🚨 Hot off the presses. Next Civ game in development!!!!!!! 🤯
February 21, 2023 6:25 AM Subscribe
It Is Finally Time For A New Civilization Game [Kotaku] “Like many of you I’ve been a fan of this series for life, and like many of you (or so the vibes seem) I’ve grown increasingly despairing of Civ VI, a game that initially seemed to try some genuinely interesting things to set it apart from its predecessors, but which has ultimately fallen prey to an obsession with its district-improvement meta, that has come at the expense of more important stuff like enemy AI and combat. I know this isn’t a proper announcement. There’s not even a Civilization VII logo to slap on that tweet. But it does at least publicly herald that Civ VI’s days are finally coming to a close, and that it’s hopefully not too long before we see something that shows us how the series plans to tackle its fourth decade of existence.”
One more turn
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 6:38 AM on February 21, 2023 [22 favorites]
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 6:38 AM on February 21, 2023 [22 favorites]
This announcement coming along with the departure of Firaxis President and Studio Head Steve Martin (who has run Firaxis since soon after Civ 4's release) sounds like 2K and Take-Two were just as worried about the lack of a VII confirmation as the rest of us were.
posted by Etrigan at 6:42 AM on February 21, 2023
posted by Etrigan at 6:42 AM on February 21, 2023
Old World's district-improvement meta is much more interesting than Civ 6, too.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:47 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:47 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
I sure hope they do something to revive or modernize the franchise. Civ VI was very good in so many ways and yet somehow underwhelming in total.
There've been some interesting alternatives out there; both Humankind and Old World are serious variants on the Civ formula although neither grabbed me as much as I'd hoped. I also think there's some good ideas left to mine from Endless Legend, although that's 8 years now so hardly counts as novelty.
posted by Nelson at 6:48 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
There've been some interesting alternatives out there; both Humankind and Old World are serious variants on the Civ formula although neither grabbed me as much as I'd hoped. I also think there's some good ideas left to mine from Endless Legend, although that's 8 years now so hardly counts as novelty.
posted by Nelson at 6:48 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
I love the genre but dropped the franchise after IV.
That's kind of a bummer, because I think V really breathed some new life into it. Hexes, no more infinite stacks, IMO the absolute best art direction of the whole series. (I know they had to make certain compromises for tablet play in VI, so I don't really hold some of its interface design flaws against it.)
posted by tclark at 6:50 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
That's kind of a bummer, because I think V really breathed some new life into it. Hexes, no more infinite stacks, IMO the absolute best art direction of the whole series. (I know they had to make certain compromises for tablet play in VI, so I don't really hold some of its interface design flaws against it.)
posted by tclark at 6:50 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
If I fired up a Civ game today, what I’d select would be IV. On some level, I think it’s probably the most fun game of the lot.
However, I do think that all of the sequels to Sid Meier’s Civilization missed a fundamental part of the original, which is that it’s a game about the dangers of technology and science.
In the first game, eventually you’re going to develop nuclear technology, and if you haven’t already conquered the world by then, the logic of the game is going to push you into nuclear war and all that you’ve built will go up in flames and the best case scenario is that you are going to rebuild civilization from the ruins and nuclear wasteland, or escape the dying earth for Alpha Centauri, where you probably will do the same exact shit.
The original Civ was about how fragile and precious small-c civilization was, but in the later games you just turn the world into a beautiful garden.
While the Civ series is essentially “scientific progress fuck yeah”, Civ I was “scientific progress oh fuck”.
posted by Kattullus at 6:50 AM on February 21, 2023 [21 favorites]
However, I do think that all of the sequels to Sid Meier’s Civilization missed a fundamental part of the original, which is that it’s a game about the dangers of technology and science.
In the first game, eventually you’re going to develop nuclear technology, and if you haven’t already conquered the world by then, the logic of the game is going to push you into nuclear war and all that you’ve built will go up in flames and the best case scenario is that you are going to rebuild civilization from the ruins and nuclear wasteland, or escape the dying earth for Alpha Centauri, where you probably will do the same exact shit.
The original Civ was about how fragile and precious small-c civilization was, but in the later games you just turn the world into a beautiful garden.
While the Civ series is essentially “scientific progress fuck yeah”, Civ I was “scientific progress oh fuck”.
posted by Kattullus at 6:50 AM on February 21, 2023 [21 favorites]
Endless Legend's successor is Humankind, which takes the framework from EL and bends it into a history-based game. Adding a nomadic neolithic era and letting you pick your civ every age are good ideas, but I didn't like the final product as much as Endless Legend. The fantasy setting, and the heroes with progression and equipment you used to lead armies and govern cities, were what made Endless Legend captivating for me, and that stuff is missing in Humankind.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:54 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:54 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
What I want is a civ-like game that isn't just applying imperialist concepts of history on a cold war simulator. States shouldn't exist at the start of the game, and neither should Nations. And the goal of the game shouldn't be to win the cold war and reach the "end of history" that neoliberals have been misguidedly seeking for the past century. Scoring victory points by strategically collapsing your civilization at certain parts of the game would present a less deluded conception of history.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:05 AM on February 21, 2023 [11 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:05 AM on February 21, 2023 [11 favorites]
I'm a longtime Civ player who never was able to get into V or VI. VI especially felt like an entirely different game to I-IV and I also hated the art direction. I'm hoping that VII is a return to form but I have a feeling I'll still be playing IV in 2030.
posted by rhymedirective at 7:06 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by rhymedirective at 7:06 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Civ VII's map will be heptagons.
posted by mittens at 7:07 AM on February 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by mittens at 7:07 AM on February 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
I think I'd be more interested in shepherding a bloated capitalist dystopian hellscape into a peaceful, carbon neutral collective of physical and virtual states with largely socialist economies. Can one do it without a catastrophic global war and/or mass assassinations? That's the real question.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:18 AM on February 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:18 AM on February 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
Honestly, while a Civ VII sounds fun, I'd much rather have a really good spiritual successor to Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. Civilization: Beyond Earth just isn't it.
posted by SansPoint at 7:22 AM on February 21, 2023 [16 favorites]
posted by SansPoint at 7:22 AM on February 21, 2023 [16 favorites]
You gotta admit though, floating cities were cool. Beyond Earth could have been good if they had spent a gallon of effort making a sane tech web instead of the mess we got.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:27 AM on February 21, 2023
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:27 AM on February 21, 2023
In order to be able to make a sphere with (mostly) hexagons, apparently you need only 12 pentagons. I think that would be a cool addition if they can pull it off. They already have impassable tiles, just make the pentagons impassible and you hopefully don't have to tinker much with your movement code.
posted by tclark at 7:33 AM on February 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by tclark at 7:33 AM on February 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
If I fired up a Civ game today, what I’d select would be IV. On some level, I think it’s probably the most fun game of the lot.
I'm there with you. I liked V okay, and Steam tells me I've put a lot of hours into it, but I just can not get into VI.
Now IV, on the other hand, always seemed like the pinnacle of the series to me so far. It's got enough of the stuff kept from previous games with enough new mechanisms to keep it interesting (great people, religions, etc.).
My absolute favorite thing in IV, though, is to culture-bomb the hell out of a city on my borders near an opponent's city and wait for it to flip. The Aztecs or whoever go "Holy shit, look at all their museums and theatre districts and late-night coffee houses and art galleries. All we have is Chuck E. Cheese and that one jukebox with the complete works of Cliff Richard. We defect."
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 7:35 AM on February 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
I'm there with you. I liked V okay, and Steam tells me I've put a lot of hours into it, but I just can not get into VI.
Now IV, on the other hand, always seemed like the pinnacle of the series to me so far. It's got enough of the stuff kept from previous games with enough new mechanisms to keep it interesting (great people, religions, etc.).
