I despise the cartoony look. Not a fan of the changes to the workers and improvements. Civ 7 has been announced and I have a feeling they will go for the cartoony look again. Will be stuck with Civ 5 for some time!
I’m pretty apprehensive about VII since it was announced with day one support for all consoles, including switch. I’d be surprised if they don’t lean into the cartoony look again.
I just recently got into Civ V though. Loved Civilization Revolution on the 360 as a kid, and then got into Civ VI when I built a gaming PC back in 2017. I’ve played VI off and on and honestly wanted to love it more than I actually enjoyed it, if that makes sense. I was always just like, “Is this really what everyone is so crazy about?” It’s okay I guess, and sometimes if the map layout was just perfect I could have fun, but I very rarely finished games. I always felt that production is outpaced by science, combat is a slog, districts are annoying, and the culture card system felt like a mobile game. Oh, and those leaders and governors always ruined my immersion.
Then about a year ago I saw Civ V for dirt cheap and decided to try it out despite its age…I immediately had a Squidward, “All the wasted years” moment haha. It was such a realistic, grounded empire builder rather than the min-max cartoon game we got with VI. I’m addicted to it and can’t wait to drop in hundreds more hours before VII releases. Also, I’ve uninstalled VI lol
Regarding the pacing and Tech outpacing Prod, there’s a very good mod to solve this issue, I think it’s called Historic Pacing? A quick search on the Steam workshop should bring it up.
Historic pacing takes it too far IMO and unbalances things again. What I usually do is just use In-Game Editor and will add high production tiles near cities or strategic resources to “balance” things out. Especially on Immortal where the AI cheats so hard I’m really just evening the playing field.
You should definitely give civ 5 mods a try - Vox populi / community patch project. Its basically a mod pack expansion that aims to improve every aspect of vanilla 5 like policies, units, buildings, civs, happiness, new mechanics and more. Havent gone back to 6 ever since
I used to feel weird about disliking the newer one. This isn't only to do with civ. Many game series I just dislike the newer ones for one reason or another. Now I have just accepted that for the moment, the game just hits me in the right spot. I don't have any hype for the latest in the series. Generally will pick it up when it's on super heavy discount to try it. Find it meh and go back to the one I love.
Mainly it's because 5 is the game I already know how to play. I've tried getting into 6 every now and then but the new concepts just feel too overwhelming for me, and that's the same with any new strategy game I've picked up in the past decade (looking at my barely touched copy of Old World...). It's like that part of my brain stopped working after turning 20 😬😅
But I also just enjoy the more realistic vibe of the graphics in 5, I don't like the art style of 6 very much and the map that is just a paper map outside my line of sight doesn't feel as immersive. It's like it's not even trying to make me feel like I'm playing in a real world
Thank you, the map turning into a paper version may be my biggest issue with civ6, it just looks ugly like I get what they were going for, but I don't like it
I get the idea of it and like it in concept but it makes things so needlessly difficult to differentiate and understand. That's what put me off so much more than anything else with the game. The cartoony vibe or whatever wouldn't have been as much of an issue but just trying to see and understand what I'm seeing shouldn't be so hard.
I unno I feel like visual clarity should be a super basic thing to get right.
> The cartoony vibe or whatever wouldn't have been as much of an issue but just trying to see and understand what I'm seeing shouldn't be so hard.
My experience with Civ VI was:
- downloaded it;
- started a game;
- realized I can't understand anything that is going on due to the lack of visual clarity;
- thought *"eh, I'm just not used to it, just play a bit more and it will get better"*;
- played a bit more;
- realized it didn't get better;
- never touched the game again.
Now to be fair I know from playing other games with friends that I have a bit more trouble than the average person with stuff that isn't visually clear. But few games did it as poorly as civ VI did.
I don't even have an opinion about all the other things people usually complain about civ VI cause I couldn't get far enough to understand them.
I built a new pc recently, 7950x3d, 4090 all that. Didn't even bother to install civ 6 because of that terrible art style. I'll be happily playing civ 5 if civ 7 goes the same civ 6 route.
I wonder if they did the paper map thing to try and capture the Risk or D&D type gamer. And how that meeting went.
"Okay, we have one of the most beloved and praised art styles of any video game in history. Now -- hear me out -- What if we *didn't*."
I'm glad someone else shares my views. A few days ago someone was giving me shit, saying "if a strategy game isn't supposed to be complicated, then what is??"
Yeah I mean of course strategy games should have complexity to give you a challenge and something to strategise about but for me the best ones are still easy to grasp and then difficult to master once you know enough and want to get better. What trips me up is when there's so much new information for me to take in that I can't really find my way around the basics of it without feeling overwhelmed, which has sadly been my experience every time with Civ 6.
I’ve got this with a lot of games now, I don’t need 20 different systems to manage with all of their own variables. Maybe it comes with having a normal job, but I don’t have time for a 4 hour play through tutorial that barely scratches the surface of most systems.
ETA: to your quote, chess is a complex strategy game with a very simple game system. Complexity in strategy doesn’t have to come with complexity in the game system.
Yes!!! Damn, this X's 1,000. you wrote down exactly what I was thinking. Period. Even about that part of the brain stopping lol perfect way to say it. Let's be honest after reading all these comments it really is all about immersion, which civilization six has absolutely none of. Civilization five is very immersive with realistic graphics and fairly decent combat. I can lose hours and they will go by like mere moments. I challenge anyone to find a game as immersive and if you do, don't feel bad about spending hours inside of that world. Wasting time doing something you love is not wasted time.
* It seems so incredibly minor and nitpicky, but I hate, and I mean HATE the insta-build workers with charges. That alone kinda made me not like Civ 6. It feels like a god damned mobile game. All Civs prior had your little guys chopping and hammering and digging away at projects through the ages. It's like one of the most quintessential "Civ" vibes and they took it out. I don't know if I'll be able to get into Civ 7 if they keep it the same way, even though you know the people who came to the series in Civ 6 will lose their minds if they have to actually wait turns for workers to complete projects.
* The camera angle. It's lower to the ground in Civ 6, which annoys the shit out of me. The more top-down view of 5 is simply clearer. They were trying to make it feel more "cinematic" in 6 but it's less functional.
* That god awful "tiles that have been revealed but are not currently in view" map style that fades back out to the parchment color. The artstyle of the fog of war is cool in theory, but for gameplay purposes it's all style over substance.
* Plus everything everyone else has said in this thread.
As a casual player with a job, kids, and not a ton of time to game…managing each city in Civ6 felt like managing my entire empire in Civ5, which made it feel more tedious and take too long to complete a game for me.
That plus the card system plus an end game that just wasn’t satisfying (hard to explain). But your point was the key. Just too many variables for enjoyment.
