Hardly an alternative unfortunately.

The biggest benefit of the Car Thing for me was flawless voice control that leagues ahead of Google Assistant, the Car Thing was much more than a screen that showed album art.

I have to second this, I've never had an issue with Car Thing's voice recognition. As you'd mentioned, even in a windy or loud car and with tough to pronounce names, it's always understood what I was asking - or opening the correct playlists from my library.

I haven't found a similar replacement for that.