Thank you. A thousand times this.
I live in Japan, and we've lost pretty much everything that would make a mapping application useful. Unlike some people, I use (or used) Maps almost daily.
Even the ridiculously wealthy use public transportation here because it's faster. That's out now. There are no routing apps currently worth using, and of course they don't integrate with Maps. The infuriating part is that transit data is very easy to come by here. And it's not just a matter of plugging in two stations either; Tokyo has around 900 stations connecting 100 rail lines run by several dozen companies. Google Maps does a very impressive if imperfect job of figuring out the quickest route and cost (plus giving you several choices).
Beyond that, the stations are just wrong. I work near Tokyo Station. I can find problems with Otemachi, Ginza, Higashi-ginza, Ginza 1-chome, Kyobashi, Hibiya and Shiodome Stations, all within a brisk walk. Even if they were right, Google Maps shows exit numbers and names, which is almost universally where people meet up around here and necessary information for going somewhere new. The wrong exit can mean a 15-minute walk back in the other direction. And shucks, the stations don't even show up in Maps unless you're zoomed in extremely closely.
Street View is fairly complete and actually useful. Tokyo is full of narrow alleys and side streets, so sometimes it's easy to get lost without a quick glance at what the storefront looks like.
Flyover doesn't apply to Japan. Turn by turn is completely inapplicable for most travelers, at least because every car here has been equipped with superior and very localized navigation for years. Yelp is awesome in the US but hasn't reached Japan, although Apple could tie up with Tabelog and achieve the same thing.
Fact is, it's unusable for transportation (lacking public transit completely) and has near-zero reliability for place names. The latter will improve--or at least I hope, after submitting 20-some problems, some egregious, and seeing none resolved--but the former is an enormous flaw. In Tokyo it's inferior to paper maps right now as those at least have respectable data quality. And it's not like good data doesn't exist; there's a reason Google uses Zenrin.
For the time being, I have Google's webapp, but it's slower and a much weaker integration with iOS.
I understand for some people the new Maps works for their purposes and might even be better. Congrats. But here in Tokyo, I and many others are very frustrated, and these problems are definitely not "hype." To call these problems minor is just ridiculous. It's pre-alpha at best in countries like mine, and it's replacing a very mature product.
It looks like on Gix1k's image if I turn it off, hybrid or satellite view works.
