Civilization VI - Now available, so you can sink all your free time into it

[Fry]

Yeah, it's Kosovo. No idea why they're blacklisted. As far as I know they're not under western economic sanction.

 

[Agame]

And now Civ VI's is apparently even worse. What is this I don't even.

As long as they stick with 1UPT the AI will always be terrible, it can only be semi competitive with the stack system. Maybe if they spent more time developing some elegant solutions to stack system (cough *Paradox* cough) and dumped this 1UPT shit civ could be good again.

But obviously that will never happen.

 

[J1M]

For those who have been following this more closely, did they actually redesign the game to play quickly with fewer, more important, decisions? Or did they lose their nerve and remake Civ IV/V again?

Answering my own question. The gameplay is exactly the same as before, except some builder improvements are called "districts" and they are not built by a builder.

If you are looking for more of the same, enjoy your purchase. If you were looking for something new/interesting in the genre you will be disappointed.

 

[Snorkack]

For those who have been following this more closely, did they actually redesign the game to play quickly with fewer, more important, decisions? Or did they lose their nerve and remake Civ IV/V again?

Answering my own question. The gameplay is exactly the same as before, except some builder improvements are called "districts" and they are not built by a builder.

If you are looking for more of the same, enjoy your purchase. If you were looking for something new/interesting in the genre you will be disappointed.

Both the district system and the eureka bonuses have a huge impact on how the game plays out. Especially city-planning is a totally different beast now than it was in previous installments. Also that agenda system adds a completely new layer of depht to diplomacy. What kind of changes did you expect?
From a gameplay point of view, I am looking forward to seeing how these changes actually play out in the game. Only thing that really irks me is that pathetic monkey-fuck of an AI, so I'll probably wait for the second expansion again before buying.

 

[Jimmious]

Reports so far indicate that AI is better than expected, more aggressive and can kind of fight... depending on land layout and stuff like that.
I'll play today evening and provide my own feedback

 

[Morgoth]

 

[Jimmious]

Glorious!!

 

[Steve]

Reports so far indicate that AI is better than expected, more aggressive and can kind of fight... depending on land layout and stuff like that.
I'll play today evening and provide my own feedback

That would be great, the horribad AI kinda kept me away from Civ5 singleplayer. I liked the game in multiplayer but it took them years to fix it so you can actually finish a game without synchronization issues.

 

[Spectacle]

Yeah, it's Kosovo. No idea why they're blacklisted. As far as I know they're not under western economic sanction.

Kebab has been removed, only a gaping black orifice remains.

 

[Great Deceiver]

i gave a try to the extended demo.
no scrolling when pointer hits screen sides

That's an option toggle, you can turn it on (not entirely sure why it's not enabled by default). When you do enable it though, it's wonky and doesn't work properly - the pan kind of stutters before actually going off. Who would have thought that screen panning would be advanced technology in 2016!

Played for a bit and agree with your other points, the interface is shit if you're looking for specific information at a glance.

I don't like the art style at all and I honestly think Civ 4 looks better. That's a fucking 11 year old game.

The terrain is too bright and it's honestly hard to find units at a glance. The new hipster fog of war is difficult to read. Resource icons are sometimes retarded (you get a cookie if you can tell what the fuck the sheep icon is supposed to be). There's no tooltip delay setting and you have to hover the mouse forever to get info on a tile. NO FUCKING KEYPAD MOVEMENT!

This is after playing for about 45 minutes, I'm sure there are many other annoyances in a long game.

Really, who comes up with this shit?

 

[Trash]

Ha, I actually laughed out loud. Now I know what my next wallpaper will be.

the fuck the sheep icon

Read it like this. The joy keeps coming.

 

[J1M]

Both the district system and the eureka bonuses have a huge impact on how the game plays out. Especially city-planning is a totally different beast now than it was in previous installments. Also that agenda system adds a completely new layer of depht to diplomacy. What kind of changes did you expect?
From a gameplay point of view, I am looking forward to seeing how these changes actually play out in the game. Only thing that really irks me is that pathetic monkey-fuck of an AI, so I'll probably wait for the second expansion again before buying.

I was expecting what they marketed in their preview salvo about shorter games with fewer turns comprised of more interesting decisions.

