Civilization VI:
Time to beat: 41 Hours
1) A Settler Difficulty Game as Gorgo
of Greece with five opponents ending in a Culture Victory
2) A Chieftain Difficulty Game as
Trajan of Rome with seven opponents ending in a Domination Victory
3) A Warlord Difficulty Game as Peter
of Russia with nine opponents ending in a Religious Victory
and
4) A Prince Difficulty Game as
Catherine of France with eleven opponents ending in a Science Victory
(Victories 1-3 were incredibly easy.
My victory in game 4 was never contested, but I couldn't conquer the
entire map as I did in the first three).
I remember first playing the
Civilization series in Jr. High School with a close friend.
Since then I've owned, and played every Civ game. I owned
Civilization III on a disc (still have it), and played
it for hundreds of hours, though pre-Steam, so there is no record of
the time spent. I probably played Civ IV a bit less
(sixty hours on Steam, but I played this on a disc as well). In the
nine years since I purchased V, I played 140 hours, a
combination of games with my brother and solo adventures.
Civilization V was a step back for the series, except
for the change in stacking limits. Previous Civ games allowed
the player to stack an unlimited number of units per hex space. The
only limit on a nation's army was its economy. The limitless stacks
led to massive escalations of force. Civilization V
destroyed stacks with one new rule: each space could only contain one
military unit. People who didn't play Civilization prior to V
will never realize how phenomenally this altered the series. In
spite of the better mechanics of III and IV, the elimination of
stacking rendered them archaic, unplayable even. Civilization
VI crucially retains the stack limit.
During the Summer Sale, Epic Games
released Civilization VI for free, presumably with the
hope that the lucky consumer would repay the favor by purchasing one
or both of the expansions. I didn't fall for their ploy (I bought
Ashen instead), so this review is about the vanilla version.
Over the course of three articles the topics will include: Expansion,
Diplomacy, Districts, Visual Effects, Technology and Policy,
Happiness and Luxuries, Trade, Workers, Options, Victory, Endings,
the Civilopedia, and Difficulty.
Each game begins with a single Settler
(and a warrior), and it's best to begin with the building of a
civilization, expansion. Every Civilization game limited
expansion in one way or another. Civ III mired cities
farther from the capital in corruption and waste. In Civ IV
every additional city added additional maintenance costs. Civ
V implemented a global happiness for each civilization,
compelling the player to remain under a certain population.
Civilization VI isn't any different. The developer
uses a number of mechanics to slow the player's spread.
The first is the cost of each Settler.
Civilizations use Settlers to expand by building cities. Each
additional Settler costs more than the previous one. Even in a short
time Settlers become costly, making it difficult for new cities on
the borders to build them. Instead, the player is compelled to build
Settlers in their center core cities, where they'd rather be
constructing Wonders or other advanced buildings.
Builders, previously called workers,
received significant changes to limit their effectiveness (but also
reduce clutter) significant change. In other Civilization
games workers improved the terrain near cities, with farms and mines,
while removing marshes and jungles. They worked as long as the
player wanted, but unless the player manually deleted them they
tended to clog up the map by the end of the game. Workers could be
automated eventually turning every tile into an improved road (later
a railroad). In Civ VI workers only build three improvements
before disappearing, which eliminates the clutter. They build all
improvements in a single turn. Builders also construct the
improvements in the ocean as well, thankfully replacing Civ
V's Work Boats. The most ingenious change eliminated the
construction of roads for the builders' repertoire. Instead traders
build roads (Military engineers do as well).
Trade networks have existed in
Civilization since III. They represented the
connection between cities, allowing the sharing of strategic and
luxury resources. Cities connected by roads, harbors, and airports
were part of the network. In Civ VI every city is part
of the Trade Network, and cities build Traders. Traders build a
trade route from the city they start in, to a destination city chosen
by the player. Traders are reminiscent of the Great Merchants in
Civilization VI in
this way. Trade routes, once established, provide a temporary
boost in food, production, gold, culture, science, and/or food,
depending on the status of the connecting cities. The bond can also
exert religious pressure. But the single biggest early game use of
Traders is the creation of roads. Each Trader, as they travel to
their destination, builds a road. Since this feature is so
important, it's frustrating that placing a new trade route is so
difficult. When looking at trade routes, the map shows a multitude
of white lines stretching from the starting city to all possible
final destinations. These white lines completely cover existing
roads, making it impossible to see if the trader will construct one.