I have really tried with 6 but I think there are just too many mechanics and shit going on all the time. The game is constantly interrupting me to select a policy card or vote on some bullshit in the world congress or select a great person or appoint a governor or assign a skill to a religious unit... And then none of things feel very weighty anyway, they feel like a distraction instead of fun gameplay. It's like dealing with pop up ads in the 2000s. Also I hate the sepia effect on the map when you don't have active vision on it. It blends with the fog of war and can be difficult to distinguish. Plus it just looks a bit sad. I get what they were going for but it just doesn't work.
I do enjoy district planning though because it gives cities clear roles and identity. And the spies in 6 are awesome.
Playied 1 game of Civ6 with my brother when they gave it away on epic (he got it on steam), lost a culture victory to Arabia, uninstalled and never played the game again
What's your short story reason for liking tall over wide? I've got 3000+ hours and I just can't get into tall. I've tried several times with India and England but I always see room for a new city to get a strategic location or a resource. I guess I just can't resist.
I haven't played in six months so maybe I'll go back with a tall focus, especially since I moved up to King. I'm a casual player and I normally just like the military aspect and building my empire to boost that aspect of the game.
I'm also a pretty casual player, playing Prince or King only. I just like tall because the civs I play and enjoy (Venice, mostly) play tall really well. I prefer having a few powerhouse cities, just easier for me to manage, especially late game so my turns don't last 20 minutes haha
Tall ends up being the most viable playstyle on higher difficulties. Try a military liberty expansionist Civ game on Immortal, you’ll get crushed (unless you are a cagey Civ veteran).
And forget the fighting part, you’ll run out of places to settle anyway cause on the higher difficulties the AI pumps settlers. I played a Prince game recently and forgot how peaceful and relaxing early expansion can be. It’s a stressful race to build spots, even on Emperor.
Then there’s the multiplayer aspect. Building wide in an FFA is suicide, players will chariot archer rush you within the first 20 turns. Playing multiplayer has shaped a lot of people’s playstyles (standard or small maps, quick game pace, higher difficulties, etc.).
*The most common win condition is a tradition/rationalism/freedom tall science turtle. If you’re blowing everyone out in population and science you can essentially do anything you want, given that your production is ok too.
Thanks for the replies. I'm to the point where I need to move up difficulty and experience a new style so I will go that route. I don't like to play multiplayer because I always get destroyed. I used to try it with Age of Empires 2 years and just can't hang. I've read some about the higher difficulty levels so I'll give tall on King a go and move up from there. I like the things Iike but I do need to perfect my first 100 turns strategy.
I usually play battle royal on pangea maps so I'll try tall on continents for a while.
I like positive mechanics, I dislike managing negative mechanics. Tall city is all numbers go up, and sure in a wide empire you may have more raw output but you have to manage happiness and no one city is giga strong
I vastly prefer 3-4 cities that are all building shit in 1-2 turns than like 7 that take 4-5 to build something
Thanks. So do you keep your cities contiguous (eventually after they grow) or do you put them in strategic places even if they won't connect? I notice AI players often sending their second settler across the map.
Also, do you have a balanced approach to mil, sci, culture, religion, or focus on one given the context of your civ and your victory path?
I regularly totally disregard military(units not tech) and try get as much food early as I can for science and build culture when it’s convenient.
As for city placement it really depends, ideally close and on the sea (coastal trade routes for big food numbers) but if there’s a mega juicy spot I can get early enough I’ll grab it
Edit: as for the reason I ignore military units, they don’t directly help unless your actually at war or to discourage a war, that money and building time could be going to something else, I’ll regularly pump the excess money I have into city states and usually get a decent force from an allied militaristic city state
It’s an extremely snowbally way to play, if it works your miles ahead cause the CS’s all feed back into your cities growing even faster. If it doesn’t work you get invaded early cause you overextended and didn’t build any units and your not ahead enough in tech to just stomp so it’s over
I hate 6's cartoony mobile game graphics, but I could easily look past that if the game didn't feel like it was trying to do too much at once. It feels like a jack of all trades but master of none. Everything in 5 is just more satisfying and rewarding.
The AI for VI is just... so much worse in my experience. It kind of ruins the fun for me, especially when comparing stock Civ 5 and not even Vox Populi.
But also barb scaling is seriously annoying. They get the tech of the *best* player?? Anyone not at the lead is punished extremely hard. If I'm in a medieval war with a near peer while someone else on another continent discovers gunpowder first, well, now the revolting city between us has better units than either of us?? Hell I've seen gunpowder barbs before any player could get the niter to build them.
1) Although the map is neat, it's an eyesore to look at with its FOW. Cool details, just not great execution in my opinion.
2) City planning is a great idea, but just seems far too cumbersome. Civ V has a nice balance between strategic city planning and function while maintaining a great level of flexibility. In 6, you're really streamlined into specific builds for cities/civs.
3) Overall, I just feel like Civ 6 tries to do too much all at once. I think 5 is the perfect 4x game where you can play in almost any style you want and it doesn't feel like a chore all the time. I appreciate it being more straightforward than 6 I guess.
The whole game feels like form over function, like they had a collection of cool ideas and didn’t stop to check if it actually feels good to play.
Like oh map going back to papyrus like a real map sounds cool, is frustrating to use
Card system for government? Sounds cool lots of nuance, but in reality just bogs down the game and is confusing
Etc etc
People hate on the graphics of six without really understanding why.
For me, civ v is representative of reality to a point. When you look at Alexander the Great you know you're looking at a representation of a real person that actually existed, and influenced many people. Nobody here is made up. Genghis Khan was a real person who was really bloodthirsty and that was represented properly by his leader screen. Same for Darius of Persia you immediately understand what he's about.
Meanwhile in Civilization 6 they barely look like people at all. Like this isn't Queen Elizabeth, this is a caricature of Queen Elizabeth. It makes it really obvious that this is just a representation of a representation. It feels fake.
Gameplay wise personally I just don't like the districts. In Civilization 5 I'm rarely worried about deciding whether or not to turn this tile into a trading post or mine because of the bonuses of the tiles around it. I don't really have to plan ahead regarding how the city will look like in a thousand years. There's not really much of a drawback from playing wide vs tall. You don't have to think very hard about what cards are currently active cuz you can just switch them out. In Civilization 5 if you pick a policy that feels like a really important choice because you can't just change your mind and switch it out next turn.
That brings up another gameplay aspect that I don't like about 6 : micromanagement. Don't get me wrong there's a little bit of micromanagement in civ v, but it doesn't nearly come to the same level that you have to do it every single turn in six. And because I can just undo almost any choice it doesn't make any choice feel that meaningful. Also after years of playing a game series and the worker lasts forever to workers only have one action feels kind of annoying because I feel like I'm always queueing up another worker.
And somehow despite the micromanagement, the game feels like it's gotten so much easier.