 

[coldcrow]

This tells me all I need to know. More hipster pop-artsy bullshit instead of a functional UI as in Civ4. Sulla is still full of hope, but I can read the desperation between the lines of his preview. Firaxis has lost it.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I've played couple of hours, all I can say so far is that in terms of features it's the most complete vanilla Civ they've ever made. None of the usual DLC/expansion milking, all the critical systems are already present.

I'll have to do couple of playthroughs before giving an honest assessment whether it's actually any good though. On a first glance it seems to have plenty of depth, but only time will tell.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

indeed everything is already present.
problem is everything already present sucks.

a terrible shame, i really believed in this ._.

 

[an Administrator]

Is it true that you can't name cities?!

 

[anus_pounder]

indeed everything is already present.
problem is everything already present sucks.

a terrible shame, i really believed in this ._.

Hope is the first step on the road to a fortress with it's gates unbarred and unguarded etc. etc.

 

[Starwars]

I'm pretty happy with the release. More than anything, it's surprisingly solid for a Civilization at launch. I like that they're building on top of the Civ 5 stuff. It doesn't feel like much is missing just in terms of mechanics and what to do in broad strokes. It doesn't feel "barren" but a full-fledged release. It'll be cool to see what the expansions will bring further down the line.

Not far enough into it to judge how the AI is but I'm guessing it'll be pretty bad but we'll see.

Probably not gonna win over anyone who hated Civ V + expansions though.

 

[tripedal]

It's not bad, but perhaps a bit dull. Especially if you're not going for domination. AI is not very aggressive, so you have to start your own fights.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/10/21/civilization-6-review/

Wot I Think: Sid Meier’s Civilization VI
Adam Smith on October 21st, 2016 at 2:23 pm.

The question I’ve been trying to answer, as I spent a final few hours with Civilization VI[official site] before writing this review, is simple: is it the best game in the series, or the best game in the series bar Civ IV? After more than a hundred hours of play, I still can’t say for sure. The fourth game has had ten years to work its way into my mind and it has endured, Civ VI is still young.


What I can say is that it’s a radical redesign, true to the spirit of the series but finding new ideas in its elevation of the map from backdrop and resource-container to new plane of strategic and tactical importance. Few 4X games emphasise the importance of geography to this degree. In Civ VI, the land makes a mark on you, just as you make your mark on the land.


If this new engagement with the map had been attached to just one feature, it might come across as a gimmick, or the foundation for a concept not yet fully constructed. As it is, the genius of the game’s design isn’t in the ideas themselves, but in the careful stitching together of those ideas. This is a very busy Civ game, with lots of different cultural, technological and military plates to spin, but nothing works in isolation. If you’re chasing religious advancement, for example, that has an impact on the other cultural policies you discover and unlock, and certain relationships will be affected by your application of religion.


Government and religion are both customisable, the latter in a similar approach to Civ V, the former in an entirely new card-based system. There are still base governments to choose from, unlocked in groups of three as you move through eras, but they’re modified using cards unlocked on the cultural tech tree. That allows for a government to suit just about any scenario and makes for much more interesting choices and stages of play – you could gamble by switching to policies that boost military production before entering a war, for example, and then switch out those policies for ones that keep the folks back home happy once the armies are built.

The risk is that if your initial assault isn’t strong enough, you might be left in need of more units without the boosts used to build the initial force. I’ve deliberately begun periods of reconstruction and actual artistic renaissances or ages of scientific enlightenment, purely by altering government to suit the mood of the times. In the late stages of the game, there are so many policies to pick from, and so many slots available for cards in the modern governments, that you can push your people in just about any direction.

Religion, particularly before it is properly organised, is more intimately related to the land. As in Civ V, upon founding a religion you choose a pantheon, and many of these give boosts based on terrain and resources. Later, you’re able to define more traits, which allow for production of buildings with various properties, or affect the way your faith changes your cities and units or those of your neighbours. Broadly speaking, religions fall into one of two camps: they’re either active in the world, taking strength from conversion, or self-contained, bringing great benefits to home-grown followers but tending not to proselytise.

