[POLL updated on request] About Civ6 finishing and Civ7 initiation

[FinalDoomsday]

I'm bemused to realise Civ 6 is the premier grand strategy game on the market. Its a fine game but up against games like Total War and Paradox's offerings it feels stale. Theres no dynamism after the start of the game, the computers cant destroy each other let alone the player. Theres no drama, a 'Constaninople has Fallen' type moments that make you take notice just the inconsequential trading of satellite cities that will probably be retaken thanks to loyalty anyway.

The 'thirds' design philosophy isnt working for me personally its much too conservative I'd be happier if for now they made a Civ 6 spinoff like colonisation/beyond earth and use it as a testbed for new ideas that could be used for the next big title. Make it fantasy/sci-fi whatever they want (Smokey skies anyone?) just go for it and really experiment with the formula.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Civilization IV, as it represented the pinnacle and end point of the 4X Civilization strategy game. Since then it's moved steadily into boardgame territory.

Is there a difference between board games and strategy games considering there are strategy board game? That being most 4X games, including all the Civilization games, in my opinion, do inherently feel like strategy board games anyway.
This is coming from someone who does play more of these types of games than the ones on the PC.

 

[comatosedragon]

I answered differently in the original poll, but now I say stop beating a dead horse. Finish up the NFP, and move on to Civ 7. Even if it is 2022 or 2023 until it is ready, I will wait patiently.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Is there a difference between board games and strategy games considering there are strategy board game? That being most 4X games, including all the Civilization games, in my opinion, do inherently feel like strategy board games anyway.
This is coming from someone who does play more of these types of games than the ones on the PC.

IMHO, There is no real difference. The medium is obviously different, but it's like the difference between pen and paper and a word processing program: what matters is the way the words come out, not how they got there.

Having played Strategy board games since the Avalon-Hill offerings of the early 1960s (anybody else remember Tactics II, Gettysburg, Waterloo or Afrika Korps?) I can speak with authority that many of the 'conventions' of computer games were lifted entirely from the board games: hexagonal 'tiles' (originally developed at the RAND Corporation), Zones of Control, Combat and Movement Factors, Terrain advantages/modifiers, - all present in board games since the early 1960s. Even 'hidden movement' (Fog of War) was available in the Guadalcanal boardgame in 1966.

So, having 'board game mechanics' is not a negative in computer games, it's merely descriptive. What IS a negative is to fall back on board game mechanics when the computer would allow you to do something much differently and potentially much better and more efficiently than any 'paper' game could. We have some of that now: Loyalty and Amenities/Happiness and Religious 'pressure' that are continuously calculated by the Machine (try keeping track of all that with cardboard markers on a paper map with 10 cities!) but there is potentially much more that could be done.

 

[Gedemon]

Is there a difference between board games and strategy games considering there are strategy board game? That being most 4X games, including all the Civilization games, in my opinion, do inherently feel like strategy board games anyway.
This is coming from someone who does play more of these types of games than the ones on the PC.

I fully agree with Boris, a computer can give you more than a strategy board game feeling, I had that "lead a civilization to stand the test of time" feeling when playing civ4, while civ6 feels, by design, like a naked board game. Maybe a good one, but not something I want to play on my computer.

About the pool, I suppose I don't need to tell you my choice, but honestly it wasn't as obvious for myself as my vocal demand for the DLL may lead to think.

At this point in development, I may prefer to have them mostly working on civ7 than civ6, and from what I see from the NFP releases, it may be the case.

Now, why ?

I think they were not lying when they said that they started from scratch for civ6, and I also believe that it's the version of the game for which they've put the more work into the modding tools.

But maybe they were lacking time, and as a result civ6 feels like a draft on that side, promising, functional for most part but unfinished. I also know that they've put some work in the WB since release, but not enough, and same for the other tools, there was some additions, but more like maintenance than new features. Same feeling for the art-related tools, promising, functional, but lacking streamlined features that I think the framework could provide, at this point it's still a very big step to learn how to use it and make simple mods.

