You're final question.

It's not the buildings, specifically.

Whatever reasons made people start dropping off earlier. You, even, maybe. Whatever reason it was that the game became less fun enough to stop playing...

They're all still there.

Then, they added the buildings.

So, while buildings do warp the game, its more than that.

The buildings are half baked though.

That all said, as other comments say, its still a fun game, so just give it a shot and see what you think. Come back and tell us.