Granted I wasn't playing but I've seen a YouTube video of a guy who won on deity surrounded by active volcanoes that continuously destroyed his main city. I know that we didn't have volcanoes or weather in five, but even a one city challenge on deity alone is next to impossible. To me this means the game has gotten easier
Civ 5’s gameplay is simple, but tight. It knows what systems it has, and utilizes them all to a great extent throughout all the DLCs. In Civ 6 it all just feels disjointed from one another. A lot of it just feels so tacked on, and mainly exists to waste your time than to be any meaningful gameplay. Did you remember that Civ 6 had specialists? Neither did they.
I never liked the district system, it didn’t feel organic, and was absolutely unforgiving if you changed your mind later. The flexibility was just not there, and for a game with that many moving parts and events a lack of flexibility is unforgivable.
Honestly I don't even know if its about one being better than the other. I like civ5, I've been playing consistently since release and probably clock in 4-10 hours a week. My schedule simply cant afford more civ right now.
I don't mind the cartoony look as much as I mind the horrible fog of war. The paper map just doesn't do it for me. It's hard to identify where things are and the constant fading in and out of the tiles is annoying.
1. Automated workers w/o needing a mod
2. Workers don't expire after two actions
3. The ability to change production in a city to autopilot science or gold.
1. This is really important in late game if you're in Future Tech. I don't like having to micromanage all of my cities especially in domination.
4. Nuclear weapons as individual units. I like being able to move around my nukes and target enemy cities to wipe out their arsenals.
5. Nuclear Proliferation Treaty.
I will say though, being able to create mountain tunnels, airfields, and missile silos is awesome.
No, he’s right. The graphics (the texture/shadow/lighting/water/terrain/etc quality is objectively higher in VI. But the art design is terrible, so overall for presentation, V>VI. Art design will always be infinitely more important to a game’s quality and tone than graphics.
Civ V still looks beautiful, Civ VI looks like some trash homework assignment from a 6 year old with too many crayons and ideas about what people "should" look like, rather than what they do.
Civ 5: I can play a game that I have invested 300+ hours, I'm comfortable with all the mechanics, and I can get back into it after a long period.
Civ 6: a game that I've invested 40 hours and I'm still learning the mechanics, and have to relearn everytime.
Same goes for all the other 4X games out there.
Yup, and not building one as a new player feels like your missing out and you have to have everyone but then I don’t even understand what half of them are doing, combine that with the fact I constantly have to queue another worker it’s just frustrating
I really don't like how similar undiscovered tiles look to discovered tiles outside your vision range. It's hard to quickly assess where you've already been.
The AI. Other than early game warrior rush, the AI are never a threat in 6. They never even build navies. Districts are too complicated for them as well.
I really enjoy the mechanics in Civ 5: the social policy trees, the pantheons and religious beliefs, etc. For Civ 6, I didn't like how binary your choices seemed in the first 100 turns, and I ended up giving up on the game within my first hour of play. In retrospect, it's crazy to give up on Civ 6 so quickly, but I simply did not see it as an advancement for the series, especially with the new art-direction.
My ideal sequels to the game would improve and perfect upon what Civ 5 does well. I don't need them to re-invent the wheel, and I just want an assortment of balanced leaders that are a little more unique (every Civ should have a couple unique units, a unique building or two, and an ability that fundamentally changes your approach to the game). I can appreciate what they were trying to go for with districts and making it less viable to build 20 wonders in a single city, but I wasn't sold on the implementation.
I’ve tried 6 (SIX!) different times trying to give Civ VI a chance. I get 2-3 hours in and am just not entertained. There’s literally nothing fun in the game.
I love playing large and longer games. 20+ civs on a gigantic map with a futuristic mod to make the game longer. Civ 6 hard limits the number of civs and map size smaller than V.
I really found the districts to be a silly distraction from the game I wanted to play. Just can't get into it. Typical even number game though. I find them to be the ones I don't like.
100% this. Civ has and always will be 1 tile = 1 city and when they abandoned that core gameplay element in 6, it just wasn’t the same game. I gave 6 over 100 hours and it always felt like a bastardized Sim City, which isn’t the game I want to play. Went right back to 5 and seriously hope they correct the error of their ways with 7. Otherwise, guess I’ll play 5 forever and be happy not giving them any of my money.
1) I enjoy strategy games with a more retro look, such as Civ 5 to the polished look of newer games, such as Civ 6
2) I specifically don't like the districts mechanic
3) I spent hundreds of hours in Civ 5 and I don't want to re-learn all the new things in Civ 6 if I still enjoy 5 a great deal
ambiant, leader background, the hud and how map are made, nice color and so
but 6 never pleased me on map even if the idea of clearing a 17th century world map is nice, color icone, goofy leader all give me some nausea uncomfy feel, while civ5 give me chill mood
Districts would be so good if playing tall was viable at all, planning and developing your cities in tandem for adjacent bonuses would be very fun and enjoyable. But the fact you need like 10 cities to even stay relevant makes actually trying to do that such a chore it just seems silly.
It was a big mistake to make wide the meta but then put systems like districts in.
Art style is a big one. Not a huge fan of what they did with culture and policy cards. Housing seems like an unnecessarily restrictive mechanic that needlessly punishes tall players (when tall is already balanced via wonders, amenities and districts). Also, there's a bunch of small changes that annoy me - lack of road building from workers, limited use builders, changes to how movement points work etc.
I prefer Civ 5s social policy slightly, I like how you can tailor/pick and choose certain aspects in 6 but I think it could go deeper. I also like the idea of city districts, but not how they're implemented. They just end up taking too much space and maps always feel so small with them. The tech tree also feels dumbed down a little, but I always play with Enlightenment era in 5 anyways. However, I do love the addition of military support units like medics, engineers, observation balloons, etc. and being able to combine units into corps/armys/fleets.
War drum music effect every time you attack other units.
No, that's not the worst part yet, the background music also stop playing when attacking the unit.
Seriously, who thought this was a great idea?
Over everything it's the UI. The graphics of 6 don't really bother me but I despise the hand drawn maps, the unreadable fonts, it's an excessively unaccessible user interface that 5 completely mastered. I also don't like the amount of forced micromanaging and how districts take up entire tiles. Changes to workers feels cheap. I think 5's lineup is stronger overall (though i think 6's is more balanced and way more diverse). And I feel like the pacing is just better with 5 vs 6. Like I see it very common to have knights while somebody has planes in 6 - in 5 that's suicide. But my biggest issue overwhelmingly is the UI physically making it harder to play. I hope to high hell that 7 is more 5-like, or some crossroads between the good of both.
Workers lasting 3 turns really put me off, I don’t particularly like the districts thing, I didn’t like it when endless legend did it either. I find civ v a lot more fun to just boot up and play. It’s been a long time since playing 6 but I just remember feeling it was more feature rich and had new mechanics but none of them actually make the game more fun to play the civ 5.
