[poll] How excited are you currently about Civ7? [vol 1 - September/October 24]

[Teproc]

I guess if you're a TSL player, it's basically 3 different game modes - I appreciate that it may suck to lose the fantasy of leading the Maya into the modern era, but you could still play Antiquity/Exploration/Modern TSL, presumably?

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

Everything.
The atrocious 1upt which basically ruined the game by itself due to all the consequences it had on the game as a whole (including the comical archers able to shoot over mountain range, the carpet of doom, cities being treated like units, the whole production balance and its glacial pace...). The dumb simple additive bonus that made a university in a small village just as good as a university in a sprawling metropolis. The gamey non-sensical "city-state". The idiotic AI. The general boredom. The horrible interface and its "console-like" appearance, plus the loss of all the little QoL that was present in the previous title.
It manages even to annoy me through personal preferences and pet peeves, like graphics (which I found utterly sterile and dead) and hex (I utterly despise hex).

That's the first time I was bored of a civ game barely a few hours in, while usually I spent weeks playing it.

It's funny, Civ5 was my first ever Civ game, and everything you mentioned here is completely normal to me.

Trying to play Civ4 and my reaction is this:

Moderator Action: Removed attachment due to language. leif

 

[trev1972]

I guess if you're a TSL player, it's basically 3 different game modes - I appreciate that it may suck to lose the fantasy of leading the Maya into the modern era, but you could still play Antiquity/Exploration/Modern TSL, presumably?

Yeh i guess you stick to a single age. I need to rewatch the latest video, i skim watched it but the distant lands concept seemed a nail in the coffin for aspects of gameplay too.

Dont get me wrong i may still get the game - i just wont rush to buy.

I think i am out of touch with younger gamers to be honest, i grew up with roleplaying games, MUDS etc but companies wanting to make money need to focus on the mainstream not oldies like myself.

 

[Vitruvian Guar]

I guess if you're a TSL player, it's basically 3 different game modes - I appreciate that it may suck to lose the fantasy of leading the Maya into the modern era, but you could still play Antiquity/Exploration/Modern TSL, presumably?

We need a ruleset on a political Earth map, where civ switching works if and only if you control TSL of this civ on a map. So for Rome to evolve to Spain you actually need to colonise Iberia and the same principle for Spain to Mexico and everything else.

 

[Infiltrator]

Mechanically I am very interested in how they аre approaching the game. It was starting to get stale, I guess they were moitoring humankind and let them take the first step before making a risk themselves. What I am not excited about is that I am not a fan of some civilization choices. Perhaps my criteria are different than Firaxis, but Buganda being a modern civilization doesn't make sense to me. I get they need an african civ to geographically inherit the previous ones but I think there were better candidates.

 

[Civinator]

For me the only thing saving it from being the weakest is the existence of Civ3, and it's a pretty close call even then.

It seems you have really no clue about the possibilities Civ 3 has nowadays.

 

[ColtSeavers]

For me the only thing saving it from being the weakest is the existence of Civ3, and it's a pretty close call even then.

Civ 6 is easily the weakest one for me for sure! Policy Cards, Agendas, unbalanced Tech and Civ research costs, a silly world congress and comic style leaders make it by far the most unappealing part of the series, so far!
Initially I was hoping Civ 7 would go into another direction, but the more I learn about this game, the more I get the impression Ed Beach is doubling down on Civ 6. Plus some not really thought through Humankind ideas like Civ Switching. Excitement Level is down to 2 for me, the only reason I'm still following this game, is because it is still a Civ game after all. Certainly not pre-ordering, have to wait how the game finally looks once it is released.

 

[trev1972]

Civ 6 is easily the weakest one for me for sure! Policy Cards, Agendas, unbalanced Tech and Civ research costs, a silly world congress and comic style leaders make it by far the most unappealing part of the series, so far!
Initially I was hoping Civ 7 would go into another direction, but the more I learn about this game, the more I get the impression Ed Beach is doubling down on Civ 6. Plus some not really thought through Humankind ideas like Civ Switching. Excitement Level is down to 2 for me, the only reason I'm still following this game, is because it is still a Civ game after all. Certainly not pre-ordering, have to wait how the game finally looks once it is released.

I can honestly say i have got a lot of fun out of every civ version from 1 onwards, for me Civ IV was the pinnacle despite the issues with stacks of doom.
I agree that the congress wasnt the best feature in 6 however. I think 6 is the one i have played the least so far but that is partially due to having less time and i still clocked 2k hours.

Personally i am struggling to get my head around the idea that i cannot play my favourite civ from start to finish in Civ VII , but i have no idea how many people will have a problem with it and i may end up loving the game.

 

[vorlon_mi]

I watched other people play Civ1; I started playing with Civ2. I dabbled with CtP and FreeCiv.

