This made me really happy because this is something we are literally busy working on!! The town in the full game is much bigger and has more shops to visit and more people to meet, and many of them have storylines that impact the town and your museum in some way. You can increase your relationship with people too which has effect on things. We've have kept it all optional though for people who don't enjoy chit chatting too much.
Noted on the zoom feature - we will see if we can add this where ever possible :-)