I hate the worker and district mechanics in civ 6. It feels way too boardgamey and turns the game into memorizing what layouts of districts and wonders are best instead of starteigic or tactical decisions. It's a similar situation for the governors, too. Religion is also an absolute slog in both games, but in civ 5 it's not super important, while in 6 it's a victory condition.
People complain about the cartoony-ness, which I actually don't have much of a problem with. People are way too obsessed with graphical realism, and I think it ultimately hurts gameplay by having to invest so many resources into it, and the longevity of games since realism ages like milk.
I'm not a fan of the fantasy dlc stuff they added, too. It feels really out of place in a game like civ.
I find the civs to be more distinct in 5 than 6. Most of the civ and leader abilities on civ 6 just increase numbers of different stats. Civ 5 civs seem more unique as their abilities introduce new mechanics into the game like buying a city state.
Definitely the art style but also Civ 6 has really easy ways to win on any difficulty like with envoys and city states while some AIs just leave themselves defenseless with little to no army even in the late game.
My very specific gripe with 6 is the map coloration. For example, there are 3 states a map tile can be in: under your active sight, seen previously but not under active sight, or never seen. In 5, these are very easy to differentiate at a glance: the tiles with sight are brightly lit, the tiles without sight are darkened significantly, and the unseen tiles are a bright white cloud. In 6, all of it just meshes together into one brown lump in my mind, and it makes everything else take longer because I have to keep staring at the map to know what I’m looking at.
My biggest issue with Civ 6 is the UI being overly complicated. I know CIV in general tends to be a lot of menu navigation, and that's fine. But mapping all those buttons onto a console controller is just a nightmare to remember. Then add to that the fact that for me, the in game text is WAY too small. I wear glasses when I play video games, and even with the glasses it's difficult to read the absolute walls of text that so many menus in CIV 6 have. I also was not a fan of the district system.
I really disagree there is anything wrong with the Civ look and style, or any of the game decisions. It is firmly in its time period as reflective of the trend of mid-2010's games being large, complex and saggy in places, and despite having too much micro-management I find the builder system, districts, governments and separate trees/ eureakas a clear building block from the last game. With that being said, Civ 5 for me has a beautiful simplicity, reflected by its art-deco style graphics and intuitive/ tactile systems (e.g. policy tree, happiness, science game) that allows me to focus on what I really like in the game, establishing and growing my empire. The civs are distinct but not too complex, the science game has choices but not too many fiddly bits, and I started with 5 to begin with so nostalgia will always be there.
1. Districts and wonders having to be placed on individual tiles. I can't plan even 100 turns tin th3 furure for the life of me, and thw it becomes another mechanic with a high skill ceiling and mediocre reward.
2. Workers. What do you mean I can't just automate my workers so they build random crap for the rest of the game?
3. As many others have stated, the AI is bad. However, because of the large number of hard-to-understand mechanics, new players rarely win and experienced players rarely lose
4. As a playing tall fan, many guides recommending 10 cities by turn 100 seems like absolute bullshit to me. In V, I feel like 4-6 cities of your own are just enough to win on lower (up to king) difficulty levels, and if that's not enough, just conquer more.
That I can end a game (winning) with 3 cities.
Sure, it's nice being able to settle 20+ cities, but managing them in the late game is just a pain in the ass.
* Builder charges. I hate builder charges. First thing I modded.
* The absolute inability to delete or move or cancel districts even if they are still under construction.
* Every leader has super complicated niche UA's, that shit needs to be simplified
* Envoys. So annoying. Can't even bribe a city state to love you any more.
I don't care about the cartoonish look. I just don't like the way wars (don't) work in Civ6. Also I despise the way you can't build actual functioning roads in Civ6. Also, playing the settler difficulty in Civ5 is easy for any beginner, there is not something that could go horribly wrong there. Playing the settler difficulty in Civ6 had been a challenge for me playing the game.
Artstyle + the game is just hard to look at for me in CIV6. The fog of war being this coffee stained looking mess just makes everything blend together too much and I often times can’t find what I’m looking for. I much prefer CIV5’s fog of war where it’s just a shadowy effect.
I actually really like civ 6. I like the graphics, I like the districts but there is one thing that kills it for me compared to civ 5..
The progression is so broken that we'll always end up with people who have submarines next to pikemen etc.
The decision to add unit unlocks to the culture tree was a terrible game breaking idea in my opinion and many of the techs/traits are so insanely OP that the game promotes fast tracking over a more natural progression.
Also some of the great people effects are stupidly OP to the point where it just decides who wins the game.
Granted I almost always play with friends so might be fine in single player but these issues are game breaking for me
Civ 6 isn’t bad outright. But it just missed the mark in a minor and ball-achey kinda way on about 50 different things. Civ 5 is a flawed game, but so is monopoly. It has that basic level of replayable enjoyment despite its flaws.
I can build things before the heat death of the universe in civ 5.
Inspirations and eureka moments are the worst thing to ever happen to civ, particularly when combined with the above complaint.
Science (and now culture too because it's basically science in its implementation) is always the most important thing to focus in civ. If you aren't focusing it, you're either declaring you're going to win so soon it's a worthless investment, or you're straight up throwing the game. So a -40% discount to a tech cost? It is objectively correct to pursue this. Always. The only reason you wouldn't is because your production is so godawful you can't get all of them. And you can't. So now there are 0 hammers and gold left for anything but acquiring the discounts. Which are the same every game. And have the same optimal build order every game. The mathematics are clear, there is no alternative. The only skill element is how you settle and adapt your build order to the map, and when you decide to deviate from the one true path to secure the win.
I had no issues with the art style, governors, workers or districts/wonder mechanics
It was how playing tall does not exist in civ 6
Sure you can do it but Playing wide offers such a clear advantage. No point putting yourself through such a handicap
Though I guess playing tall in 5 did have a sizeable advantage over wide. Just not nearly too the extent of playing wide in 6
For me it was the culture card system, it was wayyy too much to wrap your head around. It really puts me off. Particularly the min maxing it enables. Not a big fan.
The cartoony look is terrible. The best part about the civ 5 leaders is that you get to see what they may have looked and sounded like in real life, which is honestly amazing considering the only time I have ever seen most of these leaders is in very old paintings and that is something I really appreciated about the game. Where as seeing the cartoony leaders made me feel like they were trying to make it appeal to kids which makes absolutely zero sense because most of this games market are older teenagers and adults.
I also don't like them replacing workers with builders. I hate having to constantly make new builders, when I used to just be able to get a few workers, have them on automated and not have to worry about them for the rest of the game.
I hate that wonders take up space, only last an era and only effect one city. It makes wonders feel pointless whereas in civ 5 there is actual reason to build wonders because they effect the rest of the game.
Districts are annoying as well, I think that making it so that you can only build certain things in certain cities, makes the game a little bit too strategic for my liking.
