Official announcement: Hot off the presses. Next Civ game in development!!!!!!!

[The_J]

Civili7ation, for anybody who was alive in the 1990s.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1626642065864986626

"Sevelization"

 

[Gori the Grey]

It would have to be SEVElizatioN.

 

[Hakan-i Cihan]

Just make it Civen

 

[Krajzen]

The main civ games have covered ~4000bc to ~2050 ad nauseum at this point. BE picks up around 2200. Not my first guess, but seems there's gap in the story Sid Meier's been telling thus far...

Is it really ad nauseum if ~4000 BC to 2023 AD is literally the entire history of urban civilization that we have? (with several Neolithic Middle Eastern small proto - cities which push the first date backwards, but on the other hand most of the world got its first cities millenias later, so even 4000BC is very generous - Poland had no civilization in 500 AD)
We kinda have to repeat this timespan (or its smaller parts) in every historical video game Also, there are no 'gaps' in nonexistent eras of human history, Firaxis could just as easily make space colony game happening immediately after civ's scientific victory.

Personally I think main civ games should keep between 4000 BC and 2050 AD. Anything past 2050 AD is purely speculative science fiction worthy of a separate game and not historical game, and by this point playable historical factions cease to be distinctive and recognizable, turning into copies of bland vague "default futuristic civ". Especially as Civ has huge problems with meaningful endgame content in general. Meanwhile I stand fast at the position that going before 4000 BC is going both completely below and beyond the scope of empire - building game. Case in point: Humankind's tiny neolithic era, which is repetitive, pointless filler before the first city, as you have almost nothing to do on the map, as a tiny non - state, non - urban nomadic tribe.

 

[ManoftheHour333]

I have two little wishes regarding Civ VII. My first wish is that the leaders take a step out of the strange black room and return to a bit livelier background. I don't necessarily call for the leaders to be as static as many of the Civ V leaders were, but I stand by the fact that in general, I prefer that game's approach to the leaderscreens. When I remember the beutiful sceneries like Ramkhamhaeng's garden, Theodora's balcony or Ashurbanipal's library and then compare them to the black room with a background that his hidden by the diplomacy/trade screen most of the time... And I would welcome if the leaders could response with something more than "hmph" or "haha" when we trade.

My second personal little wish for Civ VII is a return of war themes. Nuking someone while the Kongolese atomic theme is playing is rather strange, mood-wise.

Bring back the war themes!!! If they want to do their era by era music sure but make one for peace and one for war...or even just make a peace one that build throughout the ages like in VI and then just one static war theme. That's the only part of Civ Vs music I really miss (Apart from the random Dvorak NW Symphony theme and Country I Vow to Thee from England) in comparison to VI.

*Edit: And Babu Yet from IV obv. But that's essentially the civ theme so they'll likely never top that lol

 

[ManoftheHour333]

Is it really ad nauseum if ~4000 BC to 2023 AD is literally the entire history of urban civilization that we have? (with several Neolithic Middle Eastern small proto - cities which push the first date backwards, but on the other hand most of the world got its first cities millenias later, so even 4000BC is very generous - Poland had no civilization in 500 AD)
We kinda have to repeat this timespan (or its smaller parts) in every historical video game Anything past 2020 AD is pure fantasy science fiction, you could as well make the main game end at 2100 and space colony game begin at 2100.

Personally I think main civ games should keep between 4000 BC and 2050 AD. Anything past 2050 AD is purely speculative science fiction worthy of a separate game and not historical game, and by this point playable historical factions cease to be distinctive and recognizable, turning into copies of bland vague "default futuristic civ". Especially as Civ has huge problems with meaningful endgame content in general. Meanwhile I stand fast at the position that going before 4000 BC is going both completely below and beyond the scope of empire - building game. Case in point: Humankind's tiny neolithic era, which is repetitive, pointless filler before the first city, as you have almost nothing to do on the map.

Agreed. Focus/storytelling should slow down much more heavily in the modern/ atomic eras to elicit world wr scenarios and cold war tensions. Not saying they need to be exactly like history but those late game interactions (And nuking) are really memorable and meme-able.

