So, what do you expect from Civ7 ?

[Krajzen]

I would like either a revolution or a perfection. I expect neither.

Considering how all "rivals" spectacularly allign their faces with the floor the civ franchise has no need for a revolution. Theoretically if a development started in a time where those "rivals" looked more prominent there may be something bold included.

They shared their 33-33-33 philosophy which practically means the same, yet different, yet the same. It will be evolutionary at best.
Well, there are people who think that civ6 is radically different than civ5. For me, it is not.

As for perfection. Learning from mistakes and improving weak elements is not an american way. Let's make it shiny.

There is also a probability that there will be the same lead designer. Even the vision may remain unchanged.

I will obviously buy it no matter what, eventually.

To be fair, they had the same philosophy and no major rivals in case of civ4 and civ5, and both of those games were radically different from their predecessors. In fact I'd say it was civ6 which was unusually conservative for the franchise standards, feeling largely like civ5.5 on release.

 

[reddishrecue]

I expect more mass construction and less mass destruction. Sort of like a Sim city but with nukes and nuclear controls.

 

[LastSword]

To be fair, they had the same philosophy and no major rivals in case of civ4 and civ5, and both of those games were radically different from their predecessors. In fact I'd say it was civ6 which was unusually conservative for the franchise standards, feeling largely like civ5.5 on release.

I actually thought that civ5 introduced hexagonal board because it was popular in turn based strategies (not necessary in historical) and board games for some time. Though I may be wrong.
However the point is how long it took civ series to adopt something as trivial/natural as hexagons.

As for civ5... those were also a times when facebook was still relatively new, companies probably felt a greater urge for a change and fresh ideas. Maybe people at firaxis felt like disonaurs and they made a 25(?) years old outsider a lead developer. Nowadays world feels more stagnant (at least to me).

Civ4 was not radically different from their predecessors in my opinion. Especially base game.

 

[pokiehl]

s for civ5... those were also a times when facebook was still relatively new, companies probably felt a greater urge for a change and fresh ideas. Maybe people at firaxis felt like disonaurs and they made a 25(?) years old outsider a lead developer. Nowadays world feels more stagnant (at least to me).

I can’t say that I can follow this logic at all, especially the digression about Facebook.

I feel the opposite and that developers are probably more and more incentivized to try new ideas to excite fans and provide better returns for publishers. Management types especially always want something new.

Ultimately I agree with Krajzen that Civ 6 felt a little too iterative.

 

[UWHabs]

I actually thought that civ5 introduced hexagonal board because it was popular in turn based strategies (not necessary in historical) and board games for some time. Though I may be wrong.
However the point is how long it took civ series to adopt something as trivial/natural as hexagons.

As for civ5... those were also a times when facebook was still relatively new, companies probably felt a greater urge for a change and fresh ideas. Maybe people at firaxis felt like disonaurs and they made a 25(?) years old outsider a lead developer. Nowadays world feels more stagnant (at least to me).

Civ4 was not radically different from their predecessors in my opinion. Especially base game.

They sort of end up with big jumps for the odd versions, and then the even iteration irons out the problems. 2 to 3 was a big leap if I remember far back, and then 4 took the core of 3 and really made it superb. And then the jump from 4 to 5 obviously ended up being one of the biggest changes of the franchise, so 6 took a more cautious turn to be more about correcting the flaws from 5 rather than being too too radical in its own right.

Given the development time is stretching out, I would expect that maybe 7 will follow a trend of the odd iteration taking a jump from the previous version. Although I do think that over the course of its development cycle, 6 might have shifted the most in its run. Sure, the expansions for the earlier civ versions added in new features and new content, but 6 in its expansions has really shifted how you play the game.

 

[Scrum Lord]

I feel the opposite and that developers are probably more and more incentivized to try new ideas to excite fans and provide better returns for publishers. Management types especially always want something new.

I'm curious about whether the developers will try incorporate more modern (generative) AI into the game. Not sure if unit management or military strategy would improve as a result of this, but there might be some other ways to apply AI.

A few ideas off the top of my head:

• An alternative to the usual scripts for map generation, where the game could provide a prompt with which to ask for "any type of map that you want".
• Diplomacy could become more interactive with AI-generated dialogs tailored to the specific game that you're playing instead of canned responses.
• A chatbot-style advisor to give detailed recommendations on how to improve your empire or info on how the game works.

 

[pokiehl]

I'm curious about whether the developers will try incorporate more modern (generative) AI into the game. Not sure if unit management or military strategy would improve as a result of this, but there might be some other ways to apply AI.

A few ideas off the top of my head:

• An alternative to the usual scripts for map generation, where the game could provide a prompt with which to ask for "any type of map that you want".
• Diplomacy could become more interactive with AI-generated dialogs tailored to the specific game that you're playing instead of canned responses.
• A chatbot-style advisor to give detailed recommendations on how to improve your empire or info on how the game works.

I think implementing generative AI would result in a lot of bad press. Right now the perception of generative AI use in the arts is that it’s lazy, results in low quality outputs, and is mired in unresolved ethical considerations.

