Civilization and similar games

Played Civ 4 and 5 to death, but they lost me after the big changes to Civ 6.

Hours played:
Civ 5: 235
Civ 6: 75

I gather they fixed the issues and obviously supported the game long term, but I'm still weary of buying a game, then having to wait for a fix.

I'm pretty much the same - countless hours lost to IV and V but never got into VI for some reason.

Funnily enough I'm giving Civ VI a go this weekend with a few mates - only a tenner on CD Keys for the full fat package with all DLCs.

I think I’ve downloaded Civ 6 on about 3 different platforms and never given it a proper go! I think I tried once and it seemed quite complicated without much tutorial

I much preferred games like Pharaoh.

I've never played a Civ game ever. I got Civ 6 free from Epic installed but it all seemed a bit overwhelming and I was a bit confused that there isn't a campaign as such. What should I be doing?

I started with Civ 5 and was introduced to it by some friends. I'm definitely not a major Civ head, so perhaps my experience is a bit better for beginners rather than hearing from a hardcore Civver. I've played Civ 6 most and tbh it seems very similar to 5 to me, which probably illustrates I'm a heretic of some sorts.

Anyway, I'd say, watch a very high level brief YouTube video tutorial to get at surface level appreciation of the paths to victory and structure of the game, etc.

Then tbh, I would just start a game and begin pursuing a science strategy. That's the most intuitive/easy path imo. Build anything which gets you Blue (science) rewards. Perhaps bung into Orange (production) things too which will accelerate your path through the science tree.

A lot of stuff like Religion and Diplomacy probably won't seem like it makes much sense, which is fine at your stage. If the just one more turn addiction gets it's hooks in and you finish a game, you'll likely find you want to play another - then I'd say pursue Culture next. Then some of the systems you ignored on the first run will begin to make more sense. Third run, maybe Diplomacy path. Then you'll start to see how the paths interweave and hopefully get even more excited to try different approaches.

Religious path is just plain boring though. God I hope that's scrapped or overhauled for VII.

I'd also say don't worry too much about which leader you go for in the beginning. They all tweak the game in some way, but you won't understand enough of the game to realise how they can be truly powerful. Choosing a diplomatic leader doesn't preclude you from going all out war, for instance. But if you had a warlord, in a serious business game, it might get you 5/10 turns or whatever ahead of a non-smashy leader.

Yeah, I think set up your own game with say 5 other CPU players, some city states and a 'normal' map time like Continents where you have good size land masses and decent amount of water. Set the difficult fairly low so you have time to noodle about without fear of being attacked too readily. Enjoy.

I've definitely played every one since 2 (don't think I played the first) and the ones that grabbed me the most have been IV and VI. I bounced off V pretty hard for some reason.

I'm not sure what everyone's issue with VI is? I think it's either the AI, which I don't care about (I'm not good enough to worry about higher difficulties; I'm very mid-range and just want to have a chill experience that I ultimately win - which, tbh, is what I want out of every single game now I think about it), or else it's the "cartoony" visuals, which I thought were such a vast improvement over the drab and hard-to-work-out-what-you're-looking-at graphics of Civ V that I can't take that criticism seriously.

VII, visually, looks like a good compromise between V & VI because it's still very colourful but I guess it's more "realistic". One thing that's a vast step back, so far, is the leaders though; the thick, chunky designs in VI were very dramatic and allowed a lot more "acting", making them feel very characterful. These guys look like the humans in Shrek.

No real Civ Head either (played 4 quite a bit and hen dabbled with 5 and 6, playing a couple of games of it), so this could just be more ill informed opinion. I wouldn't agree pure science is the best approach for a first game though. Just go with military and paint the map red. You will always have to have some military units and AI will declare war on you, no matter how friendly you try to be with them, so you are going to need to be able to win some wars. If you are building up enough military to survive wars, you might as well build an army that can go-a-conquering.

Science will be required to keep your military up to date, but I've always found it not very hard to do this without trying too hard.

Going for a culture win (or religion) always feels like you are just hobbling yourself and going to get destroyed by an inevitable war. It is an issue I always have Civ and Civ-likes, as I go in wanting to be a generally peaceful nation, but it always feels like you are forced to be militaristic.

Or I could just be shit.

General advice for Jambo though, is to treat it like a very, very long board game. There often are scenarios you can play, but it isn't the way the game is meant to be played (and I think they are normally more like challenges for people that know what they are doing). Also, don't be worried about just stopping mid-game and starting over. Even if you are winning, end game is often not hugely interesting. Mid-game is where the meat of a Civ game lies and none of them have really resolved the issue of the ending just being a matter of clearing things up for dozens and dozens of turns.

As for Civ 7, it is weird that they seem to be adopting ideas from Humankind. I didn't mind the idea of evolving your culture with other cultures as you play, although it wasn't hugely successfully executed in Humankind. So, I'm willing to see how they go about it. Only having three different ages should be less intrusive than the seven or so times you do it in Humankind. It does feel a bit of the antithesis of Civ games of past though, where the leaders and their personalities were such a focus.

Not exactly the same as Civ, but similar enough, I highly recommend Age of Wonders 4 and Planetfall. Great games for a slightly more conquest-focused 4x experience.

Don't think I've spent much time with Civ but Alpha Centauri got its hooks in me big time, would love a sequel.

I've loved all the Civ games (except Beyond Earth), I suspect whatever the new changes are you'll just eventually get used to it and it'll become the norm. I do hope they actually include the environmental stuff in the base game this time.

I had a brief 45 or so minutes with it and I'm really, really intrigued. Seems like it is going to be mixing a Civ game with an Anno style supply chain management game. Sounds like it gets very complex as go along, but could be rewarding if they have got it right.

Not experienced much from what I've played, but it does sound as if the diplomacy side is really bare bones, which is a big shame. Think I've also heard some mixed things about combat. The management side looks great though.

Probably going to focus on Frostpunk 2 for my management itch first, but looking forward to getting stuck into Ara.