Taking a concrete example is the modifier system, fantastic to apply an existing effect on any object with predefined conditions, all without scripting for the modder, just requiring logic. But yet there are still effects that are applied to specific object only because they are defined not as modifiers but hard-coded property in an object-specific table in the DB.

Makes me think that the modifier system was added after the development has started, makes me wonder how much more interesting for modders would be a civ7 always using the modifiers system for all effects.

That would not prevent me to ask for good scripting capabilities too, but if I had the choice, I'd prefer to have finished civ7 modding tools based on civ6 draft with a (promised) later DLL release in its development cycle than a DLL release now on a development-(un)finished civ6. (BTW now that I've seen modding framework allowing multiple DLL mods working together, I would hope to see that adapted for civ too)

And of course if DLL is something we'll never see again in civ, I'm not concerned, after being a game not made for me anymore, civ will be a modding framework not made for me either, but I'm sure other modders will love it.

I've stopped modding, but I'm still following the scene (here, reddit, steam, hey even on discord now, and on a totally different subject, as a personal bonus, using that tools allowed me to get my new hardware at a decent price even with low stocks and scalper bots, so thanks to the community that had moved there )

And I've the impression that the civ6 modding scene is either dying or gone in hibernation (could be wrong, but then I don't know where they've gone), waiting for something. And without any mention of modding additions since the NFP was announced, I don't know if it will wake up (edit: for civ6).

 

[Karmah]

What I truly want is 'consolidation' something to make the game more robust. Civ6 worked out so that all of those potentially-good-design-ideas get finally the implementation they deserve. From what I gather , it's also what transpire (my interpretation) from people who wishes for civ7 *soon*, but I don't think the devs can restart from scratch and get it done if they did not manage to fix it in civ6 in the first place.

 

[maconnolly]

It's interesting to me that the popular view is that the modding capabilities are limited. Perhaps that isn't the popular view - but, rather, that the relatively small pool of extremely skilled people that produce the 'most popular' mods have pushed things to the limits already and are, essentially, not able to go further. In my opinion, what has happened in terms of the Civilization VI cycle is that both the official gameplay content (mechanics, civilization variations) have been exhausted/saturated. I see the latest content - new game-modes, specifically - as attempts to lengthen the stay of execution for the game's lifespan. These are novelties, in my opinion, bolted on because the fundamental game has been 'finished' from the developers' standpoint.

I'm a new modder - perhaps one of the limited 'new wave' - and I'm, thus far, enjoying the depth to which Civilization VI's modding tools allow me to get stuck in. This enjoyment is a product of where I'm at in my own modding lifecycle - but I would say that, despite having a steep learning curve, the amount of modding possible is significant. I am quite comfortable with the position that the fundamental mechanics of the game cannot be re-written - the playbook for my mods is therefore to work within those limitations, use what is exposed and see how I can innovate to my heart's content. It may be that I quickly reach the end of that process and then my opinion will change.

Don't get me wrong - I understand that exposing more of the code allows greater levels of change. But, in my opinion, that is not a 'content mod', but rather a rules/function re-write. Take that far enough and the line suddenly becomes blurred between whether you're actually modding Civiliation VI, or using the Civilization VI engine as a base to design a new (albeit similar-mechanically) game. To use an extreme example proposition, imagine you ripped out the idea of having units altogether. You then went into the source-code and took the mechanic of culture, but re-wrote it and used it as the only mechanism for exploring a tile-based map. Culture, suddenly, becomes Visibility. For argument's sake, let's say we re-designed the art assets so the whole thing looked like space, instead of planet earth. While we're at it, we can remove all conflict-type Diplomacy - we're happy for other 'players' to exist, but we can't have wars with them. There's no mechanism for it, nor a need to. We'll come up with some other logic that allows us to place 'Space Stations' instead of Cities, perhaps we can use some kind of Unit that has the equivalent of a 'Build' action. We'll replace Gold with Prestige - as we don't care about wealth, only about showing off our space observations/discoveries. Suddenly, we've created a game that is simply about exploring some scenery and perhaps gloating about it, in a very passive way. Granted, it might be a rubbish game; but it would technically be a Civilization VI 'mod' in the context that it was based off the game's engine. My point is that this would be unrecognisable from the Civilization VI methodology - in theme, fan-base, interactions that players are looking for, history, core mechanics.

