Computer opponents in 4X are usually pretty dumb. When a game like Civilization tries to make them think and act like humans, they re about as convincing as two kids in a big coat trying to pass as Queen Victoria. Civ 6 has avoided this problem by instead focusing on making each AI leader an interesting challenge for a human player to unravel using clever systems like Agendas and the new casus belli civics, creating the most intricate and enjoyable diplomatic climate we ve ever been treated to in single-player Civ.
I talked about how game-changing AI agendas were in my discussion with Tom about the biggest new features, but it bears repeating. In previous Civ games, AI leaders were programmed to act like a friend playing with you on LAN. They d play to win, entertain mutually beneficial alliances, and often backstab you out of nowhere if they felt it would help their chances of victory.
China gets jealous when another civ builds a wonder, so I have to weigh whether the science bonus from the Great Library would be worth the economic cost of a war against them.
When a real player declares a surprise war on you and plunges the world into chaos, it creates an entertaining rivalry. But when a computer player does it, it usually seems unfair especially if you feel like you did everything right to make those duplicitous lines of code like you. We understand people being jerks and betraying us. But we understand pre-coded systems have to have rules. And we want to feel like we have the agency to play by those rules and achieve a desired outcome.
AI agendas fix this by creating a more comprehensible web of relationships with exposed knobs and levers. At the same time, it avoids the trap of making it really easy to stay best buds with everyone forever. China gets jealous when another civ builds a wonder, so I have to weigh whether the science bonus from the Great Library would be worth the economic cost of a war against them. When Germany's Barbarossa calls "dibs" on every city state, I know immediately that we re going to become foes even if we re not in competition for land or resources. I m constantly making interesting decisions between restricting the paths my empire can choose or letting relations with another leader sour. And that s not even bringing the randomized, hidden agendas (which give a new, very important role to the espionage system) into the conversation.
Pete the Great doesn't seem super stoked about this.
Why we can’t be friends
Civ 6 has also followed games like Crusader Kings and Europa Universalis by implementing casus belli: reasons to go to war. These are unlocked by civics on the new, culture-based tech tree, and lessen the diplomatic penalty you get for warmongering if you have a good reason. Unlocking Holy War allows you to rebuke someone who converted one of your cities. Unlocking Colonial War makes any civ a certain number of techs behind you fair game. You don t need a casus belli, but going to war without one requires you to either launch a Surprise War (which is likely to turn the rest of the world against you), or issue a formal Denouncement and wait five turns at which point, your opponent probably knows what s coming and has prepared their defenses.
This system not only creates a context for war and interjects some historical flavor relating to why real-world conflicts break out in the first place, but it weaves in with the agendas to create a web of friends and foes that helps the game of empires feel more complex and realistic. The other leaders aren t trying to act like your flesh-and-blood buddies. They re acting in the way that will give you the most enjoyable, challenging, and interesting experience as the sole air-breather at the table. And that design philosophy is extremely refreshing for someone like me, who spends the vast majority of his time in singleplayer.
As much as some players would like to believe that 4X is about universal symmetry between sides, it s really one of the genre s greatest myths. I d love to see more strategy devs show recognition that single and multiplayer are completely different animals, and AI should be designed around making the former the best experience it can be. What s fun and engaging for a solo conqueror is going to be very different from what makes LAN brawls great. And it s the mark of a great game when each experience is tailored to be distinct, but both perform admirably in their own way.
It's big-budget game season, and you know what that means: driver updates. Both AMD and Nvidia have packaged up new sets of drivers containing optimizations for several newly released and upcoming games, including Battlefield 1, Civilization 6, and Titanfall 2.
AMD released Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.10.2 for Radeon graphics card owners. The new driver set adds support for all three games mentioned above, plus Serious Sam VR Early Access and Eagle Flight VR.
There's just one new Crossfire profile in the Crimson 16.10.2, that being a DirectX 11 profile for Civ 6. Otherwise, the rest of what you'll find here are a handful of bug fixes. They include:
Fan speed may sometimes remain elevated on select Radeon RX 400 series graphics products even when an application has been exited.
Eyefinity group settings may not be retained after driver upgrade when using AMD CrossFire configurations.
Gears of War 4 may experience an application hang when using select high resolution and quality configurations in some specific game maps.
DirectX12 content may be unable to launch on some older CPUs that do not support popcnt instruction.
