Civ 7, A Flawed If Good Game With the Potential For Greatness In Its Bones

[Albertan Civfanatic]

It's taken me over 130 hours but I'm finally beginning to understand Civ 7 and have fun with it. I believe this game has potential for greatness, to even be the greatest Civ game of all time. But it will take time and lots of effort.
Here are what I take to be the games pros and cons. You may agree or disagree with me but understand that this is all coming from a guy who has played several thousand hours of Civ in his lifetime and profoundly wants to see 7 succeed:

The Good:
-Massive graphical/art style upgrade from Civ 6.
-Music is very beautiful.
-Civs are extremely unique and fun to play.
-No workers: tile expansion is fun and innovative.
-Specialists are extremely important.
-Combat is better: Army Commanders make combat/unit movement less tedious.
-Resource slotting in settlements is fun.
-Wonders are impactful.
-Changing civs each age is fun.
-The ages are unique and historically flavourful.
-Great replayability with leader and civ matches.
-Diplomacy is fun and innovative.
-Navigable rivers.
-Social policies are superior to Civ 6's policy cards which had TERRIBLE card gore.
-Rome.

The Bad/Meh:
-The game can feel more on rails than previous games. 7 spells out what you need to do to win more than previous games. Needs more work to feel just right. Not as bad as a lot of critics say.
-BCE/CE. Fixable with a mod.
-Strange leader choices: Harriet Tubman, Jose Rizal.
-BAD DLC policy: Great Britain was part of a paid DLC and was not in the base game but the nation of Buganda was in the base game. Go figure.
-End game feels too plain and can sneak up on you. Victory types are more similar to previous victory types than most critics will admit. Not terrible, but not great either.
-The UI: much improvement since release but needs to get better.
-Top UI display: Science, culture, influence, money yields need to give you an at a glance sense of where your yields are coming from. Too much digging is still required to figure out the totality of where your yields are being drawn from.
-Great Works need more character: Some are decent but need to be more like 5 and 6's.
-The yields of AI enemy civs can shoot up dramatically within a single turn, ie 150 science per turn gain by the AI in one turn.
-Religion is here and is somewhat meaningful but needs more work. Glad the devs didn't just copy and past religion from 6.
-More consistency required as you progress from one age to the next, ie with your civ.
-Needs more iconic leaders: George Washington, Martin Luther, Wilhelm II, King Henry VIII, etc.
-Game desperately needs more civ choice consistency across the eras: Great Britain should have the English in the Exploration Era and the Anglo Saxons in the Ancient Era; Prussia could have the HRE in the Exploration Era and Goths in the Ancient Era.

Rating: 7/10
A fun new Civ game with significant flaws. Looking forward to future updates and DLC

 

[GeneralZift]

I have a potentially irrational hatred for 'Common Era' (BCE / CE)
I'm not sure why, I think it just feels like out-of-touch, somehow disrespectful (and I'm not Christian), and always reminds me of that Neil deGrasse Tyson video.

 

[sonicmyst]

I would add that I wish they did not put Lafayette as base game leader given we already have other leaders that represent France and America. I would rather have him as DLC.

Also, Modern era civs could be improved to be more exciting to play considering Modern Era is the quickest era of the three.

 

[gbw]

I hope they bring scenarios back at some point as well. I HIGHLY doubt we'll get a World War I/II or Civil War or Scramble for Africa (e.g. Civ 5) without mods, but even 6 had ones that mixed up gameplay a bit. Religion absolutely needs to be built out too, it literally is half-built as you said and only matters at all in one of the three ages.

 

[Albertan Civfanatic]

There needs to be a National Museum or Reliquary in the game that stores all of your artifacts from the Ancient Era and going forward. Think how cool that would be if you collected and could see all of your relics by the end of the game.

 

[MagicCuboid]

There needs to be a National Museum or Reliquary in the game that stores all of your artifacts from the Ancient Era and going forward. Think how cool that would be if you collected and could see all of your relics by the end of the game.

That would be cool if the relics and codices actually had names. It's kind of unbelievable that the vast majority of them are just... blank. No celebration of human achievement there, just a "win token."

 

[King Flevance]

The Wonder rebalancing has me enjoying a new playthrough.

I am hoping with resources the way they are and factories that we see the return of corporations eventually. I would like for this game to get a big focus on modern age eventually. It would be great if they could refine it to be exciting.

 

[tedhebert]

I would add that having no hall of fame is really a letdown... or at least someplace that records the results of the games you played...

Took a long time in VI before they added it, but it really should have been there at launch... hope it's in their plan

 

[GeneralZift]

I hope they bring scenarios back at some point as well. I HIGHLY doubt we'll get a World War I/II or Civil War or Scramble for Africa (e.g. Civ 5) without mods, but even 6 had ones that mixed up gameplay a bit. Religion absolutely needs to be built out too, it literally is half-built as you said and only matters at all in one of the three ages.

I think Civ7 lends itself to scenarios more than the main game. It's kinda strange they didn't do more with that.

 

[Siptah]

I think Civ7 lends itself to scenarios more than the main game. It's kinda strange they didn't do more with that.

Agreed, it seems to be designed with scenarios is mind, at least because the main game can be seen as three scenarios (with random map and non-determined civs though). And I fully expected that the first DLCs would come with a scenario or alternate „scenario age“ that can be inserted into the main game to replace one of the others.

 

[UWHabs]

Agreed, it seems to be designed with scenarios is mind, at least because the main game can be seen as three scenarios (with random map and non-determined civs though). And I fully expected that the first DLCs would come with a scenario or alternate „scenario age“ that can be inserted into the main game to replace one of the others.

From the initial launch plan, it sounded like they wanted to run those monthly challenges, like they started at the end of the cycle for 6. But shifted away from that to nail down the core functions more. I do think in the act structure of the game, those should be fun playing out like a single era challenge with a specific setup.

 

[GeneralZift]

Agreed, it seems to be designed with scenarios is mind, at least because the main game can be seen as three scenarios (with random map and non-determined civs though). And I fully expected that the first DLCs would come with a scenario or alternate „scenario age“ that can be inserted into the main game to replace one of the others.

If I was on the team, I would have suggested to have the 'Age System' as a specific Scenario mode, and have the classic mode play like usual.
Then when you play Scenario mode, you can pick something like 'The British Empire' and play through the Roman -> Norman -> British scenario surrounded by Franks -> French, and so on.
In the regular game you would just play as England.

So it would be entirely split but those scenarios would be designed specifically for that gameplay, and the regular mode would have been more classic.