Do you think Civ VI is the best in the series?

[Disgustipated]

I would say Civ 4 was the most satisfying to me, and most challenging. That said, I actually have more hours with Civ 6. I am a bit worried about recent trends though. I hope they don't continue to go down the road of "sims". Sim games can be fun... for a couple hours. I have like none I have played over 25 hours (I have 19 hours with Sim City 4). Please don't continue along this route Firaxis. Put some teeth into the AI.

 

[Morningcalm]

It never ceases to amaze me that there are people who think Civ5's "shades of mud and misery" aesthetic was anything but hideous.

"Shades of mud and misery" is a more apt description for Civ VI's leader backgrounds better than Civ V.

 

[Zaarin]

"Shades of mud and misery" is a more apt description for Civ VI's leader backgrounds better than Civ V.

All of Civ5's terrain is five shades of mud: muddy green, muddy dark green, muddy brown, muddy beige, and muddy grey.

 

[OmegaDestroyer]

V looks so colorless compared to VI. I am really glad they opened up the pallette in VI.

I also like how you get the LA and UA's in VI. V feels pretty limited with just one and even worse when it's a pretty mediocre ability (Ottomans, the stupid Hun name thing). I do miss being able to denounce those who have denounced you back. I may be awful but it's time I told the other leaders what I really think about Boudica!

 

[acluewithout]

I haven’t played it, but Civ IV seems to be the best version in terms of execution. However, a lot of the mechanics of the game are quite dated. I genuinely think FXS could do really well with a Civ IV remastered but I doubt we’ll see that. More likely would be an indy developer making an iteration of Civ IV. Unfortunately, so far the various “free civs” have only focused Civ 2 - 3, and every other 4X I’ve seen recently seems focused on Civ V.

Civ VI is, however, the current “best” iteration the franchise overall. It’s essentially “Civ’s Greatest Hits”, and basically builds on and improves everything that’s come before.

Civ VI’s weakness, however, is that it’s still not well balanced, it’s still missing a few mechanics and other elements from earlier games, and the overall difficulty is not well tuned at higher levels. Whether Civ VI will ever eclipse eg Civ IV really comes down to whether FXS and or modders can improve the execution. NFP is obviously an opportunity for FXS to do that, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

 

[Morningcalm]

There's no doubting that the civ design in VI is more complex than that in Civ V, but that comes with the issue of almost every civ in Civ VI having a hard-to-remember set of civ abilities and unique units. Particularly since mousing over the units in Civ VI's civ intro screen ("from the first stirrings...") does NOT reveal information about said units or buildings, and instead just calls them "Unique unit" or "unique building". See https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/5a1d93/very_helpful_unique_unit_descriptions_on_the/ for an example.

All of Civ5's terrain is five shades of mud: muddy green, muddy dark green, muddy brown, muddy beige, and muddy grey.

I notice you didn't deny that Civ VI's leader backgrounds are muddy and miserable.

I disagree re: Civ 5's terrain. Look at how that water sparkles! And the forests look nice in a painterly sort of way, as do the clouds and mountains. I also think you're exaggerating the muddiness of the other dirt/desert/grass terrain.

(And hey, at least the unit, building, and wonder icons and main menu tabs of Civ V don't look like they're made of Civ VI's toy-like plastic.)

I would say Civ 4 was the most satisfying to me, and most challenging. That said, I actually have more hours with Civ 6. I am a bit worried about recent trends though. I hope they don't continue to go down the road of "sims". Sim games can be fun... for a couple hours. I have like none I have played over 25 hours (I have 19 hours with Sim City 4). Please don't continue along this route Firaxis. Put some teeth into the AI.

Agreed. City district adjacency doesn't fulfill the fantasy of a historical "what if" for me. Civ VI is a better city-building game than a Civ game in comparison to Civ IV and Civ V I would say.

 

[AriochIV]

I think the question can be looked at two ways: was an iteration the best for its time, or is it the best available version to play at the moment?

The most recent release is usually the best available version to play at any given moment (except maybe Civ V on initial release), if only because it has the advantage of using the newest technology. Even when a newer version is flawed, I rarely go back and play older versions, because it's hard to give up the benefits of the latest tech.

However, the question of which iteration was the best for its time is rather different. I'd say that's probably Civ IV. Civ III and VI were probably the weakest, simply because they changed the least from the previous versions.

 

[Thormodr]

I love Civ VI but I still think cIV is the best in the series.

If Civ VI makes some improvements and releases the source code to make some incredible mods, then I will consider it the best.

I have them ranked as:

cIV (Fall from Heaven is amazing)
Civ VI
Civ II (Very close to Civ VI. Loved Fantastic Worlds and AC)
Civ I
Civ III
Civilization 5

 

[Bechhold]

That title belongs to Civ IV and it's expansions.

