Civ VII - First Impression (for the casual Civ enjoyer)

Full disclosure, this is truly a first impression, as I’m probably close to only 5 hours of gameplay in, and just nearing the end of the Antiquity Age. But I figure I could add at least a little bit of context and opinion to the discourse the community has had prior to release, which for someone like myself, can be very confusing.

I’ve gone back and forth on whether I was even going to get the game yet, but decided to buy Founders for the early access this morning. I was completely undecided because of all the back-and-forth negativity and positivity. Overall, there is NO PART OF ME that regrets getting the game.

My first 5 hours were a blast. It looks beautiful. It plays smooth. It feels like some complexity was removed relative to VI, but (as of right now) that was done without feeling like it sacrifices the gratification you expect to feel from your Civ’s micromanagement.

The UI was probably what I personally was most concerned about, but I can’t think of one time during gameplay where it even crossed my mind (neither negatively nor positively, so take that for what it’s worth).

The other aspect I was concerned about because of stuff I saw on Reddit was the aesthetic of cities. Again, I’m only in the first age, but this concern was completely eliminated. I love the way it looks. I found myself zooming in on my city and just admiring the look. We’ll see if that changes as I progress through the ages, and more modern cities end up looking worse. I will say that while cities look dope, towns are underwhelming, but that’s probably because they’re…towns. Or because my most populous town is at 10 pop. You can pay to upgrade them to cities if you wish.

Combat animations can sometimes be a bit weird looking. I’m not sure how to describe it, but SOMETIMES it’s almost like how quick combat looks in VI, except as far as I can tell there’s no option for quick combat or movement in VII yet. Overall, I enjoyed the combat. Especially when Augustus settled a town hundreds of miles from his domain right near mine, declared war on my boy Confucius, and then promptly had my army take his town for Rome.

I’ll end with the one glaring negative (imo) - religion. It’s extremely stripped down to the point where it seems like it’s almost irrelevant. At least so far in my campaign. But I can’t see how it would get a ton more important in the following ages. From what I’ve seen, religion in VII is basically just a Pantheon. I think I heard it’s going to be added in full via a DLC, which I can’t wait for because if that’s the case, I’m optimistic that it’ll be done incredibly well.

So for any casual Civ gamer who just wants to sit back and enjoy the newest installment but is on the fence, I say go for it. Of course it’s not cheap, so if you can’t, you can’t. But if the price tag is more of a slight annoyance than an actual hindrance, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. There’s a ton more I can say, as I’ve hardly scratched the surface, but just go see for yourself. I’m sure there will be more hardcore players who disagree or can add to/correct stuff I’ve said. This “review” (if you can call it that) really isn’t for that crowd, though any added opinions from them would be appreciated, I’m sure.