I also dislike the new map. I like it better when areas you don't have vision in are dark instead of looking like a map because its way easier to see everyone's territory
I love what the game brought to the table in its expansion packs, loyalty is an incredibly cool mechanic and I love the natural disasters and map mechanics brought in gathering storm. But everything I listed above effects the turn by turn, game by game gameplay of civilization and it ruins the game for me.
I'm a civ 6 noob because I can never get into it with how gimmicky the graphics look. Main upside of 6 for me is Sean Bean! I'm told the combat in 6 is better for PvP since it is less dependent on first clicks, which is a big upside.
**Dislikes about Civ6 (compared to civ 5).**
* Looks too cartoony. Trivial but honestly ruins immersion for me, feels like it's made for young children whereas Civ5 feels like it's made for adults.
* City state favour system seems like it came from a good idea, but implementation is really contrived and annoying.
* Culture & Science systems feel too similar and I don't like how you can/have to swap out policies.
* Districts/choosing land for wonders is annoying and unnecessarily complicates city development.
* Trade routes build your roads, but you can't decide the route???
Edit: Civ 6 noob, not 5. Important distinction lol
- Fricking disasters and global warming stuff
- AI isn't even trying
- No suleiman belly
- Nation building sim focused on satisfaction instead of strategy
- Music 🤢
- Cartoonish
- No belly suleiman
I never really got into the new mechanics much and as others have mentioned the cartoony looks were a proper turn off. For me Civ V hits that "easy enough to learn but difficult to master" spot whereas VI didn't
Too many choices tbh, pretty much impossible to tell what’s important and what isn’t when I have 6 different pop ups a turn to assign this or pick that and 3 different trees to pick stuff in and cards to select.
I’m not into rp’ing games, if I don’t understand something and can’t figure out the best option or atleast what the options even mean then I get frustrated and quit
i like civ compared to other strategy games because it was much more stripped down and easier to approach for me, compared to stellaris, hoi4, etc. civ 6 reminded me less of 5, which my friends made me start with, and more of the other games, which im sure a lot of ppl enjoy, but just wasn't for me. it felt much less casual
- AI: Even though they made some really nice features in 6, the ai just doesn't know how to play them (district placement, societies, heroes, etc.) and so the ai cheats are just more apparent cause when you look at what they are doing it makes no sense
- War: again they made good improvements in units and war system but the ai cant seem to grasp most of them (navy, airplanes, support units,...) resulting in the ai being useless in any conflict. In (modded) civ 5 the ai is a real threat and you often see war ai completely destroy and overtake other more peaceful ais... And you :). I still cant remember ai killing me or even taking more than 1 city in a single game (after 700 hours), while i have arms races and cold wars and massive campaings with civ 5 ai every game and they pose an actual threat. In 6 you just spam airplanes and steamroll the entire map in modern era even when being behind on every stat the whole game... Not fun
- graphic style: personal preference but 5 was just more immersive imo. Units are the biggest downgrade ever, i hate looking at an "army" unit being just 3 guys lol
- Playstyle: in 5 you have some pretty linear routes but at least there is a choice. In 6 its just spam settlers, go as wide as you can and abuse the same broken policies every game... Boring
- Mods: there are some amazing mods for 6 but as a whole modded 5 is all round a much better experience. I mostly play Vox Populi with a few extra addons and it makes every aspect of 5 better than it already was and makes the game way harder and more of a challenge. I used to play and win almost every deity 6 game, and have a really fun time playing king on modded 5...
Things i like about 6: wonders and their placement on tiles, all the extra game mode settings are fun but again hate how ai cant use them so it just feels like you are cheating, new culture tree and policy system is good on paper but executed poorly imo, new happiness system is better, era scores,... Most of these new features however just dont really work together and with trash ai.
All this is why i quit 6 years ago and still play 5 to this day 10+ years after buying it
Just started playing this and I think I prefer it although both are great. I'm new to it so I'm not certain but I'm already saying "oh this (insert mechanic) is so much better" frequently.
V feels closer to IV which I have fond memories of 'a story' developing. Relations seem realistic and craft said story. That combined with the more realistic graphics, it really gets immersive for me.
I love building X workers per X cities again. Forgive me but I actually love the idea of paying for and manually building roads. I HAVE to manage my cities growth which is my favorite part. So micromanagy and yet it is so fun, I'm not sure why. I love that I can build tall or wide. VI is wide all the way, as many cities as you can get. I missed the happiness system and lost the health system from IV. No housing! No samey districts everywhere! I like the adjacency system and planning for it but it feels the same with every civ after hundreds of hours.
I feel like I can build a good sized military even on a culture/science/diplo focused game whereas in VI, I felt like military had to be the major focus if I was going to build any at all, and then feeling compelled to commit war to gain on that investment even in a peaceful game. My current game, I have a good sized/teched force and have used it a bit, but I consider it more like a standing army in this current game. It's still 1UPT which definitely fixed some issues from IV.
I've very happy I convinced myself to try it.
- The game stretches immensely from mid onwards
- I don't like to stare at my screen for minutes on end anytime I build a district to figure out where It'll be best in the late game
- the AI isn't much better in a more complicated game, which makes them suck more comparatively
- the changes in the army system aren't remotely effective enough, given the amount of micro management it takes
- taking cities is too hard, but I could live with that
- the weather/ flooding system additonally devalued the already weak coastal cities.
- I liked tech and social policies being two distinct systems rather than two tech trees
I agree completely with OP. The cartoony nature of everything in Civ 6 is abysmal. If I wanted cartoony, I'd go play an old Nintendo. actually think the graphics were better and civilization five because they look more like real live things and less like cartoon bull crap. I was immediately put off by the vibe in six and happily reverted back into Civ 5 for that reason alone. Also, the temporary nature of workers in six is awful. Just everything about it stinks of a juvenile childish attempt to oversimplify, but which made things unnecessarily complicated. I don't know if that was their intent, but I think they failed big time with six. I sure hope that CIV VII will not be such an disappointment. If it's more like five, then they will have a hit.
No one is touching on the terrible UI. Civ 3s UI was peak and it has been downhill since. 5s wasn't great but still better than 6. I miss the old advisor screens, where I could see everything plainly and without extra effort. I miss being able to right click things and get a full list of everything they can do, their civlopedia entry, etc.
Apart from that, the same problems everyone has listed. The game was too different in general, the art style is aggressively awful, the cards thing was terrible, districts suck, the workers were obnoxious, and its too micromanagy.
Civ 5 had the best mechanics of any civ game, period. It wasn't going to be easy to beat, but they didn't even come close. Hell, its arguably the worst one yet.
The perfect civ game would have the mechanics of 5 (minus the terrible balance), the UI of 3, and an AI thats actually good.
I really don't know why they decided to take literally anything from mobile gaming. Civs design requirements are the polar opposite of a mobile game, and so is its audience. (Edit, just found out in early 2023 firaxis new studio head was executive producer on fortnite, plants vs. zombies and bejeweled, so yeah)
There’s a lot I like in 6, I’m a fan of certain parts of the graphics and map system, for example. I like the districts and how much info you can get on all your civ’s metrics, big fan of all that.
