There’s nothing like the moment right before you sit down to see a up-to-date Civilization game for the first time – especially since this is the longest wait we’ve ever had for a up-to-date game – and I’m content to say I came away with a pretty positive attitude about Civilization VII. It’s a bolder, riskier take on the formula than any of the last few iterations, and I think that’s definitely the right way to go, considering the older games aren’t going anywhere and are still quite playable. From eras that completely change your chosen civilization to a bold, pristine, yet grounded up-to-date art style, Firaxis is already showing off its best side.
The historical 4X space has become a lot more crowded since Civ 6, and it seems obvious that Firaxis is paying attention to what others are doing as they dip their toes into the genre. Which brings us to the single biggest change Civ 7 is making: Much like 2020’s Humankind, you won’t be playing as a single civ for the entire campaign.
There are three distinct Ages: Ancient, Exploration, and Modern. The developers were quick to point out that the Ages aren’t exactly equivalent to the Ages in previous Civ games, as they’re much longer and more distinct. For example, on turn 125 on Standard speed, I was still in 1150 BC on the RP clock. The campaign should take about the same amount of time as it did in previous Civ games. You choose a up-to-date civ to play for each Age, with its own bonuses, units, and map graphics. The one thing that will stick with you is your initial choice of leader, a 3D avatar for your entire campaign, who has his own set of eternal bonuses.
The leaders themselves remain visually consistent across the ages—you won’t see Hatshepsut wearing pants in the current era, for example. And they’re all civilization agnostics. Hatshepsut’s bonuses work well with those of the antique Egyptian civilization, so you’ll have some incentive to match your leader to her historical people if you want to get the best results. But you can play her as any civilization leader. After all, you can end the campaign as the United States, so there’s still some mixing and matching to do.
HEAD OF STATE
Firaxis is also taking the opportunity to include a few leaders this time around who weren’t necessarily prominent political figures, so we don’t end up with the exact same cast. Ben Franklin is specifically called out, though we’ve yet to see him in full animation.
What isn’t entirely agnostic is your choice of up-to-date civilization in the coming age, which addresses one of my gripes with Humankind – that you can go from Celts to Chinese with little to no narrative context. Each starting civilization will have at least one “natural” path that is always available to it. Egypt can naturally go to Songhai, and then Buganda. But each can also potentially access some of the civilizations from a later age, which are unlocked through gameplay choices. For example, cultivating a few horse resources in the Ancient Age could allow you to become Mongols in the Age of Exploration. Other captivating progression paths mentioned included starting as Roman, then becoming Normans, and finally English.
The transition between ages is associated with a period of crisis, and I saw the beginning of one in Antiquity: The Rising Storm. Depicting the fall of the great empires of antiquity, it required me to take a single crisis policy card (similar to Civ 6’s Dark Ages), where they were all evil, so it was a “pick your poison” moment. At the same time, up-to-date groups of independent peoples – who had completely replaced the barbarians and could be dealt with militarily or diplomatically – began to appear in my depths.
INDEPENDENT AND EVEN SANDS
But moving to a up-to-date era doesn’t just bring up-to-date mechanical bonuses. Lead designer Ed Beach used the city of London as an example of how to build cities in Civ 7. Comparing the maps of Roman London to Medieval London, there’s little of the venerable city left. And the same goes for comparing Medieval London to Modern London. New civilizations are built on the ruins of the past. And through a concept called “superstructure,” that’s exactly what we’ll be doing in the later eras of Civ 7.
Cities are still spread out over many tiles like in Civ 6, but there are now only two types of districts: urban and rural. Urban districts can hold up to two buildings at the start of Ancient, increasing over time, and can gain special meta attributes depending on what you build there. In Egypt’s case, I was able to create a unique burial district by building both of their unique civilization buildings in the same spot. So a “science district” isn’t something you build that will focus solely on science at first. It’s simply a city district that you choose to specialize in science with synergistic buildings.
Village districts are more or less what used to be called tile upgrades. Remember builders? They’re gone! Moving citizens between tiles? They’re gone too! Instead, what happens now is that when you gain a up-to-date citizen through population growth, you immediately place a up-to-date district (which will be empty if it’s urban – you still have to spend production on urban buildings) or possibly add a specialist to an existing district if you’ve unlocked the civic skills for it.
In the build I played, you could only place districts next to existing ones, which on the one hand created tighter and more believable city cores. However, I didn’t think this restriction made sense for rural districts. I’d like to be able to place them a bit further away, because the look of distant mines and farms, in my opinion, makes for a really nice scene. And as it is, you can’t really leave room for future urban expansion, so I ended up with a weird looking checkerboard of urban and rural areas that doesn’t feel particularly genuine.
Founding up-to-date cities now starts as a city that has no production queue and instead turns all of its production into gold. You can still buy things in the city directly with gold, and the cost of upgrading it to a city will be reduced by how much you’ve already built that way. I find this a nice feature since I don’t like managing 15 different production queues.
AMBER GRAIN WAVES
Overall, Civ 7 looks great so far. The art style of Civ 6 was, let’s say, controversial, and I was definitely more negative about it. After all these years, I still think Civ 5 looks better than its immediate successor. Civ 7 took a different stylized, but much more down-to-earth and real approach. The main influences on the art style were painted miniatures, model trains, dioramas, and museum displays. And everything on the map is gorgeous to look at. I really felt like I could reach down and pick up these little creatures to get a closer look.
This is the first Civ game in a while that really feels “next-gen” in a visual sense. The mountains look a little less… mountainous? More like isolated peaks than the nice, realistic ranges you’ve seen in previous games. But that’s my only complaint so far.
The leaders, continuing in the tradition of Civ 6, are portrayed with a wealth of detail and personality. We have a look at Hatshepsut of Egypt, Amina of Zazzau (the “natural” leader of Aksum), Augustus of Rome, and Ashoka of Maurya. On the diplomatic screen, both negotiating leaders are now shown interacting, adding a touch of extra drama.
Diplomacy has also been significantly reworked from Civ 6. Influence is now the primary currency produced by certain buildings, and you spend it on direct actions directed at another civ. Firaxis wants to reduce the emphasis on transactional bargaining, so whenever you do something diplomatically, it’s more of a concrete blow or handshake. Influence also has a fairly low cap and is referred to as “use it or lose it,” which encourages regular engagement in diplomacy.
One really captivating example of this was the treaty Amina kept giving me when we weren’t on the best of terms, which caused my relationship with my best friend August to deteriorate unless I spent a higher Influence rate to counteract it. This represents some diabolical ways you can play other civs against each other.
Another really cold twist with Influence is that you can spend it during war to augment your side’s war support, which works like a diplomatic tug of war. If one side has invested significantly more influence than the other, the side with less war support will suffer scaling penalties to combat effectiveness and happiness in their cities. So diplomacy is now key in the military game as well, which I love.
AD ASTRA
Even with only three hours of hands-on time, I could probably talk for six or more hours about Civilization 7. There’s so much I haven’t covered yet, from commanders who can “pack” entire armies to make transporting them around the map easier, to culture-specific perk trees and leaders. So keep an eye out for much, much more about Civilization 7 between now and launch.