Battlefield 1 AMD CrossFire profile updates for game launch.
Moving on to Nvidia, its 375.57 WHQL driver package boasts Game Ready status for Battlefield 1, Titanfall 2, and Civ VI and the same two VR titles, which fall under Nvidia's Game Ready VR designation.
Nvidia's latest driver release also adds an SLI profile for Lineage Eternal: Twilight Resistance and 3D Vision profiles for Civ 6 (marked as "good") and Titanfall 2 (also "good").
Like AMD, Nvidia used the opportunity to fix a small number of issues, though there are only two specific to this driver package. They include:
[SLI, Geforce GTX 980M] Mirror's Edge Catalyst flickers on Ansel UI when image moved with mouse pointer. (Windows 10)
[GeForce GTX 650] Dots on all the characters in Grand Theft Auto 5. (Windows 7 through 8.1)
Update: It seems the original hour and a half video was missing a few songs roughly three hours worth, as the official Civilization YouTube account removed the original video and added a new one that's over four hours long. It also has correct timecodes for each song in the video description, so we've updated the embedded video above to the new version.
Original story: There's a lot to love about Civilization 6 (read our review here), but I came away truly amazed by its music. So amazed, that I made a whole video about how that music evolves through the different game eras. And now, all four versions of each civ's theme song is available to stream for free in one massive video on the official Civilization YouTube channel.
As you get started in Civ 6, I encourage you to keep your ears wide open. Firaxis told me that the music playing during a game is usually a mix of the other AI civ leaders you've met, and the version depends on what era they are in. So if you are in the classical era but meet Germany while they are still in the Ancient era, the Ancient German track will be mixed into the pool of possible music you can hear.
If, like me, you are going to listen to the whole video embedded above at least twice, you'll start hearing how the different themes shift, and then hopefully start recognizing them in the game. I don't believe this is the entire soundtrack (for example, the game's main theme is missing) but it's an impressively large collection. And pretty soon, we'll be able to mod Civ 6 to add our own tracks and make that collection even bigger.
Civilization 6 has had two expansions since 2016, and unsurprisingly that means it's a bigger and better game than it was at launch. Even if there are no more expansions in store for the future, that doesn't mean there's nothing new to check out. The modding community has pulled out all the stops tweaking graphics and gameplay, adding new civs and new units, and even improving the UI.
Here's our definitive list of the best mods for Civilization 6, updated to take 2019's Gathering Storm expansion into account.
Installing Civilization 6 mods
With the addition of Steam Workshop support, installing many mods is easy: simply subscribe to the mod on Steam. Steam will automatically download the mod, which can be enabled or disabled from the 'Additional Content' menu.
Mods that aren't on Workshop can be installed by creating a folder called ‘Mods’ in your Civilization 6 user directory: \Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization VI.
Extract mods to your new Mods folder (with each mod in its own subfolder) and then enable them from the ‘Additional Content’ menu in-game. Some mods may have extra steps, which I’ll describe in their individual entries.
If you want to make changes to Civ 6’s files yourself, the simplest way is to make direct changes to the files in Civilization 6’s install directory (after backing up the originals, of course). First, find Civ 6’s install folder. If you don't know where it is, you can right-click on the game in your Steam library and select Properties > Local Files > Browse Local Files. The default install location is Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Sid Meier’s Civilization 6. Identify the file you want to mess with, save a copy, and go for it—just don’t forget what you’ve changed.
One common criticism of Civ 6 is that it’s a bit too bright and cartoonish, as compared to the more realistic look of previous games in the series. This mod, released by a Firaxis dev, strikes a really nice balance between this Civ’s visual style and that of its immediate predecessor. The saturation has been turned down and almost every basic tile type and decal has been altered in some way. It even adds new, more naturalistic models for ground clutter like trees. Pair this with something like the R.E.D. Modpack (above) to get rid of the Clash of Clans-looking armies and you’re in for a much more immersive, less board game-y feel.
Gathering Storm added labels for major geographic features on the map, which was a really cool touch. But if you play a lot, you’ve probably seen the same ones over and over. Mappa Mundi can basically eliminate that problem forever, adding over 15,000 new names of real world rivers, deserts, mountains, and more. It’s also seamlessly compatible with a lot of the most popular mods that add new civs to the game, so your Taino or Icelandic empire can put their own linguistic stamp on the map.