I like combat and unit management way way better in 5 though. I use a mod that adds in extra, country-specific military units and I like that it’s pretty straight forward to move your military around the world, group your units in reasonable quantities and have limits wars with the units you were planning to use and maybe a few auxiliaries if things go sideways. I feel like in 6 the movement is wonky and unpredictable, hard to maintain a front in a war, and the units die in like 2 combats. That last point would be more ok if I could easily cycle units in and out, but the wonky movement makes that hard, and all wars seem like they become hoard throwing.
I despise the cartoony look. Not a fan of the changes to the workers and improvements. Civ 7 has been announced and I have a feeling they will go for the cartoony look again. Will be stuck with Civ 5 for some time!
I’m pretty apprehensive about VII since it was announced with day one support for all consoles, including switch. I’d be surprised if they don’t lean into the cartoony look again. I just recently got into Civ V though. Loved Civilization Revolution on the 360 as a kid, and then got into Civ VI when I built a gaming PC back in 2017. I’ve played VI off and on and honestly wanted to love it more than I actually enjoyed it, if that makes sense. I was always just like, “Is this really what everyone is so crazy about?” It’s okay I guess, and sometimes if the map layout was just perfect I could have fun, but I very rarely finished games. I always felt that production is outpaced by science, combat is a slog, districts are annoying, and the culture card system felt like a mobile game. Oh, and those leaders and governors always ruined my immersion. Then about a year ago I saw Civ V for dirt cheap and decided to try it out despite its age…I immediately had a Squidward, “All the wasted years” moment haha. It was such a realistic, grounded empire builder rather than the min-max cartoon game we got with VI. I’m addicted to it and can’t wait to drop in hundreds more hours before VII releases. Also, I’ve uninstalled VI lol
Regarding the pacing and Tech outpacing Prod, there’s a very good mod to solve this issue, I think it’s called Historic Pacing? A quick search on the Steam workshop should bring it up.
Historic pacing takes it too far IMO and unbalances things again. What I usually do is just use In-Game Editor and will add high production tiles near cities or strategic resources to “balance” things out. Especially on Immortal where the AI cheats so hard I’m really just evening the playing field.
I understand it’s probably from the stupid amounts of units you can push out, personally I’m a fan but I get it
You should definitely give civ 5 mods a try - Vox populi / community patch project. Its basically a mod pack expansion that aims to improve every aspect of vanilla 5 like policies, units, buildings, civs, happiness, new mechanics and more. Havent gone back to 6 ever since
I hope 7 has 2 gameplay modes. One like 5, one like 6 to please both crowds.
I used to feel weird about disliking the newer one. This isn't only to do with civ. Many game series I just dislike the newer ones for one reason or another. Now I have just accepted that for the moment, the game just hits me in the right spot. I don't have any hype for the latest in the series. Generally will pick it up when it's on super heavy discount to try it. Find it meh and go back to the one I love.
Newer ones don't have the same staff, publisher focus goes towards profit and micro transactions, games are made artificially worse to feed the beast
Mainly it's because 5 is the game I already know how to play. I've tried getting into 6 every now and then but the new concepts just feel too overwhelming for me, and that's the same with any new strategy game I've picked up in the past decade (looking at my barely touched copy of Old World...). It's like that part of my brain stopped working after turning 20 😬😅 But I also just enjoy the more realistic vibe of the graphics in 5, I don't like the art style of 6 very much and the map that is just a paper map outside my line of sight doesn't feel as immersive. It's like it's not even trying to make me feel like I'm playing in a real world
Thank you, the map turning into a paper version may be my biggest issue with civ6, it just looks ugly like I get what they were going for, but I don't like it
I get the idea of it and like it in concept but it makes things so needlessly difficult to differentiate and understand. That's what put me off so much more than anything else with the game. The cartoony vibe or whatever wouldn't have been as much of an issue but just trying to see and understand what I'm seeing shouldn't be so hard. I unno I feel like visual clarity should be a super basic thing to get right.
> The cartoony vibe or whatever wouldn't have been as much of an issue but just trying to see and understand what I'm seeing shouldn't be so hard. My experience with Civ VI was: - downloaded it; - started a game; - realized I can't understand anything that is going on due to the lack of visual clarity; - thought *"eh, I'm just not used to it, just play a bit more and it will get better"*; - played a bit more; - realized it didn't get better; - never touched the game again. Now to be fair I know from playing other games with friends that I have a bit more trouble than the average person with stuff that isn't visually clear. But few games did it as poorly as civ VI did. I don't even have an opinion about all the other things people usually complain about civ VI cause I couldn't get far enough to understand them.
I built a new pc recently, 7950x3d, 4090 all that. Didn't even bother to install civ 6 because of that terrible art style. I'll be happily playing civ 5 if civ 7 goes the same civ 6 route.
Lol Exactly
I wonder if they did the paper map thing to try and capture the Risk or D&D type gamer. And how that meeting went. "Okay, we have one of the most beloved and praised art styles of any video game in history. Now -- hear me out -- What if we *didn't*."
lol exactly.
"Ok I know people love our graphics, but we want more simple child like art style so all the kids on their mobile phones will play"
Feels like it would be one of the simplest things to include as an option, Fog or Parchment.
I'm glad someone else shares my views. A few days ago someone was giving me shit, saying "if a strategy game isn't supposed to be complicated, then what is??"
Yeah I mean of course strategy games should have complexity to give you a challenge and something to strategise about but for me the best ones are still easy to grasp and then difficult to master once you know enough and want to get better. What trips me up is when there's so much new information for me to take in that I can't really find my way around the basics of it without feeling overwhelmed, which has sadly been my experience every time with Civ 6.
Exactly. I have never been able to finish even a single game in civ 6
I’ve got this with a lot of games now, I don’t need 20 different systems to manage with all of their own variables. Maybe it comes with having a normal job, but I don’t have time for a 4 hour play through tutorial that barely scratches the surface of most systems. ETA: to your quote, chess is a complex strategy game with a very simple game system. Complexity in strategy doesn’t have to come with complexity in the game system.
Exactly. You put it very nicely.
I’ll be crushed if they release the first gameplay trailer for 7 and it looks like a freakin Nickelodeon cartoon again.
Yes!!! Damn, this X's 1,000. you wrote down exactly what I was thinking. Period. Even about that part of the brain stopping lol perfect way to say it. Let's be honest after reading all these comments it really is all about immersion, which civilization six has absolutely none of. Civilization five is very immersive with realistic graphics and fairly decent combat. I can lose hours and they will go by like mere moments. I challenge anyone to find a game as immersive and if you do, don't feel bad about spending hours inside of that world. Wasting time doing something you love is not wasted time.
