"steer the course of your story by choosing a new civilization to represent your empire" (civ switching)

[Turrdy]

Well that Civ switching doesn't sound like a turn on for me (at the moment at least, gameplay mechanics regarding that were explained rather superficially)

Anyway, this game is called Civilization, not Civilizations, right?

 

[CoconutTank]

TBH what really put me off on HK was the game's stinginess on strategic resource distribution. It was really not fun working myself through the game, only to find that I was going to fall behind b/c I just happened to not have control over 2 or 3 oil nodes on the entire map trading for strategics was often a pain in the butt too.

Also... even HK offered the choice to stick with the same civ throughout the game iirc (legacy civ or something for bonus stars?). I didn't see that choice explicitly during the preso, but I would think that choice is available in Civ 7 as well.

Since districts are back, here's to hoping that eurekas and inspirations come back too.

 

[seasnake]

this exactly , imagine starting out as Aztecs but continuing as european colonizers in the next age....how is that any fun??? and not to forget offensive.

To be fair, the Aztecs were the ultimate colonizers. There's a reason every other tribe in Mesoamerica was like "yeah, kick their @$$!" when Cortes showed up.

 

[moondog385]

Shawnee are an "exploration era" civ according to the preorder reveal

Noted. Then I'll definitely be making use of the "stay in one era for a whole game's duration" mechanic!

 

[Mekkh]

This is just Humankind WTH

 

[MACKA0ili]

Should I play Humankind so I can understand what we're all mad about?

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I think for me, the issue is at least the direct (presumably best) example they gave in this trailer was Egypt to Songhai, which is very much not a historical tie...Like you noted, also not a fan of the fact that i could pick Benjamin Franklin and never lead the USA if I don't want to, lol. What's the point of tying leaders to civs at all if there's no gameplay connections anymore? Like, you could jsut give us Shaka Zulu but never the Zulu, or just the Zulu and never Shaka, since leaders and civs aren't tied together anymore

Hopefully it's also not Shawnee to America, but more like England to America.
Watch it be the Iceni in Antiquity.

 

[Jkchart]

From what I gathered, each Age changing would not be just "click a button and you change Age", but rather a progressive timeline with a crisis intensifying and culminating, so that the change will seem impactful.

The reason Humankind is boring is not the culture switching, but because how generic they made it. Each player was changing culture independantly, with no requirement at all, and had very few specific things for them. It all seemed generic, and so it was boring.

Here, with only three ages, each change will be impactful. As they said, each age will feel as a game in itself, and so you'd stay with your civ for the same game. As Ed Beach said: it'd be like a trilogy, different books with big endings, and you end up a new one in a calming manner, it's the same story but not the same book.

This is also my cautiously-optimistic feeling.

This is clearly an ambitious project that was made paying attention to what they've learned from past games.

This could either be the best civ game if they fit the pieces right, or a mess. I'm hoping for the former because there's a lot here that I like, and a lot that we need to really wait and see on until there's more than just a single gameplay reveal to pan new systems.

 

[moondog385]

Aren't civs that peaked in Medieval time shafted with this change?
You can't fit them either in Antiquity nor in Exploration Age. For example, Byzantium.

Kinda figuring that Medieval civs are going to be lumped into the Exploration Age (for example, you'll go from either Rome or Greece into Byzantium) and Firaxis might not want to use the word "Medieval" given it focuses on the west.

 

[CoconutTank]

Should I play Humankind so I can understand what we're all mad about?

HK is not entirely terrible imo! It's got some cool ideas.

 

[Razpor]

Interested to see how this is handled. Maybe most of the Native American civs will be "modern"?

Its not just about native Americans,egypt for example turning in songhai makes just as little sense.
The only way to fix this is to allow the option to continue into the next era as the same civ and even then its not really a fix .

Honestly i have lost interest in Civ 7 ,just wishing ara history untold is good at this point.

 

[Thenewwwguy]

Its not just about native Americans,egypt for example turning in songhai makes just as little sense.
The only way to fix this is to allow the option to continue into the next era as the same civ and even then its not really a fix .

Honestly i have lost interest in Civ 7 ,just wishing ara history untold is good at this point.

cannot emphasize this enough. A lot of ppl seem to like that they mentioned historically or culturally appropriated civ evolution while conveniently ignorign that the Songhai are very much not a successor to Ancient Egypt in ANY capacity.

 

[Manol0]

I was fearing of getting fantasy characters and units but today's game reveal had even worse news than that. Whole gameplay becomes a fantasy story. So for example in one era my people are Romans in next era they will become Egyptians in the very next era they will become Carthaginians and in the end they will be Chinese.... Totally the Humankind mechanic that failed blatantly. Didnt developers see that people didnt like this mechanic?? I wonder.
My only hope is a future DLC that will correct this mess and give the option to play a normal game as they did with the "Gathering storm" DLC for civ vi which fixed a lot gameplay bad designs such as the strategic resources system.

 

[Quintillus]

This is the part of the gameplay trailer that I am most skeptical about, mainly because it was my least-favorite part of Humankind.

That said, there is the possibility that the implementation will be much more engaging than in Humankind. I saw two significant differences:

• There are only three eras, not seven as in Humankind. Fewer changes = less disruption
  • It also might help if all civs change at once. In Humankind, part of the problem was not even being aware that your neighbor had changed, while you had not
• The restrictions on who you can evolve to based on geographic or playstyle changes. Part of what made it so immersion-breaking in Humankind was that your neighbors could go from, say, the Olmecs to Hungary with no connection whatsoever.

Of course as we can already see, the choice of "which geographic evolution changes make sense" will be controversial. But having played Humankind, IMO the "no restrictions at all" option was not the right one.

 

[Foxforch]

What were they thinking.

 

[sav]

I bounced right off Humankind because of this civ-swapping feature - but honestly, Firaxis hasn't missed yet, so I trust they've learned from Humankind's mistakes and will implement it in a way that feels unforced. I certainly hope so, since I'll probably be 60 before Civilization VIII comes out...

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

so then what's the modern equivalent? Realistically, they're going to force us to move on to the US from the Shawnee, and any other indigenous north american civ that historically existed in what's now the US.

The Shawnee are confirmed to be an Exploration age civ. America I presume would be Modern.
It's my hope that it would go England into America instead. Maybe the Shawnee could turn into the Sioux or Apache? I don't know what indigenous civ they would consider modern but leaders such as Siting Bull and Geronimo lived later.
Either way I'm afraid that all of these tribes in game might be unrelated.

 

[bosioc]

I really hope we have a force historical path mode or something like that

 

[Leyrann]

I was hoping the civ-switching thing would be more like dynasties, and it would be based on how you play, not a binary choice.

For example rome "evolves" into one of the italian city states. Were you warmongering rome? You become merchant-navy venice. Were you cultural/religious rome? You become milan. etc.

This argument would make more sense if you could also provide examples for successor states of Babylon or the Incas.

Aren't civs that peaked in Medieval time shafted with this change?
You can't fit them either in Antiquity nor in Exploration Age. For example, Byzantium.

I expect the early Exploration Age includes most of the Middle Ages, with perhaps a few early bits being part of the Antiquity Age. Byzantium would almost certainly be an Exploration Age civilization.

 

[mrwho]

I'll reserve judgement but my initial feelings about this feature are negative. I'm glad there are only three eras, which will hopefully make the change feel impactful, but there is a real charm to sticking with one civ. I'll have to play to have a stronger opinion on it; I barely touched Humankind.