When an AI civ follows one of the former types, there’s a tendency to produce avalanches of apostles, sometimes long after every city within reach has been converted, and there is a recurrent problem with this kind of behaviour. As much as the new hard-coded personality traits have improved the credibility of the AI, by giving them distinct approaches to diplomacy and guiding their actions to an extent, the basic triggers that decide what should be built and when sometimes seem to get stuck in a loop. You’ll see wandering settlers quite often in the mid- to late-game, presumably produced because an AI realises it needs more cities to catch up with the competition, but left unsettled because there isn’t actually a decent location in which to build. Most of the AI stumbles seem to be a case of the left hand not talking to the right hand, leading one “need” to over-ride a more sensible alternative, and while it’s disheartening to see a nation treading water and cluttering the map while stuck in one of these apparent loops, they do break out eventually.

There are two great additions to diplomacy, and together they’re just about strong enough to make the AI issues a frustration rather than a major failing. The first is the leader traits, which I’ve already mentioned briefly. Essentially, they’re distinct enough from one another that every civ really does feel unique and on the higher difficulties particularly, dealing with them requires walking a fine line between appeasement of those traits and aggressive disobedience. Push too hard too soon and you might end up in an unwinnable, draining war; bend over backwards for too long and you’ll spend a lifetime walking on eggshells and making little progress.

It’s a smart system, encouraging competitive thinking in a way that suits the game’s overall structure. This Civ is rich with historical flavour – from the named Great People and their unique works to the gorgeous inked maps and evolving soundtrack – but behind all of those thematic flourishes, it is, quite explicitly, a game of numbers. History as a track and field event. There are multiple finish lines and various ways to reach them, but more than ever, it’s important to ensure every step takes you toward one of those lines.

One area where that can be clearly seen is the second of the changes to diplomacy: Casus Belli. These are reasons for declaring war and there are plenty of them, unlocked as you move through the eras. The most simple example is a war of liberation, used to reclaim a city that was taken and occupied by another civ. By declaring a war of that kind rather than the default “Surprise War”, you receive less of negative impact on your standing with other civs. Manipulating these rules of conflict, and discovering how they overlap with leader traits, makes the military side of the game as rewarding as it’s ever been, and the actual wars make best use of the single-unit-per-tile innovation of Civ V. Terrain matters, siege units are far more useful, and cities can be made resilient but are always at risk from a determined assault.

The two major features that elaborate on the relationship between a civilization and the land that it occupies relate to the cities themselves and the tech tree(s). Of all that has changed, it’s the cities that are convincing me that I’ll find it hard to go back to an older Civ now that I’ve spent so much time with VI. Districts are the visible aspect of the new urban management, zones that take up a tile within the city’s borders, and become home to buildings of a certain type. Universities, temples and marketplaces aren’t going to appear in every city now – they require the correct kind of district, and some places will make better use of their tiles without those specialisations.

This changes the game in all manner of ways, but most importantly it means that you rarely end up at that tedious point where you’re building every available improvement in every city you own simply because there’s nothing else to do. Even a seemingly minor building is a decision now rather than a default, and that’s integral to the flow of the game. Civ VI wants you to decide whether Boston is a university city or not, and your reasoning as to what belongs where will go a long way toward determining how effective each city is in the long-term.

Tech trees aim to make similar changes, though less elaborate. Certain actions taken in the world provide an inspiration boost to a specific tech, giving half of the research points necessary to earn it immediately. This might involve using a builder to improve a resource or getting into a scrap with a certain kind of unit. It’s another example of the interplay between systems, the tech trees now wrapped up in your actions and discoveries so that they don’t feel separated from the rest of your playstyle.

There are two trees now, one containing civic ideas and the other containing ‘scientific’ advances. Not only does that give culture more power, as the accumulation of culture points are actually used to unlock the civic tech tree now, it also means that you might meet nations that are technologically advanced but culturally inferior, and vice versa. While that doesn’t mean the Civ view of advanced societies isn’t still somewhat single-minded – some nations are more advanced and more powerful, and the details aren’t as important as the leaderboard rankings – there’s more nuance than in previous games, and more variety in the kinds of people you’ll meet along the way.

Given how busy the game is, with new features coming into play regularly as you advance, the UI is remarkably uncluttered. Most of the information you need is either in the bottom right of the screen, which guides you through the flow of a turn and highlights what you need to do before continuing, or in a bar along the top of the screen. That’s where you’ll find information about resources, envoys and your various forms of income.

Despite its overall tidiness, there are some aspects of the UI that don’t quite hang together though. To give one example, I find picking a pantheon and adding beliefs to religions more stodgy than I’d like, every option being dumped into a long scrollable list, with no way to see a read-out detailing how a choice would benefit your civ. If I’m choosing Stone Circles as a belief, I’d like to see a tooltip saying how many applicable resources are within my borders, both worked and unworked.