If the developers wanted to release some information to explain how some of the core concepts that are implemented in the game are defined - those that we, as modders, cannot see because they are 'one step up' from the base-game XML/SQL, I think that would be the most I would expect them to do. This would mean that there's no guesswork involved in how anything that is readily viewable via base-game SQL/XML works. To be clear - I would not see it as a slight to the modding community to not release the core files to allow complete overhauls that deviate in the really extreme way I described. Firaxis want people to mod the game to allow re-playability and variation for those seeking it - but in order to complement their offering, they want it to be the recognisable game of Civilization VI that someone purchased from Steam. Right or wrong, I can see why they limited modding access.

Personally, I think that Firaxis should stop further development of Civilization VI. They should focus their efforts on the next instalment (Civilization VII). Someone earlier in this thread made the point that each new instalment brings some kind of 'major' change. I am very interested to see what that major change (or changes) will be, eventually.

To those that think they should use Civilization VI as a test-bed for future instalments - I'm not so sure. Firstly, it will just add to the scattergun mechanics which many people already think is one of the downfalls of the game. Secondly, you can't really cohesively 'test' a new mechanic in an old environment. Dare I say it, that kind of approach leads to a patchwork of independent things that don't meld together - which is what lots of people in this thread have said they think Civilization VI feels like.

The sooner they get a working prototype for their own development team to start developing within, which includes whatever major changes they want to incorporate, the better. Civilization VI has more-than-enough content already (of course, respect the NFP content promise) and there are already a load of mods available that comprehensively extend the game beyond the base that the developers should not put further effort into extending it further.

I voted for the 'release Civilization VII as soon as possible option', but I don't mean with the connotation of rushing it. I simply mean I think they should transfer their efforts to the next game in the series; not continue to release content for the current one.

 

[Gedemon]

That may sound as a total counter-argument to my previous post, but to be fair with civ6 modding capabilities, without looking too deep into it, I do think that your extreme total conversion example could be implemented with the current tools.

And that's why it's so frustrating coming from civ4/5, so much potential to be the best ever, yet failing that because it's closed on some core components that were accessible in the previous versions of the game (sometime even without the source code like the direct control of most of the AI diplomacy and AI units using Lua for civ5).

On a side note I'm very happy to see you and a few other new names active in the C&C section.

 

[maconnolly]

That may sound as a total counter-argument to my previous post, but to be fair with civ6 modding capabilities, without looking too deep into it, I do think that your extreme total conversion example could be implemented with the current tools.

Funnily enough - and I know this is beside the topic of the thread, as such - I started thinking the same as I was writing the post. I then lost energy, to a point, in my reply so didn't give more time to think of an example that definitively couldn't be done (the fact is, I'm not an experienced enough modder to know for sure what can/can't be achieved - I have a general understanding that is being grown all the time). My point was to illustrate that the 'limitation' of the modding tools is, actually, not that limited. There has actually been so much content published by the community, in many cases that fundamentally transforms the experience of playing the game. There's always a desire to do more - but I reckon even if the source-code was released and modding was taken to the next level, there would still be a point where the limit is reached and the enterprising modders amongst us would have the same gripe: 'we want to be able to do more'.

For what it's worth, one of the areas that I think Civilization could do with a complete re-work is diplomacy; or, rather, interaction with other civilizations. It's a system that, let's face it, hasn't really developed from the early days. The mechanism of the interaction is the same - the 'things' you can interact about have changed based on what's in-game. This could be developed a lot.

