Can You Go Back To Previous Civ Titles?

[KayAU]

As the title of this thread suggests, how many of you can actually go back to older Civ titles and play deep, immersive playthroughs? My all time favourite Civ game is 5, but I find it so challenging to go back and play it after having spent over 2000 hours on 6. The game is still beautiful, it's just that I have to play the most recent game. It does seem silly to operate this way, but that's just the way I feel when I start up, or rather attempt to start up, a new game of 5.
Is anyone else in this boat?

I went back to Civ 5 some time ago, and have played it a lot after abandoning Civ 6. Part of the picture though, is that I play pretty much exclusively with the Vox Populi modpack. I do like vanilla Civ 5 more than 6, but VP makes the difference much larger. It overhauls everything, adds a bunch of new content, and improves the AI by a lot. There's a learning curve, but it's absolutely worth it in my opinion.

 

[reyaik]

Civ is literally the only video game, I ever really played consistently over the years: Civ, Civ 2, Colonization were great childhood memories. Strangely, I never liked Civ 3 much. Civ 4 was okay for me. I liked the Colonization game there too, although sadly it doesn't run on my latest PC anymore. Civ 5 kind of brought me back to Civ, maybe because I also liked the Panzergeneral series and it had some elements of that. I did also like Beyond Earth, in fact. I have played more than 1K on Civ 6, and it is a decent game. I remember on release I felt it was a weird one though. And I really don't like to go back to this one anymore. The district minigame was just not interesting. The graphics, even with mods, are just okay, and religion is a total disaster in my eyes. I think Civ 7 is a solid game, and I won't get back to Civ 6. I have played Old World as well, and I really enjoy the atmosphere it has, but the worker management is too much in late game. The graphics could be better in my eyes there, and I find the time-setting just not as interesting as playing from 4000 BC to modernity. It is interesting though that during COVID and being somewhat bored by Civ 6, I discovered various Paradox and Total War games. I think Total War: Three Kingdoms as an example is probably one of the best video games ever made, despite the developer not finishing it.

 

[Patine]

Civ is literally the only video game, I ever really played consistently over the years: Civ, Civ 2, Colonization were great childhood memories. Strangely, I never liked Civ 3 much. Civ 4 was okay for me. I liked the Colonization game there too, although sadly it doesn't run on my latest PC anymore. Civ 5 kind of brought me back to Civ, maybe because I also liked the Panzergeneral series and it had some elements of that. I did also like Beyond Earth, in fact. I have played more than 1K on Civ 6, and it is a decent game. I remember on release I felt it was a weird one though. And I really don't like to go back to this one anymore. The district minigame was just not interesting. The graphics, even with mods, are just okay, and religion is a total disaster in my eyes. I think Civ 7 is a solid game, and I won't get back to Civ 6. I have played Old World as well, and I really enjoy the atmosphere it has, but the worker management is too much in late game. The graphics could be better in my eyes there, and I find the time-setting just not as interesting as playing from 4000 BC to modernity. It is interesting though that during COVID and being somewhat bored by Civ 6, I discovered various Paradox and Total War games. I think Total War: Three Kingdoms as an example is probably one of the best video games ever made, despite the developer not finishing it.

Several iterations of Civ, the AoE/AoM series (as well as Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, which LucasArts licensed a modified version of the AoE2 engine for), the TheorySpark Election Simulator games, and WoW have been my consistent callback games for practically the whole 21st Century thus far, even though I have tried others.

 

[DocRock]

I went back to V after 60 hours in VI and never looked back.

 

[Marla_Singer]

I like to play Civilization games as an Empire-building sandbox, so I'm not really the target anymore for newer Civ games.

The Civ franchise is the only video gaming franchise I know in which you feel more limited and less free in newer games than in older ones.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

I might revert to Civ 6 soon. until modding tools become available..

 

[ThERat]

Playing C3C either with CCM2 mod, mostly always war. Tried Civ5, didn't like it much, played Civ6 more but mainly MP. Won't touch Civ7 until its in the offer bin and spruced up with DLCs etc, if ever

 

[The Economy]

I like to play Civilization games as an Empire-building sandbox, so I'm not really the target anymore for newer Civ games.

The Civ franchise is the only video gaming franchise I know in which you feel more limited and less free in newer games than in older ones.

I feel this. The Civ series are now more arcade strategy-light games. Good for people that want a first taste of strategy, or people that just want to pump out quick games.
The series has lost that sandbox feeling that attracted me to it.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

I feel this. The Civ series are now more arcade strategy-light games. Good for people that want a first taste of strategy, or people that just want to pump out quick games.
The series has lost that sandbox feeling that attracted me to it.

I genuinely don't get it, and I'm trying!

I went back and played Civ 1 yesterday, because for me that is still the simplest and purest example of Civ. In what way is that game a sandbox? What are people doing in these games? What am I missing? Like, you build stuff. You scout. You meet neighbours. You either try to befriend or kill said neighbours. If you fancy it, you try to win. If not, you just carry on building stuff. Isn't VII the same?

I'm honestly trying to understand.

 

[Patine]

I genuinely don't get it, and I'm trying!