My absolute favorite thing in IV, though, is to culture-bomb the hell out of a city on my borders near an opponent's city and wait for it to flip. The Aztecs or whoever go "Holy shit, look at all their museums and theatre districts and late-night coffee houses and art galleries. All we have is Chuck E. Cheese and that one jukebox with the complete works of Cliff Richard. We defect."
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 7:35 AM on February 21, 2023 [18 favorites]
As I recall, civ 4 felt really broken by the addition of corporations. It would be completely unplayable in a multiplayer environment, because whoever got sid's sushi or mining inc would just win. I think that was the game where I started feeling I could just stop playing after the Renaissance era because I knew whether I had won or lost by then. Early advantage in civ gets compounded like interest, but real civilizations that win early tend to stagnate and decline from the advantages that got them ahead in the first place.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:39 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:39 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Hear me out: A Firaxis-backed take on the Fall From Heaven 2 mod from Civilization IV but updated with the modern hexes and lack of doomstacks.
There is so much potential to do cool things with the basic Civ framework and they mostly don't do any of it, except for SMAC. And that was, so far as I am aware, Brian Reynolds baby much more than Sid's.
posted by Justinian at 7:41 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
There is so much potential to do cool things with the basic Civ framework and they mostly don't do any of it, except for SMAC. And that was, so far as I am aware, Brian Reynolds baby much more than Sid's.
posted by Justinian at 7:41 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I have trouble differentiating between V and VI in my mind. I think I bought and played VI, but would have to actually go and look to be sure. (The same is true of recent versions of Europa Universalis.)
As I recall, civ 4 felt really broken by the addition of corporations.
You can feel the legacy code in Civ IV creaking and grinding and shuddering as you play it, but it is still the 'classic' civ experience — the last to really feel like an adapted strategy board game and not a video game.
Which is not a knock on the later titles.
The documentary on the making of Civ V that was included in the collectors edition is worth watching if you enjoy that sort of thing.
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:45 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
As I recall, civ 4 felt really broken by the addition of corporations.
You can feel the legacy code in Civ IV creaking and grinding and shuddering as you play it, but it is still the 'classic' civ experience — the last to really feel like an adapted strategy board game and not a video game.
Which is not a knock on the later titles.
The documentary on the making of Civ V that was included in the collectors edition is worth watching if you enjoy that sort of thing.
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:45 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Why I probably won't be buying Civ VII:
The base game will come out, and will be woefully incomplete. To the point where it's just about unplayable. So I'll put off buying it.
The first few updates won't fix the base game, they'll just be long-planned additional content which should have come out with the base game. So I'll put off buying it.
The long-awaited update that fixes the base game and adds in the mechanics that make the game make sense comes out, and it's almost as expensive as the base game. So I'll wait for it to go on sale.
By the time it goes on sale, a plethora of new DLC will be out, and the price of the whole package will be astronomical by then, even on sale. And I really don't want to spend that kind of money on a game, so I'll never buy it.
The full Civ VI bundle is still about $30 and that's at 86% off. It came out in 2016.
posted by MrVisible at 7:47 AM on February 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
The base game will come out, and will be woefully incomplete. To the point where it's just about unplayable. So I'll put off buying it.
The first few updates won't fix the base game, they'll just be long-planned additional content which should have come out with the base game. So I'll put off buying it.
The long-awaited update that fixes the base game and adds in the mechanics that make the game make sense comes out, and it's almost as expensive as the base game. So I'll wait for it to go on sale.
By the time it goes on sale, a plethora of new DLC will be out, and the price of the whole package will be astronomical by then, even on sale. And I really don't want to spend that kind of money on a game, so I'll never buy it.
The full Civ VI bundle is still about $30 and that's at 86% off. It came out in 2016.
posted by MrVisible at 7:47 AM on February 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
Incidentally for those who liked Civ 4, the lead designer on that was Soren Johnson, and Old World is his new game. It's the best turn-based 4X out there right now, IMO, though it only covers the ancient age.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:48 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:48 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
If I fired up a Civ game today, what I’d select would be IV.
3, but I play civ much more for building an optimal layout given the terrain than I do for a challenge against other "players"
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:49 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
3, but I play civ much more for building an optimal layout given the terrain than I do for a challenge against other "players"
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:49 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Replaying Civ 6 lately, felt it suffered from coming out at the time of peak "let's gamify everything to maximize engagement" thinking. In keeping with this idea, every turn there was an engaging decision to be made. This kept the Civ addict part of my brain hooked, but in the big picture it felt like I was taking 50 extra steps just to go move a few steps to stop a barbarian invasion in a way that would have taken fewer keystrokes in Civ II. (There was an extreme version of this in the Civ Facebook game.)
Also I'm still frustrated that Firaxis never confronted the troubling treatment of Triangular Trade as a power-up rather than as a giant crime against humanity. I wonder if they will rethink some of this stuff in 7. I really enjoyed Sid Meier's recent memoir but his take on criticism of Civ was mostly "you're overthinking it."
posted by johngoren at 7:54 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Also I'm still frustrated that Firaxis never confronted the troubling treatment of Triangular Trade as a power-up rather than as a giant crime against humanity. I wonder if they will rethink some of this stuff in 7. I really enjoyed Sid Meier's recent memoir but his take on criticism of Civ was mostly "you're overthinking it."
posted by johngoren at 7:54 AM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Anyone who wants to play a civlike on their phone should look at Unciv - I think it started as an attempt to make an open source version of civ5 and it's still FOSS.
Not exactly pretty but plays wonderfully and has loads of mods (Android only I think).
posted by thatwhichfalls at 8:07 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Not exactly pretty but plays wonderfully and has loads of mods (Android only I think).
posted by thatwhichfalls at 8:07 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Back in the day - Civ I? Civ II? - if you conquered a city then the people became part of your civilisation. If you're playing France, they become French. So if you've got great culture, women's suffrage, all that good stuff - the people become part of your culture and everyone is happy!
From Civ III or so, civilisations became - I don't know a better term - races. A German is always a German, and will always be unhappy and discontent and Other in your civilisation. So you are better off waging wars of genocide and replacement if you want a truly happy civilisation in the future. Kill off the Germans and replace them with your race.
I leave it to the reader to decide what this is trying to say, if anything. But I don't like it. I'm probably a Marxist at heart.
posted by one more day at 8:12 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
From Civ III or so, civilisations became - I don't know a better term - races. A German is always a German, and will always be unhappy and discontent and Other in your civilisation. So you are better off waging wars of genocide and replacement if you want a truly happy civilisation in the future. Kill off the Germans and replace them with your race.
I leave it to the reader to decide what this is trying to say, if anything. But I don't like it. I'm probably a Marxist at heart.
posted by one more day at 8:12 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
What I want is a civ-like game that isn't just applying imperialist concepts of history on a cold war simulator.
You should add Terra Nil to your wishlist: Terra Nil, an ecological spin on a city-building game that has you reclaiming nature and building ecosystems using wind power, irrigation, and the like.
posted by Fizz at 8:17 AM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
You should add Terra Nil to your wishlist: Terra Nil, an ecological spin on a city-building game that has you reclaiming nature and building ecosystems using wind power, irrigation, and the like.
posted by Fizz at 8:17 AM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I don't think it's trying to say something, which is what Sid's comment about "overthinking" it is getting at. But by simply parroting unexamined tropes about how civilization works, it says things inadvertently. But the game design response to finding out their mechanics encouraged genocide was to no longer allow you to raze cities, not to reexamine the empire-aggrandizing narrative they're telling. I think my biggest problem with Civ games is simply that I no longer enjoy the stories it is capable of telling.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 8:17 AM on February 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 8:17 AM on February 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
And on the seventh play, Sid vested.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 8:26 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 8:26 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
I spent untold hours playing Civ IV mods, particularly Fall from Heaven. Never could get into V, have never bought VI.
posted by bonehead at 8:35 AM on February 21, 2023
posted by bonehead at 8:35 AM on February 21, 2023
I love the Civ games and will probably get this at some point assuming I have a system that can run it (I ended up getting Civ6 for the Switch because I didn't have anything else it could run on at the time). I do find it weird that a game like Civ needs to bring any PC to its knees but I'm sure there are reasons for it.
