Slow Loading in MP?

[Ex.plode]

Anyone else have this issue, whenever I press launch to start up a MP game it takes a serious chunk of time to start up. And it's not because of the written intros, it almost seems like it freezes on the lobby screen, and takes a while to even get to the civ introduction.

Is this normal, if not what could be causing it?

 

[Tabarnak]

Anyone else have this issue, whenever I press launch to start up a MP game it takes a serious chunk of time to start up. And it's not because of the written intros, it almost seems like it freezes on the lobby screen, and takes a while to even get to the civ introduction.

Is this normal, if not what could be causing it?

It's normal. Don't worry, it will usually start minutes after. Some games are pretty fast started and others can take 2 or 3 min.