Shacknews: Best Strategy Game of 2025 - Sid Meier's Civilization 7

[enKage]

A game, which has many great concepts and huge potential, but was released in pre-Alpha stage and is currently at Beta, with User Interface not existing yet (maybe in concepts only, to be released within a year), should not be even nominated.
The award simply proves, how spoiled game industry is nowadays, without any basic respect to a customer, unfortunately all that being driven by customers, requesting QUANTITY over QUALITY (refers also to Civ6 with more and more and more civs, leaders, districts added without even fixing trade).
Game industry is still not responsible enough to say "sorry, we are not ready yet with a game, you may be given your pre-order cash back or wait 2 more months", instead pretends "the game is great, steam community simply is stupid".

 

[Vandlys]

A game, which has many great concepts and huge potential, but was released in pre-Alpha stage and is currently at Beta, with User Interface not existing yet (maybe in concepts only, to be released within a year), should not be even nominated.
The award simply proves, how spoiled game industry is nowadays, without any basic respect to a customer, unfortunately all that being driven by customers, requesting QUANTITY over QUALITY (refers also to Civ6 with more and more and more civs, leaders, districts added without even fixing trade).
Game industry is still not responsible enough to say "sorry, we are not ready yet with a game, you may be given your pre-order cash back or wait 2 more months", instead pretends "the game is great, steam community simply is stupid".

Are you talking about Civ VII here? If you are, I'm sorry but I don't get how people can use terms like pre-alpha, alpha, and beta, so willy-nilly. You might not like aspects of the game, but in no way was it released in a pre-alpha stage, and in no way is it now a beta stage "with user interface not existing yet". To say there is NO UI is just a plain lie. You might not like it, you might not like the way it works, but the game has a UI.

You also claim the game industry is spoiled nowadays, and not responsible enough. I've been able to buy demos in store claiming they were full games, back in the 90s. I've been able to buy games that were in no way shape or form ready to be shipped. I've been able to buy games that were riddled with bugs and no way of patching them. But you claim that -nowadays- the game industry is spoiled? It's changed, surely, but it's never really been all that different. Great games are released nowadays, bad games are released nowadays. Bug free, full of bugs, it happened before, it happens now, and it will happen again.

You also claim they (the entire game industry, Firaxis?) pretend that the game is great, and that the steam community is stupid. This, again, is your interpretation. There is no mention of Firaxis pretending this. Not even an allusion. They've mentioned multiple times that they hear people's grievances and want to work on making the game better. This is not even close to "pretending the game is great" and "pretending the steam community is stupid".

On the original topic, I would like to say it's crazy to me how again and again topics derail into an "Civ VII is not good enough because of X". Every. Single. Time. There are plenty of topics in which the game can, rightfully, be criticised. If these guys like the game, and they like it better than any other strategy game in 2025, it's their strategy game of the year. Great. Kudos for having that opinion, and I hope you enjoy Civ VII. You know what? For me it was also strategy game of the year. Have I played them all? No. Have I played any other strategy games? Not really. Does that invalidate my opinion? Nope.

Looking at things in an objective and nuanced manner where needed really helps this discussion. Making wild assertions is just venting anger online, and other than venting emotions does nothing but create static in discourse.

 

[UWHabs]

Are you talking about Civ VII here? If you are, I'm sorry but I don't get how people can use terms like pre-alpha, alpha, and beta, so willy-nilly. You might not like aspects of the game, but in no way was it released in a pre-alpha stage, and in no way is it now a beta stage "with user interface not existing yet". To say there is NO UI is just a plain lie. You might not like it, you might not like the way it works, but the game has a UI.

You also claim the game industry is spoiled nowadays, and not responsible enough. I've been able to buy demos in store claiming they were full games, back in the 90s. I've been able to buy games that were in no way shape or form ready to be shipped. I've been able to buy games that were riddled with bugs and no way of patching them. But you claim that -nowadays- the game industry is spoiled? It's changed, surely, but it's never really been all that different. Great games are released nowadays, bad games are released nowadays. Bug free, full of bugs, it happened before, it happens now, and it will happen again.

You also claim they (the entire game industry, Firaxis?) pretend that the game is great, and that the steam community is stupid. This, again, is your interpretation. There is no mention of Firaxis pretending this. Not even an allusion. They've mentioned multiple times that they hear people's grievances and want to work on making the game better. This is not even close to "pretending the game is great" and "pretending the steam community is stupid".

