Sid Meier’s Civilization VII

[Baroquen]

Well... it unlocked early (for Deluxe/Founders). I've downloaded from Steam (w/ a GMG key) and am into the main menu. About to start up a game. Back with impressions later.

[msteelers]

Oh really? Time to get the kiddo to bed!!

[The Meal]

Well... it unlocked early (for Deluxe/Founders). I've downloaded from Steam (w/ a GMG key) and am into the main menu. About to start up a game. Back with impressions later.

I just randomly noticed you were playing this, and so now I'm downloading it myself.

Cheers, mate!

[msteelers]

Is it unlocked on PS5 or PC only? It’s still showing a countdown for me.

[Torfish]

Holy cow, I'm downloading now. I was about to get some sleep and wake up at 5am to play. Sweet! Wonder if it includes the day 0 patch.

[Enough]

Wow, thanks for the heads up! Downloading....

[Lassr]

My daughter's gift cards, for my b'day, finally came through since she had to wait 3 days after friending me. Downloading the game now. Not sure when I'll actually get to play it but it will sit there and tempt me.
Ooo, I just got the finished installing sound from Steam. That green Play button is so inviting.

[Enough]

Wow, thanks for the heads up! Downloading....

And I just fat-fingered some remote IT work and managed to kill the networking on one of our VM hosts and now have to go into the office to bring it back up. Sigh....

[raydude]

Thanks for letting me know! I downloaded and started playing. First thing to do was pick a leader. I was initially going to go with Himiko, then Jose Rizal caught my eye. The title above his name (Pambansang Bayani) seemed vaguely Filipino to me, so I looked him up. Turns out he is! I think this is probably the first time I've seen a Filipino character in a video game. I've never been one to search for cultural representation, but honestly it's quite inspiring to see a leader from the country of my birth in a game, let alone a Civ game!

And then when I picked him he started speaking in Tagalog! That's so cool! Anyway, 14 turns in, but I have to restrain myself because I have too many deadlines and am too old to pull an all nighter then work the next day

[Brian]

Just wrapped up a session of Helldivers 2 with Blackhawk and though, I'll check the thread to see if there are any updates.

Downloading now.

[Exodor]

I caved. I wasn't going to pre-order or get one of the upgraded versions.

I just spent ~45 minutes playing the Founder's edition.


I've played every Civ and I'm still not sure exactly what I'm doing. I'm having fun though!

[Lassr]

I'm old. No staying up to 4AM to play like the golden days. Got 30 minutes into the game. Nothing off putting yet. But hard week of work and my eyes are getting heavy...

[Baroquen]

Ok, so I'm 90 turns into my first try at the game, and I'm 50% through the first age. I picked Xerxes as my first ruler, mainly because I wanted to get a militaristic ruler and not have to think too much strategy as I get my feet wet.

Quick observations:

1) Despite all the relatively dramatic changes, to me, it still feels like a Civ game. I was a little worried about that, and the graphics threw me off for the first few dozen or so turns (but I might have spawned in a dense part of the world; don't know). Anyway, after a while, it felt familiar and I'm happy about that.

2) I thought I would miss builders, (as I enjoy that mechanic previous Civs) but I really don't. The "Grow City" action let's you expand your cities with the actions builders would typically undertake. So I don't feel any loss of options; just streamlined? Which was probably the intent?

3) I reserve judgement on the Ages gameplay. Not really sure how it all works, and I'll know more once I transition over to the second age.

4) After relatively calm rounds of Civ VI recently, this first game of VII is tense. Two of my three neighbors declared war on me (Hatshepsut & Napoleon; Ben Franklin ain't fond of me either). I don't know if it's agressive AI, or my gameplay set them off based on their agenda, or if it's leader-related. Just kind of a shock to be put on the defensive with a two front war early in the antiquity age.

5) That said, once war was declared, I beat back Hatshepsut's army commander and troops easily. Then dropped south to easily take one of Napoleon's cities. Both leaders have asked for peace already, but I'm pushing on with the war to see where it gets me.

6) Oh - army stacks are back. Kind of. You get Army commanders which act like Great Generals from Civ VI. Support units mainly. But they can vacuum up troops around them and carry them all together around the map. This helps slower troops like siege units keep up with the rest. Then, when you're ready to fight, you 'deploy' the army to adjacent spots (all in one click) and it's game on. I don't hate the mechanic, though I don't think I'm using it efficiently yet.

7) One freeze/crash at turn 10. It was auto-saving I think, and just never came out of it. No freezes since. Also, the game loads a lot quicker than Civ 6 does.

8) In terms of the meta progression (Challenges, and such), I did customize my banner and title and such which was fun, but pointless. As I think the only people who see that are multiplayer people. And that's not really on my to-do list. I cleared a lot of the Tutorial challenges already, but haven't received anything for it? I suspect that stuff will be handled at the end of each game? I'm intrigued, but verdict is still out.

I'm taking a break for a bit, but will probably play some more before sleep and maybe knock out the first age? Or at least resolve the current wars before I get bogged down too much. Overall - happy so far, but I expected to be. Don't let me tentatively positive experience influence your (probably stronger) feelings about what you've read or watched in game. I went in blind (and a little anxious) and so far don't hate it. But still plenty of opportunity to be disappointed later.

[Unagi]

I'm only on tun 24. I started my first game as Confucius with the Han, last night - but then was called to the Hospital to help my mom with some issues she is having.

A couple turns in, my scout bumps into a Rome scout (leader: the Baroque Friedrich) - and we make friendly.

I'm enjoying myself so far. The game is indeed massively 'streamlined' - and I'm okay with it, but it does feel like it was done to support consoles.

While I don't really care for that 'streamline' change - the rest of the game also has clearly taken a big step away from the other Civ's with the approach to Ages, City Growth and development, etc - and I suppose kudos to the devs for taking these risks.

Anyhow - from out of nowhere - Friedrich denounces me. We hadn't even seen each other once since that first meeting, so I'm not sure what I did. edit: It would appear he took offense to me being friendly to a Mauryan scout (leader: Tecumseh)
and while I've never actually heard of him (I don't think) - my goodness he has the best name for a Special Ability: Nicaakiyakoolaakwe


I was actually a little disappointed by this Denouncement from Friedrich because that felt like almost every other Civ game, and I had kinda wished that maybe Diplomacy would feel a little more like diplomacy in this iteration, but I (way too early) am guessing it's still like it always was.

So, I'm building an Army around a general - and I'm going to see if I can take over a nearby Independent Village (I think I may get clocked). I've still not made my first settler.


I was surprised to see one of the natural resources to be Kaopectate.

The UI isn't a nightmare - but I will say it really puts a spotlight on how amazingly well done Civ 6's UI was - and they have not re-achieved that.

I'm frustrated by how much I'm (not) allowed to zoom out on the main screen. That seems really limiting (perhaps it will change as I have more map)


edit: now I'm starting to wonder if I should not attack this City State, and instead spend a boatload of Influence to befriend them.



(also, pro-tip: you can 'right-click' on a lot of the subscreens to back out of them. You don't need to go find the Close button and click it; one of Mr.Potatoe's complaints)

[YellowKing]

I folded like a wet blanket and grabbed the Deluxe version. Fanatical had it for 12% off which is the only discount I've seen.

What pushed me over the edge is that my wife and kids are all sick with colds, so there's an excellent chance I'll be stuck at home all weekend. I knew there was zero chance I'd be able to watch everyone else play while I'm sitting here with a ton of free time. Installing now.

[hepcat]

I was going to pick it up, but I'm seeing primarily "it's mediocre" to "it sucks!" reviews for it so far. I think I'll wait to see how it plays out in reviews after some more players have given it a chance.

[Max Peck]

The early Steam user reviews are on the negative side. I'm seeing complaints about the UI, bare bones features, lack of polish (weird for a Firaxis game), etc. Even positive reviews are noting that the UI is not great. It's notable that these are the players who were sufficiently enthusiastic about the franchise to pony up for the advanced access.

I installed it last night but haven't had time to check it out for myself yet.

[Unagi]

The immature UI and the lack of polish are undeniable and they are also the most head-scratching complaints for a Firaxis Civ game.

[Exodor]

I'm still early in my first game and making lots of mistakes but it seems you can't occupy and take control of independent states with military force?

I had a pesky one just south of my starting position that was hostile and crapping out units. I fought through those and moved onto the city tile and...nothing? The only option I see is to "disperse" it which just makes it disappear. I thought independent states were the CIV7 version of city states but are they just barbarian camps?

I do have the option to spend influence to befriend them which is part of what led me to believe they were basically city states.

[Unagi]

I'm still early in my first game and making lots of mistakes but it seems you can't occupy and take control of independent states with military force?

lol - well that's good to learn before I march my army over there!
thank you.

I'm confused on this point too. When they are marked as Hostile and pump out units, I thought I could claim them as one of my settlements.

I just need to go back and keep playing and deal with the learning curve.

[Unagi]

Also, I think I'm being forced (kinda) to Denounce Friedrich. I just got an event that was "because of Tecumseh's agenda" (or something to that effect) - and it opened up the screen I saw before where it had just me and Friedrich on the screen and the option title was:

DENOUNCE
Led with a block of text that said "Friedrich, Baroque" Decrease your Relationship with the other leader

Two options are:
1) Accept: Your relationship will decrease by 60 over 10 turns (free)
2) Reject: Cancel the Diplomatic Action (costs 120 Influence)

I thought, the first time I got a message like this earlier, that it was Friedrich denouncing me.

But now I'm thinking that it was actually a diplomatic action put upon me by Tecumseh - forcing (asking) me to denounce Friedrich. And since I didn't have 120 influence back then, I had to Accept.



It's expensive to reject that. But I have no reason to start denouncing Friedrich - hmm. Not sure I'm following this correctly.

The old penalty I have that still in effect with Friedrich says "Sanctioned another Civilization".

Honestly, this is really unclear. I had and still have no intentions or understanding of what the heck transpired here.

So, on my current screen - I pay the 120 influence to Reject Denouncing Friedrich... and the Friedrich character on the screen scoffs and rolls his eyes.
Honestly WTF.

[Max Peck]

In celebration of the release of Civ7, Epic is giving away a free copy of Humankind this week.

[msteelers]

I got a few hours in on the PS5 this morning. In typical Civ fashion I have restarted already after my first game started to all go to hell. I ended up dropping down to the lowest difficulty as I really need to just learn the game and go through the motions.

The UI on consoles is ok, but not intuitive. I keep hitting the wrong buttons, and at least once it caused me to move my slinger instead of take a shot at the enemy.

[Unagi]

Also, just an example of the lack of polish:



The tip tells you that they "occupy an entire tile in a Settlement" - twice - in a 2 sentence paragraph.

And for some reason the font they use in the Tutorial tips is completely janky - as seen(click to embiggen). Some letters ride high and others are set low. Very weird.

[infinitelurker]

In celebration of the release of Civ7, Epic is giving away a free copy of Humankind this week.

Thanks for the heads-up on this - just got it on Epic, and removed it from my Steam wishlist, so I don't mistakenly buy it in a future sale like some other games I got on Epic

[The Meal]

There’s a Reddit post about one of the civilization’s musical scores having an open mic during the recording and the recording editor’s voice and throat clearing and keyboard clacking being obvious in the track.

Polish is not at peak levels here.

I’m 50% through my first age and enjoying things well enough, but am spending a lot of time confused as to how things work.

[Exodor]

One of the first things I learned is that rivers are now navigable and the ranged ship created by hostile independent states can one-shot unwary slingers.

Those independent settlements are also a lot more aggressive. I made the mistake of creating a new settlement near a hostile one without any units to protect it. In Civ6 I did this all the time and barbarians would just kind of wander randomly around it. In Civ7 the nearby settlement immediately sent units over to take it.

Jerks.

[YellowKing]

I played for about 2.5 hours (around 100 turns) this morning. Here are my impressions (take with a grain of salt as I'm a Civ newbie who just recently learned how to play Civ 6 and has little or no experience with previous iterations).

- First off, I'm having a lot of fun with it. Nothing about it so far has impacted the addictive quality of the formula.

- The lack of Builders doesn't bother me at all, I found it a bit annoying in Civ 6 to have to interrupt my production constantly to churn out another limited use builder to make improvements. Simply being able to make improvements when it's time to grow my city just as if I was choosing a new tech or a new production is great. I'm still not 100% clear on how towns work, but overall I like how city improvements work more than I did in Civ 6.

- I have a bit of mixed feeling on the Commanders, but I think it's primarily because I don't fully know how to use them effectively yet. I do like being able to stack units and move them across the map quickly. And they seem to be able to give orders to have units in range simultaneously attack with a combat bonus, which is cool. I haven't quite figured out if that replaces their individual attack or acts as a bonus attack. However, I'm quite certain I'm not using them to their full potential.

- As far as the UI goes, I don't love it but nor do I hate it. For me as a n00b it kind of helps to not have so many menus and options to figure out. On the other hand, I can see why people would think it a bit sterile and dumbed down.

- I haven't crossed into the next age yet so I don't know how that works.

- I do really like the "paths" (I don't know what they're called) that keep you focused on a particular victory. As an inexperienced player in Civ 6, I often didn't really know how to achieve a "cultural victory" or "science victory" so I was just kind of flailing around. At least here I have concrete objectives I can work towards during each age, and that has been a huge positive for me. I don't know how veteran players feel about it, but for me it makes the game MUCH more accessible.

- I'm playing on the lowest difficulty, and I've had MUCH more interaction with other Civs than I ever did in Civ 6. I'm constantly fielding diplomatic offers, having to spend influence, etc. In Civ 6 I'd go 100 turns without really interacting with another civ at all, so I was surprised to be so immediately caught up in drama right out of the gate. I even had another nation attack me early, which I never had them do in Civ 6 on the lowest difficulty setting. I do like this, as it opens up an aspect of the game that I previously never really deal with because I was playing on a low difficulty and didn't know what I was doing.

- I haven't run into any major glitches or polish issues, though at one point all my Commanders completely disappeared and didn't come back for several turns. I'm not sure if that was a glitch, or me just not understanding something I did.

- I too, was confused about not being able to conquer an independent state. I didn't see the "disperse" option though so I'll do that next time.

Overall it feels like a game that is trying to make Civilization more accessible. For me, that's a positive. I can see how that might be a turn-off for experienced players, which is maybe why we're getting mixed reviews.

One of the first things I learned is that rivers are now navigable and the ranged ship created by hostile independent states can one-shot unwary slingers.

I learned the hard way that units on a river can't attack (as they're on a boat), so rivers act as a seriously effective defense mechanism. I had to go to war with Harriet Tubman due to an alliance I had with another civ, and both of her towns were strategically placed behind rivers which made conquering her a total bitch.

[Exodor]

I had to go to war with Harriet Tubman

Congrats on writing a sentence that I've never read before.

One annoyance so far is that save games seem to save the game state at the start of the turn. Every time I've loaded back into the game I've had to redo some moves and I couldn't figure out why at first.

[Baroquen]

I haven't really figured out diplomacy yet either, but it seems much more transactional with the influence points (or whatever they're called). In Civ 6, I'd talk to the other leaders every once in awhile, but I have to figure out how to manage this better. A couple times, I've piled up points and the Tutorial is reminding me to spend them. I like the increased options on the diplomacy screens, but I know I'm not using it effectively.

I don't like the journey towards 'Crisis' that seems to be baked in. I don't know if that's just the endgame for each Age and I'll get better at managing the transition, or what. But I got hit with those negative penalties and it was definitely a surprise. Sometime I definitely need to plan for next time.

[Exodor]

I found this guide on commanders that taught me a lot:

https://www.thegamer.com/civilization-7 ... ers-guide/

Army Commanders have special abilities that allow you to either Focus Fire with the ranged units within the command radius, or lead a Coordinated attack with your Infantry and Cavalry units. This provides a flat +2 combat strength for units when using this ability

One of the most powerful functions of Army Commanders is the Reinforce ability. This allows you to quickly transport units to an Army Commander even if they are many tiles away. A unit just needs to be further than six tiles from the Commander and have full movement speed. The speed at which units appear in your Army Commander's stack depends on Recovery Time - this is determined by distance to the commander and whether you have any Recovery Time promotions.

Very curious about that reinforce ability - I love the idea of not having to spend time moving units up to the front when I'm fighting on the other side of the world.

[Unagi]

I learned the hard way that units on a river can't attack (as they're on a boat), so rivers act as a seriously effective defense mechanism.

You probably know, but - there are 'rivers', and then there are (now) 'navigable rivers' as well - which are treated like a 'coastal' tile (which sounds like the river you were talking about).

There should still be a bonus defending behind a river, but I've not checked the numbers myself.

[Unagi]

Very curious about that reinforce ability - I love the idea of not having to spend time moving units up to the front when I'm fighting on the other side of the world.

Double edged sword too. I wonder how it will feel when the enemy commander seems to just have endless reinforcements at his disposal.

[Max Peck]

This fucking game knows how to make a good first impression. The first time I launch it, it immediately crashes to the desktop. The second time I launch it, it does actually run, plays a very nice cut scene, then immediately demands that I sign up for yet another pointless fucking data harvesting account (with the publisher, 2K) if I want to play my fucking $166.99+tax game as Napoleon fucking Bonaparte.

Eat a bag of dicks, Firaxis!

[jztemple2]

A Message From Firaxis Games

Hey everyone! We're officially in Advanced Access, and from the entire Firaxis studio, we just wanted to take a moment to say... thank you! Seriously.

The studio has just released a message that I hope you all will take a look at.

But, I also wanted to take the time to summarize some major highlights and notes from your community team:

We’re actively listening to your feedback.

Over the last few days, the team has been poring over your feedback, including our most recent Steam Reviews during the Advanced Access period. As stewards of the Civilization franchise, we hold ourselves to a high standard and are striving to create the best game possible. Civ really would not have come this far without you, and your opinions matter so much to us!

In response to your feedback, we’ve identified three key areas that we’re prioritizing. We will share a development roadmap as soon as we can, in the meanwhile, our focus is on the following:

This is one of the new features that the devs will be adding... Interesting

Allowing you to pick your starting and ending Age to allow for single or double Age games

[Kraken]

In celebration of the release of Civ7, Epic is giving away a free copy of Humankind this week.

Thanks for the heads-up on this - just got it on Epic, and removed it from my Steam wishlist, so I don't mistakenly buy it in a future sale like some other games I got on Epic

Yeah, thanks. It was a little dicey because I had a forgotten Epic account with a now-invalid email address, but I finally sorted that out and, after overcoming some rigamarole with their launcher, it's finally downloading. I think.

Based on the feedback I've seen so far I'm inclined to hold off on Civ7 for a while. Humankind might scratch that itch in the meantime.

[YellowKing]

I finally advanced to the Exploration Age, after kicking Harriet Tubman's ass (don't start none, there won't be none, Harriet.)

Didn't mind the age transition at all, and in fact I think I'm really going to like it. Your units get wiped if they can't fit with a Commander, so you do have to plan ahead just a bit. However I liked having a fresh start. Your completed path goals count towards points to spend on your attributes, so you feel leveled up going into the next Age and not like you're starting from scratch.

In fact, I'm sort of bogged down now because I'm stuck on a continent with two other friendly nations that I don't want to anger. I've got mad trading going with both of them, so I'm ultra-wealthy and have 7 cities to their 3 or 4. Combine that with almost every city heavily fortified and a large standing army, and there's little to no chance I have to worry about them going rogue on me.

The next path goal, however, is to establish a settlement in a distant land (across the ocean), and that's easier said than done. Your boats take damage when crossing deep water (don't remember that from Civ 6), so it's a bit of a pain to explore. I've been spinning my wheels trying to get a settler over somewhere to find a place to found a new town.

One thing I really like about the age transition is that I don't feel super locked in on my victory condition. I started out going a military conquest route, but now that I've got a well-established continent I'm starting to see other potential avenues. I'm sure in previous iterations you could change your victory strategy mid-stream, but it feels like with each Age being its own mini-session in Civ7, it might be more viable than in previous iterations. I'll have to let the veterans weigh in on that.

Still having a lot of fun with it, but I think in my case I think not being a Civ veteran is probably an asset. I'm just not familiar enough with previous versions to know what's "worse" in this version. To me it's just as fun as Civ6, with a lot of features I like better.

[Kraken]

Can one still choose Epic and Marathon pacing, or is it one-time-fits-all?

[msteelers]

I’m into the exploration age. Man, the crisis at the end of the first age was tough even on the easiest difficulty. The three other starting civs declared war on me within a few turns. Then barbarians started spawning everywhere, and the crisis penalties were really harsh. At one point I was losing 50 gold per turn.

I still managed to knock out two of the civs, and then the last one early in the exploration age. Now it’s a bit boring as I am all alone on the starting continent. I’m exploring the ocean but all I’ve found are tiny islands. I’m having trouble finding places to expand.

[msteelers]

Can one still choose Epic and Marathon pacing, or is it one-time-fits-all?

I think so. I didn’t mess with settings much yet.