I went back and played Civ 1 yesterday, because for me that is still the simplest and purest example of Civ. In what way is that game a sandbox? What are people doing in these games? What am I missing? Like, you build stuff. You scout. You meet neighbours. You either try to befriend or kill said neighbours. If you fancy it, you try to win. If not, you just carry on building stuff. Isn't VII the same?

I'm honestly trying to understand.

If you don't know, you're not one of us.

Seriously though, I think a lot of people use, "sandbox game," and, "4x strategy game," interchangeably, but that seems not perfectly accurate to me. In fact, I'm unaware of a game on the electronic market, going back to the '80's, that would TRULY qualify as, "sandbox."

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

If you don't know, you're not one of us.

Almost certainly.

So... leaving aside the term sandbox, what are you doing in earlier Civs that you can't do in 7? What am I missing? It seems a common criticism and I just can't wrap my little brain around it.

 

[ThERat]

Give you a specific example. Always war games, easily doable in Civ3 and Civ4 (though not easy to win). Try that in Civ7, always war means you need to declare war the moment you meet other players. The happiness penalties for declaring war immediately, on top of razing cities or conquering too many would be crippling. Add to that, the arbitrary era switch...ok, forget it, no need to even try

 

[Patine]

Almost certainly.

So... leaving aside the term sandbox, what are you doing in earlier Civs that you can't do in 7? What am I missing? It seems a common criticism and I just can't wrap my little brain around it.

Me? I'm not one of those who made the comparative claim. I haven't tried Civ7 yet because my current computer's an antique that BARELY plays Civ6.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

Give you a specific example. Always war games, easily doable in Civ3 and Civ4 (though not easy to win). Try that in Civ7, always war means you need to declare war the moment you meet other players. The happiness penalties for declaring war immediately, on top of razing cities or conquering too many would be crippling.

Hm, ok... There's nothing stopping you doing always war in 7 though. It might be harder? I don't know, never tried it in any Civ, but don't people only do this sort of thing for a challenge anyway?

Add to that, the arbitrary era switch...ok, forget it, no need to even try

Right, so I do wonder if this is really what people mean. I still don't think it makes the game more restrictive though; totally appreciate that some people don't like it but I can't really follow the logic that it makes the game less of a sandbox.

 

[ThERat]

Hm, ok... There's nothing stopping you doing always war in 7 though. It might be harder? I don't know, never tried it in any Civ, but don't people only do this sort of thing for a challenge anyway?

You said, you don't understand why we think Civ7 is more restrictive and I gave you an example. The absence of a government without war weariness or manageable war weariness makes always war either totally impossible of no fun at all (I don't play always war to deal with war weariness issues, I play it cos I am a warmonger at heart). The city limit mechanism combined with steep penalties for razing cities and it's a no go.
What does this mean? Yes, one less option in civ7.

 

[Siptah]

Hm, ok... There's nothing stopping you doing always war in 7 though. It might be harder? I don't know, never tried it in any Civ, but don't people only do this sort of thing for a challenge anyway?



Right, so I do wonder if this is really what people mean. I still don't think it makes the game more restrictive though; totally appreciate that some people don't like it but I can't really follow the logic that it makes the game less of a sandbox.

And here I was thinking that being able to build your civ kit during the game instead of before the game would increase the sandbox considerably. But I guess I‘m wrong and only civ 1 and 2 are truly a sandbox as there aren‘t any civ related bonuses to play with. Every content you add for interaction and making games more distinguishable mechanically is apparently just restricting player‘s freedom. Thinking along these lines, minesweeper might have been the best 4x ever made.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

You said, you don't understand why we think Civ7 is more restrictive and I gave you an example.

Yes, thank you. I'm not trying to be belligerent, my not understanding your perspective is genuine. I'm trying to be respectful whilst still not really following the logic.

Every Civ game has slightly different mechanics whilst following the same core premise. Would you argue that Civ 1 is more restrictive than 7 because religion is nothing but a tech? It just seems to be an imprecise criticism to say "Civ VII ruins the sandbox" if you actually mean "I don't like the settlement cap or war weariness".

 

[ThERat]

There are a lot more examples, no worries. For example playing on huge maps, not knowing how the landmass actually will look like, be it continents, fractal or pangaea. It is fun to explore it in true 4x fashion and I can tell you, civ3 creates the most interesting, diverse landmasses with peninsulas, mountain ranges, 1 tile wide passages in between etc etc In Civ7, we got those ugly old and new world blobs, including this really eurocentric idea of colonizing the new world in the second era. What if I don't want to play this predetermined colonial style?

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I like to play Civilization games as an Empire-building sandbox, so I'm not really the target anymore for newer Civ games.

You should love Civ 7 then, that's my style as well and it works well in this iteration! You can kill all your opponents apart from one leaving them with one crappy city (Capitals can be razed again!), you can't accidentally trigger a victory condition (by having too much tourism, or too much land etc) as there are specific projects you need to run to trigger victory.

 

[Auraiz]

I'm sorry. Please try to enjoy all the Civilizations equally and not show preference for any over the others.