I want to play a Civ game where all games are on the inside of a Dyson sphere and if you are able to extend far enough you would come to some other game. It wouldn't be multiplayer, it would be the CPU controlling the remnants of someone else's game, and other CPU civilizations would need to show up as well because you've got about 550 million times the earth's surface to deal with, but imagine playing and expanding and then you come to an area that had been ravaged by nuclear war and you've either got to contain it so that the nuclear barbarians don't attack your civ or put in the work to remediate the whole thing.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 8:52 AM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I want to play a Civ game where all games are on the inside of a Dyson sphere and if you are able to extend far enough you would come to some other game. It wouldn't be multiplayer, it would be the CPU controlling the remnants of someone else's game, and other CPU civilizations would need to show up as well because you've got about 550 million times the earth's surface to deal with, but imagine playing and expanding and then you come to an area that had been ravaged by nuclear war and you've either got to contain it so that the nuclear barbarians don't attack your civ or put in the work to remediate the whole thing.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 8:52 AM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I-Write-Essays: As I recall, civ 4 felt really broken by the addition of corporations. It would be completely unplayable in a multiplayer environment, because whoever got sid's sushi or mining inc would just win.
This is solvable by modding the game such that State Property, which renders corporations moot, is the pinnacle of its Civics category. You then enshrine it into global law via the U.N.—although admittedly this can require…housecleaning when some AI leaders proclaim they will "Never!" vote for it.
(Corporations also have a tendency to cause out-of-sync errors in multiplayer—ending the game prematurely—which is about 60% of why I did the above.)
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 8:58 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
This is solvable by modding the game such that State Property, which renders corporations moot, is the pinnacle of its Civics category. You then enshrine it into global law via the U.N.—although admittedly this can require…housecleaning when some AI leaders proclaim they will "Never!" vote for it.
(Corporations also have a tendency to cause out-of-sync errors in multiplayer—ending the game prematurely—which is about 60% of why I did the above.)
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 8:58 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Civ VII's map will be heptagons.
The map has to tessellate, so dodecahedrons ahoy! 6 sides good; 12 sides better.
I want to love VI. I've sunk an ungodly number of hours into it, and it's the first in the series that I can consistently win at deity level. Districts are unquestionably a good idea, religion finally works, it's sprinkled with really good gameplay ideas (playing as Babylon is like playing a completely different game! letting units (eventually) navigate water tiles without having to cram them into caravels is a great idea! siege warfare is capably implemented!) and I've even come around to the art style. But. The AI is so. bad. I'm a deity player because I've learned how to survive the early game, where deity-level AIs just start with three times as much stuff as you and can build military ~3x as fast as you, so even their breathtakingly stupid decision-making tree is capable of deciding "ah-ha! I will go to war with my extremely weak neighbor!" and steamrolling you on turn 12. Once you make it to the medieval era, any halfway-competent human player will quickly overtake the AI players, even with their absurd bonuses to production and science, because the AIs are busy chasing wonders that won't help them, amassing military units three eras behind their technological capabilities, and building religious buildings that don't complement their strengths. It's stunning how bad the AI is at playing this game, even compared to the Civ IV AIs (which at least knew how to throw a competently-managed stack of doom at human players), and no amount of new player mechanics or balance tweaks can cover up that level of incompetence. So I'm hopeful that Civ VII will devote some serious effort to their AI play, or at least not hide it all in compiled code so that the modding community can't fix their shoddy work.
posted by Mayor West at 9:24 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
The map has to tessellate, so dodecahedrons ahoy! 6 sides good; 12 sides better.
I want to love VI. I've sunk an ungodly number of hours into it, and it's the first in the series that I can consistently win at deity level. Districts are unquestionably a good idea, religion finally works, it's sprinkled with really good gameplay ideas (playing as Babylon is like playing a completely different game! letting units (eventually) navigate water tiles without having to cram them into caravels is a great idea! siege warfare is capably implemented!) and I've even come around to the art style. But. The AI is so. bad. I'm a deity player because I've learned how to survive the early game, where deity-level AIs just start with three times as much stuff as you and can build military ~3x as fast as you, so even their breathtakingly stupid decision-making tree is capable of deciding "ah-ha! I will go to war with my extremely weak neighbor!" and steamrolling you on turn 12. Once you make it to the medieval era, any halfway-competent human player will quickly overtake the AI players, even with their absurd bonuses to production and science, because the AIs are busy chasing wonders that won't help them, amassing military units three eras behind their technological capabilities, and building religious buildings that don't complement their strengths. It's stunning how bad the AI is at playing this game, even compared to the Civ IV AIs (which at least knew how to throw a competently-managed stack of doom at human players), and no amount of new player mechanics or balance tweaks can cover up that level of incompetence. So I'm hopeful that Civ VII will devote some serious effort to their AI play, or at least not hide it all in compiled code so that the modding community can't fix their shoddy work.
posted by Mayor West at 9:24 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I've kind of surprised myself with not buying Civ VI, despite sales or anything else. I watched some let's plays of it over the years, and it just didn't grab me the way others did. I enjoyed Civ V, but still find myself going back to Civ IV when the bug really bite hard... which is less and less these days.
Maybe I'm just old and can't adapt to the new systems, maybe my tastes haven't evolved, maybe its that spending an entire day playing CIV isn't as possible for me anymore, or maybe my days of just one more turn are coming to an end?
posted by nubs at 9:31 AM on February 21, 2023
Maybe I'm just old and can't adapt to the new systems, maybe my tastes haven't evolved, maybe its that spending an entire day playing CIV isn't as possible for me anymore, or maybe my days of just one more turn are coming to an end?
posted by nubs at 9:31 AM on February 21, 2023
I spent untold hours playing Civ IV mods, particularly Fall from Heaven.
For me it was Rhyse and Fall, where civs would spawn in at the right historical time on the world map. Incredible job with balance! And cool to be able to win as, say, Babylon in 2000BC... or wait and watch the whole Earth history and then come in for the last few turns as the USA and still dominate.
posted by Meatbomb at 9:36 AM on February 21, 2023
For me it was Rhyse and Fall, where civs would spawn in at the right historical time on the world map. Incredible job with balance! And cool to be able to win as, say, Babylon in 2000BC... or wait and watch the whole Earth history and then come in for the last few turns as the USA and still dominate.
posted by Meatbomb at 9:36 AM on February 21, 2023
Honestly, while a Civ VII sounds fun, I'd much rather have a really good spiritual successor to Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. Civilization: Beyond Earth just isn't it.
Same here. I like a little flavor with my building game, and later Civs just seemed so bland on that count.
posted by tavella at 10:13 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Same here. I like a little flavor with my building game, and later Civs just seemed so bland on that count.
posted by tavella at 10:13 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I really like this talk by Soren Johnson at GDC last year. While it's about the development Old World, he also discusses other games in the 4X genre.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 10:13 AM on February 21, 2023
posted by I-Write-Essays at 10:13 AM on February 21, 2023
From Civ III or so, civilisations became - I don't know a better term - races. A German is always a German, and will always be unhappy and discontent and Other in your civilisation. So you are better off waging wars of genocide and replacement if you want a truly happy civilisation in the future. Kill off the Germans and replace them with your race.