On the original topic, I would like to say it's crazy to me how again and again topics derail into an "Civ VII is not good enough because of X". Every. Single. Time. There are plenty of topics in which the game can, rightfully, be criticised. If these guys like the game, and they like it better than any other strategy game in 2025, it's their strategy game of the year. Great. Kudos for having that opinion, and I hope you enjoy Civ VII. You know what? For me it was also strategy game of the year. Have I played them all? No. Have I played any other strategy games? Not really. Does that invalidate my opinion? Nope.

Looking at things in an objective and nuanced manner where needed really helps this discussion. Making wild assertions is just venting anger online, and other than venting emotions does nothing but create static in discourse.

Well, you "not really having played any other strategy games" I would argue slightly invalidates your opinion, if you are trying to claim that your favorite strategy game "deserves" to be THE strategy game of the year. Like I haven't played any of the other games that were seemingly up for this award, so I'm really in no place to judge whether civ was better or worse than them.

But yeah, anytime someone says that a game like civ released "pre-alpha" is being intentionally disingenuous. Pre-alpha would have placeholder graphics for leaders, the modern age would be "TODO: Placeholder for modern age", etc... You could probably make an argument that it was a late beta, since it was complete at a core but did need a good amount of touch-ups to really get going. And yeah, it's unfortunate that that's the reality these days of the industry. The pressure to get things out there is too much that it's hard to hold back.

 

[Vandlys]

Well, you "not really having played any other strategy games" I would argue slightly invalidates your opinion, if you are trying to claim that your favorite strategy game "deserves" to be THE strategy game of the year. Like I haven't played any of the other games that were seemingly up for this award, so I'm really in no place to judge whether civ was better or worse than them.

This is a strawman argument, since I didn't mention this anywhere. But, I agree with your general statement. I would personally never say "this is the game of the year" if I haven't played anything else (aside from mentioning it in the above argument that, for me, it was). It's a meaningless statement altogether. In fact, I think grading games in such a way is not for me at all. I can say this is the game I enjoyed most, but even that is highly changeable from moment to moment.

But yeah, anytime someone says that a game like civ released "pre-alpha" is being intentionally disingenuous. Pre-alpha would have placeholder graphics for leaders, the modern age would be "TODO: Placeholder for modern age", etc... You could probably make an argument that it was a late beta, since it was complete at a core but did need a good amount of touch-ups to really get going. And yeah, it's unfortunate that that's the reality these days of the industry. The pressure to get things out there is too much that it's hard to hold back.

Exactly. And this, along with the first part of your post, is exactly the nuance people should talk with in my opinion.

 

[pjotroos]

But yeah, anytime someone says that a game like civ released "pre-alpha" is being intentionally disingenuous. Pre-alpha would have placeholder graphics for leaders, the modern age would be "TODO: Placeholder for modern age", etc... You could probably make an argument that it was a late beta, since it was complete at a core but did need a good amount of touch-ups to really get going.

Yeah, even that is generous. I had beta access to World of Warcraft expansions a couple of times, and they were fully playable, but still missing critical assets all the way through the beta - no music, no map, placeholder text, cutscenes replaced with a single slide description of the events. The most accurate label for the state of the game in February is "early access", mainly due to the seriously lacking UI and significant gaps in game balance, as all the art assets were there. That it wasn't marked as early access was egregious; I didn't pre-order so I knew what I was buying, but people that had preordered trusting that they'll get polished experience had every right to be annoyed. However, I also get the sense that for some posters the original sin is the ages & civ swapping, and they treat those mechanics as "objectively wrong and bad", rather than "not for me". And once you've settled on the fact that the game is objectively wrong & bad, you'll take any chance to voice your righteous indignation, take the potshots at it, dismiss the opinions of the people that find it good, and add any other complaint as an extra ammunition to prove your objective correctness.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

The title is giving it fully away: Shacknews has crowned Civ7 to be their best strategy title of 2025.
It managed to beat the latest Commandos title and Final Fantasy Tactics among others.
The Shacknews team appreciated the changing civs (yes, they did) and the new strategies it allows, the navigable rivers and the removal of workers.
At the end, Civ7 won narrowly with 4 vs 3 votes against Jurassic World Evolution 3, and is now Shacknews strategy game of 2026.

Most of the discussion is in the video, the link to the article is here.