 

[c4c6]

maybe they were lacking time, and as a result civ6 feels like a draft on that side, promising, functional for most part but unfinished.

This! You can acquire new tight budgets, and hope to mend under the hood some of still missing, unbalanced, bugged content, but finally the budgets won't last. I think, there is only one budget, which could be enough: done by players, who "just" love the game.
But I understand, if some deciders don't like titles like "voice of the people" ... isn't it enough to buy & consume?!

I've the impression that the civ6 modding scene is [...] gone in hibernation [...] waiting for something.

A signal? You are welcome! Personally as modder I feel even 'not ignored', kind of a sexual molester. How can I dare asking for such things - isn't it clear, the game does not want to be deeply modded?!

I do think that your extreme total conversion example could be implemented with the current tools.

I started thinking the same as I was writing the post. I then lost energy, to a point, in my reply so didn't give more time to think of an example that definitively couldn't be done

I'd say, the most important mod of that type would use 100% of the original rules (valid for both, human and AI players) and only improve the behaviour of the AI players. Eg. which tile an AI unit enters, whether it attacks or retreats ...

My point was to illustrate that the 'limitation' of the modding tools is, actually, not that limited. There has actually been so much content published by the community, in many cases that fundamentally transforms the experience of playing the game. There's always a desire to do more - but I reckon even if the source-code was released and modding was taken to the next level, there would still be a point where the limit is reached and the enterprising modders amongst us would have the same gripe: 'we want to be able to do more'.

Maybe ... theoretically ... they never released ALL source code files, but from my point of view only those concerning AI behaviour and realizing the methods available to Lua scripting are interesting anyways. It would provide a good documentation for them and the option to modify those methods if need be.

The modifier system is great, but perhaps we reach all essential permutations with the 256th released Civ. (Andorra)

 

[treadwin]

Civ6 is my least enjoyed Civ ever. They really did builders in with this version and the game at any difficulty over Prince forces you a kind of warfare only track that is really one-dimensional. It is just so easy to end up in a blind alley where everyone hates you and you have to focus all your effort in 300 years of mindless warfare, playing what is essentially a really basic wargame.

Due to this, despite all the efforts to make the Civs different, every game feels the same. I really think they should sack all the developers, get a new team in, and start from scratch.

 

[The Civs 6]

Here's a different spin on this, just to introduce a different angle here. For the price that we pay, we get a great deal. Yeah Civ doesn't quite feel like it has the hundreds of hours of replayability, like it did when I was a child. This Babylon expansion thing is what, 1/10th of 40 dollars - 4 dollars? And I just sat down and got about 2 hours of utility from it. I quit mid-game because it just felt "meh". But my alternative is what, to spend more money to get less fun?

I feel the people who have gripes with 6, but ultimately, I think part of the problem is also that we have been in the genre so long that we have this very min-max way of thinking about the game. Of course a game "only" lets you do military stuff - if you have enough experience with 4x's to know that conquest is simply overpowered. Part of it is that I have been through so many game stories that it just doesn't feel fresh and original anymore. That's nothing wrong with the game, but at some point it's can only be the same story or a few stories over and over again.

I got my fun out of the latest thing. I think I'm going to step away from this genre for a while. It gave me something to look forward to during my day of work, and it kind of delivered.

 

[treadwin]

I would also add that the latest patch here they tuned up the combat for AI CIVs and Barbarians did nothing to improve the game. I had a city 2-shotted by warriors a game or two ago. If the AI can take a city just by getting two warriors in attack range, there really is no point in playing. I had a slinger in the city and 4 or 5 warriors nearby. Of course that wasn't enough for me to be able to retake it, even with both the AI warriors on practically no health.