They changed this significantly in V and then backtracked in VI. A better way of describing it now is that civilizations that are conquered have a sort of inertia.
In Civ V, they basically said "look, conquered peoples will be unhappy - unless you do specific things to make them happy." Which in practice usually means "build a courthouse," the game effect of which is to remove the additional unhappiness conquered cities suffer from. (The game notes that if you are an enlightened democracy, then the courthouse tells people that they are protected by the law and are equals; if you're a despotic tyranny, then the courthouse reminds people they're in a police state and better behave.) But even with the courthouse in place, conquered cities will always have a small unhappiness modifier that is just there as a reminder: this place was once a different culture before you came and wrecked the place, and even content people have long memories. I felt this was a pretty elegant way of dealing with the issue of cultural lag in terms of gameplay.
In Civ VI, they got rid of courthouses and changed it so that once you conquered a city, it became "occupied." Now, conquered cities would always be unhappy until one of two things happened - either the empire you conquered it from ceded it to you diplomatically (usually as the result of a ceasefire agreement), or that empire was destroyed. This was a much more simplistic take on conquered cities and one that generally wasn't well-received.
posted by mightygodking at 10:18 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
They changed this significantly in V and then backtracked in VI. A better way of describing it now is that civilizations that are conquered have a sort of inertia.
In Civ V, they basically said "look, conquered peoples will be unhappy - unless you do specific things to make them happy." Which in practice usually means "build a courthouse," the game effect of which is to remove the additional unhappiness conquered cities suffer from. (The game notes that if you are an enlightened democracy, then the courthouse tells people that they are protected by the law and are equals; if you're a despotic tyranny, then the courthouse reminds people they're in a police state and better behave.) But even with the courthouse in place, conquered cities will always have a small unhappiness modifier that is just there as a reminder: this place was once a different culture before you came and wrecked the place, and even content people have long memories. I felt this was a pretty elegant way of dealing with the issue of cultural lag in terms of gameplay.
In Civ VI, they got rid of courthouses and changed it so that once you conquered a city, it became "occupied." Now, conquered cities would always be unhappy until one of two things happened - either the empire you conquered it from ceded it to you diplomatically (usually as the result of a ceasefire agreement), or that empire was destroyed. This was a much more simplistic take on conquered cities and one that generally wasn't well-received.
posted by mightygodking at 10:18 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Districts are unquestionably a good idea
Are they, though? The idea of city specialization seems absolutely unlike how historical cultures actually expanded, and they encourage insane amounts of tile planning that doesn't quite feel right for the genre.
posted by mightygodking at 10:21 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Are they, though? The idea of city specialization seems absolutely unlike how historical cultures actually expanded, and they encourage insane amounts of tile planning that doesn't quite feel right for the genre.
posted by mightygodking at 10:21 AM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Despite the fact that I know I don't want any actual fighting or war in my game beyond the occasional skirmish with an animal, every so often I try Civ again only to bail when the game makes the war part unavoidable. Which is, you know, the whole point of the game! This is a me problem, for the most part! But it does make me think about how so many of these games have those unexamined and taken for granted assumptions. Like, I want a game that lets me achieve what amounts to fully automated luxury gay space communism or whatever, without waging a ton of war and conquest to get there. (And don't @ me about realism, I am not playing video games for realism.) I pretty much want a game that lets me start a settlement and build up a civilization in peace.
The upcoming Roots of Pacha will scratch some of that itch, since it looks like that will be Stardew Valley, but make it Stone Age, but I still kind of want something with I guess the aesthetics and mechanics of a game like Civ, but that doesn't require warfare. Even a chill as possible run of Rimworld doesn't quite do the trick, since that still involves some violent events. Townscaper and Dorfromantik are too simple to scratch this itch. I wish Civ would enable a "just build shit" mode that lets you toggle war off entirely, or that it'd let you play on a map that's empty of anyone but you and some "barbarians" (itself a fairly problematic and unexamined trope). I feel like I used to be able to do that on an earlier version of Civ, but can't on more recent ones.
BTW, thank you for the rec for Terra Nil, Fizz, I will keep my eye out for that! FYI for anyone else interested, it looks like it will be included as part of a Netflix subscription, so you will be able to play it on mobile when it comes out next month if you have Netflix. Just based off the screencaps and info on Terra Nil, I think my ideal game in this mode would be something like Terra Nil + people, where the goal is to achieve/maintain a harmonious balance between nature and civilization.
posted by yasaman at 10:23 AM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
The upcoming Roots of Pacha will scratch some of that itch, since it looks like that will be Stardew Valley, but make it Stone Age, but I still kind of want something with I guess the aesthetics and mechanics of a game like Civ, but that doesn't require warfare. Even a chill as possible run of Rimworld doesn't quite do the trick, since that still involves some violent events. Townscaper and Dorfromantik are too simple to scratch this itch. I wish Civ would enable a "just build shit" mode that lets you toggle war off entirely, or that it'd let you play on a map that's empty of anyone but you and some "barbarians" (itself a fairly problematic and unexamined trope). I feel like I used to be able to do that on an earlier version of Civ, but can't on more recent ones.
BTW, thank you for the rec for Terra Nil, Fizz, I will keep my eye out for that! FYI for anyone else interested, it looks like it will be included as part of a Netflix subscription, so you will be able to play it on mobile when it comes out next month if you have Netflix. Just based off the screencaps and info on Terra Nil, I think my ideal game in this mode would be something like Terra Nil + people, where the goal is to achieve/maintain a harmonious balance between nature and civilization.
posted by yasaman at 10:23 AM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
City specialization is totally a thing in real life, though. Lyon is famous for its silk. New York City is known as a financial capital, while Washington DC is a political capital. These distinctions give your cities personality and produce part of the story of the game. Specialization of Labor is part of the definition of Civilization. It's the details of how a game implements city specialization that will determine whether it plays well or not. City specialization should feel organic, the result of making the best decision at any given moment, not the result of planning everything out ahead of time.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 10:27 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 10:27 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
bail when the game makes the war part unavoidable. Which is, you know, the whole point of the game! This is a me problem, for the most part!
I don't know how unique you are. I too prefer the sim-like aspect of the game. A Whiggian version of history where we march towards a Good Society with more justice and comfort for our citizens is a fantasy, but an appealing one.
So my standard successful game is an initial scramble for land, followed by economy building and just enough military to fend off an attack just long enough for me to bring my financial and industrial weight to bear. Running the table on late-era Wonders, even if they are mechanically useless, is one of my favorite things, and (since Civ IV) a culture victory is my favorite victory.
posted by mark k at 10:50 AM on February 21, 2023 [5 favorites]
I don't know how unique you are. I too prefer the sim-like aspect of the game. A Whiggian version of history where we march towards a Good Society with more justice and comfort for our citizens is a fantasy, but an appealing one.
So my standard successful game is an initial scramble for land, followed by economy building and just enough military to fend off an attack just long enough for me to bring my financial and industrial weight to bear. Running the table on late-era Wonders, even if they are mechanically useless, is one of my favorite things, and (since Civ IV) a culture victory is my favorite victory.
posted by mark k at 10:50 AM on February 21, 2023 [5 favorites]
So my standard successful game is an initial scramble for land, followed by economy building and just enough military to fend off an attack just long enough for me to bring my financial and industrial weight to bear. Running the table on late-era Wonders, even if they are mechanically useless, is one of my favorite things, and (since Civ IV) a culture victory is my favorite victory.
This is my playing style as well, though sometimes I'll get a game where the AI is not happy unless I lay waste to someone.
