In terms of the legacy paths, the exploration age seems very very closely tailored to Spain?
Spain is the only released civ, in the exploration age, to have settled and fought in the new world. That's military and economic, two of the four paths.
For the military path, I like what they did with the Mongols, but that's just an exception. Otherwise, to complete the military path without wrecking your settlement limit, you have to colonize/conquer/convert the new world.
Regarding the economic path, the richest civs in the medieval era were China, the Byzantines, some Islamic states, and some Italian states. They were rich due to initiating or capturing trade within the old world. This is not represented at all. Instead, you MUST colonize the new world and send back treasure fleets to gain any economic points at all.
And for the cultural path, you gain points through and only through relics. This is clearly a Christian (Byzantine/Gothic) thing. So this leaves Spain and the Normans.
For centuries, Islam and China were among the most advanced cultures in the world; for a while much more advanced than Europe, except maybe for the Byzantines. The Islamic golden age and the flourishing of arts in China had hardly anything to do with religious relics. And even if we're only talking about European culture, what about the Renaissance?
Also, look at the modern age. It's literally training explorers to dig up artifacts around the world, lol. Do we consider France to be culturally dominant because of Egyptology? Because their explorers dug up a bunch of artifacts and put them in museums? What about Britain? Is the British Museum the crowning achievement of British culture?
I get that this is just a game, but the theme matters, and this kind of interpretation of the world, economically and culturally, verges on ignorance, and is especially bad for a game that's clearly otherwise trying to be culturally inclusive. I don't dispute the massive cultural and economic influence Europe has had on the world, and I didn't care that much when people brought up Eurocentrism in civ5 or civ6. But now with civ7, to have almost a thousand years of medieval & early modern history be about colonization of the new world and relics? This is too much for me.
If theming was neglected, if we removed great works of art, tourism, and so on, in favor of simplifying or streamlining gameplay, I'm afraid gameplay suffered too. I won't belabor a point that people have already brought up, but cultural victory is now purely about buying museums and pumping out explorers. I'd rather this path be disabled at this point. Same in the exploration age - it's all about pumping out missionaries and converting a few target cities. This isn't interesting or fun. And the economic path has very little interactivity beyond conquering other people's settlements for resources. Beyond that, it's just sending treasure fleets back, or dragging resources one-by-one to factories every few turns.
I won't just rant here, though. My suggestion is to add alternative paths to win legacy points in each age, both for historical flavor and for gameplay variety. This is besides the necessary tuning of the current paths.
Spain is the only released civ, in the exploration age, to have settled and fought in the new world. That's military and economic, two of the four paths.
For the military path, I like what they did with the Mongols, but that's just an exception. Otherwise, to complete the military path without wrecking your settlement limit, you have to colonize/conquer/convert the new world.
Regarding the economic path, the richest civs in the medieval era were China, the Byzantines, some Islamic states, and some Italian states. They were rich due to initiating or capturing trade within the old world. This is not represented at all. Instead, you MUST colonize the new world and send back treasure fleets to gain any economic points at all.
And for the cultural path, you gain points through and only through relics. This is clearly a Christian (Byzantine/Gothic) thing. So this leaves Spain and the Normans.
For centuries, Islam and China were among the most advanced cultures in the world; for a while much more advanced than Europe, except maybe for the Byzantines. The Islamic golden age and the flourishing of arts in China had hardly anything to do with religious relics. And even if we're only talking about European culture, what about the Renaissance?
Also, look at the modern age. It's literally training explorers to dig up artifacts around the world, lol. Do we consider France to be culturally dominant because of Egyptology? Because their explorers dug up a bunch of artifacts and put them in museums? What about Britain? Is the British Museum the crowning achievement of British culture?
I get that this is just a game, but the theme matters, and this kind of interpretation of the world, economically and culturally, verges on ignorance, and is especially bad for a game that's clearly otherwise trying to be culturally inclusive. I don't dispute the massive cultural and economic influence Europe has had on the world, and I didn't care that much when people brought up Eurocentrism in civ5 or civ6. But now with civ7, to have almost a thousand years of medieval & early modern history be about colonization of the new world and relics? This is too much for me.
If theming was neglected, if we removed great works of art, tourism, and so on, in favor of simplifying or streamlining gameplay, I'm afraid gameplay suffered too. I won't belabor a point that people have already brought up, but cultural victory is now purely about buying museums and pumping out explorers. I'd rather this path be disabled at this point. Same in the exploration age - it's all about pumping out missionaries and converting a few target cities. This isn't interesting or fun. And the economic path has very little interactivity beyond conquering other people's settlements for resources. Beyond that, it's just sending treasure fleets back, or dragging resources one-by-one to factories every few turns.
I won't just rant here, though. My suggestion is to add alternative paths to win legacy points in each age, both for historical flavor and for gameplay variety. This is besides the necessary tuning of the current paths.