Right now that periods are all about their respective victories just like much of the game...while that's all important I'd like to see more storytelling and interactions with the world through the mid-late game. I haven't noticed this that bad in MP but in SP it's painfully obvious that the AI can't handle anything super complex past the medieval era...

 

[Pistol90]

For me only question is where can we expect something more ... some news of where game is heading, basic features and maybe one little screenshoot.

I belive it would be by the end of this year, and game release next year.

It would't make any sense to announce this if we wont see anything about game for years (see Elder Scrolls 6)

 

[Krajzen]

Bring back the war themes!!! If they want to do their era by era music sure but make one for peace and one for war...or even just make a peace one that build throughout the ages like in VI and then just one static war theme.

I absolutely agree. Civ6 desperately lacks the musical mood difference between the joyful peace and the grim pathos of war
It is especially bad for civs whose theme is not 'kinda ambigous, vague epicness' but swings into either very festive or very bellicose mood, so you hear lighthearted dancing tunes in trenches and somber drama of tourism.

 

[Hellenism Salesman]

so you hear lighthearted dancing tunes in trenches and somber drama of tourism.

Such as Brazil.

Macedon’s theme (on account of it being so long) actually seems to account for this, including both a lighthearted first song (Tino Mori) and an intimidating war-like song (Buvcansko Oro). The fanfare that sandwiches the war in the middle pretty neatly represents the congratulatory and pompous nature of a victorious nation and Alex himself.

(The music isn’t Greek but is instead North Macedonian- slavic- but that’s another matter)

 

[pokiehl]

Minor thing I’m hoping for is the return of separate themes for the expansions. I was really disappointed that Civ 6 only had Sogno di Volare from release through now.

 

[InsidiousMage]

The relationship between culture or diplomacy and score is appalling.

Because diplomacy and culture in the game are fairly shallow all things considered. I think tourism should count towards your score but tourism is useless if you aren't going for a culture victory so there is no reason to even bother with so I'm perfectly fine with you not really get score for it. Same with diplomacy. If they are improved upon in Civ7 then, yeah, add them what gets you score.

And then you get points for silly things like buildings or districts, which is rewarding the means, rather than the completion of objectives.

I haven't played Humankind but Old World has an objective victory, called ambitions, and you know what they include? Building certain types of buildings! And its not silly if the point is to try and emulate the idea of creating a "great civilization" because building projects have always been a part of that.

No unique Civ specific ways to accrue points

Good luck balancing that and coming up with 50 to 60 unique ways for a civ to get victory points.

- Score heavily favours domination oriented Civs, which is not an inevitability, it's just a consequence of poor design;

No, its an inevitability because having more cities/territory is better than having less unless you arbitrarily penalize wide play vs tall. That kind of arbitrary penalizing is poor design. And, not incidentally, if you look through the "great' civilizations in history, they almost always have a conquer/imperial phase that leads to what is considered their high point as a civilization.

I'll add this: a game designed around Score Victory should permit a Civ to win a game even after being eliminated through conquest.

No, that's bad game design. If you've been eliminated from game, you lose the game.

- Score in civ 6 needs to fit and work around the main narrative of specialization towards specific victory paths. Is meeting all Civs a diplomatic, cultural or a scientific milestone? Having your religion nominated as World Religion in the world congress is a diplomatic, religious, cultural or scientific milestone? Is circumnavigation a military or scientific achievement? If I convert all people in the world through the use of radio and television, was that a scientific or religious achievement? These things aren't separated and impossible to design in a game that attempts to force a split between them.

I'm not really sure what you are getting at here. Like, you do want to have a checklist you go through have do something "diplomatic" and something "religious" and something "scientific?" Because that seems kind of boring and tedious. Its also kind of limiting because you have to specific things. A good score victory should just reward the player for playing good instead of having to chase after specific objectives.

