My quarrel here was never with board games. "Gamify" could be interpreted to mean more like a board game and more like a computer game. Criticizing a computer game for becoming more computer game-like may seem a little strange, but I don't know if there are any better words for this and you probably understand what I mean with "gamifying".
Simulation could mean different things to people, especially in computer games, hence why I wrote it in brackets. The main aspect of the simulation or "simulation" in the Civ series is as you mention the other civilizations, how they interact with each other, with you and with the world. This interaction is also governed by rules, which change as their technological level increases. This interaction creates situations such as for example civilizations that were isolated on small geographical bodies lagging behind in technology, compared to those that were on larger continents and had a lot of contact. (In Civ 4 and earlier games, because of tech trading.)
This difference in technology based on geography isn't something that was hardcoded as a mechanic in the game, but instead something which developed naturally, and also mirrored developments in the real world. (Jared Diamond's "Guns Germs and Steel" is a strong argument in favor of how important the size and shape of continents have been to shape the destinies of the people living on them.) I would definitely call this a simulation aspect of the game series. And there are many of those, both intended and unintended.
Sorry, didn't mean to suggest you had a problem with one or the other, I was just trying to nail down definitions. My problem is I can talk about design for hours, and this time - when a new game has just been announced - is just a bit addictive, hah. The possibility space is far greater now than it will be as soon as info actually starts dropping about what the game will eventually look like. Eventually, we constrain it to "what we want for the current title", and then the speculation ramps up again.
Having experienced tech trading in SMAC, I can't say I was a huge fan of that as a mechanic. It overwhelmingly favoured the AI as a catch-up mechanism, as in general you are both better than the AI, and the AI was rarely going to give you something you needed (though, admittedly, I favoured Planet, so a tech lead was the general state for my style of gameplay). I dunno. Diplomacy systems in general are tricky, and I avoid using them precisely because they're very hard to get right. I'll participate when there's an obvious benefit to me, and the AI kinda do the same thing, but at higher and lower margins. It doesn't create an organic relationship - it's inherently transactional, and that becomes very "game-y" to me, rather than emergent (the latter is what I'd assign to a more simulation-style game).
I liked the Agendas and how they introduced a need to actually buy into talking with other leaders, building up trust, and so on. It made inevitable betrayals more meaningful (even if they were still obvious). It wasn't just a downward spiral of denounce > war (looking at you, CiV) - you could tailor your gameplay to sooth potential allies in VI, even if the AI still wasn't great at making clever decisions, it felt more organic. It also allows the AIs to interact with each other in more nuanced ways (at times). But I'm harping on about AI personalities a bit and they've often not been a strong point for the series (AI in general is a tricky thing, in my opinion).
I can definitely see it the other way around, mind you. Religion is something that was very "gamified", with entire armies of religious units (by the time we get to VI) massing to maximise the spread of religion. There's a pressure system that enjoy, because that's a consequence of empire-building in a specific way, but the active component was very much not emergent.
(I'm trying not to talk about SMAC too much because it's not a core series entry, but Probe Teams are another great example of gamify-ing a system in a very active way)
The problem with things developing naturally, or any kind of emergent property, is it's linked to how well the game is paced. If the game pacing is off then you could end up missing potential behaviour like this - nomatter how the game progression incentivises it (like tech trading does in IV as you mentioned). It's what I'd call a "quiet" mechanic, vs. the more game-y mechanics that I'd consider louder and more prominent in the core turn-based gameplay loop. Border expansion with culture is pretty
prominent in CiV and VI, but it's also a quieter mechanic in that it progresses somewhat organically (unless you nudge it along). You don't have to re-assign tile focus even
n turns, or something like that.
It does make me wonder what VII is going to change. The rule of thirds suggests we're overdue for more of a shake-up than we got between V and VI, because VI went into big flashy changes unpacking cities and overhauling the visual identity of the game (both of which I really enjoyed personally), but carried over a lot of the actual mechanical decisions and polished or iterated on them in some fashion.
