OK, I have to say that I
REALLY think they dropped the ball on Diplomatic Victory. Given that they regularly come and check out both Civfanatics and Apolyton, they would surely have seen that the vast majority of players felt the Diplomatic Victory Condition of CivIII 'bit the big one'-and was definitely unsatisfying in nature. Surely the game testers they have are telling them this too, so why keep such a crap victory condition, when it can be
so much more !!!
Anyway, enough ranting. The good news is that they mentioned
SIX victory conditions, but only mentioned the four that we are already familiar with (with the allied victory being a possible fifth), this means that there is at least one-and possibly two-victory conditions which could be completely new to the game-fingers crossed.
Also, the nature of permanent alliances sounds a HECK of a lot like the Vassalage/Protectorate Agreements we saw in SMAC-which makes another great feature that makes its long overdue return

. Here is hoping that a decent-non abusable-unit trading system is thrown into the mix.
Oh, and in the Gamespot article, they mention that game testers were saying religion was 'too vague' as it currently stood, and that it is being 'tweaked', one can only wonder what
that means!! Heres hoping it marks a way of truly differentiating religions once they are founded.
Oh and lastly, I think when they say 'Light', I don't think they mean 'light and frothy', but that they are referring to the fact that turns are less of the plodding 'micromanagement nightmares' we have come to dread, and are more of an easy point, click and do system. Also, I think this refers to the fact that the time
between turns will be less time consuming as well. If correct, then both these factors link the 'Light' component very much into the 'Fun' component.
Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.