* Purely subjective opinion: It's ugly as hell. The front of vehicles isn't just for engines, it's also for aerodynamics.
* It's crazy expensive.
* The bed looks too short to be practically useful.
* The wheels look comically small.
* The ground clearance doesn't seem to make it useful for more than suburban and urban road environments.
Also as a corollary, I was thinking about games from the 90s I spent hundreds of hours playing back then earlier today. Bolo and Escape Velocity in particular come to mind. They were "simple" games with immense depth. But after some fruitless searching, all I find is scattered questions and comments over the last few years looking for modern equivalents are a handful of recommendations for games that are no longer developed or are defunct.
There's clear prior evidence of both success and lack of modern supply. Want to have a minimally minor successful game with established nostalgic audience? Make a new version of EV that is that game at its core. Don't be fancy, just do the thing Ambrosia did. Expand from there.
The simple model is look forward, and also look back. The first itch is small. For yourself. Find some others with a similar itch.
The hard part is pushing your idea into something more people want. That's where pg's 2013 article comes in to play. That's the hard part.
But that leaves a huge space between 0 and 10 where someone can find a successful niche.
Hell I've thought about trying to make a modern EV. It's tantalizing. But I've never made a game in my life. Ok I've rewritten Game of Life a lot. Good concept to try new ideas with. But the amount of work for a solo dev trying to recapture that original magic with no background in game dev is daunting.