I think a more interesting question might instead be, "would there be this much backlash for previous Civ games were they released today?" And I would say: yes, almost certainly. In my estimation it's less a matter of objective quality-on-release, and more a matter of how video games, as consumer culture, are subjective to the current historical moment and broader discourse. There are a few factors going into this, and forgive the following essay; I'll give a summary at the end.
The first is socioeconomic, and it ultimately all stems from this in some way or another. This goes beyond the price tag of the game itself: while we can point out that this game is priced relative to inflation, we must also point out that incomes have not kept up with the same inflation—to say nothing of the price still being essentially pegged to the US dollar, which has further knock-on effects for people around the world trying to afford it. People will be more critical and more discerning the relatively bigger of a slice something takes out of their income. This is a doubled problem because the cost of making games has concomitantly increased—whether the publisher decides to make the consumer foot the bill for these rising costs or not, as they have with Civ VII.
The second follows naturally from the socioeconomic factor, and it's about uncertainty: basically, things are more expensive and politics in previously steady-state Western countries are more volatile and partisan. These two things act on one another to make social discourse as a whole more fraught, whether we're on a video game forum or on the street. People broadly feel both unable to improve their socioeconomic status and stability, and following that unable to affect politics in such a way as to ameliorate these problems. We recognise the connection between economics and politics—you could make the argument that, more than ever before, democratic politics is consciously about economics and the rest is secondary. Certainly every politician understands this. So, we end up in a situation where people not only feel economically insecure, but simultaneously unable to prepare for the future: broadly feeling demoralised about the capacity for political systems to change this and their own capacity to affect those political systems.
The third factor is a bigger one, and admittedly more theoretical, but bear with me. What the above points converge on is consumer culture, the form of political and economic expression that largely became dominant worldwide in the late 20th century. People express themselves and identify themselves through their consumer choices. At the same time, and particularly in the modern internet age, people feel more able than ever to affect their consumption at the site of its production: to influence game developers, film producers, food manufacturers, various brands, and so on. Normally this isn't an area of great contention, because people either have bigger problems and ways to deal with them, or they're more or less content. Today, people do have bigger problems—the first factor—but are hindered in their expression by their perceived inability to do anything about them—the second factor. So, political and socioeconomic expression converge on consumer culture, both directly to affect change with regards to consumption itself—things like food safety and game release quality, for example—and indirectly, to express frustration about problems beyond sites and items of consumer culture but indelibly tied to them. This is nothing especially new: the US National Consumers League was formed in 1899 and agitated for various social reforms from the angle that individual citizen-consumers deserved a right to determine the ethics and standards of their purchasing options. We aren't too different—though the Chicago meatpacking industry of the early 1900s was maybe a bit more awful than game development.
Think of it this way: people are more likely to write a complaint or praise for a video game where they think a developer or publisher will see it, than to do the same for their local elected political representative. Posting about the problems surrounding Civ VII, people generally—consciously or unconsciously—feel like they have a right to consumption of a certain quality standard, and that they can directly affect, through social discourse, the quality and content of consumer products. So, they post on forums and social media in the desire to persuade or dissuade game developers and publishers about issues that simultaneously involve the game directly, yet indirectly are tied one way or another to surrounding political and economic factors. On top of this, there are year by year more and more people taking part on social media, so the number of conversations and conversants in this discourse increases, thereby becoming more visible, thereby seeming bigger in absolute terms. Part of all of this comes down to: there really were just fewer people talking about past games in this same franchise. Consider the fact that on these very forums the General Discussion for Civ VII, released one month ago, has 257,000 posts, while Civ VI, released almost a decade ago, has 424,000.
In summary: we want to enjoy playing a game, but it becomes harder to just enjoy a game because the world is uncertain, polarised, and difficult. Games are expensive and we have less money with which to buy them. Games cost more and publishers control the process of development and publication in order to (subjectively) maximise profits against these costs. We identify with our articles of consumption, feeling an increasingly personal investment in them and a relatively high degree of agency in defining their content and quality. This leads to greater criticism and consciousness of perceived flaws in a game, and resulting discourse which frames discussion about it. There are more people talking about games on social media, which means that the number of participants in this discourse is larger, its inertia greater, and polarisation—reflecting external political and economic polarisation—increases in step.
This isn't to say that this or any game is flawless, or that there is nothing to complain about or no reason to lodge complaints. Instead I think it's a good idea to consider the why of why we go online to spend a great deal of time in heated discussions about an article of consumer culture, what we expect our goals and outcomes to be, and more broadly how certain game flaws (considering all games ship with bugs, questionable design choices, etc.) become discursively framed as fundamental "problems" while others are positively excluded from this same discourse.