Gedemon brings us a Civ 6 version of one of our favorite Civ 5 mods. The R.E.D. Modpack rescales units to make them a little more like miniatures, a little less like cartoon giants stomping over the hills. Check out the mod's collection for versions that are compatible with all of Civ 6's expansions.
Graphics mods can make certain things look more realistic, but if you want the world layout itself to feel a bit less game-y, this is the mod for you. In addition to adding more coastal detail to replicate all those little coves, bays, and fjords we expect to see on a globe, it also makes the placement and size of deserts, rainforests, and marshes much more true-to-life. And if you’re all about that Nile Valley life, it improves food placement along rivers running through desert tiles as well. It comes with seven different map scripts, including Continents, Pangea, and Islands.
Yet Not Another Map Pack is another map pack from well-known modder and bundler Gedemon. YNAMP for Civilization 6 includes Earth-shaped maps with the correct start locations for each culture. If you’re tired of playing a landlocked Norway, this is your chance to create a proper Viking empire. The pack also adds new, bigger map sizes (one of which is so big it might take five or so minutes to load).
When starting a game, you’ll have new map types and size options available. Head to the post on Civfanatics for more information on how to use YNAMP, as well as known bugs and issues.
The highest disaster intensity in vanilla Civ 6 is called "Hyperreal." If that’s just not enough for you though, this mod let’s you crank it up to basically Just Plain Ridiculous. The description states that some kind of disaster will happen somewhere on the map just about every turn, and the severe versions are made more common. There is no longer any such thing as a dormant volcano. And in the late game, the number of coastal lowland tiles that can flood from climate change has been increased from the vanilla 33% all the way up to 75%. Mother Nature is coming for you and this time she’s not gonna play nice.
To Hell With The Devil: Religious units fight Rock Bands
This mod is so great we wrote an entire article about it. The premise is pretty simple: Rock Bands, Civ 6’s new, late game "culture nukes," can now engage in theological combat with religious units. For the pious, you can send apostles to keep these long-haired hooligans from corrupting the hearts and minds of your people. For the sacreligious, you can cast down the sanctimonious clerics of the Demiurge and make sure all the world gets to hear your tasty riffs and the good word of our Lord, Satan. This mod is so much fun that I have a hard time playing late game Civ 6 without it.
The struggle of having to tell Victoria you’re not interested in her weird trade proposals constantly is real. This mod forces the AI to give it a rest once in a while, whether it’s pestering you for your gems or begging for their lives in a war. The AI cooldown for trade offers is increased from 10 turns to 50, peace offers in war from 3 turns to 10, and offers of friendship from 5 turns to 30. Maybe now you can finally enjoy some peace and quiet while you plot their ultimate demise.
Adjust starting units, techs, and more
Unfortunately, starting with this many units and no treasury to support them doesn't quite work out.
While I was messing with Civ 6 to try to play a game without ever founding a city, I found that all the player and AI starting conditions are stored in a file called Eras.xml. You ll find it in the Civ 6 install directory, under \Base\Assets\Gameplay\Data.
Using what s there as an example, it s not hard to copy and paste to add starting units, or limit the AI s unit bonuses on harder difficulties. Just make sure you backup Eras.xml before you start tinkering in case you want to revert to the defaults.
The 'Repeat Route' checkbox alone makes Better Trade Screen worth it, but it brings lots of improvements, such as new sorting options to the Trade Overview screen. It's one of those quality of life improvement UI mods we'll keep checked forever.
One of the most poorly-explained mechanics in Civ 6 is the fact that certain districts, like Industrial Zones, grant their benefits to all city-centers within six tiles. (I’ll pause for the gasps of everyone who has played hundreds of hours and still didn’t know that.) What makes it even more annoying is that there isn’t an easy way to figure out which cities are close enough—you have to count out tiles individually while bouncing your cursor along. At least, there wasn’t an easy way until now. This mod adds a tool that makes it very easy to quickly display the range of these effects so you never waste land on a redundant district again.
If you love data visualization and miss the demographic graphs from previous Civs, you’re in luck. CIVIGraphs 2 adds a Civ 5-style demographics panel that lets you see info on things like army size and population for you and all of your rivals over time. Simple, lightweight, but very useful. TPS Report cover sheet not included.
