Wow you can really tell the CIV community is dedicated here....and that not many of you seem to play other 'modern games' that much. I can't say I blame you, i go through my 1 or 2 months of nothing but civ 4 about every year still....but i've got some sad news for you.
Civ 5 is designed for consoles, controllers, and a much younger target audience than previous civs.
Unfortunately this is how most modern games of all genre's are headed/currently at....they dumb down the internal workings, add in lots of gimmicks, and reduce the difficulty and knowledge required to beat the game so that anyone of any age or intelligence has a high chance of 'feeling good about themselves'
Expect over simplified commerce, diplomacy, and 'civics.' Gone are the days of intense turn by turn micromanagement....welcome in the age of pressing X to skip to the turn you can fight and have very little if any downfalls for doing so.
Money is in the consoles, and the console mindset. Casual gaming, non thought provoking gameplay, and pretty graphics....8 pages and no one's said this yet?
Look at Dragon Age:Origins...made by Bioware and described as 'the spiritual successor to baldur's gate'.....the game was so simple you could beat it naked(your character, not just you!) on nightmare while using 1 hand. No min/maxing, no character building, just mindless button mashing to victory.
Let's just hope they don't follow the DLC path DA:O took, and offer a single new civ for $5 every month....or worse new units for the current civs.