It feels like an oldschool city builder like Sim City 3000 more than anything else. Its just a straight city builder without the "world" or region aspect you get in SimCity 4, SimCity 2013 or Cities XL. I think the region aspec from other games can add to longevity, but I don't think you lose much and you can simulate regions with districts to some extent
I like it but haven't played that long yet. Didn't really have any issue with budget and haven't touched taxes yet. Only thing was getting a lot of traffic but the mass transport is really well implemented, so have dealt with that pretty much. Still quite a smallish city though atm