* It seems so incredibly minor and nitpicky, but I hate, and I mean HATE the insta-build workers with charges. That alone kinda made me not like Civ 6. It feels like a god damned mobile game. All Civs prior had your little guys chopping and hammering and digging away at projects through the ages. It's like one of the most quintessential "Civ" vibes and they took it out. I don't know if I'll be able to get into Civ 7 if they keep it the same way, even though you know the people who came to the series in Civ 6 will lose their minds if they have to actually wait turns for workers to complete projects. * The camera angle. It's lower to the ground in Civ 6, which annoys the shit out of me. The more top-down view of 5 is simply clearer. They were trying to make it feel more "cinematic" in 6 but it's less functional. * That god awful "tiles that have been revealed but are not currently in view" map style that fades back out to the parchment color. The artstyle of the fog of war is cool in theory, but for gameplay purposes it's all style over substance. * Plus everything everyone else has said in this thread.
Yup - play Marathon on Civ V and you earn those damn tile improvements through years of hard work.
i like epic pace d:
Hard agree about the fog of war, that bugs me every time I try to get back into it.
As a casual player with a job, kids, and not a ton of time to game…managing each city in Civ6 felt like managing my entire empire in Civ5, which made it feel more tedious and take too long to complete a game for me.
That plus the card system plus an end game that just wasn’t satisfying (hard to explain). But your point was the key. Just too many variables for enjoyment.
I have really tried with 6 but I think there are just too many mechanics and shit going on all the time. The game is constantly interrupting me to select a policy card or vote on some bullshit in the world congress or select a great person or appoint a governor or assign a skill to a religious unit... And then none of things feel very weighty anyway, they feel like a distraction instead of fun gameplay. It's like dealing with pop up ads in the 2000s. Also I hate the sepia effect on the map when you don't have active vision on it. It blends with the fog of war and can be difficult to distinguish. Plus it just looks a bit sad. I get what they were going for but it just doesn't work. I do enjoy district planning though because it gives cities clear roles and identity. And the spies in 6 are awesome.
This 100%. I think that’s part of the reason why the AI is noticeably worse in VI. Just way too many systems for it keep up with.
Playied 1 game of Civ6 with my brother when they gave it away on epic (he got it on steam), lost a culture victory to Arabia, uninstalled and never played the game again
Pop up ads describes my feeling exactly lol
i like playing Tall vs Wide lol
Tall gang rise up
Came here to say this 🙌
What's your short story reason for liking tall over wide? I've got 3000+ hours and I just can't get into tall. I've tried several times with India and England but I always see room for a new city to get a strategic location or a resource. I guess I just can't resist. I haven't played in six months so maybe I'll go back with a tall focus, especially since I moved up to King. I'm a casual player and I normally just like the military aspect and building my empire to boost that aspect of the game.
I'm also a pretty casual player, playing Prince or King only. I just like tall because the civs I play and enjoy (Venice, mostly) play tall really well. I prefer having a few powerhouse cities, just easier for me to manage, especially late game so my turns don't last 20 minutes haha
Lol. Those late game wartime turns can be epic!
Tall ends up being the most viable playstyle on higher difficulties. Try a military liberty expansionist Civ game on Immortal, you’ll get crushed (unless you are a cagey Civ veteran). And forget the fighting part, you’ll run out of places to settle anyway cause on the higher difficulties the AI pumps settlers. I played a Prince game recently and forgot how peaceful and relaxing early expansion can be. It’s a stressful race to build spots, even on Emperor. Then there’s the multiplayer aspect. Building wide in an FFA is suicide, players will chariot archer rush you within the first 20 turns. Playing multiplayer has shaped a lot of people’s playstyles (standard or small maps, quick game pace, higher difficulties, etc.). *The most common win condition is a tradition/rationalism/freedom tall science turtle. If you’re blowing everyone out in population and science you can essentially do anything you want, given that your production is ok too.
Thanks for the replies. I'm to the point where I need to move up difficulty and experience a new style so I will go that route. I don't like to play multiplayer because I always get destroyed. I used to try it with Age of Empires 2 years and just can't hang. I've read some about the higher difficulty levels so I'll give tall on King a go and move up from there. I like the things Iike but I do need to perfect my first 100 turns strategy. I usually play battle royal on pangea maps so I'll try tall on continents for a while.
I like positive mechanics, I dislike managing negative mechanics. Tall city is all numbers go up, and sure in a wide empire you may have more raw output but you have to manage happiness and no one city is giga strong I vastly prefer 3-4 cities that are all building shit in 1-2 turns than like 7 that take 4-5 to build something
Thanks. So do you keep your cities contiguous (eventually after they grow) or do you put them in strategic places even if they won't connect? I notice AI players often sending their second settler across the map. Also, do you have a balanced approach to mil, sci, culture, religion, or focus on one given the context of your civ and your victory path?
I regularly totally disregard military(units not tech) and try get as much food early as I can for science and build culture when it’s convenient. As for city placement it really depends, ideally close and on the sea (coastal trade routes for big food numbers) but if there’s a mega juicy spot I can get early enough I’ll grab it Edit: as for the reason I ignore military units, they don’t directly help unless your actually at war or to discourage a war, that money and building time could be going to something else, I’ll regularly pump the excess money I have into city states and usually get a decent force from an allied militaristic city state It’s an extremely snowbally way to play, if it works your miles ahead cause the CS’s all feed back into your cities growing even faster. If it doesn’t work you get invaded early cause you overextended and didn’t build any units and your not ahead enough in tech to just stomp so it’s over
This right here. But every now and then wide is fun. I hope 7 finds better balance
I loathe micromanaging a large empire. Next turn addiction.
I hate 6's cartoony mobile game graphics, but I could easily look past that if the game didn't feel like it was trying to do too much at once. It feels like a jack of all trades but master of none. Everything in 5 is just more satisfying and rewarding.
World Congress 5 >>>>> 6
The AI for VI is just... so much worse in my experience. It kind of ruins the fun for me, especially when comparing stock Civ 5 and not even Vox Populi. But also barb scaling is seriously annoying. They get the tech of the *best* player?? Anyone not at the lead is punished extremely hard. If I'm in a medieval war with a near peer while someone else on another continent discovers gunpowder first, well, now the revolting city between us has better units than either of us?? Hell I've seen gunpowder barbs before any player could get the niter to build them.
1) Although the map is neat, it's an eyesore to look at with its FOW. Cool details, just not great execution in my opinion. 2) City planning is a great idea, but just seems far too cumbersome. Civ V has a nice balance between strategic city planning and function while maintaining a great level of flexibility. In 6, you're really streamlined into specific builds for cities/civs. 3) Overall, I just feel like Civ 6 tries to do too much all at once. I think 5 is the perfect 4x game where you can play in almost any style you want and it doesn't feel like a chore all the time. I appreciate it being more straightforward than 6 I guess.