Basically 'The Most enjyable Strategy Game' of the year doesn't always means 'the best ever'. Basically FXis 'can do better'.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Yeah, even that is generous. I had beta access to World of Warcraft expansions a couple of times, and they were fully playable, but still missing critical assets all the way through the beta - no music, no map, placeholder text, cutscenes replaced with a single slide description of the events. The most accurate label for the state of the game in February is "early access", mainly due to the seriously lacking UI and significant gaps in game balance, as all the art assets were there. That it wasn't marked as early access was egregious; I didn't pre-order so I knew what I was buying, but people that had preordered trusting that they'll get polished experience had every right to be annoyed. However, I also get the sense that for some posters the original sin is the ages & civ swapping, and they treat those mechanics as "objectively wrong and bad", rather than "not for me". And once you've settled on the fact that the game is objectively wrong & bad, you'll take any chance to voice your righteous indignation, take the potshots at it, dismiss the opinions of the people that find it good, and add any other complaint as an extra ammunition to prove your objective correctness.

I wouldn't name it "Early access" too. Among recent big games - BG3 was released with a single act and barebone player options, inZoi had very minimal playable content.

So yep, I'd say Civ7 release was just that - very unpolished, but release version.

 

[Leucarum]

I don't think it was fair to call it "early access", but I do think early access is a good idea for future civ games given how important large-scale player feedback is to making the game good.

 

[pjotroos]

I wouldn't name it "Early access" too. Among recent big games - BG3 was released with a single act and barebone player options, inZoi had very minimal playable content.

So yep, I'd say Civ7 release was just that - very unpolished, but release version.

I don't think it was fair to call it "early access", but I do think early access is a good idea for future civ games given how important large-scale player feedback is to making the game good.

Yeah, there's no clear boundary, so my opinion is all vibes, too. Both BG3 and Hades 2 had released into early access, and they were at very different stages of development when they started and when they left it, and I'm definitely comparing to the latter.

But the one thing I go back to is that the UI on release was flat out deficient - among the things that were missing was information about city connections, or tile tooltips. Within days from the release, a number of amazingly essential mods was released, and that's probably the experience we all think back to; but without them, the game was largely guesswork. For me, it went beyond unpolished; it was incomplete, and the missing stuff is being slowly added over time. Even now, after the base version has been massively improved, it's still nowhere near as good as Civ VI on release - no unit list, no proper yield breakdown ("other sources" covers A LOT).

 

[stealth_nsk]

Yeah, there's no clear boundary, so my opinion is all vibes, too. Both BG3 and Hades 2 had released into early access, and they were at very different stages of development when they started and when they left it, and I'm definitely comparing to the latter.

But the one thing I go back to is that the UI on release was flat out deficient - among the things that were missing was information about city connections, or tile tooltips. Within days from the release, a number of amazingly essential mods was released, and that's probably the experience we all think back to; but without them, the game was largely guesswork. For me, it went beyond unpolished; it was incomplete, and the missing stuff is being slowly added over time. Even now, after the base version has been massively improved, it's still nowhere near as good as Civ VI on release - no unit list, no proper yield breakdown ("other sources" covers A LOT).

It's hard to compare as Civ6 and Civ7 are different games and yes, I'd say Civ6 UI on release was in better state than Civ7 UI now, but still, Civ6 didn't include ability to rename cities, for example, and trade route UI was a mess for some time...

 

[Civinator]

The title is giving it fully away: Shacknews has crowned Civ7 to be their best strategy title of 2025.
At the end, Civ7 won narrowly with 4 vs 3 votes against Jurassic World Evolution 3, and is now Shacknews strategy game of 2026.

What now : Best strategy game of 2025 and 2026 ??

Even if 2026 would be a typo, this means, that 2025 in the eyes of Shacknews was a catastrophic year for strategy games, if they made the one-eyed the king among the blind ones.

 

[Kev1916]

I don't think it was fair to call it "early access", but I do think early access is a good idea for future civ games given how important large-scale player feedback is to making the game good.

Fair or not "Civ" Vii was actually a lot worse than most early access games I've ever tried . It was literally a con, total con withheld content with an outrageous price tag .
The UI lol
The single worse release of any game I can think off

Totally agree that early access is a good idea, working pretty well for others - Endless legends 2 , Elemental reforged

 

[UWHabs]

I mean, opinions on release vary. Even just speaking of the civ franchise, I feel both the Colonization re-adaptation and civ 5 were worse on launch (they were more complete in UI, but were un-playable in terms of features and game balance until months after launch). Not to mention obviously some big games like cyberpunk, sim city, etc...