I also don’t think we’re there yet in terms of usefulness. I don’t know what generative AI would really add that’s worthwhile in those ideas.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

I would like to see an improvement on the 'core' rules of the game.
Which game one may ask?

Civ III and IV still worked on the 'classic' rules, which, by comparison, I will relate to 'standard chess'
Civ V and VI works on the new set of rules, the hexagonal 1Upt rules, which I would relate to 'Alpha Go'

Chess had an ancient asian variant, supposedly born in the times of the Kublay Khan, in China.
It had a bigger 'map' and it used a pair of elephants in addition to standard pieces.
Plus it had an 'impassable tile', a mountain, or a fort, next to an additional 'safe' square that would protrude outisde the borders of the chess board, in which
the King could dock.
The elephants if I remember correctly could move three squares in all directions except diagonally, and it could attack only in front of them.
That is to say it didn't have to move on top of another piece to destroy it.
Some versions had archers and cannons on top of these elephants pieces, that could bombard enemy lines from behind the lines.

So, with that in mind, I would expect Civ VII to go back to the drawing board, and try to fix some of the rules coherently to the 'old standard chess' whilst
trying to apply the new '3D' chessboard to the table.

Verticality, crossing rivers that are still just a line on a map, has been an issue for movements points, so much so boats, and helicopters, disappeared from
the latest instalment. I would like those back. I would like Engineers to be able, and only them, to build bridges and pontoons from antiquity.
I would like water reserves to be a thing (Sri Lanka, Laos etc), with wells and acqueducts having a subterranean layer, plus at least 5 more vertical layers.
A proper water cycle. Proper 'lake Titicaca' and future water displacement power potential for massive green industrialization (Norway).
Take HK map as an example of what is possible to do, and vastly improve on that.

And for gods' sake, have some dinobarbs here and there, and some meaningful and 'Hard' exploration in the first 6000 years (12000BC to 5500BC)
where techs are hard capped, like i it must be possible to research just two techs and that's it. Just a bonus special trait for example on Agriculture,
but there are five or six levels of agriculture tech to research before the basic 'stone age' agriculture'... now heroes might have sense, but with more
'human' characteristics, and can be unlocked normally, like great persons, without need to compete between civs... somewhat natural approach.

Also, some lore could do a maningful appearence, in say, 5500BC, a big comet enter the skyes, burns a lots of forests, kill half of the world pop,
and after that, religions pop up naturally all around the world, and all civs can now start researching new techs that are no more hard capped..
all civs gets instant access to a pantheon.

 

[Lazy sweeper]

I don’t want to call anyone out specifically or hurt peoples’ feelings. Just go read the Ideas subforum.

There are long diatribes about very specific, granular details, like modeling soil health or overcomplicating any given system of the game for the sake of realism.

I appreciate that the feedback is enthusiastic and stems from peoples’ excitement about their pet subject or whatever, but the average fan just doesn’t have a background in game design or enough experience to give actionable and realistic
feedback.

Knowing a bunch of facts about history doesn’t make your videogame ideas good, unfortunately.

Yes this is a very heated argument, which stems from the 'standard chess' set of rules and the 'Alpha Go' sub-mindset generated from it.

I'm strongly in favor of granularizing the map soil and water, invisible layers and so on. It would be OP if an ancient Amazonian civ could grow to 10mil pop
in 5000BC, and I can't deny it's fascinating aspect to see Tibetan cities also grow to 1.000 pop when only goats, honey, and maybe some sprouts were available on top of the Himalayas.
Terraforming some mountainous environment or forest environment to host life did require some very specific set of skills.

Another argument are rebellions, cultural flips. I like how barbs camps would evolve in city states.
I like EU where some rebel part of a civ would turn into new civs at certain points in time. Selyuks, Hummayds, for Persia, USA for English and French colonies, and so on.
I don't like whatsoever HK culture swap. These are some kind of basic rules that should be agreed on for example. Map behaviour is just a collateral in my view.

In general to not bleach completely the old 'standard rules', I'm more in favor of new resources, and specific techs. Pastoral tech is domestication afterall.
More condensed maps, with higher unpredictability should be tested with old rules, and see if it could work. I'm not sure about it.
There should be a lot of testing thereof of possible 'Alpha map' implementetion. Micro-management of particularities of these maps should be simplified, hidden as much as possible,
to not steer too much away from the core aspects of the 'standard chess' set of rules-

In Civ III TEThurkhan, after medicine was discovered, cattles in particular spots, as well as wheat, rice, and many other resources would pop up previously invisible (crabs, more fish species, etc) would automatically multiply their output to mind boggling 25-30 food...
India, Egypt, China, Amazon, and many other locations had acces to really based food ouputs also from antiquity, and with medicine, they would explode in pop. Interesting gamplays to say the least.

 

[LastSword]

I can’t say that I can follow this logic at all, especially the digression about Facebook.

It was a terrible thought shortcut.
Kind of based on article I read about social-economic factors for an opportunity and change. Can't find it online, some topics it covered:
-Ancient greeks/romans knew steam power yet used it mostly for toys or religious tricks. Yet the same technology basically started an industrial change/revolution centuries later.
-The class the stars of fell on - USA army.
-Oil revolution (Standard Oil company).
-Computer revolution (Internet, Apple, Microsoft).
-Such life-changing transformations became more frequent and frequent since industrial revolution.

