Sid Meier's Civilization VI

Mr E

Announced for October 2016.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvBf6WBatk0

http://kotaku.com/civilization-vi-coming-later-this-year-1776007440
http://2kgam.es/CivilizationVI

The_Valeyard

Interesting. But what else can they bring to the game. Civ6 with both expansions is a great game.

pixelburp

I'm conflicted: on the one hand, NEW CIVILISATION, WOO! On the other hand, bye-bye social life. It's a conundrum.

Interesting that they're reverting back to the ability to merge units onto a single tile. Very intrigued by the comment that 'cities now physically expand on the map'. Wonder how that'll affect gameplay.

Shiminay

Taking the queues from Beyond Earth so with regards to cities physically expanding. Stacking units, yea, I can see why anyone who's a veteran of the series would be glad to see that back (I only really threw myself whole heartedly into Civ with V having played a LOT of Civ Net on my first ever PC 20 years ago).

I'm not all that fussed to be honest, it'll take an expansion or two for it to mature and settle into it's position.

ForstalDave

i want the throne room from civ 2 back, Never could get the damn thing fully done

Agent J

Oh crap.

Dave_The_Sheep

The_Valeyard wrote: »

Interesting. But what else can they bring to the game. Civ6 with both expansions is a great game.

In fairness, Civ IV with both Warlords and Beyond the Sword is a fantastic game. Close to, if not the equal of, Civ V + Gods and Kings and Brave New World. Every Civ games might take an expansion or two to hit their near perfect stride, but they usually do.

And even then there's always things we wish they would improve.

That's what the bring to the game.

Hopefully.

Vicxas

Really looking forward to this, although 5 still all consumes me when i go back to it.

Be interesting to see what 6 brings to the table.

Beefy78

I only picked up Brave New Worlds yesterday (it was reduced on Steam). This will be my first new Civ game as a fan of the franchise - I bought V about four years ago but my crappy PC wouldn't run it so I played, and fell in love with, IV and its expansions. V has never quite clicked with me as much but I'm playing it pretty frequently at the moment. I turned it on for ten turns last night and next thing I knew it was 12.30am.

Looking forward to seeing what they do with VI. I think having cities get bigger on the map makes total sense - London should take up much more space than Aberdeen. Not sure what to think of the return of having multiple units on the same tile. In the meantime I'll throw myself into Brave New Worlds.

Generic Dreadhead

Beefy78 wrote: »

I only picked up Brave New Worlds yesterday (it was reduced on Steam).

Enjoying doing much googling of how Tourism works :P

Do you have Gods and Kings too?

Beefy78

Yeah it must have been bundled with Civ V when I bought it back in the day. 2012 maybe. That's the only version of Civ V I've played.

I'm actually Googling tourism now Aside from the odd successful trip to Alpha Centuri I always end up going to military domination no matter how much I try to be a benevolent leader.

Shiminay

I only got my first ever culture/tourism victory the other day It's difficult, but it's all about rushing those archaeologists and getting Cathedrals in the early Religion wars so you can hang more early art.

Beefy78

I imagine you need to be careful about not over-expanding the civilisation as well? I just love starting new cities

Generic Dreadhead

Beefy78 wrote: »

I imagine you need to be careful about not over-expanding the civilisation as well? I just love starting new cities

Cultural victory is best with small to medium sized cvs, I find about 8 cities is a about as high as you should go, with about 3 favouring culture while the rest take rolls like troop building, commerce, science etc

Toursim is much harder to get a victory with than the previous (pre-Brave New World) culture victory was imho.

You really need to hit the renaissance fast and hope you kick it's a$$

Shiminay

If you get Uffizi and The Louvre, then you've got a good head start when you get their theme bonuses and the Aesthetics social policies multiplies those bonuses.

Ri_Nollaig

now you are all making me want to play some civ5 again...

Gbear

For me the problem with Culture is that it's desperately boring.

The key to making the game stay fresh is having stuff to do as you get to the latter stages.
Either you need to be at war constantly, expanding constantly or both.