Rise and Fall brought us the concepts of Era Score, Golden Ages, and Dark Ages. But there was one glaring problem: You’re never really told what actions will give you Era Score. So until you memorize all of the mini-achievements that do so, it’s a lot of guesswork and hoping. It can be even harder to keep track of which world firsts are still available. But no more! This mod adds an objective list of ways to earn Era Score, and even lets you know which moments are no longer available once they’ve been claimed by another civ. This makes it much easier to stack up those Golden Ages and let the good times roll.
Australia finally got some representation in Civ 6 after long being the only populated continent to never appear in the series, but they’re represented by the British colonizers that came along pretty recently. This mod adds an Aboriginal Australian civilization, the Anangu, under Tjilpi with two unique units, a unique tile improvement, and bonuses to setting up specialty districts in arid regions akin to their Outback home. They also benefit greatly from finding and building near natural wonders. If you own the Australia DLC, which the mod creator recommends, they will use Australia’s music tracks for added thematics.
Vlad the Impaler leads Romania in this appropriately bloody addition, and he’s all about causing chaos for his enemies. His unique unit is basically a crossbowman with the movement speed of a cavalry unit, which is already pretty crazy. But even more interesting is his unique ability that damages enemy units adjacent to a tile that’s being pillaged and sends out a wave of disloyalty to nearby cities when he captures a city, which can result in a chain revolt if you use it in the right place at the right time. You’ll need to download the Romania civ separately, which gives even more unique bonuses like a free technology for being on the winning side of an Emergency.
"A Song of Ice and Fire:" Rise and Fall of Usurper
This mod adds NINE(!) new civs based on George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire novels, the basis of the television show Game of Thrones. These include Rhaegar Targaryen of the Crownlands, Eddard Stark of the North, Tywin Lannister of the Westerlands, Robert Baratheon of the Stormlands, Mace Tyrell of the Reach, Jon Arryn of the Vale, Hoster Tully of the Riverlands, Doran Martell of Dorne and Balon Greyjoy of the Iron Islands. Each have unique units and bonuses appropriate to the lore. And yes, of course, you can train dragons.
This is one of the most involved mods I’ve ever seen. It basically takes Civ 6’s gameplay and zooms way in on the Ancient and Classical eras "from the Dawn of Time to the fall of Rome," keeping the same game pace and roughly the same number of civics and technologies to unlock. This sharper focus allows Anno Domini to model things that would normally be outside the scope of a Civ game, including new Historical Moments and new government types.
Sounds cool already, but who can you play as, you might ask? Well, these beautiful, crazy bastards have gone way above and beyond to bring us THIRTY distinct leaders (some being alternates for the same civ), including Ashurbanipal of Assyria, Sargon of Akkad, Hannibal of Carthage, Hatshepsut of Egypt, Arminius of Germania, Boudica of the Iceni, Zenobia of Palmyra, Leonidas of Sparta, Helen and Hector of Troy, four new Roman emperors, and reworked versions of some vanilla favorites like Pericles, Qin Shi Huang, and Chandragupta.
Civilization 6 is the ultimate digital board game. More than ever in the series, the board the world is the soul of every opportunity and challenge. As usual for Civ, I build empires, compete for a set of victory conditions, and fend off warmongering leaders like that scoundrel Peter the Great. But I m also playing for, with, and against the board. Forests and deserts and resource-rich tundras each influence the flow of my civilization, granting us boons and burdening us with lasting weaknesses. Bands of barbarians put my farms in crisis, but also open up opportunities to speed the development of my military techs. The glorious, challenging dynamics that emerge from Civ 6 s redesigned maps left me with no question that the storied series has crowned a new king.
The storied series has crowned a new king.
While Civ 6 is probably the most transformative step forward for the series, its changes shouldn t trip up longtime players too much. There s definitely a learning curve to overcome, but much of what you need to be to be victorious isn t necessary when you start exploring. You still settle cities, develop tiles, train military units, wage turn-based warfare, and conduct diplomacy. It mirrored my memories of past Civs closely enough that hints from the in-game adviser were all I needed to course-correct when something I hadn t seen before came my way.
But there are so many of these new features that it could feel overwhelming at times. The depth and variety of systems resembles a Civ game that s already had two or three expansions added on top from the new Districts that perform specific tasks and spread my cities out into an often messy but somehow pleasing sprawl, to a whole separate 'tech' tree for civic and cultural progress that ties into a sort of collectible card game for mixing policy bonuses to build a unique government. The feature richness averts the common problem with strategy games on day one where I feel I m being sold a platform on which a great game will eventually be built. But I also worry that Firaxis may have sailed a bit beyond the calm waters of accessibility for more casual strategy fans, and any expansions that add major features or new systems could heighten the barrier to newcomers.