For every minor complaint, there are three or four improvements to celebrate. City States, one of Civ V’s most interesting but flawed features, work superbly now. Again, they tie back into other systems, with some AI having traits that define how they feel about your relationships with these smaller nations, but the big change is in how those relationships actually work. Rather than having to top up your friendship through regular attentions, you now deploy envoys and leave them in place, reaping the benefits. There’s a competitive element here as well, though, with suzerain status possible, granting a unique bonus, which adds another interesting wrinkle to the whole system. Some of those bonuses can be game-changing when married to the right kind of Civ – La Venta’s Colossal Heads plus faith-based Civ equals very happy early years – while others aren’t worth fighting for if they’re not a natural fit for your current playstyle.

There’s something similar happening in the realm of Great People, who are now drawn from a pool when civs have enough points to attract them or resources to buy them. As with Wonders and City States, everyone is competing for the same bonuses, which makes acquisition time-pressured and more cutthroat than previously. With Wonders, I don’t find quite as much need to rush for them thanks to the requirements for construction being much more complex – simply having the tech isn’t always enough, and some Wonders are locked out if you don’t have the right districts or geographical features to exploit. An educated guess, and some knowledge of your neighbours, can help you to concentrate on Wonders that the whole world isn’t mid-way through constructing already.

All of this combines to do what I thought might be impossible: Civ VI breaks all of my old habits. I’m the pacifist Civ player who now enjoys starting and finishing a fight, and I’m the culture-hungry tourist magnet who has built steaming great industrial empires. Civ VI demands flexibility of thought and function, and it rewards it handsomely with a game that responds elegantly to all kinds of different playstyles

It’s a treat to look at as well. I adore the strategic map in particular, but the expressive units and distinctive tiles are always lovely. A sountrack that moves through the time periods along with your civ is icing on a delicious cake.

Imperfect AI is the fly in the ointment, as it is for the vast majority of 4X games. It’s a shame that the flaws in that department are so apparent at times because in almost every other regard, this is an innovative and extremely thoughtful take on a series and formula that feel as old as PC gaming itself. Where Civ VI makes changes to that formula, they are improvements across the board, some bolder than others but all vital to the overall structure of a game that understands how to build compelling, overlapping strategic systems.

It is, quite simply, a thing of wonder, and a late contender for my personal game of the year.

 

[MilesBeyond]

Reports so far indicate that AI is better than expected, more aggressive and can kind of fight... depending on land layout and stuff like that.
I'll play today evening and provide my own feedback

Yeah, I've actually heard that. Significantly more interested in the game now. It appears to be waaay better on launch than Civ V was.

 

[Starwars]

If you compare it to Civ V at launch then yeah, there is no competition. Civ VI is in waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better shape now than Civ V was at launch, no question.

 

[rezaf]

Lol, are you supposed to have learned how to play this via letsplays and such?
Because if you just click on the "I'm new to Civ6" option, the game does a horrible job of guiding you for the first few steps.
For the very first game, I merely selected Warlord difficulty, yet the AI is rapidly outproducing me and I have no clue how they do it. By the time I finished a Warrior and a Scout, my neighbor - the Egyptians - had three Warriors and a Slinger in the field, they had already built a holy district and several tile improvements (at least one Worker) ... can anyone write a short primer?

 

[Drax]

Ok, just *bought* The Special FitGirl Edition, gonna try it out later.

 

[rezaf]

So you must be doing something wrong like poor resource allocation or not settling on spot. Early game is all micro. Plus warrior is not really my choice for initial build order - I would go scout, slinger, builder/monument.

Oh, no doubt the blame rests on my shoulders, my point was that the game ought to at least give me some basic information/tutorage.
Restarted and had a much better time, but before I could even build ships, a pair of barbarian galleys reduced my everything to tatters. IIRC in Civ4, ship bombardment couldn't kill land units, and it was not without reason.
Anyway, I wasn't far into the game, so no big loss.
Restarted another time and noticed the game doesn't store my selected options when starting a new game. Seriously? In 2016? Fo' shame, Firaxis, fo' shame.

Also: Is it just the interface being bad or is there no building queue?