Genereally speaking, I have liked CivVI just fine, and, seemingly unlike most players, like the visual style over CivV quite a bit. I agree that CivIV was probably the best overall game so far, especially with mods, but Civ VI is the first iteration that rolled up a lot of the good stuff from the beginning and was left without much to offer in DLC except more and more leaders and, for some reason, vampires.
I had not heard about Old World until this thread, so thank you for that. I found Humankind underwhelming and gave up on it pretty quickly. I imagine CivVII won't really incorporate some of the things I'd love to see in a 4X, but I have no doubt I will plunk down whatever they charge for it anyway.
posted by briank at 11:35 AM on February 21, 2023
This is my playing style as well, though sometimes I'll get a game where the AI is not happy unless I lay waste to someone.
Genereally speaking, I have liked CivVI just fine, and, seemingly unlike most players, like the visual style over CivV quite a bit. I agree that CivIV was probably the best overall game so far, especially with mods, but Civ VI is the first iteration that rolled up a lot of the good stuff from the beginning and was left without much to offer in DLC except more and more leaders and, for some reason, vampires.
I had not heard about Old World until this thread, so thank you for that. I found Humankind underwhelming and gave up on it pretty quickly. I imagine CivVII won't really incorporate some of the things I'd love to see in a 4X, but I have no doubt I will plunk down whatever they charge for it anyway.
posted by briank at 11:35 AM on February 21, 2023
I played Civ I and II a lot back in the day. Civ I ate up a lot of time in university that should have been spent on schoolwork or sleeping or whatever. But I've bounced off pretty well every other iteration since. I still go back to I and II, and Alpha Centauri occasionally though.
posted by fimbulvetr at 11:39 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by fimbulvetr at 11:39 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
It wouldn't be multiplayer, it would be the CPU controlling the remnants of someone else's game, and other CPU civilizations would need to show up as well
You could always tell which species were from other player's games in Spore because they were mostly agglomerations of boobs, butts and dongs.
posted by snuffleupagus at 11:46 AM on February 21, 2023
You could always tell which species were from other player's games in Spore because they were mostly agglomerations of boobs, butts and dongs.
posted by snuffleupagus at 11:46 AM on February 21, 2023
By the time it goes on sale, a plethora of new DLC will be out, and the price of the whole package will be astronomical by then, even on sale. And I really don't want to spend that kind of money on a game, so I'll never buy it.
I bought Civ V Complete for $10.99 two years after the first release of Civ VI. I still haven't bought Civ VI.
I do find it weird that a game like Civ needs to bring any PC to its knees but I'm sure there are reasons for it.
I remember thinking maybe with III or IV that what I really wanted was a laptop mode that turned all the animations off and just let you play the thing as a static turn-based strategy game. I had bought it before a plane trip and I realized that I wouldn't actually be able to play very long with that kind of gratuitous power consumption going on. At least by the time I bought Civ V I actually owned a computer that could sort of adequately run it, which is to say it sort of adequately ran as long as it took me to realize I didn't have the time or the focus to learn how to play it. The new map and combat rules were too much for this casual gamer. I guess that's also part of the reason I still haven't spent any money on Civ VI.
Do they all still crawl when you get to the endgame, even on a high end computer that otherwise doesn't struggle with all the animation?
posted by fedward at 12:10 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I bought Civ V Complete for $10.99 two years after the first release of Civ VI. I still haven't bought Civ VI.
I do find it weird that a game like Civ needs to bring any PC to its knees but I'm sure there are reasons for it.
I remember thinking maybe with III or IV that what I really wanted was a laptop mode that turned all the animations off and just let you play the thing as a static turn-based strategy game. I had bought it before a plane trip and I realized that I wouldn't actually be able to play very long with that kind of gratuitous power consumption going on. At least by the time I bought Civ V I actually owned a computer that could sort of adequately run it, which is to say it sort of adequately ran as long as it took me to realize I didn't have the time or the focus to learn how to play it. The new map and combat rules were too much for this casual gamer. I guess that's also part of the reason I still haven't spent any money on Civ VI.
Do they all still crawl when you get to the endgame, even on a high end computer that otherwise doesn't struggle with all the animation?
posted by fedward at 12:10 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Civ I is now over 30 years old. You can play it in your browser here. That music and the opening graphics sequence bring back *so many* memories of schoolwork not done...
posted by inflatablekiwi at 12:14 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by inflatablekiwi at 12:14 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
"I played Civ I and II a lot back in the day. Civ I ate up a lot of time in university that should have been spent on schoolwork or sleeping or whatever."
Same. I almost flunked out of second year because of it.
I know I can't trust myself with the full Civ experience anymore. I just play the IPad version while watching teevee every night, where a full game can come in under two hours.
I just like building stuff.
posted by Capt. Renault at 12:24 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Same. I almost flunked out of second year because of it.
I know I can't trust myself with the full Civ experience anymore. I just play the IPad version while watching teevee every night, where a full game can come in under two hours.
I just like building stuff.
posted by Capt. Renault at 12:24 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Civ6 is pretty damn great in my opinion. The art style is lovely (the more caricatured style of leader designs avoids the uncanny-valley waxy ugliness that we got in 5, and while the maps in 5 looked very nice, they are dreary as hell in comparison to 6's vibrancy.) It continues a lot of the important leaps forward that 5 made from 4 (hexes instead of squares, no stacks of doom, leader abilities instead of pairs of traits, etc.) and adds a lot of creativity into the mix. Plus there's just a ton of official DLC for it (including free stuff that's still in the process of dropping over the next month or so!)
I think the biggest knock that can be made against 6 (and it's a very real one) is that the depth and creativity in the mechanics far outstrips the A.I.'s ability to make decisions based on what's in front of them, much less act distinctly from one another in still somewhat reasonable, competent ways.
Very excited to see what Ed Beach does with his second time at bat for the series here. And I really hope that he looks into the ideas they were playing with in Beyond Earth and Beyond Earth: Rising Tide, which went in some very cool directions but didn't quite coalesce into a satisfying whole in that game (Which always seemed like it was expecting to get another expansion that never came, to be honest.)
posted by Navelgazer at 12:38 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I think the biggest knock that can be made against 6 (and it's a very real one) is that the depth and creativity in the mechanics far outstrips the A.I.'s ability to make decisions based on what's in front of them, much less act distinctly from one another in still somewhat reasonable, competent ways.
Very excited to see what Ed Beach does with his second time at bat for the series here. And I really hope that he looks into the ideas they were playing with in Beyond Earth and Beyond Earth: Rising Tide, which went in some very cool directions but didn't quite coalesce into a satisfying whole in that game (Which always seemed like it was expecting to get another expansion that never came, to be honest.)
posted by Navelgazer at 12:38 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I'm still playing V. The combat model (particularly the lack of stacking) was hard to get used to but in the end I've found it much more satisfying.
I've tried to get into VI a few times but it's just sort of... eh.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 12:46 PM on February 21, 2023
I've tried to get into VI a few times but it's just sort of... eh.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 12:46 PM on February 21, 2023
Civ V did have strategic view that simplified everything and made it run better. It was useful for me in the later stages of the game when it really slows down.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:54 PM on February 21, 2023
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:54 PM on February 21, 2023
I stopped playing when it became clear that I could win easily every time on Emperor, but I would never, ever, ever win on Immortal. I’m not sure what game design flaw makes that so. My guess? At Emperor, you’re essentially maxing out the skill of the game’s AI, and beyond that it can only increase the game’s difficulty by giving itself enormous bonuses.
Also I would love if they invented some easy, fun way to manage a truly large military force. Beyond a certain number of units, it becomes so tedious to manage every. single. one. every. single. turn. that the game becomes less fun than doing your taxes.
posted by panama joe at 12:58 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Also I would love if they invented some easy, fun way to manage a truly large military force. Beyond a certain number of units, it becomes so tedious to manage every. single. one. every. single. turn. that the game becomes less fun than doing your taxes.
posted by panama joe at 12:58 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Also I would love if they invented some easy, fun way to manage a truly large military force.