Hexistential realities
What binds everything together, though, is the map. I have reservations about the art style I preferred the pseudo-realism of Civ 5, and some of the Civ 6 military units in particular look goofy enough to have fallen out of a freemium mobile game. But the map itself, and its cities, iron mines, and festival squares, is more alive than ever. I was delighted, for example, to discover that I really never needed to pull up an overlay to see which tiles were being worked, because the models and animations do that job for me at a glance.
Unworked fields lie barren, and I could tell how many citizen slots in my commercial district were taken up by the level of bustle occupying its streets. It s a pretty brilliant way of keeping you engrossed and focused on what matters. The tech trees and the leader interaction screen are the only parts of the UI that hide my soaring cities from my view. The latter of the two involves fully animated, 3D representations of everyone from Montezuma to that jerk Peter the Great who thinks his mustache and his science bonus from tundra tiles are so cool, even though they re not and I ve had bombers in range of his second largest city since the Atomic Age, ready to wipe that stupid grin off his face. They re all very well voice-acted, with the return of native language dialogue from Civ 5.
Spending a lot of time staring at hills, valleys, and potential pyramid locations isn t just enjoyable and informative, however. It s critical to getting the most out of the game. Terrain and tile types have always been a factor in Civ, but they re at the heart of nearly everything in Civ 6. With districts and wonders each taking up a whole tile, and being the most powerful tools I had to catapult myself toward victory, city planning became a huge focus of my every move. When I unlocked the ability to build a Holy Site, I had to ask myself if I wanted to nestle it in the middle of all those forested hills to gain bonus faith from the adjacent, natural splendor. If I did, I d miss out on the chance to clear out all the trees later on, plop down an industrial district surrounded with mines, and enjoy a huge boost to my production.
If you build it… (it might be wrong)
There was never a time that I felt I could fill every tile around me with the most obviously correct district or improvement and call it a day. The need for foresight is unending. There are always sacrifices to make, like when I fell behind in culture because my only eligible tile for a theater square was the one I d been saving to build a rocket launch site to clench a science victory. It s a fantastic, richly realized way of forcing difficult decisions at every bend in the river and making sure no two cities you build will ever look or feel the same. It feels like a revelation for someone who s been playing 4X games since before I could see over a car dashboard. The constant planning and trade-offs seem like how this series was always supposed to work, and they inject a layer of variety that made the pull of Just one more turn even stronger than ever.
There s a level of trial and error in this that caused me some legitimate frustration in my first few races to the space age. When everything is fresh and new, you might not realize that you re plopping down a university campus in a place you should have waited to build a neighborhood several centuries later. One late game civic (the cultural equivalent of a tech) unlocks the ability to build National Parks, granting a massive boost to culture but unless you ve been planning where it s going to go from 4000 BC, chances are you ve already destroyed all of the pristine nature required to set one up.
I longed for some kind of city planning utility, where I could mock up where everything was going to go once I d unlocked all the districts and improvements, especially considering some of them get adjacency bonuses for being next to each other as opposed to specific terrain features. If you like to play efficiently, just be aware that you re going to be slapping yourself that you dumped out such a haphazard monument to mediocrity until you have a few campaigns under your belt and understand where to leave or create an ideal space for something important and have the patience to do so.
Worlds of inspiration
The other way the map has become a much more important part of Civ 6 is in how it ties into the tech and civics tree. Every technology and civic has an associated mini objective that will trigger a Eureka moment and pay off half the cost immediately. Founding a city next to an ocean tile sped up my progress toward Sailing. Building three industrial districts with factories jumped me ahead in my quest to embrace communism (Viva la Economic Policy Slots!) These are often tied to having room for specific districts, access to specific resources, or contact with other civilizations. Where I spawned on each map had a significant effect on which techs I could get quickly, and thus which ones I tended to go for first. It also really helps alleviate the feeling of spending several turns waiting for a building or a unit to finish, since I could always be pursuing a Eureka objective for a tech I had my eye on.
