3rd expansion or spin-off poll

[Zaarin]

I'd prefer Firaxis stick with historical settings, even in a spinoff. The market is flooded with space 4X games (Endless Space and its sequel, Galactic Civilizations, Stars in Shadow, Stellaris, and many others), most of which are probably better than what Firaxis could come up with in the genre. If we do get a spinoff, I'd rather see a bronze age, mythological, or even neolithic focused game over an original setting.

 

[Pistol90]

Either expansion or next Civ ... please dont spin-off ... they arent (at least for me) what Civ is all about. But of course I would love expansions , Civ 6 could be best Civ ever with 3 expanssions --- everyone would buy it. Why not then

 

[Sherlock]

Babylon in the news:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/science...e-short-film-nearly-2-000-years-DIED-OUT.html

 

[SupremacyKing2]

They could change this pattern and push off Civ 7 to 7 years (or longer) from the release of Civ 6. The biggest gap between base games was between Civ 5 and Civ 6, at six years (looking only at calendar years, might be different if counting by months). If it's economical for them to slow down the pace of base game releases, there's room for another Civ 6 expansion and a spin off before Civ 7. I hope they don't delay completing Civ 6 that long, but time will tell.

I am skeptical that Firaxis would push off civ7 to 7 years. That seems like a lot. I am sure civ7 will generate big money for them so I doubt they would wait 7 years. Sure, they would probably spend those 7 years doing a 3rd expansion for civ6 and a spin off game too but those won't make as much money as a civ7 will. It's probably more profitable to release a civ7 say 4-5 years after civ6 and get that huge cash flow sooner.

 

[Guandao]

I am skeptical that Firaxis would push off civ7 to 7 years. That seems like a lot. I am sure civ7 will generate big money for them so I doubt they would wait 7 years. Sure, they would probably spend those 7 years doing a 3rd expansion for civ6 and a spin off game too but those won't make as much money as a civ7 will. It's probably more profitable to release a civ7 say 4-5 years after civ6 and get that huge cash flow sooner.

I think the earliest year that Civ7 will probably come out is 2022. 2020-2021 would be for the Spin-off game.

No DLC or expansions after GS.

 

[Xmonger]

Artists draw, managers decide. The cartoonish style is certainly not my choice and one suspects it was not the artists either.

Managers are investors more typically, especially on the revenue fat product lines like Civ. Only when a product is in market trouble (declining revenue or whatever) do managers step in to micro manage. When successful they correctly step back as to not disturb the Golden Goose, so the development team gets full control. The managers then decide resource (= people) and schedule (= release date), plus the day to day people management and endless meetings with each other.

Before the release of VI there was a video with the team leads around a table (Ed, the art director and so forth) where I believe the art guys talked about having come up with the paradigm. Ed said a few things I think so was naturally a part of the process. I have no reason to doubt that was the truth, which is the art department felt this was a good visual paradigm. Also there are a billion decisions to be made in any game and the reasons you hire people is to make those decisions! No one person could call all the shots.

On the cartoonish look I saw some discussion of this - this style was first really developed by the Spielberg movie Tin Tin, then copied elsewhere. Really the team is following industry patterns. We do the same, for example when Apple flattened the iOS UI we all followed suit, in diverse industries.

 

[TheSpaceCowboy]

Where's option 3? Get another lead game designer, fire the art designer, hire a team of AI programmers and start work on civ7. Make civ great again

I was fairly happy with the art direction of VI with two exceptions.

1. The icons had nothing on the gorgeous Art Deco images from Civilization V.
2. The Governors, which are so inconsistent with the rest of the Art direction

 

[Kamino]

Civ7.
Civ6 has too many flaws. Rebuild from scratch would be my choice.

 

[Piranga]

That last sci fi spin off game was the biggest pile of dung I've ever played, I'll never purchase another civ spin off because of it. Instead of wasting their time with something like that again, I hope they just continue with a third expansion, then focus completely on building the AI for 7.

 

[Isengardtom]

Civ 6 expansion 3 > civ 7 > spin off

I’m probavly one of the few people who actually prefers the cartoonish graphics over the for me dreary “real” looking graphics of Civ V and I love the game mechanics a lot more than V.

So definitely would prefer a 3rd expansion. A spin off can be interesting but I’m not interested in a sci-fi game based on Civ.