 

[Tekamthi]

Is it really ad nauseum if ~4000 BC to 2023 AD is literally the entire history of urban civilization that we have? (with several Neolithic Middle Eastern small proto - cities which push the first date backwards, but on the other hand most of the world got its first cities millenias later, so even 4000BC is very generous - Poland had no civilization in 500 AD)

Its hard to say 4000 bc was a true starting point of history, though its as good an approximation as any I suppose for these purposes. I wouldn't suggest the series should explore eras prior to that time -- as you note it would be rather dull, not to mention the historical record from that long ago is essentially non-existant, civ would become a game of guesswork and fiction.

But consider that there are 6 "civilization" games that cover 4000-2050 (or 9 if you count civrev and civnet). There is also one "civilization" game that exclusively covers 1500-1800, and one that covers 2200+. If some snapshot of history, or even speculative sci fi world were delivered next under the "civilization" label, it would not necessarily be off-brand.

 

[Hakan-i Cihan]

Isn't the start with ~4000 BC, the biblical start of humanity?
I thought that it more or less coincides with Adam's presence on earth...

 

[Tekamthi]

Isn't the start with ~4000 BC, the biblical start of humanity?
I thought that it more or less coincides with Adam's presence on earth...

It may or may not coincide, I'm not sure, though this is not the inspiration: the game tells you why it starts when it does -- 4000 bc is the generally accepted approximation for the rise of agriculture and sedentary society in the archaeological record. Read between the lines here and its a very euro-centric, particularly UK-centric, interpretation, though we have to start somewhere in the 4x formula.

 

[Mogloth]

I've played a little bit of Humankind and I think there is pretty good potential with a system they have where you can "Attach" cities to other cities. They become a kind of suburb for the larger city.

 

[Krajzen]

I've played a little bit of Humankind and I think there is pretty good potential with a system they have where you can "Attach" cities to other cities. They become a kind of suburb for the larger city.

What are the upsides of this idea? Because I have played Humankind as well and it has brought terrible consequences:
1) It promotes Tall gameplay to the extreme, with one gigantic mega city always being better than many small cities (thanks to exponential bonuses accumulating in it).
2) Said exponential bonuses make such mega cities incredibly unbalanced, you can stack and multiply multipliers ad infinitum, making crazy snowballing.
3) It makes the map feel very small, since you have one city where Civ would have like a dozen of them - despite being very powerful it still feels just like one city, not an empire.

 

[Zaarin]

Its hard to say 4000 bc was a true starting point of history, though its as good an approximation as any I suppose for these purposes.

History, by definition, cannot predate writing so if one doesn't count proto-writing then 4000 BCE predates the start of history by about 500 years. It does roughly coincide with both the beginning of Sumerian civilization and proto-writing in Mesopotamia and Egypt, however.

Isn't the start with ~4000 BC, the biblical start of humanity?
I thought that it more or less coincides with Adam's presence on earth...

Not far off: Anno Mundi is 3783 BCE according to rabbinic tradition.

 

[Sherlock]

Meanwhile I'm STILL waiting for 'Ancient Civilizations' the game that goes from 4000 B.C. to 4000 A.D.

 

[aieeegrunt]

It was a pretty nice looking game...by the standards of twenty years ago. Though I have to say its gameplay has aged worse than its graphics. I took it for a spin a few years ago while I was bored of Civ6, and...it was not fun anymore.

I had a similar experience, too much micro and fhe game visually was so ugly

Also, if we get another version of World Congress with question marks for Civs, I'm gonna start a riot...

Moddability is a make it or break it point for me, just so you can delete stuff like this

 

[PiR]

The score victory in Civ6 is basically what you want. You literally get points for doing everything that helps you win in all of the victory types except getting diplomatic points, tourism, and killing units. Covert cities to your religion? Points. Founding cities? Points. Building things? Points. Anything that gets you era score? Points. Playing the game well gets you points, which is basically what you want. The only thing that I think could be added is winning things like aid requests but otherwise? Everything you do to win in other victory types helps you will in a Score Victory.

There is a big difference with "cumulative" score and "status at the end of the game" score.
The first would consider all you've done during hundreds of turns, the second only where you are at turn X, no matter what you've done to get there.