It s not all a reinvented wheel, though. The Civ staples of war and diplomacy have returned recognizable, but honed to the sharpest edge we ve ever seen on them. I particularly enjoyed the way AI leaders are now given agendas (one public, and one that must be uncovered through espionage, building a positive relationship, or observing context) that overtly tell you what they like and don t like, and make it theoretically possible to stay on everyone s good side through the whole game if you re willing to jump through a lot of hoops. Frederick Barbarossa of Germany, for instance, wants to kill all city states and hates anyone who so much as lets them borrow a cup of sugar. If you re going for a very pacifist run, you can let that agenda guide your gameplay (ignoring city-states and the benefits courting them can provide), and chances are you won t have pretzel-scented warriors knocking down your door.
In the event that hostilities do break out, Civ 6 has split the difference between 5 s one unit per tile and 4 s Clash of the Doomstacks to reach a happy middle. Support units like medics and Great Generals can attach to and occupy the same tile as a regular combat unit like a pikeman. In the mid and late game, you also gain the ability to combine two combat units into a Corps, and later you can add a third to make an Army, which is are more powerful versions of that unit that only take up a single tile. This adds some new layers and tactics to a model of warfare that could get predictable and repetitive in Civ 5.
Civ's score breathes life into all these conflicts and conferences. Christopher Tin s new main theme, 'Sogno di Volare,' is just as sweeping, catchy, and beautiful as 'Baba Yetu.' I predict it will join his previous Civ effort in the pantheon of the greatest pieces of music written for a videogame, though I suspect it won t spawn as many memes if only because it s more difficult to imitate its soaring, Italian cathedral choir chorus without sounding like an asthmatic screech owl. The real magic happens past the menu screen, however, where each and every civ has a main theme that grows more complex and epic as you progress through the ages. England, for example, begins with a simple, inspirational, and somewhat haunting flute rendition of the medieval folk ballad Scarborough Fair. By the Modern Age, it has exploded into an orchestral and choral celebration of all things English that made me want to sail a ship of the line made of crumpets through the walls of a Spanish fort and unleash the redcoats to toss scalding tea into the faces of their enemies.
When I looked down upon everything I d built as my Mars colonists blasted off to barely snatch victory away from Peter and his doubtlessly mustachioed cronies, every tile struck me with a sense of history. The sprawl of the Dehli-Calcutta metroplex reflected moments from the windows of its skyscrapers. There was the little tentacle I d made by purchasing tiles to get access to coal. There was the 3000-year old farmland I d had to bulldoze to place an industrial-era wonder. And just beside where our first settler had spawned, at the foot of the soaring peaks that had protected us from marauding armies for generations, was the new growth forest I d planted on the site of a former lumber mill to have enough uninterrupted nature for a National Park. For each valley and steppe and oasis, I could tell you why I d developed it the way I did much more meaningfully than Because hills are a good place for mines. As the board shaped my empire, and I shaped it, the history of my civilization and my decisions accumulated and followed me right up to the threshold of the stars. And that, more than anything, is why I ll never need another Civ game in my life besides this one.
We've seen some pretty slimy pre-order incentives in recent years, and even the least offensive methods have basically become commonplace for big budget games. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided's now infamous "Augment your Pre-order" campaign was so egregious it had to be scrapped entirely. The new trend: Gears of War 4 offered exclusive skins and even access to the game four days early if you ponied up $40 more for the special edition, and Battlefield 1's "Early Enlister Edition" offers items skins and access to the game three days early for a $20 higher price tag.
So in a world where pre-order incentives can sometimes feel exploitative, tempting gamers to buy before we even know if the game is any good, Civilization 6's pre-order bonus stands out as a surprisingly decent compromise. The Aztecs a civ that's been in the base version of every game in the main series will be exclusive to those who pre-order Civ 6, but only for 90 days. Approximately three months after release, Montezuma and the Aztec people will become free DLC, essentially being incorporated into the base game at no cost.
Huh. So it's a pre-order exclusive, and sort of gated day-one DLC, but it will eventually be available to everyone. And not just available, but completely free. That seems OK? It's certainly not an appealing idea to pitch to those who are deadset against pre-ordering, but it's not nearly as offensive as the pre-order schemes we've seen before it, where the Aztecs would eventually become available to purchase. And it's certainly better than if pre-ordering was the only way to get them.
This seems like 2K and Firaxis attempting to have their cake and eat it too trying to incentive pre-orders while also placating those who would condemn any sort of exclusive content gated behind doing so. The only difference in content between pre-ordering or not is how much patience you have to only play the 19 other leaders Civ 6 has to offer for the next 90 days. But for people who've grown attached to the Aztec civ and were understandably expecting them in the base game, I get how this could be frustrating, too.