Culture gameplay basically stops at around 1500AD and then you're just waiting to see if you get some wonders and watching your influence meters trickle along.

It's not specific to culture but it's a function of playing with tall empires.

Generally Domination, Points, Science or Political (via earning more money and buying City States or destroying rivals for the position) all lean towards wide empires, although there are tall empire strategies that work for each of those, particularly with access to civ-specific advantages.

There needs to be something that mimics the strength of smaller empires throughout history that gives them enough advantages through emergent gameplay (rather than just huge bonuses for small empires like the Tradition culture branch) and gives you something to do once you've your core of cities established to really improve that side of the game IMO.

More concrete rewards for exploration (presumably around the early renaissance), like a new wave of goody huts in unexplored parts of the world, more interaction with other civs outside the diplomacy screen like building trade routes rather than pressing the establish trade route button, having more in-empire issues to deal with like putting down rebellions and such. Something to get you away from just mashing the end turn button for 2 hours.

Billy86

Huge, huge Civ fan - it's about the oldest game I've been into apart from Super Mario and Axelay (neither of which I have played in years and years), been playing it since the original when I was about 5 years old and called the most important technology in that version of the game 'Phisopholy'.

When I saw the news I just about came. Now I just need to wait until October so I can see and conquer!




(please don't be like Beyond Earth - never had high hopes for that one, though)

Buona Fortuna

I'll probably do what I always do in my wise old age - wait and see .

I'm curious as to what the machine requirements will be. Five was always shaky for me, despite a new machine. Add some DLC and patches and bigger maps would eventually ctd.

So we'll see.

pixelburp

Yeah, after Civ5 there's no way this is going to be a day 1 purchase, not unless they're going to ensure all planned features make the first release this time. The 2 DlCs of 5 really transformed the game into some spectacular, I'd rather wait and see in case the same happens again.

Zillah

Gbear wrote: »

More concrete rewards for exploration (presumably around the early renaissance), like a new wave of goody huts in unexplored parts of the world

Yup, I always felt there should have been more scope/reward for exploration - it just seems to fizzle out too soon. I'd love if there was a map setting to generate a significant continent with no civs on them to allow for a colonial scramble once the tech was available.

Beefy78

Are there not map settings where that effectively happens? everyone starts in the same region and the rest of the map is empty?

I may be dreaming.

Manach

Hopefully it will not be stripped of all the DLC content that made Civ-5 playable.

Zillah

Beefy78 wrote: »

Are there not map settings where that effectively happens? everyone starts in the same region and the rest of the map is empty?

I may be dreaming.

Not that I ever saw. They also tend to scatter the city states on all of the bloody islands.

Sephiroth_dude

What were the problems with Beyond earth that people had? seems it didn't live up to expectation ? I see this is for pre-order already on steam for 60 euro LOL :rolleyes:

Zillah

Sephiroth_dude wrote: »

What were the problems with Beyond earth that people had? seems it didn't live up to expectation ? I see this is for pre-order already on steam for 60 euro LOL :rolleyes:

This is what I said in the PC Gaming forum about it.

I finish one and a half games and it was just bad. The Civs are bland as anything (seriously, they basically drew a box around areas on Earth and called them factions: there's the ambiguous Asian lads and the ambiguous European lads and the ambiguous Russian lads - no flavour whatsoever).

The aliens are the most generic and phoned-in space aliens I've seen in any scifi (game, book, movie, or TV). The tech web is a bloated, illegible nightmare. The wonders are boring, most seemed forgettable and unimportant.

It compares poorly with everything that made Civ or Alpha Centauri good. It plays like a knock-off Civ game made by lesser developers.

Billy86

I was looking forward to BE, but when the reviews starting coming in it was like what BC Comics fans must have felt about reading Batman vs Superman reviews... not good. I'm not too proud to say I decided to pick up a dodgy copy and run a quick test game to see if it was still worth buying, because I am a huge, lifelong Civ fan and I really wanted BE to be at least decent. First game was so bad I thought I must have just messed things up. Did a quick bit of reading tips & hints and got into a second... a few hours later, I deleted the game.