I really don't know what the developers are thinking. The end game is so deathly dull and mindless, yet they think they will make the game better by cranking up the frustration in the early game? I can't even imagine the development meeting where they come up with this stupidity. My start build queue is now always 4 warriors, then a settler and I get overwhelmed sometimes anyway, if I am next to a civ that just doesn't like me. My warriors are out-damaged by the AI about 2 to 1 even when they are attacking across a river and the AI has twice as many. I generally cant get to city walls and bows quick enough to fight off aggressive civs. You can't win unless you focus all out on military, never build a settler and just attack. Why make a game where only one strategy works?

Playing on a lower level difficulty just makes the AI less aggressive, so it makes the game boring. I get that you can't stop the good players winning with this strategy even with the higher difficulty levels, because the AI is so bad, but why ruin the game for everyone, all the time, because of a handful of deity players who play one strategy?

 

[whyidie]

Civ6 is my least enjoyed Civ ever. They really did builders in with this version and the game at any difficulty over Prince forces you a kind of warfare only track that is really one-dimensional. It is just so easy to end up in a blind alley where everyone hates you and you have to focus all your effort in 300 years of mindless warfare, playing what is essentially a really basic wargame.

Due to this, despite all the efforts to make the Civs different, every game feels the same. I really think they should sack all the developers, get a new team in, and start from scratch.

The thing to keep in mind on Prince is they rarely win. You will have 400+ turns to comeback. So you can wonderbuild, putz around, and eventually win around turn 430. To be sure, space is limited so its hard to sprawl and build without going to war, unless you modify map size/player numbers.

I would also add that the latest patch here they tuned up the combat for AI CIVs and Barbarians did nothing to improve the game. I had a city 2-shotted by warriors a game or two ago. If the AI can take a city just by getting two warriors in attack range, there really is no point in playing. I had a slinger in the city and 4 or 5 warriors nearby. Of course that wasn't enough for me to be able to retake it, even with both the AI warriors on practically no health.

I really don't know what the developers are thinking. The end game is so deathly dull and mindless, yet they think they will make the game better by cranking up the frustration in the early game? I can't even imagine the development meeting where they come up with this stupidity. My start build queue is now always 4 warriors, then a settler and I get overwhelmed sometimes anyway, if I am next to a civ that just doesn't like me. My warriors are out-damaged by the AI about 2 to 1 even when they are attacking across a river and the AI has twice as many. I generally cant get to city walls and bows quick enough to fight off aggressive civs. You can't win unless you focus all out on military, never build a settler and just attack. Why make a game where only one strategy works?

Playing on a lower level difficulty just makes the AI less aggressive, so it makes the game boring. I get that you can't stop the good players winning with this strategy even with the higher difficulty levels, because the AI is so bad, but why ruin the game for everyone, all the time, because of a handful of deity players who play one strategy?

Deity is wack, but yes, I usually turn to it when I need a little excitement. I swear I get the worst starts (always roll random) on diety. Usually some wonder focused Civ smack dab in the middle of three different Civs who like to war with their uniques kicking off at different times. I always felt that if they just gave AI more troop building ability at lower levels I'd enjoy them more. As is I feel that I need to go up to Deity to feel the pressure, and quite often I'll get so entrenched in early warfare that once I've dealt with the immediate threat another AI will show up with tanks when I've got Knights.

 

[thecrazyscot]

Where's the "forget Civ 7, I want Beyond Earth 2" option?

 

[Zaarin]

Where's the "forget Civ 7, I want Beyond Earth 2" option?

Only if they actually hire a decent writer this time.

 

[Hellenism Salesman]

This... this is going to sound totally crazy here, and it's merely a utopian fever dream, but here it is:

Say that, suddenly, Firaxis just fully opens up the game for modding potential. It's entirely open, no restrictions, nothing hidden, an invitation for enthusiastic modders to go wild and create the game of their dreams. Now, since they've done this, they choose to continue on the same path as what they've done recently: a Frontier Pass sandwiched between larger expansions, maybe the tangential standalone DLCs to fill the gaps... but here's the thing.

They don't stop.

