Last expansion?

[Deutsch]

Do you think this is the last Civ 6 expansion? Do you think any more civs will be added? I'd personally love to see Babylon, Vietnam, Colombia, Austria, and Mexico.

 

[Wingednosering]

Maya, Ethiopia and Byzantines are pretty much guaranteed if there's a third expansion.

 

[Navelgazer]

I get the feeling that they'd prefer to keep adding to Civ VI as long as it's feasible from a market standpoint. And the fact that we haven't seen mainstays like Maya, Ethiopia and Babylon makes me pretty sure a third expansion will arrive eventually.

 

[NukeAJS]

I'd have to see the sales numbers to say whether this is the last expansion or not. Regardlessly ...

I will continue to think that a 1/2 expansion will be released without any evidence whatsoever. It'd be a bunch of new civs and alternative leaders and it'd be $20 or so.

I'm going to armchair market this and say that not too many people are going to shell out another $40+ dollars for corporations (or whatever few/limited mechanics could be added), but if they added a couple of returning civs (like Maya, Ethiopia, and Byzantines) plus one or two true oddballs that would be quirky and fun (like Inuit) PLUS 2-3 alternate leaders (America, China, Germany, Ottomans, Rome ... kind of your 'obvious' civs), I'd be cool with that.

It'd basically be the civ DLCs they put out between vanilla and RaF but marketed as a package.

 

[Tabarnak]

Console and pc games will die soon(Stadia). Gaming industry is going into another direction. So is Firaxis. Nope, no more xpansions.

That's my guess.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Third expansion is nearly impossible from marketing perspective. I'd experiment with some DLC, though if I were Firaxis.

 

[iammaxhailme]

My guess is the stadia will be an ouya tier flop.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Console and pc games will die soon(Stadia). Gaming industry is going into another direction. So is Firaxis. Nope, no more xpansions.

That's my guess.

Actually, Stadia works best for games like Civilization. Stadia will have a bit more visual lags than usual network games as it can't compensate them by making predictions on the client side. That's not a problem for turn-based games, though.

 

[SlySlySly]

From what I've heard Gathering Storm is pretty well liked. That means money. On twitter the dev team is active and they are constantly getting support. The situation seems as if it would be feasible to release more DLC.
There will definitely be more civ added. I'm expecting Ethiopia as said above. Probably another ancient middle eastern civ like Assyria or Babylon. Given the lack of American civs probably some more of those. Byzantines appearing at some point isn't doubtful. The fact that they added Phoenicia for Dido and not Carthage leads me to believe a possible alternate leader is there.

Moving on to things I wish we would get. More Chinese leaders, for such an influential civilization that lasted as long is it did we need more leaders. I would love to see a Vietnam, but southeast Asia recently got 2 civs so its unlikely. I would love the Khazars given where I'm from but that's highly unlikely due to the fact that they're less well known and we just got a asian steppe horde leader (Genghis Khan). Alternate Roman leaders? Alternate Egyptian leaders... Hatshepsut is extremely notable in her successes.

That's all I've got.

 

[Tabarnak]

My guess is the stadia will be an ouya tier flop.

I tried to be apocalyptic. Looks like i failed

Actually, Stadia works best for games like Civilization. Stadia will have a bit more visual lags than usual network games as it can't compensate them by making predictions on the client side. That's not a problem for turn-based games, though.

Great!

 

[XplosiveLun]

DLCs are expansions, duh. Jokes aside. I would like to see more DLC coming similiar to Paradox's, i.e. adding new mechanics gradually that expanding the same game in multiple ways. Not to mention that at this state, Civ 6's gameplay feels very polished and coherent overall comparing to older installations .

 

[Melliores]

I would temper those Stadia hopes with some caution. VR games and devices were expected to become the norm by a few years ago, yet their price and the high-end hardware expected to run them makes it a really expensive proposition even for the most dedicated gamers. Unless the Stadia service comes with a high-speed Internet subscription, you won't see it being widely adopted even in the USA.

The countries that currently have proper internet infrastructure are mostly in Europe and some in Asia (Japan, Korea). As with VR, it is not the device itself that is lacking, it is the infrastructure and additional hardware that it requires to function as expected.

Other than that, yes, I think that there will be a third expansion. They are still selling the previous content at discounts and CIV 6 is currently in a good place, with room for growth.

