Is Gods and Kings worth it?

Gilkanese

Chieftain
Joined
Dec 28, 2010
Messages
26
I'm a big fan of the Civilization series and I've had a lot of fun with Civ 5, but I'm wondering if Gods and Kings is really worth the 30 dollars. Can you Civfanatics help me out here?
 
You realize you're going to get a biased answer on a site called Civfanatics. There's no question mark there because it's not a question. I'm saying I know you realize this.

If you like Civilization V, you'll certainly appreciate getting a series of new civilizations, religion, and espionage. I don't know what it's worth to me yet, but I did already buy it, if that says anything.

Espionage is a very small factor that's just kind of cool to have. Religion is a very large addition that greatly affects the game. Early on it can be a huge influence to power, and later you can use faith to create great persons, so it's always very useful to have.
 
With all the new things added to the game and the changes made to the mechanics, this really is like getting a whole new game. I'm absolutely getting my money's worth out of it, and I haven't even dipped into the new scenarios yet.
 
Absolutely. It gives you more options to play, the civs are not so prone to war, and you can actually have a peaceful world (with one or two jerks spoiling the mood and give you reasons to steamroll their cities)
 
If you're still playing Civ V, then G&K is a no brainer. Even if it isn't a perfect expansion, the balance is much better, and there's more stuff in general.
 
If you like Civ 5 then yeah, there are some really neat additions in G&K. It is a bit expensive though for what it is, so definitely shop around - I think Greenmangaming is the best place to pick it up comparatively cheap.
 
Well, after reading some reviews and the answers to this thread I think I'll go ahead and pick it up. One final question though, would it be best to wait and see if it goes on sale for the Steam summer sale or is it not going to happen considering it was only released a short while ago?
 
Buy it now it is awesome! Don't wait BUY IT NOW!
 
It's a huge improvement over vanilla. I had stopped playing the game months ago and now can't put it down. The religion system is amazing, far better than Civ4's. The new civs are themselves interesting, and even the scenarios are fun.

A must buy.
 
Well, after reading some reviews and the answers to this thread I think I'll go ahead and pick it up. One final question though, would it be best to wait and see if it goes on sale for the Steam summer sale or is it not going to happen considering it was only released a short while ago?
Depends, are you planning on playing CiV a lot? If so, just buy it, I would never, ever ever ever ever want to go back to vanilla. If you haven't played CiV in a while though, and you are just wondering if you should give the game another go with the expansion, well you can wait I guess.

It all comes down to this - how long are you willing to wait to play the by far best version of CiV? I know I am happy with my purchase, this coming from someone who didn't touch CiV for over an year after release.
 
Yeah. Religion is a great addition. One more feature to manage. And a far more influential one than the religion in Civ 4. And many mechanics are changed. For example. Conquering a city isn't nearly as easy as it once was early in the game.
 
Well, after reading some reviews and the answers to this thread I think I'll go ahead and pick it up. One final question though, would it be best to wait and see if it goes on sale for the Steam summer sale or is it not going to happen considering it was only released a short while ago?

I was going to mention the Summer Sale. Yeah, it just came out, but you never know with those Steam sales. As an expansion and depending on the sales trend, they may figure that the full price buyers have bought and lower the price enough to juice it. I've seen some crazy things there (and I have the backlog of games to prove it :lol:)

That said, if you're playing every day then just buy it; from what most people say you'll probably like it. If you're a casual player or thinking of returning, the Summer Sale should be coming within a couple of weeks iirc so it probably won't hurt to wait.

I myself only played vanilla for a couple of months but am intrigued by the additions and will pay attention to any discounts. I doubt we'll see more than 25% off (maybe 33%) though, if anything.
 
Sound advice. I think I'll wait, as the Steam Summer sale typically starts around this time - the next two to three days if past dates are anything to go by.
 
The only reasons you might consider it not worth are if either you consider $30 prohibitively expensive for a game, or if you didn't like Civ5 vanilla at all (because the underlying systems like 1upt are still in place). If you liked vanilla, though, it's definitely an upgrade.
 
26.99 at http://www.greenmangaming.com/

My two biggest gripes with vanilla were poor AI and long turn length. The AI has improved, but it has certainly not been perfected. Turn length is still an issue.

Otherwise, it delivers on what expansions should deliver on - new features to learn/enjoy, tweaking old stuff that needed tweaking.
 
It is definitely worth it. For me, it has taken CiV to a whole new level, with all the re-balancing, the addressing of various issues (like the RA spam issue on Vanilla), and of course, the new concepts (Religion, Espionage) and the new Civs. I bought it when it was 33% off for just 16,5 Euros. It was worth every single Euro.
 
ive probably made more anti civ 5 threads than about anyone - and i approve g+k.

Its no BTS but maybe a warlords, and i hope for a final expansion to add in 1-2 future era's, more civ's, corporations - and a good earth map that isn't terrible.

Religion is not only important but it can not be avoided - EVERYONE will found a religion (pretty much) however i have not seen everyone get enhancers. The reason you can't avoid it is that you want the good policies in it.

Espionage isn't "cool" like in BTS, its more of a pain that it is reminiscent of some 13 year old raging troll with a high pitched kid voice over teamspeak.

By that, i mean that EVERY civ gets one spy automaticly in the ren era. Then, one more each era thereafter.

If a spy is in your city it will work to prevent tech steal.

In enemy city it will tech steal. If the AI has plans to invade another AI, (or you) it might tell you, and you can "share intrigue" if your spy in Thebes learns Ramses plans to invade Monty.

If a spy is in a city state, it will thwart the election which has such a big impact on city state diplomacy that you can throw all the gold into a city state you want, one spy will make you "friends" again.

Despite that espionage is a bummer, the new civ's are worthy - religion is nice - and units tend to take 5 volleys instead of 3 to kill, meaning it's "easier" to defend oneself. New city state types are good, and now i am just waiting for the mods to roll in. Some mods exist for "small things" but nothing big yet.

The only thing positive i can say about espionage is the gap between the top and bottom 3 nations mid-late game seems to have closed somewhat because they can steal techs to keep up.
 
In a word yes it is worth it

@thadian

Disagree. G&K is its own thing and I'm glad that's how they approach it, rather than trying to pretend it's some other expansion back.
 
Top Bottom