Should I start with this game or Civ V?

[ohmybob]

Want to get into a Civ game. I played the trial for VI and enjoyed it(and really liked the graphics). I know many people say V is more complete though(and it's cheaper atm)

Would it be wise to play V for awhile and then eventually move onto VI? Or should I just skip straight to VI? Thanks.

 

[Haig]

I recommend going with VI right away, it has much more interesting features and details already, and is still in developement.

Especially with the new Rise & Fall -expansion, the mid- and late-game in Civ VI is much more interesting.

I played 2300 hours of Civ 5 so it's a great game, but 6 has already surpassed it.

 

[TomKQT]

I would recommend CivV only if you wanted to eventually play both games. Because it would be quite fine to play CivV and then after some time move to CivVI. But I don't think you would be able to go from CivVI to CivV.
And if you want to play just one of those games, then definitelly go directly for CivVI. And it could maybe be better to buy just the core game at first, get used to the mechanics, and later buy the very recent expansion Rise And Fall. The expansion mostly adds stuff and does only very little changes in the game, so if you get familiar with CivVI vanilla first and then get into R&F, you will have a better learning curve.

 

[Leyrann]

Go for Civ VI, absolutely. The game, specifically with the R&F expansion, is absolutely amazing and almost dangerously addicting. A great advantage Civ VI also has over Civ V is that Civ V has several mechanics that punish you for doing certain things, while Civ VI has more elegant ways of giving you choices rather than "can I deal with the punish or not?"

Alternatively, you could also go for Civ IV, which could still be considered the best game of the series, but it's not nearly as much fun as Civ VI is, and they're really getting close in quality by now.

(oh and don't look at the AI complaints in this forum, people here are always super optimizing and stuff, an average player will get more than enough challenge from the AI even on the "average" difficulties)

 

[TomKQT]

Alternatively, you could also go for Civ IV, which could still be considered the best game of the series, but it's not nearly as much fun as Civ VI is, and they're really getting close in quality by now.

I loved CivIV at its time, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone anymore. The square tiles look worse and play MUCH worse compared to hexs, the graphics is already a bit old, there are many very similar systems in Civ4 so the game is a lot about micromanagement, one unit per tile in CivV/VI finaly made tactics important in battles etc.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

If money is no object, I would go for VI, especially if you enjoyed the trial. VI is the better game in my opinion and playing V wouldn't help you to play VI, they're quite different. If money is a consideration then the complete version of V is well worth it!

 

[Leyrann]

I loved CivIV at its time, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone anymore. The square tiles look worse and play MUCH worse compared to hexs, the graphics is already a bit old, there are many very similar systems in CivVI so the game is a lot about micromanagement, one unit per tile in CivV/VI finaly made tactics important in battles etc.

Yeah, that's indeed why I prefer VI or IV as well. AI in IV might be better and balance might be better, but it's less fun, graphics are worse, there's not nearly as much strategic decision making, etc.

The ones who really just want to tryhard and optimize and play perfectly should play Civ IV, the ones who want to have fun first and want to tryhard second (like me) should play Civ VI.

And the ones who are masochistic should play Civ V.

 

[Bad Wolf]

VI, absolutely VI. It just all fits together so much better, the design philosophy is much clearer and better-implemented. V felt like they were trying to turn it into a board game, but also stay as historically immersive as possible, and I don't think it really succeeded at either. (I have 843 hours of playtime in V btw so obviously I liked it!) VI doesn't bother with historical immersion, it feels much more like a big board game and the AI's are representing not other real-life factions but other players around the table trying to win the game (at least in theory, in practice they're often kind of bad at that lol).

Which is fine by me because Civ should really be more about the gameplay, with the historical trappings being more for flavour than anything else. I've got Paradox games if I want to really get into the weeds of historical detail (and let's face it, sometimes one is just not in the mood to play a game as complicated and totally immersive as CK2 or EU4).

If you want to play an earlier title I'd recommend IV, since it's probably the most different/unique entry in the series. It's on the complete opposite end of the "board game -- historical simulation" scale at least as far as Civ goes so you get a completely different experience. One thing I will say about V though is I loved the water-colour art style and most of the music is solid.

Oh, and both of the expansions for IV (Warlords and Beyond the Sword) and V (Gods & Kings and Brave New World) are quite necessary, the games simply aren't complete without them. Whereas VI is a complete game on its own; the Rise and Fall expansion is cool but hardly necessary to have a great experience playing.

TL;DR - VI is a better version of V, if you want to play an earlier Civ try IV instead, but otherwise stick to VI. V is pretty though.

 

[GlobalTree]

well,this is civfanatic after all,but from what i have seen in general streamers and youtubers just tend to go back to civ v or the casual crowd in general....i too just go for civ 5 mainly because i play multiplayer
Here's the thing civ 5 graphics,artstyle ,art direction,ui,little details and just general qol improvements and polish is far far better compared to civ 6 imo,but civ 6 do imo have better models and animations though sadly rest of it doesn't support it especially the shaders,lighting,textures and ui.....so partial you see mainstream still clinging to civ 5.

But here people can overlook visual of the games,civ 6 has by far more mechanics gameplay side of things,Problem is and i will get hate for it,More is less in this case,and the addicting gameplay loop has been lost for me in civ 6 for me,Partly because even though civ 5 has less mechanics and features(but still some features and gameplay stuff that civ 6 don't have..like united nations..etc)...
The less is better in this case because each mechanic is layer beautifully and gel togethers well,its balanced and just designed better in general..
But it wasn't like at launch at all for civ 5,that's why i had hope civ 6 in time will surpass civ 6 easily with lots of fixing but r&f actually made me fear more of civ 6 gameplay and design issue....unit imbalances,gaps in unit upgrades,dumb a.i,exploitve system district and linear card policy system(civ 5 civic tree was perfect with nqmod),happiness issues,warmongering to be the dominant playstyle,huge imbalances in almost everything and all these not supporting each other.

