Discussion On Why Civ 7 Doesn't Feel Like A "Civ" Game

[99-percent-sure]

I have played Civ since the 90s and love playing 7 fwiw. Not all old timers are rejecting the game.

I'll say this: I already have 350 hours played in just a couple of months, which makes this one of my four or five most-played PC games ever. I don't know that it'll reach the uncountably absurd gameplay hours of Civ 4/BtS or even the 1500ish hours I've invested in Civ 6 or Stardew Valley, but I've definitely gotten my money's worth, and expect to be playing it a lot more going forward. Given that, it's a little surreal to watch people openly calling for the game to be discontinued quickly, or even replaced with a clone of Civ 5, which I've played for a grand total of 7 hours.

And I've been sitting on AoE2 Definitive for a couple of years now, having bought it on the cheap. I've played only five hours total, and it's just been running through tutorials every now and then. Having to manage everything in real time feels too urgent, and I don't find it that fun. Maybe I'll eventually come to enjoy it at some point, but I've tried three times, and just haven't been able to connect with it.

 

[Brutus2]

I have played Civ since the 90s and love playing 7 fwiw. Not all old timers are rejecting the game.

I'll second that. I'm in my 50s, and have played Civ all my life. Every civ has been an improvement in different ways. When civ6 was announced, I thought there is no way they can do anything better than Civ5 but I was wrong. Civ6 was great. Now, I'm having lots of fun with Civ7 and have no interest in going back.

 

[MutilationWave]

AoE2 DE is much more than just graphics update. It has a lot of new content and a lot of UI improvements. For RTS games, UI is critical, as you need to operate quickly. I could totally imagine players accustomed to modern games being unable to play older ones without such improvements. Those things don't apply to turn-based games, at least not in the same scale.

I only play RTS on story mode because I just can't keep up. I have barely played AOE, and not the DE. But what you said reminded me of Baldur's Gate. The first one is unbelievably clunky once you've played the second, and I can't imagine anyone who started with the third going back to BG2.

 

[sonicmyst]

Civ 7 for me still feels like civ.

We still interact with other leaders, engage in wars, build wonders, race to space, establish faith, etc in a board-gamey way inspired by history.

 

[DannyMustardpants]

Also putting my hand up to say I have played since CIV 1 was current and am enjoying 7.

I actually think it helps...I'm not comparing 7 to 6...I'm comparing 7 to them all.

 

[ThunderLizard2]

Civ VII is not a Civ game at all. It more like a Simcity type of game. The AI is braindead and it's just all feels wrong.

 

[Kev1916]

2000+ hours in Civ IV ( mods )
495 hours in Civ V
1325 hours in Civ VI

Zero hours and will never buy Civkind it's to me not a Civ game and never will be
Seeb enjoy your night

 

[tman2000]

Civ 7 for me still feels like civ.

We still interact with other leaders, engage in wars, build wonders, race to space, establish faith, etc in a board-gamey way inspired by history.

It wasn’t board gamey until civ vi

 

[trev1972]

It wasn’t board gamey until civ vi

I think it may have been, but more effort was made to hide it in older versions

It doesn't feel like civ to me, because it feels as if all the sandbox elements have been stripped in the name of balance and streamlining

Of course if people love it, that's all good. I don't think it's about age, I think how we percieve 7 is more about what we look for in civ games.

I have always played civ as a cross between an alt history simulator (what if India colonised the world instead of being colonised etc) and an RPG. I have never been about min maxxing and making arbitrary numbers as high as possible.

 

[Manpanzee]

I think turning Civ VII into a deckbuilder makes a ton of sense. In fact, I'd take that idea one further and make it into a tabletop deckbuilder, not a digital one. And I'd re-theme it to be a fantasy game, not a history one. Hopefully, at that point Firaxis could be honest enough with the community to admit that it's not a real Civ game anywhere, and would rename it to something more appropriate, like "The Gathering of Magicians".