For anyone seeking to build new roads this is a serious impediment.
Transportation is essential, and
Civilization VI is the first to eliminate the upgrade to roads;
railroads. Each of the four eras features its own road type. Roads
improve automatically from age to age, allowing faster movement, but
none are as efficient as the railroads of II, III, and
IV. The rails of II and III were absurd; a
units moved an unlimited distance as long as it traveled entirely on
a railroad. Civilization IV curtailed the abuse
slightly, by allowing units to move ten spaces along a railroad for
every one unit of movement. Civilization V at least
included railroads, though they provided only minor movement bonuses.
Civilization VI's slow travel speed, and a lack of
early roads, further limits the expansion of the player, both in the
beginning and end of the game.
Another change limiting expansion is
the curtailment of the luxury system. Every Civilization game
included some measure of happiness. Unhappy citizens fomented
revolution, or at least sabotaged the production of buildings,
soldiers, and wonders. In Civilization II, III,
and IV happiness was local. Each city had its own measure of
happiness, which could lead to revolt if it was allowed to
deteriorate. Civilization V made happiness global for
a civilization, but thankfully Civ VI reverted to the prior system.
There are a number of methods to increase happiness, and one of them
is collecting luxury resources.
In previous versions of Civ, all
cities connected to the trade network shared luxury resources
equally. Happiness increased by one in every city for each each
unique luxury owned by the nation. Civ VI reduces the
effectiveness of luxury resources by allowing each unique luxury to
only benefit four (or five, or six) cities. For example, pearls are
a luxury resource. Owning one boosts the happiness of four cities.
Owning a second pearl adds no benefit (though it can be traded to
another civilization). Though luxuries are less effective, happiness
doesn't seem as critical as previous Civilization games. Over
four games not a single city revolted. According to the Civilization
Fandom Wiki and CivFanatics discontent doesn't increase at higher
difficulties. In all Civilization versions the nation starts
with a reserve of happiness. But in I through V that
reserve decreased with an increase in difficulty. In Civilization
VI, regardless of difficulty, the player starts with the same
number of happy citizens. A final problem with luxuries is ease of
use. There was no task bar, no obvious method of seeing what what
luxuries the player already controls.
One would assume the information
contained here about happiness, movement along roads, luxuries,
trade, workers, and settlers, comes from within the game itself, but
these naive people would be wrong. Civilization has always
included a Civilopedia; an encyclopedia of game mechanics. But
though it acceptably describes happiness and builders, it barely
explains movement. The Civilopedia has no page for luxury resources,
only one for resources in general. It includes no examples of
resources, no pictures, and no links to other related articles. The
resource on trader only describes them “makes trade routes,” and
creates roads. Civilization VI doesn't describe what
trade routes do, nor does it include a page for them. On the Settler
page it includes the introductory cost, but fails to mention the
increasing cost. And there is not a single reference to difficulty
or how each difficulty level is different from another. Of course
there are many more omissions and errors, but the point is, it's a
useless resource. It has insufficient descriptions, a lack of links,
and missing articles. For anyone hoping to play the game, the
internet is the only resource.
As I've been writing this article, I've
found it humorous to read Shamus
Young's recent review of Civilization VI. He levels the opposite
criticism. He critiques the developers for making
it difficult to win by playing tall, that is, playing with four
to six well developed cities. My thesis isn't that the game
prohibits many cities, but that at some point additional cities are a
net loss. Yet, I also recognize that this was to some extent true of
all past Civ games. I actually agree with Shamus that the new
districts (future article), weakens the effectiveness of massive
cities. But as someone who always builds as a few dozen cities
cities as possible, I'm not compelled to write an article defending
the build tall strategy.
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