Rather than making a Civ 7, having to start from scratch, and abandon the game they've been working to perfect, they just continue to support Civ 6 and try to make it the best game according to their vision. Essentially, they don't stop development until they are in unanimous agreement that the game is perfect, and cannot be improved any further. Now, for those of you anticipating another mainline release, this scenario of another 5 years or so of purely Civ 6 support may sound absurd, but here was my thought:

Since the game has been fully opened up in this hypothetical scenario, essentially, there's nothing stopping talented individuals in the community from creating their dream mainline game but ambition. Effectively, the community has just been handed a fully-functional Civ engine, ripe with features, civilizations, leaders, and mechanics to unpack, change, revise, rework, buff, nerf, and perfect and add on to their heart's content. So, if you want a Civ 7, you can make it. You can now make your dream Civ game, since the tools are their waiting for you. It would be a theoretically perfect scenario: community members dissatisfied with Civ 6 or unhappy with certain elements of it can make the exact changes that they want and create the game they want to play most, while those who enjoy Firaxis' vision of the game can continue playing it and enjoying the content they supply it with.

In this scenario, everyone has the freedom to play or make the Civ game they like best. There is absolute freedom, absolute customization, and theoretically infinite content. It would be the true peak of the franchise, because it could be anything.

Now, that was entirely a pipe dream, and as someone who couldn't be any less educated on the modding side of things (or the game as a whole ), I assume all of what I just said is utter hogwash, an infeasibly impossible Herculean task that could never truly occur. But man would I be happy if it did.

Now, do I have any realistic expectations of that ever happening? No. But hey man, I can dream

 

[Xur]

It is never going to happen in a civ game. Not civ6 or civ7. If it was PC only, then yea, maybe. Firaxis is targeting every platform there is, and we will always end up with a weird Frankenstein game that is limited by consoles. Everything is possible on PC, while consoles are limited by design. We end up with the lowest common denominator. You can dream, but that dream should probably start with “PC exclusive”.

 

[anonxanemone]

It is never going to happen in a civ game. Not civ6 or civ7. If it was PC only, then yea, maybe. Firaxis is targeting every platform there is, and we will always end up with a weird Frankenstein game that is limited by consoles. Everything is possible on PC, while consoles are limited by design. We end up with the lowest common denominator. You can dream, but that dream should probably start with “PC exclusive”.

I don't quite appreciate the PC-master-race-eque implication of this comment. If the game hadn't released on the Switch, I probably would have not have fallen in love with the series having not being exposed to it. I am definitely an example of how making the game approachable in a wide range of platforms reaches markets that themselves are unware they are markets for the franchise.

IMHO, limitations allows more creativity in design and the New Frontier Pass demonstrates the consequence/result of such restrictions. The new civs have a design space limited to the mechanics available in the original Vanilla so those without expansions can play them. Among them I consider Maya to be the most creative while many others consider others to be very fun to play.

I think the saying goes "Rising tide floats all boats." Whatever they do, please do NOT make it "PC exclusive".

 

[Xur]

I don't quite appreciate the PC-master-race-eque implication of this comment. If the game hadn't released on the Switch, I probably would have not have fallen in love with the series having not being exposed to it. I am definitely an example of how making the game approachable in a wide range of platforms reaches markets that themselves are unware they are markets for the franchise.

IMHO, limitations allows more creativity in design and the New Frontier Pass demonstrates the consequence/result of such restrictions. The new civs have a design space limited to the mechanics available in the original Vanilla so those without expansions can play them. Among them I consider Maya to be the most creative while many others consider others to be very fun to play.

I think the saying goes "Rising tide floats all boats." Whatever they do, please do NOT make it "PC exclusive".

I’m not asking for it to be PC exclusive. I’m just pointing out possibilities on PC vs an Ipad etc. It’s kinda like the Soviet Lada car. Everyone gets the same car. The quality of the car we call “civ6” just have to run on an Ipad or switch. Everything runs on a PC - the PC isn’t setting the quality standard. The worst hardware is setting the standards.