 

[AsH2]

I think civ6 is potentially the best in the series - it still need a strong finish and probably it's DLL released. Then in hands of modders, I think that new game mode addition can improve the gameplay experience a lot.

 

[Gedemon]

I think civ6 is potentially the best in the series - it still need a strong finish and probably it's DLL released.

Exactly my thoughts as a modder, I just hope it will not stay "potentially" for ever.

As a player, I'd say civ4, it's the last one I have played without felling the need to mod it to my taste.

When I try play civ6, the game does it best to remind me each turn that, no, I'm definitely not leading a Civilization to stand the test of time, I'm just playing a game... And unlike civ5, I can't mod it to my taste.

So my order would be civ4 > civ5 > civ6

 

[trev1972]

I really do understand why people disliked stack of doom, and feel 1upt made for more tactical gameplay

But i think it caused a lot of problems too - i think it forced the devs to mess with production to avoid every square full of units...cmpunded by the smaller feel of maps.

I remember on civ 5 having a nightmare actually trying to move units around.

It also took the 'teeth' away from the AI? I genuinely lost a heavily defended capital on civ iv (catherine, betrayal and she must have been planning it for ages)

The fact they didnt need a smart AI to use stacks made them a real threat imho.

 

[Ezumiyr]

Civ4 has a special place in my heart but Civ6 is better in many ways. I wish people would acknowledge the game design issues Civ4 had, and why Civ6 did it better. Less units and maps that feel smaller but fuller aren't issues, they are solutions. Or that they are just better as the game and don't see that them losing in Civ4 mostly meant that they were just not as good at playing the game.

Civ3 and anything before that are too old for comparison. In their times, they were certainly something, but that something didn't age well.

I was always bored eventually when playing a game of Civ5. It was just too much about turtleing and optimized builds. It lacked chaos. It's really a transitionnel game between the linear map painters that previous civs were, and the more tactical, sandbox-y Civ6. I really enjoy how each opus tries to tell stories even more so it's not just "I took a civ with early UU and built by city on hills for bonus production then spammed units so all other civs went extinct".

 

[Chefofrats]

The fact they didnt need a smart AI to use stacks made them a real threat imho.

But it was a stupid, brainless threat, and the only defence was to have your own stacks, the bigger the better. Stacks of doom also made me quit Endless Space 1, even though I liked every other aspect of that game. To survive, you just had to spam units and stack them. It was terribly boring and repetitive.

I actually prefered the stacks in Civ I, when you could kill the whole stack by killing its top unit. It made no sense from a simulation perspective, but at least it served to limit the uncompromising dominance of stacks. You could defend against one with even a single unit.

Anyway, I will never miss that "feature".

 

[Mahi]

I think Civ4 with mods was the best game of them all. Unfortunately it's a bit too oudated now so I don't play it anymore, really.

I'm all for UPT but I wish the AI handled it better. For me, stack of dooms worked pretty well for the AI. You couldn't necessarily stop the AI if you hadn't prepared for it in advance. In the UPT system you can buy a single archer unit that can change the war immediately.

 

[agonistes]

VI is beautiful. Has some great civ choices and some cool new features.

But if I were playing with my eyes closed, III is the best.

 

[Infixo]

All of Civ5's terrain is five shades of mud: muddy green, muddy dark green, muddy brown, muddy beige, and muddy grey.

Yeah... we hate it so much that CivV environment skin is the top of subscribed mods on Steam with almost 120000 subs

 

[ColdClimate]

I actually prefered the stacks in Civ I, when you could kill the whole stack by killing its top unit.

It's funny that it's been so long since civ4 that I apparently don't even remember how stacks work? I thought that if you attacked a stack everything got damaged (at least in a ranged attack), which was supposed to be a kind of 'balance'. Not that it balanced anything...

I feel like they could split the difference by allowing a limit per tile, or by allowing the formation of corps/armies of different kinds of units.

 

[Elhoim]

More likely would be an indy developer making an iteration of Civ IV

Old World from Soren feels kinda like an evolution of it.

It's funny that it's been so long since civ4 that I apparently don't even remember how stacks work? I thought that if you attacked a stack everything got damaged (at least in a ranged attack), which was supposed to be a kind of 'balance'. Not that it balanced anything...

I played it a few months ago and it was a bit more complex than just "stacking units". Basically, it was making "one tile armies", with units using different counters and abilities. And yes, some units had the collateral damage ability to hurt other units in the stack, and IIRC cavalry would damage other siege units.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

I came to IV quite late and it was the stacks that stopped me from really getting into it, though I do take the point that the AI was much better at using them. I think perhaps there is a middle ground that could work well.