And that's it i am just really concerned about civ 6 future..

As for what to choose.....civ 5 vox populi > civ 4 > Civ 5 nqmod/bnw > civ 6.

just go with civ 5 if you are new to civ ,its the best game for beginner's most people i know just don't have the same itch for one more turn with civ 6 as they do with civ 5 bnw

 

[pgm123]

Probably VI. The main reason to start with V is that the learning curve is less steep. VI builds on many mechanics of V.

 

[ohmybob]

I'm thinkin that if I end up really liking the game I might want to experience more than just VI though. It seems like it would be hard to go back after VI and I feel like maybe I would be missing out

 

[TheSpaceCowboy]

You could probably go on Wikipedia and read the plot summary of Civilization I - IV, but I'd recommend playing V in full; otherwise you'll be completely lost as to the story in VI.

 

[Morningcalm]

Civ V and Civ VI are easy and sometimes run into the Monopoly syndrome where we all know who will win but have to sit through til the end (or exit, there are few players worldwide relatively speaking that have won a full game of VI judging by Steam statistics).

Civ IV arguably had the best balance and most competent AI (they are better at stacks than 1UPT combat). It also has the steepest learning curve, best main menu music (vanilla anyway), and most interesting domestic city management (free of the tall-favoring happiness penalties of V, or the ridiculous district production times of VI).

Civ IV also has the best official scenarios, ranging from a tactical zombie shooter to a fantasy epic to a space scenario with hologram leaders to World War II to the Chinese unification of ancient times.

Between V and VI I think V is the best to start with, and arguably has the better UI, leader backgrounds and scenario variety. It's also complete in a way that VI isn't yet, and much cheaper (I saw it going for as low as a dollar and some cents in some Steam sales).

 

[Tarzan737]

I must say civilization 5 with vox populi mod! You cant compare those games if you ask me, i have played with Rise and fall and it did not made me impressed. People that say civ6 is a good game should try civ5 with vp mod and then think again. I dont say civ6 is a bad game, if i didnt have civ5 with vp mod i would probably keep on playing civ6 but sorry i want a smart Ai, possible to make other civilizations to my vassals and world congress and in my point of view better graphics where you can see your units in late game. Civilization 5 with Vp mod have all of this.

 

[ohmybob]

is the vox populi mod somethin as a beginner I should use? Or does it make the game very hard

 

[skodkim]

I just went from civ 6 to civ 5 with vox populi and man am I enjoying it! Imho far better than civ 6.

I should of course as that my civ 6 experience is from before R&F so it could be better now. Guess I'll come back at some point, if not before then when modders get hold of the dll. What was done dll wise in vox populi is really AMAZING! Far superior to what I've seen in civ 5 and civ 6 vanilla.

\Skodkim

 

[Archon_Wing]

I would say VI, but I was never a huge V fan. With R&F, I think it's pretty clear.

 

[criZp]

Civ V is dirt cheap on the sales. I like civ 6 more because no global happiness and no instant city walls. I do miss the naval trade routes, thought. And the leader design of V was superior.

 

[Tarzan737]

is the vox populi mod somethin as a beginner I should use? Or does it make the game very hard

Ofcourse, just start at lower levels

 

[Leyrann]

I tried Vox Populi when I already had several hundred hours experience with Civ V but I couldn't get used to it. It's a weird and hard to use UI imo, and I didn't get much forther than that.

Civ VI is a great game, it's already got great mods (so "use VP" isn't really an argument; AI+ and Civ Flavour Deity did a good job of fixing AI issues in the past and probably will do so again once they're updated and if you do dislike the UI you can use CQUI which is apparently (don't ask me why; I don't like it) much better). And that's basically the only two reasons why people dislike Civ VI.

As for Civ V, there's just a lot of fundamental errors in that game. To balance expansion (instead of making it a mindless "more is better", something all Civ titles struggle with in one way or another) it gives straight up penalties, which are also very visible and because of that very annoying. A major source of income is connections between cities, but you get those by building roads... which cost maintenance, making it a mathematical exercise to find out if you should build a road. All your empire happiness is calculated in a single number. Whenever that dives below 0 for one reason or another (every time a city grows, for example) all your cities have 75% reduced growth, making for a very staggered growing of your cities. The World Congress is extremely tedious to work with, as typically you just end up banning random luxeries. City states are controlled by throwing money at them. Diplomacy victory is basically economic victory, as you win a diplomatic victory by getting votes in the World Congress, which you get from controlling city states.

And let's go through the awesome mechanics Civ VI has that miss in five. Civ V doesn't have districts, arguably the best design idea there has ever been. Placing districts is just awesome. Civ VI has a natural creation of roads - they're made along trade paths. This also makes it the first Civ game that typically forms roads between different civilizations, something that has always been weirdly absent in Civ games unless cities were conquered. Civ VI has unique Great People, where every single one does something different - also absent from Civ V, where all Great People from a class have the exact same powers. Civ VI has builders that can use several charges to improve terrain, rather than workers that just hang around all game. That means that improving tiles is far more of a strategic choice than just something that's happening all the time. And so on.