Yes, it was that bad. Zillah covered a good few of the reasons. It was like going to your favourite five star restaurant that you're only able to visit once every few years, and getting served McCains micro-chips with easy singles. To paraphrase Goodfellas, I expected meatballs in marinara sauce and all I got was egg noodles in ketchup.

intune

Always thought on of the problems with it was the diplomacy. It felt so very shallow
It is always something along the lines of:
"Give me this or I will be mad at you and make war."

There is no depth in it at all as could be. Politics could also be so much more.

Anyone remembers Civ2? ( I know ages ago...)
Maybe politics wasn't amazing either yet, but the advisers were absolutely amazing!
Pity they never brought back that feature.

Generic Dreadhead

Same as the others, played like 2 (maybe 1.5) games of BE and was like "meh, not enjoying this at all"

intune

Yep...

Are there any alternatives to Civ which are a bit more deep? I can only think of a some more less decent space strategy games but nothing actually amazing...

Generic Dreadhead

intune wrote: »

Yep...

Are there any alternatives to Civ which are a bit more deep?

The Anno Series provides an interesting alternative but not quiet the same genre.

I also really like the Total War Games.

intune

Cormac... wrote: »

The Anno Series provides an interesting alternative but not quiet the same genre.

I also really like the Total War Games.

Good point! Anno is quite good. Forgot about that.
Never tried the TW series but must try it sometimes.
Thanks !

Generic Dreadhead

intune wrote: »

Good point! Anno is quite good. Forgot about that.
Never tried the TW series but must try it sometimes.
Thanks !

Shogun 2 Total War is the best entry of the series since it's not too bloated.

Anno 2070 is worth picking up

varuka

Anno is more city building sim like City Skylines. Total War is good but Civ 5 was best for me. Looking forward to Civ 6.

Check out Offworld. It's fun too.

intune

Thanks for the suggestions. Will take that into account.
Yeah can't wait for 6 either !!

Beefy78

Zillah wrote: »

Yup, I always felt there should have been more scope/reward for exploration - it just seems to fizzle out too soon. I'd love if there was a map setting to generate a significant continent with no civs on them to allow for a colonial scramble once the tech was available.

Beefy78 wrote: »

Are there not map settings where that effectively happens? everyone starts in the same region and the rest of the map is empty?

I may be dreaming.

Zillah wrote: »

Not that I ever saw. They also tend to scatter the city states on all of the bloody islands.

I checked and there is what I was talking about. Map type 'Terra'. All the Civs start in the centre of the World (The Middle East effectively) and the rest of the map is empty aside from a few City States.

I wouldn't recommend it though - I tried it over the weekend and it took until the late 20th Century before any of the Civs bothered exploring.

Buona Fortuna

I seem to remember earlier civs handling that better. Maybe a case of rose-tinted glasses.

In "the real world" we're still exploring the Artic, Antartic, the sea bed ....

As Zillagh said it just seems to whimper out.


I also thought the wonder movies on civ2 (I think) were really something, and later Civs never handled it as well. Just my 2 cents.

Zillah

Beefy78 wrote: »

I wouldn't recommend it though - I tried it over the weekend and it took until the late 20th Century before any of the Civs bothered exploring.

Yeah the AI just crapping out sometimes was a little disappointing.

Pepe LeFrits

The biggest problem by FAR with Civ 5 is the AI. It's absolutely abysmal. I couldn't care less about any of the features they're talking about being in Civ 6 - sort the fricking AI out. It's nearly 20 years since a computer beat the best chess player of all time, there's no excuse!

Washington Irving

Pepe LeFrits wrote: »

The biggest problem by FAR with Civ 5 is the AI. It's absolutely abysmal. I couldn't care less about any of the features they're talking about being in Civ 6 - sort the fricking AI out. It's nearly 20 years since a computer beat the best chess player of all time, there's no excuse!

