Game review: Civilization VI

Now it is here, Civilization VI! Okay, it's been out for a while, and I didn't get to make the first impression review, but let's make a proper one then.

Civilization VI is sixth part of the turn-based strategy game series Civilization. It is developed by Firaxis Games and published by 2K Games.

I played few games, and I have to say, I'm a bit disappointed. After only three games, I was starting to get bored with this game. There are some good changes made to it, and it seems more complex, at least when comparing to Civ V, but something just seems to be missing.

Pros:
- The science-kind of Civic-tree is nice, where you use culture to "research" causes, which give you these cards, that have different kinds of bonuses and perks. The new government system connected to this, in which you get to choose your government from classical republic to fascism and communism, is a neat feature.

- Districts. These are a new feature, that instead of building every building inside your city center, you choose a tile where you build a certain district, like campus or market. This is good, because it makes the cities look more realistic and good-looking. It gives the cities the feeling, that a city in reality is more than just the city center. It's also about it's surrounding towns and suburbs.

- Graphics style is a bit two-bladed sword: other like it, others don't. I like the new fog of war, where instead of the usual fog or clouds, the map actually looks like an old map. Otherwise, though, I don't like the graphics that much, the cartoony style doesn't just fit, especially the leaders, and the actual map is kind of bland: all civs look alike and the units look all the same. Diversity is missing here.

Cons:
- Pretty much everything else. The game still feels like the old Civilization V with some good features taken out. There's no diplomatic victory, no UN, no World Congress. Cultural victory is laughably easy. City-States don't seem to matter at all. After 200 turns there just doesn't seem to be anything left to do, other than press for next turn, and hope you have done the required things for your favored victory, as in the end, it's just about turns, and who started doing it first.

- Barbarians are made more aggressive and hard, and in most cases, too much. At only 10 turns the barbarians are already attacking with horsemen against your warriors and slingshots. And new barbarians seem to spawn almost like every turn. The first minutes of the game is just about fighting the barbarians and you have to focus your science and civics to military, just to get by. And sometimes the computer players are stupid enough to lose to barbarians right at the start of the game.

- Which leads to the stupid AI. They have no logic and seem to be denouncing you all the time with no apparent reason. In one game, I had good relations with one city-state. Then, a random player started a war against it, then suddenly all the other computer players denounced me for being a warmongerer - I mean, seriously?

Only good things about the AI is trading: you can actually haggle and try different deals, and get somewhere with it, unlike in Civ5. But that's about it. Talk about the civs' agendas, the Norway seems to hate me all the time, just because I can't be bothered to build few ships, and Cleopatra hate me because I have a weaker army (even though sometimes I have even greater than hers). And Peter of Russia seems to first wonder why I have no science and arts, but the next time he idolizes how much I have science and arts, and this goes back and forth the whole game. I just don't get how they coded any of these lines.

In short: I think the game feels incomplete and rushed. They just added some cool things and took out other, without ever properly testing the game. Everything sound and seems great and cool at first, but nothing really works actually. Like the warring penalties, that if you suddenly out of no reason start a war, you get penalties, and when you get things that justify a war (like finding a spy), they don't work of affect in any way.

I rate this 3/5: if you're a true Civ-fanatic, or otherwise love TBS games very much, give it a try once it's on sale. In any other case, I'd recommend to pass on this one.