 

[tman2000]

I think turning Civ VII into a deckbuilder makes a ton of sense. In fact, I'd take that idea one further and make it into a tabletop deckbuilder, not a digital one. And I'd re-theme it to be a fantasy game, not a history one. Hopefully, at that point Firaxis could be honest enough with the community to admit that it's not a real Civ game anywhere, and would rename it to something more appropriate, like "The Gathering of Magicians".

Jokes aside a 4x tactical tabletop with deck building sounds awesome. Have to check if it exists.

 

[tman2000]

Jokes aside a 4x tactical tabletop with deck building sounds awesome. Have to check if it exists.

Yeah I’m gonna make this thing. I call dibs (obviously I can’t but let the record show this is where the idea was born).

The age system is perfect for leveraging performance over certain goals into deck upgrades. First age should be basic mechanics. Second adds systems on top of mechanics. Third complicates and adds idiosyncrasies.

I think civ 7 should work this way. Religion should convert early in exploration but transition to it being hard to convert, where in the second half of the age it becomes a system that does more than have a couple beliefs for its owner. This system should be present and relevant in modern but transform into “cultural ethics” like hard work, social welfare. With a modern age unique civ having the ability to convert in the modern age even though other civs can’t (like what if there was the Mormons civ?)

I’ve always said treasure resources should be mostly about slotting into colonial warehouses for factory like bonuses, with added features involving factories in modern.

This is why we say 7 is unfinished. All this stuff has obvious implications, it’s just not implemented.

 

[Siptah]

It wasn’t board gamey until civ vi

Nah, it was basically a board game since 1. But 1 and 6 embraced that the most, while 3-5 especially tried to hide it. Some features always were different, e.g., the palace building or civ 2‘s advisors, but the base game loop always felt like a board game.

 

[Verified_Confection_Being]

Yeah I’m gonna make this thing. I call dibs (obviously I can’t but let the record show this is where the idea was born).

The age system is perfect for leveraging performance over certain goals into deck upgrades. First age should be basic mechanics. Second adds systems on top of mechanics. Third complicates and adds idiosyncrasies.

I think you're looking for a game called 7 wonders

 

[tman2000]

I think you're looking for a game called 7 wonders

Not tactics though. Do love me a 2 expansion 7W duel though.

 

[tman2000]

Nah, it was basically a board game since 1. But 1 and 6 embraced that the most, while 3-5 especially tried to hide it. Some features always were different, e.g., the palace building or civ 2‘s advisors, but the base game loop always felt like a board game.

Before 1UPT you can't call it a board game. Especially with the degree to which you could modify terrain.

 

[Marla_Singer]

Before 1UPT you can't call it a board game. Especially with the degree to which you could modify terrain.

Civ 1 was clearly designed as a video game from the start. During its first full year of development, it was even real-time (like SimCity and Railroad Tycoon), but Sid Meier wasn’t satisfied with the results, leading to the "valley of despair" he often mentions. The shift to turn-based gameplay came from Empire Deluxe (another video game), which was the main inspiration for Civ 1. The intent was to let players control the pace of the game, not to structure it around multiple players, especially since Civ was always thought primarily as a single-player experience.

The "board game feel" really began with the introduction of 1UPT (one unit per tile) in Civ5, which pushed players toward solving more boardgame-like tactical problems. That direction was further reinforced in Civ6 with the addition of policy cards, adjacencies, and districts. Tiles became increasingly important over time, which is quite distinctive as other historical video game flagships usually went in the other direction.

 

[Yzman]

Me too, I've played since the beginning and I think VII is the best version since IV.

I am having a lot of fun too, especially with more fixes coming.

 

[Yzman]

2000+ hours in Civ IV ( mods )
495 hours in Civ V
1325 hours in Civ VI

Zero hours and will never buy Civkind it's to me not a Civ game and never will be
Seeb enjoy your night

So you never played the game? Good to know.

 

[Yzman]

Before 1UPT you can't call it a board game. Especially with the degree to which you could modify terrain.

Have you ever played risk or similar board games? You have whole armies on a tile...

Modifying terrain? I do that all the time in board games too.