Instead of a single quest that gets generated that you binarily fail or complete, both resulting in global effects if I'm not mistaken, perhaps a more elaborate system?

Even just making it two-tiered would be a gigantic improvement: Instead of a single quest, you get 2. One at about 75% or so of the level of the current game and another at 100%. If you succeed in the 75% one, you can make promises in the next election and your penalties are only incurred for people who have mild to severe disapproval of you, while people with neutral or better opinions of you consider it a satisfied promise.

I feel like this more realistically reflects the way political life actually works. Politicians make and fail to live up to promises all the time. If their supporters see they make a meager effort at least, they generally don't take it so hard, or at least, not nearly as hard as those already primed to disagree.



I had this thought while playing yesterday and my promise to improve living conditions failed by exactly 1 point when the time limit elapsed. It felt kinda dumb frankly that not a single citizen was satisfied with a 16 point improvement in housing quality, and it would have been no less weird if on that final day suddenly the happiness level jumped one higher and now suddenly every citizen was convinced. People don't work like this, and it felt very "simulator"-esque. I think a tiny bit of nuance could go a really long way.