMEGA, perhaps?)
• Region-specific currency that is difficult to obtain.
  
  • A player mostly spend simoleans on their new region, but also must collect the region-specific currency that is, quite frankly, hard to get. Currently, my only route has been through citizen offers. I am level 25 with two region-specific items to produce. They don't yield a lot of coins. One or two here and there, and because I can't afford the utilities (either because of simolean constraints or to remove the temptation to level up prior to being ready for it, since I so badly would like to play with the new region) I have few citizens to begin with. This is an excruciatingly slow process for me. It seems like it's slow for some of the more established players in my club as well, and I assume they have far more opportunities to earn region specific coins than I do. 
  • Fix option 1: Make everything in that region be and produce that region-specific currency. Have taxes in that region. Items traded should yield that region-specific currency, etc. Just like in the start of the game, give everyone a reasonable amount of region-specific currency when they open the region.
  • Fix option 2: Get rid of region-specific currencies and have everything be in simoleans.
• Storage.
  
  • The new regions add a huge storage constraint. Most, if not all, level 25 players aren't maxed out on storage. I'm not even close to maxing out on storage. Additionally, regional storage is costly in region-specific currency. I doubt it's possible for a level 25 to gain that storage in any kind of timely manner. In that time, players that are already struggling for storage and struggling even more with the added region items. 
  • Fix: When a player starts a new region, they also start with that region's separate storage.
• Club chest limited to top 25 members.
  • I've enjoyed being part of a club where players come in and out of the club as they need to trade. I've met very fun and interesting individuals that I'm sure I otherwise would not have. As an added bonus, I don't have to worry about the pressures of staying active every day (for when life comes up), since I'm just part of the club when I need or want to be. This has also helped me grow and enjoy the game more because I was able to gain the benefits of the legendary chest even though I was not always able to be a top contributor. I've played the game more than I otherwise would have because of fo this club.  The new top 25 members limit means that smaller players in clubs with a rotating membership don't really have a shot at any kind of chest. The new top 25 limit means that larger players who were already well established continue to add to their accounts while newer, less established players, don't get anything. This is just making the game more exclusive and more discouraging for new players and adds a level of competition that need not exist in this game. 
  • Fix: Remove the top 25 limit on clubs and allow smaller players to get ahead by collaborating with more established players.

I have spent real world money on this game in the past. With the new update, I'm not even sure how long I want to play. I'm certainly not going to spend money on a game that makes it harder for me to enjoy the game at all.