 

[cosmicmangobear]

I had to vote 3rd expansion. Mostly because there’s still a few key civs (PORTUGAL!) and mechanics (CORPORATIONS!) I would need to see added before I could call Civ 6 a complete game. But also because when Firaxis does decide to branch out, they take their time and get it RIGHT! Sure Beyond Earth looked nice, but it felt so barebones and uninspired when compared to SMAC. The resources that would go into creating a standalone game should be no less than the amount in a core installment of Civ. Instead, it just feels like an afterthought or a cash grab. That’s why I voted for a 3rd Expansion because until Firaxis can redeem themselves with regard to spinoffs, that’s where I want to see the time spent.

 

[Lord Lakely]

I would want a 3rd xpac MOSTLY for new civs, but I'm okay with those being limited to DLC if they can't come up with new mechanics.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Sure Beyond Earth looked nice, but it felt so barebones and uninspired when compared to SMAC.

When you look at the Rising Tide expansion to Beyond Earth, I don't think you can say that BE was barebones compared to SMAC. BE:RT actually has more gameplay systems and mechanics than SMAC. But despite all those new systems, yes BE:RT did feel uninspired in some places but that is only because SMAC had such amazing storytelling and world building.

 

[cosmicmangobear]

When you look at the Rising Tide expansion to Beyond Earth, I don't think you can say that BE was barebones compared to SMAC. BE:RT actually has more gameplay systems and mechanics than SMAC. But despite all those new systems, yes BE:RT did feel uninspired in some places but that is only because SMAC had such amazing storytelling and world building.

Fair enough, perhaps “barebones” wasn’t the right word. There are some elements of BE and Rising Tide that I really enjoyed and a few I wish they would implement in the base game. Diplomatic favor, fear and respect, aquatic cities, quests, dynamic aliens (barbs), tech web, affinities, etc. The problem is that no matter how many cool mechanics they added, there wasn’t much of a strong cohesive narrative to bind them all together, and not much to differentiate the civs/sponsors either.

 

[Zaarin]

I’m probavly one of the few people who actually prefers the cartoonish graphics over the for me dreary “real” looking graphics of Civ V

I don't get the impression that we're the minority; I get the impression that the people who dislike it are simply extremely vocal about it.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Historically Firaxis has released spin-off games following the release of the 2nd expansion of the main Civilization series. I never get too excited about the spin-offs myself.

Would you prefer a 3rd expansion of Civilization 6 or a scenario style spin-off such as Beyond Earth or Colonization?

I think this is the first game in the Franchise that has enough "room" for a full blown 3rd expansion. I do hope, though, to also see at least one Patch on the scale of the one that overhauled religion a while back.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

My first reaction was to say third expansion, but I wonder if that would be trying to cram in too many features/mechanics. We're getting pretty full already.

I think there is plenty of space still. Heck, I'd be happy enough with an expansion that merely "fleshes out" & further connects together the stuff brought in during the previous 2 expansions. In particular, I think there is an opportunity to look back at Civ4 & Civ5 to see what aspects of that game could fit well within Civ6. An updated version of the BtS Event system; a return of the deeper diplomatic & domestic aspects of religion, from Civ4; some of the spy missions from BtS & G&K (like Election Rigging, Coups (against City States) & info that you can pass on to 3rd party civs-in return for favour); some form of Ideology system to help tie together city loyalty, diplomatic victory & culture victory mechanics; bringing back aspects of the Civ4 Health system. That kind of thing.

 

[Leathaface]

3rd expansion all the way for me. I'd like for Civ VI to realise it's full potential, a 3rd expansion would make that more probable.

Plus Beyond Earth wasn't all that good.

 

[Thormodr]

3rd expansion would be fine. If they've still got a lot of design space then make Civ VI an even better game.

I'd buy it as long as one is able to turn off a certain "feature" that will be in the upcoming expansion that is absolutely horrendous. Not going to say what it is here as it would derail the thread.
Hopefully there will be some good mods that do that at the very least.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

I do like the concept of a civ game in a scifi setting. It is a nice change of pace from the historical setting. If Firaxis did a spin off of civ6 that was basically BE/SMAC but using the civ6 engine, I'd definitely buy it.