I see the progression in the franchise as a series of duos, pairs. Civ1 created the game category; Civ2 improved it.
Civ3 added workers, cultural boundaries, more victory conditions, great people; Civ4 improved it in SO many ways.
Civ5 switched to hexes, 1UPT, made fundamental changes to VCs; Civ6 stretched it to reward wide play again, with several notable backward steps.

Civ7 breaks new ground with towns/cities, map expansion, ages/eras, and civs-as-layers. SOOO many civs to learn about. More than half of the 30 civs they have listed so far, I know very little about. It will literally be a new way to grow my empire through the centuries.

I'm less certain that I will pre-order now (sorry!). Perhaps I can persuade a family member to give it to me as a Christmas gift, which would be a preorder.

 

[dtarchon]

Just to be clear. On my previous DLC post. There is a big difference between real expansions and PIECEMEAL DLCs we see today..
Expansion happen as an overhaul or refresh of game mechanics, and adding tons of game content in one package. Basically u get your money's worth, and support the developers in their bid to make the game better, and not purely for monetary gains. You see the difference ??

Anyway I do support reasonably priced Expansions as in these cases, these content were not ready at launch and probably a work in progress, and bring real value to the game.

Let me put it this way. All these DLC leaders/Civs, why couldn't they release it for free, as goodwill or as a reward for fans supporting the game? This is a rhetorical question. No need to answer it. I want to support game developers that does not nickel-and-dime its fans. That's all. Anyone can have a differing opinion.

In all probability, it will be better to wait and see how the game turns out, and purchase the game with its padded DLCs at a discount, maybe a year from release? Excitement..everything new is exciting until it comes out..and gets panned, or hyped further.

 

[AriochIV]

It looks like they're returning to the piecemeal DLC model with Civ7 after moving away from it in Civ6. Together with embracing the "pass" model where they encourage you to pay for content ahead of time without even knowing what it is. Very wholesome.

 

[TheGhostEnthusiast]

I know I should check my hype, but besides the lack of innovation with Religion, I haven't really been disappointed by any info since the 31 civ launch count. Even then, the programmer in me finds something oddly beautiful about the economic use of slots to provide "historical" paths for the AI to use while still including popular civs. I guess not being able to choose which building you overbuild is unfortunate, and the UI is still a bit clunky, but the former isn't much of an issue at all and the later is something they're certainly aware of.

City building looks right up my alley. Towns to support my cities through indirect control seems fun and I think will make my civ feel more interconnected. Resource management looks like a more in-depth and involved version of optimizing internal trade route placement, which is something I really loved in six. Diplomacy seems like something you can play around with more, rather than the hassle of renewing deals every thirty turns it was in 6. The power to change my civ abilities depending on what direction I want to take appeals to my love of midgame war pushes while offering more flexibility than just knowing it's optimal to do one because my civ has a UU at the time (sorry Khmer, love you, just a tad predictable.) Every change seems specifically curated to offer more of the decisions I like to make and less of the decisions I don't like to make (queuing up all the district buildings, mid to late game builder management, etc.) all topped off with the fact that all the facets of my empire, the town/city ratio, the shape and size of my cities, the architecture, will directly reflect my gameplay choices.

I LOVE looking back on my empire in the end game and imagining little stories about the cultural evolution of my people, how the citizens of my awful Portugal spawn became obsessed with the resources of other lands, leading them to seek land in the stars, how similarities and differences formed between the culture of the land of lush floodplains where the capital of Khmer led military efforts against the Zulu and the other side of the mountains in the land of harsh desert hills where the second largest city made peace with nearby clans and city states to form a powerful diplomatic coalition that lasted for centuries, how the Polish harbored ill will towards their neighbors for millennia for settling all ocean access except for a stupid frozen port next to a volcano until tensions boiled over into the thousand year Oceanic Crusades. Now, my gameplay choices and the shape of my civ are going to be connected in-game more than they have ever have been before. I'll look at the endgame board and see the unique Quarters and Tile Improvements I built during times when I had completely different goals. I'll end the game using traditions in my government that were started in a completely different world. I'll look at cities that used to be food suppliers, towns that used to be major production hubs or an ancient capital, their names reflecting the steps I took along the way. I'll look at the board on those last few turns and see a history built in layers.

I've seen doubts about the cohesion of the game's direction, but while I can see why, I don't personally feel that way. It might not be a Civ for everyone, but it's looking like a Civ for me. And since they've made it for me, it would be rude not to buy it, wouldn't it?

In all seriousness, I don't know. Might wait for reviews. The Modern Age preview could be kinda disappointing too, which discourages me from preordering now. I'm also just generally busy, ESPECIALLY early next year, so such a big time commitment might not be reasonable. Looks conceptually and mechanically great from what we have now, though, so I'll eagerly follow development as things pan out.