 

[Haig]

No idea what a stadia is but from the sounds of it I guess it's a total collapse and destruction of life

 

[Sostratus]

No idea what a stadia is but from the sounds of it I guess it's a total collapse and destruction of life

Basically, you put the game on a cloud server, and then you can deliver it to basically any device over the internet.

Besides the obvious engineering problems, this wouldn't do anything to the games (which is what Stadia platform has to deliver.) And there's the problem that people will still have personal computing devices (how are they going to access stadia?) and its way easier to just make the consumer pay for computation than a google server farm and then transmit it. It's not like a service such as stadia would be free. A gaming class video card can produce more throughput than a home internet connection. I'm sure google's project will function but I doubt it will succeed. Again, the business plan isn't announced and the fundamentals just don't make sense. People hate "always online" SP games.

Anyways. I don't think they will do another xpac. It takes them about 3 years to go from last xpac to new civ game (2007-2010; 2013-2016). That's a huge capital sink with no revenue for 3 years. If it were me making the financial case, I would happily extend that cycle 1 year and push out 10-20$ of DLC to fund the development of civ7. Civ6 dlc at this point (civs/leaders/scenarios) is much cheaper to produce per revenue dollar than the work for civ7 (new engine, gotta make new game building tools in the software, then you gotta make the actual game!)

Example: Release George Washington alt leader (extra points if on July 4.)
Pay a voice actor a few grand and have ed scribble some new ability down on a napkin, boom, done. Repeat with 2-4 other alt leaders and you have yourself a $5 dlc that will make you millions.

 

[Melliores]

@Haig

Google Stadia aims to allow to stream games directly from a clod server, without even actually having a PC or a console that can physically run the game. They aim to make high-demanding games be playable on telephones and tablettes via streaming.

As the game is not actually on any of your devices, this raises the logical question whether you will have to buy it beforehand and can you mod it. The other pressing question is what kind of a internet connection will you require to be able to play it with minimum latency issues.

A neat feature was showing gameplay on Youtube and having the button "Play now". You could actually connect to that very same moment during gameplay via your browser and continue playing.

 

[mitsho]

It all depends on how long it takes them to create a leader (model). Then take the time they have left in their business plan for civ6 and you get how many leaders the next Xpac will have. I see them more perfecting existing stuff than adding new things. Smaller ideas like the Rockband can still be added, things like Earthquakes, another ship and some new wonders, but I can‘t see a whole new system (and if, it would be the turn for Trade and Religion to be revisited). But probably a part of the team will get drawn to other projects in the planning phase (the one before they need artists...).

As for the leaders, there is an obvious roster of civs with the Maya at the core and already listed in this thread, but I can also see a few outsiders (What about the Soviets as Russia is too religious focused for the Communists?). I can also imagine a „2nd leader pack“ with returning classics such as Bismarck, Washington/Lincoln, Wu Zetian, Ramesses, Napoleon, Isabella, Julius Caesar (or Scipio Africanus?), Churchill and so on. Would probably sell fine.

 

[Karmah]

Console and pc games will die soon(Stadia). Gaming industry is going into another direction. So is Firaxis. Nope, no more xpansions.

That's my guess.

That's gonna take at least three years.
When tablets went out and mainstream late 2000's-early 2010's, everyone predicted a quick death to gaming on PC.

 

[acluewithout]

I really hope we get another expansion or at least some chunky dlc.

The game is in really good shape (just needing some tuning). But there is room for more - mechanics that could definitely be expanded on. Moreover, I think if FXS could flesh out a few mechanics more then we really could end up with not just a good or great game, but really something quite amazing.

#onemoreexpansion

 

[Solomonic Wisdom]

I also hope so. Would like to see Ethiopia. Would also like to see Cuba.

 

[Wingednosering]

Stadia conversation is sort of off topic, but I've used similar services before. I was with a company for a while that kept revisiting them as an easy way to distribute our service (sort of like a game, but wasnt marketed as such). It really isn't sustainable with today's infrastructure, not to mention the limitations it creates with internet connections, lack of modern support, etc, etc. The #1 thing it would have going for it is mobility and compatability.

It's been known for some time that these sorts of services would be coming, I just think it's way too early for them to become the norm. Amazon's streaming experience cost you a completely unsustainable amount of money if you need a machine with a graphics card for your streaming (per user, per minute) and the quality is always pretty lackluster.