Sounds like your lucky day: http://time.com/4324490/civilization-6-interview/#prclt-FQ1DJIiB

Pepe LeFrits

Washington Irving wrote: »

Sounds like your lucky day: http://time.com/4324490/civilization-6-interview/#prclt-FQ1DJIiB

hm, didn't see any mention of AI in the original press but that's a little encouraging. Remains to be seen what kind of a job they'll do, the cynic in me says that strong AI doesn't ship units but we'll see.

intune

While everyone already knows... here it is anyway:

:D:D

Zillah

intune wrote: »

While everyone already knows... here it is anyway:

:D:D

Thanks for the trailer that is in the first post on this thread...?

intune

Ha lol... I must have been asleep really. Read it all and didn't even see that...:P

pixelburp

A new video gives more detail about how those 'unpacked' cities are going to work: really looks like the placement of these districts - and Wonders - is going to be pretty strategic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv-sOUkv9UI

Shiminay

It's very "Endless Legend" in that respect, eh? Maybe Endless Legend borrowed it from elsewhere, apologies if they did, I'm still a relative newcomer to this genre - it's become more appealing as I've gotten older

Generic Dreadhead

Googles Endless Legend

Shiminay

Steam Sale's a-comin'

Generic Dreadhead

Has anyone here played that extensively and how does it stack up to the Civ series?

Gbear

Cormac... wrote: »

Has anyone here played that extensively and how does it stack up to the Civ series?

Dunno about extensively, but I did put 30 hours into it.

Rather than try and remember I'll post some of my thoughts from another thread:

I stuck a fair few hours into it but for TBS games 30 hours isn't a whole lot. By no means do I regret getting it but it was something I picked up and put down without being hugely impacted.

I think the level of focus that each race has, the lack of units and the small tech tree makes for pretty shallow gameplay.

I really like the districts idea, the way the questing and pacification of lesser civs work and the sheer volume of resources you harvest (giving you massive latitude in how you build and focus your cities) but it's not enough to drive the core gameplay on.
The way combat plays out is possibly a better solution than Civs 1 unit per tile as well, or at least there's elements to it that ought to be taken on board.

They're things I'd love for Civ to explore with it's greater complexity.

Maybe I'm being unfair in comparing it to the champion of the genre or maybe my biases from playing civ are leading me to play it the wrong way, but it was little more than a brief diversion for me.

I ended up picking up Endless Legend at some point during the sales.

Life's too short for Civ 5 to be the only 4X game you ever play.

It's interesting to see some of the relatively subtle differences that I really like, but also how much less I like it as a game on the whole despite those, although I don't want to be too critical because it's entirely possible I've overplayed Civ5 to the point where I don't like the genre anymore in general.

I love the increased granularity of resources - there's much more flexibility in how you manage your cities. The economy buildings give you huge bonuses that vary wildly depending on your terrain.

There's more balance in starting places with even "useless" tiles giving some yields.

Some of the cool faction-specific traits really change how you play the game.

I really hated 1 UPT from Civ5 - possibly the games primary fundamental weakness - so EL's take was a much better compromise IMO.

I liked the levelling system as well, but haven't quite got to grips with the inventory system yet.
And there's the

Butttt.. there's something missing.
Not only are there too few factions, but there are particularly too few "standard" factions for my liking - as far as I can tell, only the Vaulters and Elf-guys (whatever they're called) use the "normal" game mechanics.
There certainly aren't enough standard units. I know that it pushes you towards assimilated units from other factions, but it's not a good enough solution to the problem IMO.

Because of the large quantities of resources availble, the game has a pretty steep learning curve in some respects - not getting the basics, but learning how to play the AI in the same way.
I'm finding it a lot easier to fall miles behind in this, or generally cock things up beyond repair, than I would in Civ 5.

I keep wanting to go back to it, but I'm tending to quit games after about 100 turns.

ShaneU

Civilization 6 E3 Demo, Narrated by Sean Bean

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTyIjGrmKw8