Civilization 7 is in development

[TheArchduke]

I think the age system could have been interesting, but CIV VII really dips deep into the worst sins of the franchise.

- tiles feel irrelevant like in CIV V, techs mitigate this, but the terrain feels absolutely useless, unlike cows or gold like in CIV IV for instance. Ressources matter but only some of them.
- buildings feel less impactful then in CIV VI or CIV IV. There are no great person points to get, so it is mostly like Humankind, get more hammers to get more hammers.
- CIV VII really dips hard into CIV V happiness restriction but adds a cherry on top and tells you how many settlements you are supposed to get. Why establish a town system to reduce micromanagment when you have only 4-5 anyway. I know it is a soft limit, but they present it like a hard limit.
- The UI is atrocious
- I dislike the leaders assortment a bit. I really thought CIV V was the best here with Iroquis and others and CIV VI dropped the ball with balance but had likeable leaders. Machiavelli as a leader? Really? Harriet, for an european audience?
- I do actually like the idea of the age system, but while Humankind tells you to gather stars, in CIV IT DOES NOT MATTER. You get 1-2 more traits to choose from if you do good. Yay.
- And do not get me started on exploits. I look at you superscout. How am I supposed not to use you?

I could go on.
Maybe it is my age and I am finally one of the guys, in the past everything was better, like I often felt here with CIV V or CIV VI.

But CIV VII really is a bad release in the franchise.
Do not buy it, I regret it.

[haphazard1]

Apparently patch 1.1 has been released. Some fixes plus new content for those who paid extra. Carthage, England, and (another bizarro world choice) Ada Lovelace. The summary notes from the devs' road map seem to indicate that they realize the final era victory conditions needed a rework, particularly cultural.

Thoughts?

[MJW (ya that one)]

An influx of bad ratings has dropped Civ7's Steam rating below 50%. 

I think it will go back up someday due to casual player's lower standards inflating the rating. But it's the principal that counts!

[Sullla]

What's more concerning is that Civ7 has fallen below Civ6 in terms of active players on Steam. And it's not just a little bit lower either, Civ7 is down around HALF of the active players on Civ6 (27k against 55k as I type this). That should not be happening for a game that's been out just over a month as compared with its predecessor that came out nine years ago! Take-Two was obviously operating under the belief that it wouldn't matter how unfinished the release version of the game might be, everyone would just buy it anyway and keep buying downloadable content for the next decade. I think they may have screwed this one up very, very badly with their shortsightedness.

[T-hawk]

I wouldn't condemn 7 for that just yet. Civ 6 took a fair while (several months) to pass 5 for active players on Steam. It just takes time for everyone to buy it, particularly the discount addicts who wait for sales and bundles instead of paying full price. I think they'll still figure out how to fix and market 7 well enough and 6 will fade like 5 did compared to 6.

[Krill]

T-Hawk, I don't read Sulllas' post as a condemnation of 7 as a game, but a condemnation of T2 business practice. I wholeheartedly agree of the condemnation of the drip fed, nickel and dining experience and I hope it burns in hell.

[yuris125]

Another telling number is that Civ7 so far did not break the peak concurrent number of players of even Civ5 (per SteamDB, Civ5: 91363, Civ6: 162657, Civ7: 84558)

Now, we have to keep in mind that Civ7 was a multi-platform release, and apparently had strong sales on PS5. So it's hard to judge the actual number of players

Nothing to add regarding sales practices (which continued from the tail end of Civ6) - they were the reason I didn't buy Civ7 on release, and so far my concerns only increased. Releasing a $30 DLC, with another due to come out at the end of this month, before fixing even the most glaring issues with the game, really isn't a good look. Even if I understand that they promised specific dates for the first DLC when they sold the Founders edition for $100, so delaying them would've been just as bad of a look

[sunrise089]

Sales model sucks.

Do you guys have a sense of whether the Steam ratings are low due to the rushed release, the game mechanics, or both? As T-Hawk said way up-thread, lots of casuals just want to press End Turn and watch cool stuff happen, and I wonder if the Age Reset feature disrupts that enough to genuinely hurt even the mainstream perception.

[yuris125]

I'd say both. Plenty of comments about things which can be attributed to rushed release (bad UI, lack of QoL, lack of larger map sizes, etc. - things they have on the roadmap to be addressed, but which really should've been in the game on release). But also a fair amount of comments that because of the ages system, the game doesn't feel like one where you can devise and execute your own strategy, more like a set of scenarios where you're given objectives to complete in each age, and it gets repetitive quickly

[TheArchduke]

I do not think CIV 7 is here to stay.

From my small but dedicated strategic gaming group(about 15 people) everyone has already stopped playing it.

This is not a good sign. They badly screwed up this one.