 

[Gedemon]

We need a ruleset on a political Earth map, where civ switching works if and only if you control TSL of this civ on a map. So for Rome to evolve to Spain you actually need to colonise Iberia and the same principle for Spain to Mexico and everything else.

my plan, and if the game is not moddable enough to allow that, I won't play it for long.

(for reference, if it's as moddable as civ6, I expect this to be possible)

 

[Slayan]

I was super excited when it was first announced but the more I see on Discord and YouTube the les excited I am, I already own a copy of Humankind I dont need another one

 

[Siptah]

I was super excited when it was first announced but the more I see on Discord and YouTube the les excited I am, I already own a copy of Humankind I dont need another one

Presumably, you are also owning at least one copy of a previous civ game (otherwise you wouldn‘t be here, right?). In consequence, you don‘t need civ 7 anyway (or needed 6 if you owned one of 1-5, etc.). Basically, you were satisfied in the 90s with turn based history-inspired strategy games and devs should rather invent new genres than repeat making the same game again and again.

 

[Verified_Confection_Being]

Presumably, you are also owning at least one copy of a previous civ game (otherwise you wouldn‘t be here, right?). In consequence, you don‘t need civ 7 anyway (or needed 6 if you owned one of 1-5, etc.). Basically, you were satisfied in the 90s with turn based history-inspired strategy games and devs should rather invent new genres than repeat making the same game again and again.

To paraphrase Sherlock Holmes "I know what is civ when I see it".

There are 4x games, and some of them are civ games. There are different civ games too but they are all civ games. These are hierarchies of classification.

I think what this chap is suggesting is this has passed the threshold of being recognisable as a civ game to become more recognisable as a humankind game, not that he wants to be resold the same game over and over.

I'm sure you know that already given the sarcasm emoji, but I don't think it's helpful to be sarcastic to people who are disappointed and expressing it nicely.

 

[Siptah]

To paraphrase Sherlock Holmes "I know what is civ when I see it".

There are 4x games, and some of them are civ games. There are different civ games too but they are all civ games. These are hierarchies of classification.

I think what this chap is suggesting is this has passed the threshold of being recognisable as a civ game to become more recognisable as a humankind game, not that he wants to be resold the same game over and over.

I'm sure you know that already given the sarcasm emoji, but I don't think it's helpful to be sarcastic to people who are disappointed and expressing it nicely.

Well, in that case I just have to disagree with him. Civ 7 is clearly a civ game. Humankind is so different in so many aspects from what‘ve seen with civ 7. They share one superficial and prominently mentioned mechanic, mostly, that lead to overreactions as the one post above. And as you might know many people claimed that civ 7 would be HK2 when it was announced, without knowing much about civ 7 (or HK for that matter). With all the info we‘ve received since then, the fear that civ 7 would lean into being HK isn‘t very rationale. I personally would even say that if there is a game that‘s closer to civ 7 than civ 6, it would be Millennia by a long shot over HK.

 

[Leucarum]

The headline feature of both games is the same though, I think that's a fair statement. That said, if someone really wanted to cast Civ7 as Humankind 2, I think they'd have to acknowledge that the other changes - less switching, distinctive ages, highly recognizable leaders - do address a lot of humankind's flaws.

Civ switching definitely made me less excited about Civ7 - but having given it time to sink in it feels like the element I'll tolerate because the other innovations seem really well thought out. I.e. I've reached acceptance after going through the other stages.

 

[Voidwalkin]

I came across this post about Dungeons & Dragons but it neatly encapsulates what I dislike about the current trend in abilities and mechanics in Civ:-

I get a DD or WOTC vibe but for different reasons.

I don't play either DD or Magic but guys at work did and I'd watch them on break(table nearby). Seemed there was absolutely no symmetry, no balance, of any note whatsoever. It was about compiling bonuses and figuring out who could figure out the most busted combination.

Starting to feel a bit like that in 7 with all the uniques and bonuses. It's a different kind of skill than reading the terrain and maximizing yields or moving units skillfully with effect. It's about compling bonuses that multiply those yields rather than the terrain itself.

That can work. It can be fun. But it is different. And there have to be so many busted paths that it isn't immediately clear which one is the best, or that path becomes the equivalent of the unbeatable game of checkers.

They may HAVE to go all out with power creep and busted combos because they've already passed the line that simple skillful geography reads and unit maneuver are not competitive with a good compilation of stat boosts. They can't have one simple strategy or the game is effectively solved within a week of release.

 

[Zaarin]

Let me put it this way. All these DLC leaders/Civs, why couldn't they release it for free, as goodwill or as a reward for fans supporting the game?

Good question. Why don't you do your job for free as a show of goodwill to your boss or as a reward to your company for hiring you?