Bus Simulator 27 is the latest entry in astragon’s long-running series, developed this time by Simteract and built in Unreal Engine 5. It launches on September 8 at $29.99, with a $49.99 Year 1 Edition that grants advance access — which is how we and everyone else quoted here have been playing it.
Our verdict: if you crave authentic bus management with licensed vehicles and deep simulation mechanics, this is worth your money. With one large caveat about timing, which is the whole reason for the note at the top of this page.
What’s Genuinely Improved
Both switchable directly in settings, so you can shape how you experience the cities.
Toggle between arcade and realistic city colour grading. A small, well-judged option.
Play as driver, inspector, or passenger — or leave the bus entirely and explore on foot.
Full modding on PC, plus support for popular steering wheels and gamepads.
Performance appears solid too. Players report the game running smoothly without lag spikes, including on laptops — which is notable for a UE5 open world of this size, even if the recommended spec asks for a lot.
The Traffic AI Is the Problem
There’s a smaller cluster around the bus stops themselves: shaking when you dock, stops not rendering correctly on the ground, turn signals occasionally not registering at intersections, and curb contact at low speed being scored as a high-speed impact. Individually minor. Collectively, they add up in a genre where precision is the point.
One Accessibility Request Worth Amplifying
Things to Know Going In
The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly
| The Good | The Bad | The Ugly |
|---|---|---|
| Every Bus Sounds Like ItselfIndividual door and engine audio across the fleet, replacing BS21’s recycled sounds. Series veterans single this out above everything else, because it’s the difference between knowing you’re in a different bus and feeling it. | Turn Signals Don’t Always RegisterIndicating at intersections sometimes isn’t detected, which in a game scoring you on procedure is more than a cosmetic issue. | NPC Buses Rear-End You at StopsAn AI bus on your own route driving into you rather than waiting — costing money — reportedly at every stop along a route. That’s not an annoyance, that’s a broken loop. |
| 45+ Licensed Buses, and Coaches at LastThirteen manufacturers including Solaris, Mercedes-Benz, MAN, IVECO, Scania and Volvo. Rigid, articulated, double-decker and electric — plus coach buses for the first time, which finally makes long-distance routes viable. | Curb Contact Is Mis-ScoredClipping a kerb at low speed near a stop can register as a high-speed impact. Small, but it penalises careful driving, which is the opposite of what a sim should do. | Frozen Traffic That Penalises YouCars and buses stall on the road and intersections gridlock. Driving around them is the only option, and the game fines you for it. Being punished for the simulation’s own failure is the worst version of this bug. |
| Felicia Bay Is Worth Driving ThroughTwo cities, 20 districts, detailed buildings and varied landscape, with switchable weather, time of day, and an arcade-or-realistic colour toggle. Players report it running smoothly, laptops included. | Bus Stops Shake and MisalignDocking can cause visible shaking of the bus and the surrounding area, and some stops don’t display correctly on the ground. | No Text Scaling for Departure BoardsReading stop departures is a core repeated interaction and there’s no way to enlarge it. A cheap accessibility fix that’s currently missing entirely. |
| Genuine Route and Role VarietyMixing city and intercity lines in one network keeps the loop fresh, and you can switch to inspector, ride as a passenger, or leave the bus and explore on foot for collectibles. | A Steep Recommended Spec32 GB of RAM recommended and Windows 11 required. Not unreasonable for a UE5 open world, but worth checking before you commit $49.99 for advance access. | It’s Being Judged Before It’s OutReviews are landing during paid advance access, ahead of the September 8 launch and whatever patch comes with it. Some of what’s being scored now may not exist in a week. |
The Verdict
There’s a very good bus game in here, and most of it is already working. The fleet is the largest the series has assembled, the coach buses open up a genuinely new kind of route, Felicia Bay is a pleasure to drive around, and the per-vehicle audio finally delivers the thing this series has always been selling. Series veterans who own three previous entries are calling it a step up from 21, which is the endorsement that matters most here.
The traffic AI is holding it back, and it’s holding it back in the most frustrating way possible — by charging you for its mistakes. Frozen cars you have to illegally overtake, gridlocked junctions, and an NPC bus that repeatedly drives into the back of you while you’re doing your job correctly. In a game about quiet competence, that’s the one category of bug that undermines everything else.
What keeps this on the right side of a recommendation is context. The game isn’t out yet. These reports come from advance access, Simteract are visibly responding to players in the review threads, and every single person raising these complaints still recommended the game. One put it at 6.5/10 and recommended it anyway, on the strength of how much is actually here.
The honest read: wait for September 8, then buy the $29.99 standard edition. The Year 1 Edition’s advance access is currently buying you the right to play a version with the traffic bugs still in it, at a $20 premium. Unless you want the Year 1 content specifically, there’s no advantage to being early on this one — and a launch patch could change the picture entirely.
We’ll come back to this after release. If the AI gets sorted, the score goes up, and we’d rather tell you that than pretend we knew in advance.
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