Thanks for the response; I definitely don't have flexible difficulty enabled.
I am not sure if I have Realistic Timescale on; the version of my mod is quite dated (at least 2 years) and the Realistic Timescale option is not familiar to me, so if its a new feature it most likely does not apply. If its been there for a while I don't remember disabling it. I will check on this. Cheers.
Also, are you familiar with this feature (tech costs increasing)? And if so, do research costs increase permanently? Because of thats the case it comes to a point where its not worth stealing / bulbing techs which in turn throws those aspects of the game out the window. If the research costs are temporary then I think its a good feature, as it balances things out in the long run.