It's a hard balance to find. We almost always recommend against pre-ordering especially since games on Steam often drop to half price within seven months and it's very easy for day-one DLC, loot boxes, and other microtransactions to feel exploitative. But at the same time, publishers of big games are desperate to make up for their massive budgets, and game prices have stayed at $60 since 2005. We have to recognize that games are expensive to make while still calling out scuzzy pre-order incentives and microtransactions when we see them.
And if pre-order incentives must be a necessary evil, I hope to see more games handle them in a similar manner to Civ. Adding gated pre-order content is almost never a player-first decision it's a marketing tool used to boost pre-release sales but this is probably one of the least-bad ways you can do it. And while we've really enjoyed most of the changes in Civ 6 so far (especially its music) it's always prudent to patiently wait for reviews when it comes to spending your hard-earned cash on a game. Unfortunately, that patience also has to extend 90 days past launch for Aztec fans.
When you do start playing, be sure to check out our Civ 6 guide, and our breakdown for each of Civ 6's leaders and their unique stuff.
The Civilization 6 launch trailer is a good one. It's inspirational without being overbearing, efficiently covers the game's millennia-spanning breadth, features the new theme song, "Sogno di Volare," from Grammy-winning "Baba Yetu" composer Christopher Tin, and includes enough Sean Bean deaths to cover a solid decade's worth of Hollywood blockbusters.
He's not actually shown meeting an untimely end at any point during the trailer, but that trip off the edge of the cliff doesn't look like it's going to end well, and that machine-gun fire into the cockpit of his Spitfire is pretty ominous too. And then there's that photo and face at the end, as humankind indulges its drive to "push itself toward the horizon." Yet even though Sean may die, the spirit of Sean lives on. The whole thing kinda gets me right here, y'know?
Yup, that's a good trailer. The game seems to be shaping up pretty well too: We've got a breakdown of the five biggest changes from Civ 5 to Civ 6, info on all the Civ 6 leaders, and a few things you might want to know before you start playing. Civilization 6 preloading has begun on Steam, and it will unlock on October 21 at the times listed below.
Although sort of teased by Civilization 6 lead designer Ed Beach a while back, it has now been officially confirmed that Firaxis' incoming 4X strategy game will allow multiple leaders to represent the same civilizations.
Which means players can take different civs in different directions manipulating each leader's strengths as they see fit. As an alternative to Pericles, Gorgo will also vouch for Greece, offering players a distinctly different playstyle to her compatriot.
"As with playing Greece under Pericles, you're going to want to focus on Greece's strong culture game," notes the following trailer. "Gorgo allows you to play more aggressively... [and] when you go to war, you're going to want to completely destroy your enemy's army in order to use her ability to its utmost."
Success will in turn hinge upon your understanding of when to pursue war and when to ascertain peace, yet it seems Gorgo is more inclined to chase the former, should this character spotlight be anything to go by:
As Gorgo, your capital city is Sparta as opposed to Pericles' Athens, while her unique ability is the culture boost-focused Thermopylae. With Your Shield or On It marks her leader agenda which in essence means she can't give up items during peace deals.
Civilization 6 is due next Friday, October 21 tell us which alternative leaders you'd like to see added in the comments below. In unrelated Civ 6 news, this interview with composer Christopher Tin is pretty interesting.
Going from Civ 4 to Civ 5 was probably the biggest step out of the comfy, immortal dictator shoes Sid Meier s flagship series had ever taken, but Civ 5 to Civ 6 is an even more significant transformation. So whether you re totally new to this world domination thing or a veteran of weathering Gandhi s aggressive nuclear policy along with battling the rest of Civ 6 s leaders it s wise to seek some understanding of the basics. There are some tricky concepts to come to terms with a couple layers under what Sean Bean will tell you in the tech pop-ups. And it s Sean Bean, so you never know when he might get impaled or immolated, leaving us to navigate the winds of time on our own.
City-plan ahead
There s really no way for a new player to visualize what an ideal city layout is going to look like in the modern era when your stone age tribe has just wandered out of the woods and decided that maybe houses would be a good idea for keeping the tigers away. Terrain and districts are massively important, and just about everything can gain some kind of adjacency bonus for being built next to certain other things.