Now I assumed the 2008-2010 as decisive period for civ5 development. It was preceded by several social events:
-Rise of smartphones (since June 29, 2007).
-Obama became a president with the famous "Yes, we can".
-2007–2008 financial crisis.
-Rise of facebook (with the young CEO). I used this one due to Social Network movie.
It all created social-economic factors that could make people subconsciously choose more radical solutions and make bolder decisions.

They sort of end up with big jumps for the odd versions, and then the even iteration irons out the problems. 2 to 3 was a big leap if I remember far back, and then 4 took the core of 3 and really made it superb. And then the jump from 4 to 5 obviously ended up being one of the biggest changes of the franchise, so 6 took a more cautious turn to be more about correcting the flaws from 5 rather than being too too radical in its own right.

Given the development time is stretching out, I would expect that maybe 7 will follow a trend of the odd iteration taking a jump from the previous version. Although I do think that over the course of its development cycle, 6 might have shifted the most in its run. Sure, the expansions for the earlier civ versions added in new features and new content, but 6 in its expansions has really shifted how you play the game.

Going back to sociology, I have read that pandemic created fear of the unknown and make people instinctively yearn towards known solutions. Hard to say how it had impacted civ7 development (when it started / started being planned).
And I have to disagree on this big shift. Rise and Fall had indeed shifted the gameplay radically. However Gathering Storm is probably one of the most meaningless expansions in civ series (just a content pulp).

Rethinking, I have to be a bit more fair towards civ4 and civ6 as they were also marked with some significant changes:
-3D world view.
-New game engine. Expansion to consoles.
They were just less interesting from the point of player. I don't even find console compatibility a positive thing.

 

[Nikolai II]

Now I assumed the 2008-2010 as decisive period for civ5 development. It was preceded by several social events:

That assumption seems fair, yes.

 

[Flactine]

No more Challenge of the month

 

[reddishrecue]

No more Challenge of the month

Its okay, hopefully they will pop out with something else that's new. That usually happens.

 

[Countmonte8242]

I expect to be disappointed... which may be somewhat of an oxymoron since if I have that expectation to begin with it shouldn't happen right?!

I expect them to stick with 1 UPT, in which case I will likely not buy the game, just like I didn't buy 6. I learned from 5 that 1 UPT = dumbed down AI and tedium. All reviews I read on 6 early on said the AI was even worse. If stacks don't return, I won't buy it, and will continue to play Civ IV whenever I feel that Civ itch that needs a scratch.

 

[reddishrecue]

Most of these projects seem a bit abandoned to me because of how long they are taking. The same thing happened to dragon quest 12 which has been in development since 2020 and hasn't come out with dq 12. There has been no word about it and it seems like it just died out. I think that's what is starting to happen in civ 7 because programmers aren't afraid to fail like this. I guess its still alive since Civilization for china version came out and content from the company still comes out like those monthly challenges and how the polycast was brought back.Sort of like a sports series where they make a new sports game each year with a few exceptions and differences of course.

 

[SemiLazyGamer]

Most of these projects seem a bit abandoned to me because of how long they are taking. The same thing happened to dragon quest 12 which has been in development since 2020 and hasn't come out with dq 12. There has been no word about it and it seems like it just died out. I think that's what is starting to happen in civ 7 because programmers aren't afraid to fail like this. I guess its still alive since Civilization for china version came out and content from the company still comes out like those monthly challenges and how the polycast was brought back.Sort of like a sports series where they make a new sports game each year with a few exceptions and differences of course.

For DQXII, the main issue is that they announced it too early. The game likely only fully began development in 2019 after finishing up the revised version and I wouldn't be suprised if we saw it within the year.

Also, Square Enix cancelling the newest game in the biggest series in their home market? That would be completely stupid.

Back on Civ, I don't think VII has been cancelled. Take Two have closed down some studios, but we haven't heard of any major ones or cancellations on the same scale as Square Enix or Microsoft.

It's likely that development is just taking longer, and there's also the fact that we don't know when they began full production, either after Gathering Storm or during/after New Frontier Pass.

 

[Nikolai II]

Most of these projects seem a bit abandoned to me because of how long they are taking. The same thing happened to dragon quest 12 which has been in development since 2020 and hasn't come out with dq 12. There has been no word about it and it seems like it just died out. I think that's what is starting to happen in civ 7 because programmers aren't afraid to fail like this. I guess its still alive since Civilization for china version came out and content from the company still comes out like those monthly challenges and how the polycast was brought back.Sort of like a sports series where they make a new sports game each year with a few exceptions and differences of course.

You seriously believe the next Civ is abandoned?

 

[pokiehl]

Yeah, they’d only abandon Civ if they decided they don’t like making money anymore.

 

[reddishrecue]

You seriously believe the next Civ is abandoned?

I sometimes feel this way so yeah, but when I see new content, new polycast episodes and new stuff from 2k that's civ related, I stop thinking this way.