 

[Leucarum]

Fair or not "Civ" Vii was actually a lot worse than most early access games I've ever tried . It was literally a con, total con withheld content with an outrageous price tag .
The UI lol
The single worse release of any game I can think off

Totally agree that early access is a good idea, working pretty well for others - Endless legends 2 , Elemental reforged

The fact that I got hundreds.of hours out of Civ7 at launch makes me doubt the most egregious claims here.

But I would love to see the devs recognize that balancing a Civ game without letting the public loose on it is going to be really tough... Early Access would really help the series.

Though I also appreciate some folk are really against early access in principle.

 

[Skojardu]

The fact that I got hundreds.of hours out of Civ7 at launch makes me doubt the most egregious claims here.

But I would love to see the devs recognize that balancing a Civ game without letting the public loose on it is going to be really tough... Early Access would really help the series.

Though I also appreciate some folk are really against early access in principle.

Yeah, it's contentious. I think 4 was strengthened by bringing together a quorum of Civ 3 fans to further refine the game (eg Sullla). This is distinctly different than early access, but some sort of extended testing done by CivFanatics so that the new game was legible to them as a Civ game. This is different from a fully open beta that might turn Civ (Coca Cola) into New Coke as fans of other franchises push to make Civ more like the competition.

 

[Evolena]

The fact that I got hundreds.of hours out of Civ7 at launch makes me doubt the most egregious claims here.

They always take the time to write " "Civ" vii " so that says a lot about their stance.

 

[UWHabs]

The fact that I got hundreds.of hours out of Civ7 at launch makes me doubt the most egregious claims here.

But I would love to see the devs recognize that balancing a Civ game without letting the public loose on it is going to be really tough... Early Access would really help the series.

Though I also appreciate some folk are really against early access in principle.

I think there's a difference between early access when it's claimed out front, and when it's subtle. Like even if they branded the founders bonus as actual "early access - there might be some bugs", and basically took that week to really go wild in fixing things, rather than trying to pretend it was fully complete and you just got the game a few days early.

Sure, a few days isn't enough to fix all the balance problems, but if you mentally go into something knowing it's slightly raw, and they actually quickly and aggressively fix it, it sets you up in a different mental state. Although when you give the early access and label it that way, and then DON'T fix those issues for the actual launch, it can feel worse too.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I wrote already, there are several arguments, why Firaxis shouldn't use Early Access model:

1. Early Access usually requires some justification, it usually happens when studio never done games like this before - either by their scale (i.e. BG3) or genre (i.e. inZoi). It's generally a statement "we can't make the game ourselves". If a studio which released 6 games of the franchise, asks players to pay for Early Access games, this would raise as many questions as unpolished release.
2. Early Access is a separate business model - you get money early and without discounts, but can't sell DLC, at least until full release. That makes it less attractive for studios with big publishers, who could provide early money and have strong marketing teams, which could use discounts effectively. In that case DLC model fits much better

 

[Kev1916]

If Firaxis had used a Early Access model:

The cash grab, community disengagement and horror regarding withheld content and an overpriced unfinished mess would not have happened.
Community engagement would have highlighted the "flaw" within "Civ" Vii in terms of age system and civ switching. Allowing players to be part of a game’s development journey. Providing feedback, reporting bugs, and participating in discussions could have helped shape the game and improve the final product.

Now Firaxis are apparently backing down and franticly scrabbling to create a single Civ play through ( If you try to please all , you will please none )

Who knows, the lemming like drop in player numbers after a disappointing (to say mildly) release may indicate an early access model would have been off benefit for this version

 

[Gorbles]

If Firaxis had used a Early Access model:

The cash grab, community disengagement and horror regarding withheld content and an overpriced unfinished mess would not have happened.
Community engagement would have highlighted the "flaw" within "Civ" Vii in terms of age system and civ switching. Allowing players to be part of a game’s development journey. Providing feedback, reporting bugs, and participating in discussions could have helped shape the game and improve the final product.

Now Firaxis are apparently backing down and franticly scrabbling to create a single Civ play through ( If you try to please all , you will please none )

Who knows, the lemming like drop in player numbers after a disappointing (to say mildly) release may indicate an early access model would have been off benefit for this version

Community engagement is good, but Early Access doesn't mean "the fans make the game" or "the fans force the developers to make core system choices". The developers, at all stages in the process, choose what feedback to take on board.

So there's no guarantee EA would've changed anything you dislike about the game. And it could've even changed something I like about it.