As if 2016 didn't already contain a rich enough seam of strategy games, Firaxis announce today that Civilization VI will be released on October 21st. Development duties are in the hands of the team behind Civ V's expansions, Gods & Kings and Brave New World, and when we spoke to designer Ed Beach and associate producer Sarah Darney last week to learn all the details, they told us that almost every system from the complete Civ V will be included in the sequel: trade routes, religious systems, archaeology...there'll be no need to wait for expansions, it's all in the base game.

The game is running on a brand new suite of software, built to be far more mod-friendly than its predecessor, and as well as brand new AI systems, there are a host of new mechanics that will explore and emphasise your relationship with Civ's greatest character: the map.

Read more

The last big official update to Civilization V [official site] came in 2013 with its second large expansion, Brave New World. Three years later, and almost six years after the game’s original release, there’s another big new release expected, but it’s not an official expansion. It’s the Community Patch Project (CPP; to be named Vox Populi on release), a community-made mod that overhauls and improves a majority of the game’s systems in an attempt to make Civilization V the best game it possibly can be.

Read more

Who'd win in a war: Pagan Min out Far Cry 4 or Gandhi? Sure, Min's great at murder and oppression and has a crack army and all that, but push Gandhi too far and nukes will fly. In Civilization V [official site], anyway.

Custom civilisations are one of the more common Civ mod types, but I do like the look of a new mod adding Pagan Min and the nation of Kyrat. They're mostly focused archeology and exploration, see, though can always deploy those horrible sneaky Hunter soldiers, the gits in the hoods who pelt you with arrows then vanish. Yeah, you can have them.

Read more

A strange thing happened in the Civilization community r/civ on January 10, 2015. Inspired by similar, smaller-scale offerings by a Twitch.tv livestream and fellow redditor DarkLava (from whom he explicitly sought permission), user Jasper K., aka thenyanmaster, shared the first part of an experiment he was conducting wherein he put 42 computer-controlled civilisations in their real-life locations on a giant model of the Earth and left them to duke it out in a battle to the death, Highlander style (except instead of heads they need capital cities).

Since then, the practice has exploded in popularity. Reddit's Civilization community has AI-only fever, but what exactly is so compelling about watching the computer play a very slow-paced turn-based strategy game with itself?

Read more

The release of Civilization V: The Complete Edition rather suggests we've reached end of the line for Firaxis' latest history-spanning strategy game, and thus can start drawing up our mental wishlists for Civ VI. Though if I've learned anything in this business, it's that there's any number of final-sounding suffixes left in the game names cupboard. Be braced for Civ V: Ultimate, Civ V: Director's Cut, Civ V: What They Couldn't Show Gandhi Doing In Cinemas, and Civ V: In A Different Box.

Back to that shortly, however. The Cool Thing happening off the back of this new omnibus edition is a new and free Civ V scenario that's being given to existing and future Brave New World owners for no-pennies. Said scenario is also a little bit Colonizationy (but only a little bit).

Read more

I've founded religions, spied on my neighbours and sent a spaceship in search of a new home on a distant star. The promise of a Brave New World was enough to bring me crashing back down to Earth though, and I've been making new friends, meeting old enemies and creating great works of art. This latest expansion takes on the greatest challenge of all - injecting some meaningful activity into Civilization's end-game. I've spent a week uncovering its charms and chores, and here's wot I think.

Read more

Civ V brings out the worst in me and Brave New World may be the expansion that changes all of that. I was approaching the industrial age in a recent multiplayer game when I realised what a terrible ruler I was - 'terrible' not because I was a failure but because I was too much of a success. I was the coal-devouring, smoke-belching face of global domination, like a nightmarish Punch cartoon come to life, the leader of a people who saw foreign nations as obstacles to be removed. Civ V is a strategy game that encourages the drive toward victory rather than the establishment of a culture with character. Brave New World may change that when it is released on July 12th. Here's an early launch trailer.

Read more

Civilization V: Brave New World adds a continent-sized piece of content to Civ V, with nine new civilisations, more wonders, trade-routes, ideologies, and an over-hauled cultural victory. Looks like this could be a fairly big deal compared to Gods & Kings, partly thanks to the "world congress" feature intended to facilitate greater diplomatic happenings between nations.

Footage and details below.

Read more

I am saddened to admit that I am not a Civilization player. My brain does not work in that way. No matter how much I try, I just bounce off the game, and then I'm pushed out the way by mean Civ bullies who mock my tactical and diplomatic failings. It's like home economics all over again. But I'm a bigger man than those meanies, and don't begrudge Civ fans the opportunity to see the new expansion pack, A Brave New World. And I don't begrudge Revison3 the hits for the preview that I am shamelessy yoinking. Do click here, as that Sessler guy seems like a nice chap.

Read more

I’ve started more games of Civilization V than a hundred men could ever finish and that’s not only because I enjoy discovering new worlds more than I enjoy conquering them. Civilization doesn’t have a compelling end-game, lacking the peaks and troughs of grand strategy, and instead taking a predictable course once the pieces are in place. Brave New World attempts to fix that by overhauling culture, diplomacy and trade.

Read more

There's going to be a second major Civilization V expansion. It's called Brave New World, it introduces 9 new Civs, the concepts of tourism, ideologies, international trade routes and archaeology, and basically it sounds like it's pretty huge on an under-the-hood front. I had a big chat with Firaxis lead programmer Ed Beach and senior producer Dennis Shirk on what's in there, why, how it works and why we'll be forming impressive in-game art collections.

Read more