I believe these are called 'Lieutenant Colonels.' I'm not sure how much fun they are.
posted by snuffleupagus at 1:58 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I believe these are called 'Lieutenant Colonels.' I'm not sure how much fun they are.
posted by snuffleupagus at 1:58 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I recently reinstalled VI, which I resisted buying until I was stuck in my house during the initial peak of COVID and Steam put the complete edition on sale for some ridiculously low sum. It's okay, and I appreciate some of the differences but the barbarians often ruin games and it's the first Civ game where I often don't even save the game, I just exit it when I feel I've had enough. I think the series peaked with V, personally -- once I got over the lack of unit stacking, I could appreciate the other improvements in the game.
Like many others have said, nothing the series does will top the feeling of the first two games worming their way into my brain, costing me untold hours of sleep at very inopportune times! Still, I remain hopeful for whatever comes of VII.
posted by Dark Messiah at 2:17 PM on February 21, 2023
Like many others have said, nothing the series does will top the feeling of the first two games worming their way into my brain, costing me untold hours of sleep at very inopportune times! Still, I remain hopeful for whatever comes of VII.
posted by Dark Messiah at 2:17 PM on February 21, 2023
The problem right now is that Civ V uses DX9, which is gone (at least on Steam). I've tried all the hacks and re-installs: nada! I was into comparing V and VI since I think V is slightly superior, but... Anyway, I have enjoyed VI, which takes some getting used to but is easy to win (culture, politics are the easiest, military the toughest). Recent DLC has included numerous new leaders, each meant to modify the game in interesting ways. Creating an interesting or aesthetically pleasing civilization has become the object of the game for me. It isn't that hard to avoid warfare. Lately, I've been playing without advancing Religion, just using the Divine Spark pantheon. There's other ways you can modify your play to fit you.
But the best was Civ II, whether as Test of Time (better animation) or the original (fun movies -- yeah, I liked 'em and missed them when they were pulled -- more diplomat info, other stuff). If they combined these two Civ II versions, I would pay full price for the game. But I understand there are corporate/legal bars to this combination. Too bad.
posted by CCBC at 3:27 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
But the best was Civ II, whether as Test of Time (better animation) or the original (fun movies -- yeah, I liked 'em and missed them when they were pulled -- more diplomat info, other stuff). If they combined these two Civ II versions, I would pay full price for the game. But I understand there are corporate/legal bars to this combination. Too bad.
posted by CCBC at 3:27 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
I've been playing Battle of Polytopia as kind of a Civ methadone.
posted by credulous at 3:46 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by credulous at 3:46 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
As the (or at least a) person defending Civ6 in here, I'll say that one of the big things that all of the myriad DLC has allowed the game to do is to kinda be tailored to however you most enjoy playing it, because there are so many modes that you can toggle on or off as you wish. For instance, I like to play as a builder, expanding my civilization peacefully while building up diplomatic ties and raking in gold and faith. I basically never declare war on another Civ (unless I can tell that they're about to move against me, and an ally presents me with "hey! wanna kick their asses together?" and that still comes up pretty rarely.) I like some Mythos in my games, and I like making choices that further customize my civ based on the map and what's going on around me.
Luckily for me, there's a mode that lets you choose a "Secret society" (pick one of four options) to belong to early on (but you still have to explore around to get those invites), all with different bonuses that enhance through the ages, one that lets you earn Legendary Heroes with a turn-limited lifespan but big impactful abilities, one that lets you build industries around luxury resources, later on build corporations, and basically just more impactfuly use the resources you can get your hands on, and one that eliminates "normal ages" from the game, so that you're always either in a Golden Age or a Dark Age (with the dark ages causing civs to lose cities to rebellion, allowing me to swoop them up either militarily - without having to declare war! - or through loyalty pressure due to how simply great my own civ is. All of these are optional, but they're pretty much exactly the sort of thing I, personally, want from the game.
So I tend to almost always play with Secret Societies, Heroes & Legends, Monopolies & Corporations, and Dramatic Ages enabled. I don't know if anybody else likes that particular combo of modes, but it's what works for me, and there are a lot of other modes you can mess around with too (like shuffling the tech and civics trees, or a mode that gives more personality to Barbarians, gives you more possible interactions with them, and lets them, I believe, form their own city states if left to their own devices for long enough.)
In other words, there's a lot there! But it requires having all of the DLC (and there's a lot by now) and the A.I. isn't great at adapting to all of these different options. But you can always up the difficulty setting if that's a problem (though, as panama joe said, there's no such thing as "smarter" AI through the difficulty levels. The AI is always the same intelligence level, and just gets degrees of bonus or malus depending on which level you decide to play at.)
posted by Navelgazer at 3:56 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Luckily for me, there's a mode that lets you choose a "Secret society" (pick one of four options) to belong to early on (but you still have to explore around to get those invites), all with different bonuses that enhance through the ages, one that lets you earn Legendary Heroes with a turn-limited lifespan but big impactful abilities, one that lets you build industries around luxury resources, later on build corporations, and basically just more impactfuly use the resources you can get your hands on, and one that eliminates "normal ages" from the game, so that you're always either in a Golden Age or a Dark Age (with the dark ages causing civs to lose cities to rebellion, allowing me to swoop them up either militarily - without having to declare war! - or through loyalty pressure due to how simply great my own civ is. All of these are optional, but they're pretty much exactly the sort of thing I, personally, want from the game.
So I tend to almost always play with Secret Societies, Heroes & Legends, Monopolies & Corporations, and Dramatic Ages enabled. I don't know if anybody else likes that particular combo of modes, but it's what works for me, and there are a lot of other modes you can mess around with too (like shuffling the tech and civics trees, or a mode that gives more personality to Barbarians, gives you more possible interactions with them, and lets them, I believe, form their own city states if left to their own devices for long enough.)
In other words, there's a lot there! But it requires having all of the DLC (and there's a lot by now) and the A.I. isn't great at adapting to all of these different options. But you can always up the difficulty setting if that's a problem (though, as panama joe said, there's no such thing as "smarter" AI through the difficulty levels. The AI is always the same intelligence level, and just gets degrees of bonus or malus depending on which level you decide to play at.)
posted by Navelgazer at 3:56 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
That sounds like a lot of work to make Civ play like Crusader Kings. Intriguing though.
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:56 PM on February 21, 2023
posted by snuffleupagus at 4:56 PM on February 21, 2023
In some ways Civ II and the Fantastic Worlds expansions were my favourites, I certainly spent a huge amount of time playing them. There was a lot that Alpha Centauri did right and I'd really love to see them develop that kind of approach to the complexities of colonisation - depending what faction you played, you could just stomp all over everything making it the way you want, or you could try to work with the native environment and try to understand it. It had an actual story! I also loved being able to design your own units - paratrooping settlers and terraformers! Expensive to build but totally worth it.
I never really bonded with Civ III or IV, and I tried Civ VI but really couldn't get into it, I hated the idea of districts and that you have to choose between developing the surrounding land and building improvements because the districts take up space separately from the city itself. I mean, I can see the logic, I just didn't enjoy the gameplay.
Civ V is still my sweet spot although it's true that I have so many mods installed that the out-of-the-box version was maddening when I installed it on a new machine, I immediately had to download all the mods again. Anyway, I am cautiously hopeful but yeah, it will probably be a couple of years still before I think about getting it (based on how long it will probably spend in beta, the DLC content and bug-fixes being drip-fed to us, the big price tag it will undoubtedly have). I really hope they provide a multiplayer co-op option, that is my favourite way to play.
posted by Athanassiel at 5:20 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I never really bonded with Civ III or IV, and I tried Civ VI but really couldn't get into it, I hated the idea of districts and that you have to choose between developing the surrounding land and building improvements because the districts take up space separately from the city itself. I mean, I can see the logic, I just didn't enjoy the gameplay.
