Thoughts on the Difficulty in 1.14?

[Arakash]

After maxing out the marketing budget I managed to sell one single pickup truck after 6-7 months. It's also hard to sell poor quality (I guess) since I couldn't make them any better due to the cost of the units. So yeah. Ethiopia will have to wait until my überskillz are far better.

Not saying this is good or bad, but as a beginner I observe that changing history by creating an Ethiopian car company is not easily done. So it seems it works as it should.

It might sound like a clichè, but this game seems to have so much potential. Excited to see how it evolves through the next patches

If you want a more reasonable low tech city in the 1900 start, try Japan.
Its percapita is still a lot lower than Europe and the US, but its high enough that you can actually run a car company there. Ive certainly done so before.
For any new players watching though, id highly recommend London or New York, until you really get familiar with the complex game mechanics.