Your first few campaigns almost have to be trial and error and that s okay! Just take note of what you ran out of room for, or how you screwed yourself out of some bonuses to your commercial hub by filling all the land next to that river with farms. Eventually, you should strive to be able to look at a newly-settled city and have an idea of where everything is going to go centuries down the road. Don t ever hesitate to leave some tiles blank, saving a spot for a late-game district or wonder that will pay back your patience manyfold.
Barbarians have gotten a lot smarter
You know that scene in Jurassic Park where they realize the velociraptors have figured out how to open doors? My first couple encounters with Civ 6 s barbarians were a bit like that. The first barbarian unit you see is probably going to be a scout. And guess what? He s coming to scope out your city and determine if it s weak enough to attack. Not only that, but when his friends do arrive, they re likely to have an intelligent unit composition and an understanding of the terrain similar to a human player.
City centers can t attack in Civ 6 until walls have been built, so your first couple dozen turns can really put you at the mercy of the barbarians. Don t wander off too far with your first warrior. I also recommend building at least one more warrior and a slinger very early on before you even make a second settler. It s worth it. On the bright side, barbarians are also now smart enough to retreat and lick their wounds if they know they ve been beaten. So you only really need to kill a little more than half of their raiding party to buy yourself a respite.
Spread your Traders around to build road networks
Since trade routes now automatically generate roads between cities (and this is, in fact, the main way of building roads), you re going to want to keep re-basing your traders every time their mission expires to add another link to your network until all the cities of your empire are connected. Roads are more important than ever due to the harsh terrain movement changes I discussed with Tom. They can easily be the difference between being able to reinforce a city that's under siege, and allowing it to fall to friggin Saladin and his friggin auto-heal overpowered stupid-face Mamluks.
Also, don t forget to protect your traders passing through the fog of war! I lost two of them to a barbarian scout with one health that I let live after the destruction of his village, thinking he wasn t worth chasing and wouldn t be a threat anymore. He apparently learned kung fu and took vengeance for his ancestors, costing me a lot of money, and I wasn t too happy about it.
Pay attention to AI agendas, but don’t let them ruin your fun
Civ 6 has made interacting with AI leaders better than ever with the introduction of agendas. You ll know from the second you meet one of them what you can be doing to keep them happy or tick them off. Establishing diplomatic ties with everybody is in your best interest, as it will allow you to reveal their hidden agenda (though you can often get a feel for this by observing which of your actions they comment on positively or negatively), and specific details about why they love/hate/don t even care about you.
On the other side of that coin, you shouldn t fall into the trap of letting the AI agendas ruin your fun. If Teddy or Pericles are getting uppity that you re courting that city-state you need for your culture victory, guess what? They can go shove it. You live on this board too, and you shouldn t let the AI leaders personalities bully you out of playing the way you want to. If it comes to war, then so be it. Just figure out who you re pretty sure you re not going to get along with and be prepared to kick them in the teeth when they come knocking. (It shouldn t be too difficult. Teddy has pretty big teeth.)
Read the tech and civics trees carefully
The tech tree, and especially the civics tree, can sometimes seem uninspiring from a cursory glance. "Oh, great, I can choose from two new Diplomacy cards or two new Economic cards that I m not going to use." But wait! Hover over each of those civics and you ll find that many of them unlock some sort of new ability. For example, the very early civic Military Tradition unlocks flanking and adjacency bonuses for your units that were standard in past Civ games. Later ones will unlock the ability to combine land units into Corps and Armies, and naval units into Fleets and Armadas.
Also pay attention to the fact that unlocking certain civics will make some earlier era policy cards obsolete. They will usually give you a card with the same general theme to replace it with, but you should plan accordingly if you ve been basing your entire strategy around the specific effects of a card.
The latest Civilization 6 trailer introduces Peter the Great, a man who needs no introduction oh alright then I know nothing about Peter the Great. However I now know, thanks to the nice trailer lady, that he gets territory bonuses for his beloved Russia in Civ 6, that he can deploy Cossacks as unique units (Cossacks can move after attacking, fancy that), and that he has a rather enviable moustache.
Peter's ability benefits trade routes with more advanced Civs, so he should help to get your society up to speed in record time. Click on the below video to see Peter in action, or check out our hands-on if you want a more, well, hands-on take on Firaxis' game.
Civ 6 is out on October 21, so there can't be too many of these trailers left.