Civ V is still my sweet spot although it's true that I have so many mods installed that the out-of-the-box version was maddening when I installed it on a new machine, I immediately had to download all the mods again. Anyway, I am cautiously hopeful but yeah, it will probably be a couple of years still before I think about getting it (based on how long it will probably spend in beta, the DLC content and bug-fixes being drip-fed to us, the big price tag it will undoubtedly have). I really hope they provide a multiplayer co-op option, that is my favourite way to play.
posted by Athanassiel at 5:20 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Right now (through Thursday) the game and all DLCs are on sale at Steam and the Switch eshop. This is a good time to catch up for those interested. Wish the iOS version was also on sale but it isn't.
Yeah, there appears to be some possible friction going on between Firaxis and Aspyr (the company who ports the games to Mac) such that Aspyr went from promising that they'd have the new DLC (which is releasing on a drip schedule currently) on the same days that Firaxis had it for PC users, to now saying "We'l have the rest of it ready to go by the time the last of this release season comes out" (an announcement that came about a month ago while Mac users were refreshing Steam a lot waiting to download the new stuff) and confidence is somewhere less than 100% that they'll complete the Mac ports of the last Civ6 stuff at all. But that's basically a handful of new leaders that we Mac users are missing out on.
posted by Navelgazer at 5:58 PM on February 21, 2023
Yeah, there appears to be some possible friction going on between Firaxis and Aspyr (the company who ports the games to Mac) such that Aspyr went from promising that they'd have the new DLC (which is releasing on a drip schedule currently) on the same days that Firaxis had it for PC users, to now saying "We'l have the rest of it ready to go by the time the last of this release season comes out" (an announcement that came about a month ago while Mac users were refreshing Steam a lot waiting to download the new stuff) and confidence is somewhere less than 100% that they'll complete the Mac ports of the last Civ6 stuff at all. But that's basically a handful of new leaders that we Mac users are missing out on.
posted by Navelgazer at 5:58 PM on February 21, 2023
Chiming in to agree with I-Write-Essays that the best current Civlike is Old World. A really polished, well done, relatively balanced game.
I was pulling for Amplitude's Humankind so hard. The more Civlikes trying new things the better! And I love-love-love Endless Legend and particularly Endless Space 1 and 2. So good. But it just... doesn't hang together. The basic gimmick of choosing different civilizations and their abilities/perks to absorb into your uberciv simply didn't quite work and I don't know how it could be changed to make it work balance-wise. I really didn't do any significant theory crafting and I was still getting to a positive feedback loop money/tech wise halfway through the game to the point that I don't even know what the late game is like and what the techs are because every time I'd hit NEXT TURN I'd research 2 new techs. It was crazy.
Now this was right after launch. One presumes they have patched it a lot. But it was so chaotic and unbalanced because of the central premise of the game that it seems unlikely to have been brought up to something I'd consider good.
Uh, the point of this comment was to plug Old World.
posted by Justinian at 6:01 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I was pulling for Amplitude's Humankind so hard. The more Civlikes trying new things the better! And I love-love-love Endless Legend and particularly Endless Space 1 and 2. So good. But it just... doesn't hang together. The basic gimmick of choosing different civilizations and their abilities/perks to absorb into your uberciv simply didn't quite work and I don't know how it could be changed to make it work balance-wise. I really didn't do any significant theory crafting and I was still getting to a positive feedback loop money/tech wise halfway through the game to the point that I don't even know what the late game is like and what the techs are because every time I'd hit NEXT TURN I'd research 2 new techs. It was crazy.
Now this was right after launch. One presumes they have patched it a lot. But it was so chaotic and unbalanced because of the central premise of the game that it seems unlikely to have been brought up to something I'd consider good.
Uh, the point of this comment was to plug Old World.
posted by Justinian at 6:01 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Note that Old World is basically 75% Civilization, 25% Crusader Kings. That's a good thing.
posted by Justinian at 6:02 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Justinian at 6:02 PM on February 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
If the next Civ game doesn't head-on deal with the issues of colonialism and capitalistic extraction I don't know how the hell the designers can look themselves in the mirror in the morning. It's hard to be excited about playing through the power structures that are leading to the rapid collapse of humanity on this planet. I don't care if I get to use the powers of Religion and Corporation to dominate everyone else.
"but which has ultimately fallen prey to an obsession with its district-improvement meta, that has come at the expense of more important stuff like enemy AI and combat."
Like.. that is not what its fallen prey to, and that is not what's more important in 2023.
posted by curious nu at 6:13 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
"but which has ultimately fallen prey to an obsession with its district-improvement meta, that has come at the expense of more important stuff like enemy AI and combat."
Like.. that is not what its fallen prey to, and that is not what's more important in 2023.
posted by curious nu at 6:13 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
And I say this as someone who has spent many, many thousands of hours on Civilization games over the years, sometimes casually, sometimes obsessively. Sure, one-more-turn gameplay.. but like everything else, it's time for doing some real serious soul-searching and take an opportunity to do better.
posted by curious nu at 6:14 PM on February 21, 2023
posted by curious nu at 6:14 PM on February 21, 2023
I hope they do that and I also hope they work on the enemy AI which has always been kind of lackluster.
posted by Justinian at 6:24 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Justinian at 6:24 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I'd much rather have a really good spiritual successor to Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
No spiritual successors! Only reboot! No Zakharov, no sale.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:31 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
No spiritual successors! Only reboot! No Zakharov, no sale.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:31 PM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
That's a pretty decent sale, $27 (Canadian) to get all of the updates and added content, but I haven't played the game in maybe 2 years because I really don't have big unbroken chunks of time to play anymore. Kind of feels like throwing good money after bad at this point.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 6:32 PM on February 21, 2023
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 6:32 PM on February 21, 2023
No spiritual successors! Only reboot! No Zakharov, no sale.
What do I care for your suffering?
posted by curious nu at 6:33 PM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
What do I care for your suffering?
posted by curious nu at 6:33 PM on February 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
I've always liked the idea of a miniature Civ spinoff where you get to play as the Barbarians, generating at random in some out of the way spot on a map, and then either having to negotiate the hostile attention of one or more empires by existing in a hill-people liminal space beyond State control (James C. Scott style), or deciding to make a glorious piratical dash for glory, destroying stuff and plundering (Blackbeard the pirate style). Raise the black flag.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 7:46 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 7:46 PM on February 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
head-on deal with the issues of colonialism and capitalistic extraction
What do you mean exactly? The choice to go one way or another is up to the player. You can choose slavery, imperialism, militarism, or not. Maybe I don't understand your point. Are you trying to posit a game that demands a moral stance on these issues?
posted by CCBC at 10:23 PM on February 21, 2023
What do you mean exactly? The choice to go one way or another is up to the player. You can choose slavery, imperialism, militarism, or not. Maybe I don't understand your point. Are you trying to posit a game that demands a moral stance on these issues?
posted by CCBC at 10:23 PM on February 21, 2023
What do you mean exactly? The choice to go one way or another is up to the player. You can choose slavery, imperialism, militarism, or not. Maybe I don't understand your point. Are you trying to posit a game that demands a moral stance on these issues?
Maybe they're talking about the subtext of the game, what's left unsaid, reading between the lines. Sure I can make all the "ethical" choices and pick a democracy rather than police state, and focus on green energy rather than fossil fuels.
But.. for example, I begin a True Start Locations game and pick Australia. Apparently I'm John Curtin. And the first thing the game forces me to do is genocide all the "barbarians" that keep spawning in Australia and attacking me. Once the last of them are wiped out I can the focus on building a magnificent country in peace with the increased yields from high appeal tiles.
We still live with the results of the massacres and stolen generation today, manifesting in poverty, crime and disease. The average Australian life expectancy is near best in the world (83) while Aboriginal Australians lag behind at 73 - outcomes comparable to people in North Korea or Occupied Palestine.
For a game supposedly committed to celebrating history, this seems like a serious and distasteful omission. I think they have heard this feedback, and many years later released the barbarian clans DLC which allows for other kinds of interactions with "barbarians" rather than simply killing them, but even calling them barbarians at all to begin with is problematic. It's sort of saying, oh we don't mean those people like you, but there are always native people who have lived off the land before we arrived who are predisposed to violence and never had the intellect to civilize enough to form a nation (what) unless you spend resources educating and uplifting them (hoo boy).
Yes, nations were violent in the past, and committed awful atrocities. Don't be afraid to name it, and let us explore alternative histories - Black Panther was such a powerful SF movie because it fully explored that space - what if things were different - and that is the peak fantasy of what world building games like Civ aims to achieve, imo.
Ironically, the closest we ever got to this was Alpha Centauri, as mentioned above, following a long tradition of constructing a science fiction future to critique our past and present. An absolute masterpiece of a game. As each faction committed atrocities upon each other, you nonetheless empathized with each leader's viewpoint and conviction that they were absolutely doing the right thing.
We haven't yet made a self-aware game where you put yourself in the shoes of the French as they forced Haiti into generations of debt, or in the shoes of the Portuguese as they laid waste to Calicut and dismembered Arab merchants, and contemplated the morality of those choices, understood why those choices felt right and inevitable to those who made them - and then, be given the choice to write a different future.
posted by xdvesper at 11:39 PM on February 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
Maybe they're talking about the subtext of the game, what's left unsaid, reading between the lines. Sure I can make all the "ethical" choices and pick a democracy rather than police state, and focus on green energy rather than fossil fuels.
But.. for example, I begin a True Start Locations game and pick Australia. Apparently I'm John Curtin. And the first thing the game forces me to do is genocide all the "barbarians" that keep spawning in Australia and attacking me. Once the last of them are wiped out I can the focus on building a magnificent country in peace with the increased yields from high appeal tiles.
We still live with the results of the massacres and stolen generation today, manifesting in poverty, crime and disease. The average Australian life expectancy is near best in the world (83) while Aboriginal Australians lag behind at 73 - outcomes comparable to people in North Korea or Occupied Palestine.
For a game supposedly committed to celebrating history, this seems like a serious and distasteful omission. I think they have heard this feedback, and many years later released the barbarian clans DLC which allows for other kinds of interactions with "barbarians" rather than simply killing them, but even calling them barbarians at all to begin with is problematic. It's sort of saying, oh we don't mean those people like you, but there are always native people who have lived off the land before we arrived who are predisposed to violence and never had the intellect to civilize enough to form a nation (what) unless you spend resources educating and uplifting them (hoo boy).
Yes, nations were violent in the past, and committed awful atrocities. Don't be afraid to name it, and let us explore alternative histories - Black Panther was such a powerful SF movie because it fully explored that space - what if things were different - and that is the peak fantasy of what world building games like Civ aims to achieve, imo.
Ironically, the closest we ever got to this was Alpha Centauri, as mentioned above, following a long tradition of constructing a science fiction future to critique our past and present. An absolute masterpiece of a game. As each faction committed atrocities upon each other, you nonetheless empathized with each leader's viewpoint and conviction that they were absolutely doing the right thing.
We haven't yet made a self-aware game where you put yourself in the shoes of the French as they forced Haiti into generations of debt, or in the shoes of the Portuguese as they laid waste to Calicut and dismembered Arab merchants, and contemplated the morality of those choices, understood why those choices felt right and inevitable to those who made them - and then, be given the choice to write a different future.
posted by xdvesper at 11:39 PM on February 21, 2023 [9 favorites]
Whoa! There are two problems here. First, game mechanics: under "Modes", check the Clans option. Now you will be able to deal with these other clans as communities rather than nuisances. Second, I say "other clans" because you are not John Curtin, you are an indigenous tribe millennia in the past. "John Curtin" is a symbolic representation of the current Australian popular mythos, but it is not a mythos that you have to support.
posted by CCBC at 1:23 AM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by CCBC at 1:23 AM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Leaders are a weird platonic personification of eternal leadership rather than a literal person, which only makes them more problematic, not less. They are the embodiment of eternal imperial autarchy. I don't see how you can play as them and not support what they stand for.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:19 AM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:19 AM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
If you want to see a Civ take on colonialism then Sid Meier's Colonization (1994) or the 2008 remake based on Civ IV are the answer. Neither was a big success but were honest attempts to make an explicit game out of the colonialism inherent and uncommented in the main series.
These games are also problematic. In a previous discussion I linked some interesting articles looking at these games from a critical perspective. This essay is the quickest read of the three.
posted by Nelson at 7:31 AM on February 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
These games are also problematic. In a previous discussion I linked some interesting articles looking at these games from a critical perspective. This essay is the quickest read of the three.
posted by Nelson at 7:31 AM on February 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
I don't see how you can play as them and not support what they stand for.
What? You play as the leader that gives the bonuses you like or to try out different game play or because it's your country. I'm not thinking about what the leaders stand for in real life when I'm picking them.
You end up being a mass murderer in most popular games because that's how they work. I don't think me stomping on goombas in Mario or killing bokoblins in Breath of the Wild translates to me endorsing such violence in real life.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 11:32 AM on February 22, 2023
What? You play as the leader that gives the bonuses you like or to try out different game play or because it's your country. I'm not thinking about what the leaders stand for in real life when I'm picking them.
You end up being a mass murderer in most popular games because that's how they work. I don't think me stomping on goombas in Mario or killing bokoblins in Breath of the Wild translates to me endorsing such violence in real life.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 11:32 AM on February 22, 2023
Thanks to this thread I've discovered that I can now download Civ 5 from Steam on my Mac and not have to figure out if my Windows installation still boots. Now I just have to find time to play it.
I probably shouldn't buy Civ 6 on sale right now, should I.
posted by fedward at 2:48 PM on February 22, 2023
I probably shouldn't buy Civ 6 on sale right now, should I.
posted by fedward at 2:48 PM on February 22, 2023
I've said enough but one last thing: this game allows all kinds of strategies. You need not play an expanding agrarian/civic model. You can play a one-city game; you can play a game with no cities. (another one.) You are not confined to an imperialist path.
posted by CCBC at 4:21 PM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by CCBC at 4:21 PM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
I've always liked the idea of a miniature Civ spinoff where you get to play as the Barbarians
Not quite what you describe, but someone did make a mod to play as the barbarians in Civ I. They also made a barbarian scenario for Civ II and are planning on doing the same for other games in the series.s.
posted by fimbulvetr at 6:11 PM on February 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Not quite what you describe, but someone did make a mod to play as the barbarians in Civ I. They also made a barbarian scenario for Civ II and are planning on doing the same for other games in the series.s.
posted by fimbulvetr at 6:11 PM on February 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Relevant book published today by MIT Press: Playing Oppression: The Legacy of Conquest and Empire in Colonialist Board Games By Mary Flanagan and Mikael Jakobsson. Not at any of my libraries yet but I’ll keep an eye on it.
posted by fedward at 11:49 AM on February 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by fedward at 11:49 AM on February 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
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posted by Meatbomb at 6:35 AM on February 21, 2023