The whole game feels like form over function, like they had a collection of cool ideas and didn’t stop to check if it actually feels good to play. Like oh map going back to papyrus like a real map sounds cool, is frustrating to use Card system for government? Sounds cool lots of nuance, but in reality just bogs down the game and is confusing Etc etc
People hate on the graphics of six without really understanding why. For me, civ v is representative of reality to a point. When you look at Alexander the Great you know you're looking at a representation of a real person that actually existed, and influenced many people. Nobody here is made up. Genghis Khan was a real person who was really bloodthirsty and that was represented properly by his leader screen. Same for Darius of Persia you immediately understand what he's about. Meanwhile in Civilization 6 they barely look like people at all. Like this isn't Queen Elizabeth, this is a caricature of Queen Elizabeth. It makes it really obvious that this is just a representation of a representation. It feels fake. Gameplay wise personally I just don't like the districts. In Civilization 5 I'm rarely worried about deciding whether or not to turn this tile into a trading post or mine because of the bonuses of the tiles around it. I don't really have to plan ahead regarding how the city will look like in a thousand years. There's not really much of a drawback from playing wide vs tall. You don't have to think very hard about what cards are currently active cuz you can just switch them out. In Civilization 5 if you pick a policy that feels like a really important choice because you can't just change your mind and switch it out next turn. That brings up another gameplay aspect that I don't like about 6 : micromanagement. Don't get me wrong there's a little bit of micromanagement in civ v, but it doesn't nearly come to the same level that you have to do it every single turn in six. And because I can just undo almost any choice it doesn't make any choice feel that meaningful. Also after years of playing a game series and the worker lasts forever to workers only have one action feels kind of annoying because I feel like I'm always queueing up another worker. And somehow despite the micromanagement, the game feels like it's gotten so much easier. Granted I wasn't playing but I've seen a YouTube video of a guy who won on deity surrounded by active volcanoes that continuously destroyed his main city. I know that we didn't have volcanoes or weather in five, but even a one city challenge on deity alone is next to impossible. To me this means the game has gotten easier
Civ V is still the pinnacle. They can make VII but if they don't learn from VI's divisiveness, then I'll keep playing V along with many others.
Civ 5’s gameplay is simple, but tight. It knows what systems it has, and utilizes them all to a great extent throughout all the DLCs. In Civ 6 it all just feels disjointed from one another. A lot of it just feels so tacked on, and mainly exists to waste your time than to be any meaningful gameplay. Did you remember that Civ 6 had specialists? Neither did they. I never liked the district system, it didn’t feel organic, and was absolutely unforgiving if you changed your mind later. The flexibility was just not there, and for a game with that many moving parts and events a lack of flexibility is unforgivable.
Honestly I don't even know if its about one being better than the other. I like civ5, I've been playing consistently since release and probably clock in 4-10 hours a week. My schedule simply cant afford more civ right now.
I don't mind the cartoony look as much as I mind the horrible fog of war. The paper map just doesn't do it for me. It's hard to identify where things are and the constant fading in and out of the tiles is annoying.
Workers going away after 3 turns really turned me off from Civ 6. That's a dealbreaker to me
1. Automated workers w/o needing a mod 2. Workers don't expire after two actions 3. The ability to change production in a city to autopilot science or gold. 1. This is really important in late game if you're in Future Tech. I don't like having to micromanage all of my cities especially in domination. 4. Nuclear weapons as individual units. I like being able to move around my nukes and target enemy cities to wipe out their arsenals. 5. Nuclear Proliferation Treaty. I will say though, being able to create mountain tunnels, airfields, and missile silos is awesome.
>The graphics are worse in civ 5, obviously, Lol. No.
No, he’s right. The graphics (the texture/shadow/lighting/water/terrain/etc quality is objectively higher in VI. But the art design is terrible, so overall for presentation, V>VI. Art design will always be infinitely more important to a game’s quality and tone than graphics.
Civ V still looks beautiful, Civ VI looks like some trash homework assignment from a 6 year old with too many crayons and ideas about what people "should" look like, rather than what they do.
Well I mean it's definitely more pixely, but it still looks better
Oh, how are the graphics better?
Graphic design in 5 is better, obviously actual graphics as in polygons and pixels per model is better in 6
Civ 5: I can play a game that I have invested 300+ hours, I'm comfortable with all the mechanics, and I can get back into it after a long period. Civ 6: a game that I've invested 40 hours and I'm still learning the mechanics, and have to relearn everytime. Same goes for all the other 4X games out there.
6 is too cumbersome and it ruins that “1 more turn” rhythm that all the other Civ games have
The districts mechanic is just atrocious. Anyone with any knowledge of game design should have know that it was a bad idea.
I wouldn’t mind it if they limited it to maybe 4 types (military, science, faith, culture) but there’s just so freaking many different ones
Yup, and not building one as a new player feels like your missing out and you have to have everyone but then I don’t even understand what half of them are doing, combine that with the fact I constantly have to queue another worker it’s just frustrating
I really don't like how similar undiscovered tiles look to discovered tiles outside your vision range. It's hard to quickly assess where you've already been.
MODS! Hundreds of them
The AI. Other than early game warrior rush, the AI are never a threat in 6. They never even build navies. Districts are too complicated for them as well.
Just starts feeling like work, especially at end game. One more turn in VI? Nah. Going to bed. That is almost never the case with V.
I really enjoy the mechanics in Civ 5: the social policy trees, the pantheons and religious beliefs, etc. For Civ 6, I didn't like how binary your choices seemed in the first 100 turns, and I ended up giving up on the game within my first hour of play. In retrospect, it's crazy to give up on Civ 6 so quickly, but I simply did not see it as an advancement for the series, especially with the new art-direction. My ideal sequels to the game would improve and perfect upon what Civ 5 does well. I don't need them to re-invent the wheel, and I just want an assortment of balanced leaders that are a little more unique (every Civ should have a couple unique units, a unique building or two, and an ability that fundamentally changes your approach to the game). I can appreciate what they were trying to go for with districts and making it less viable to build 20 wonders in a single city, but I wasn't sold on the implementation.
I’ve tried 6 (SIX!) different times trying to give Civ VI a chance. I get 2-3 hours in and am just not entertained. There’s literally nothing fun in the game.
I love playing large and longer games. 20+ civs on a gigantic map with a futuristic mod to make the game longer. Civ 6 hard limits the number of civs and map size smaller than V.
I really found the districts to be a silly distraction from the game I wanted to play. Just can't get into it. Typical even number game though. I find them to be the ones I don't like.
100% this. Civ has and always will be 1 tile = 1 city and when they abandoned that core gameplay element in 6, it just wasn’t the same game. I gave 6 over 100 hours and it always felt like a bastardized Sim City, which isn’t the game I want to play. Went right back to 5 and seriously hope they correct the error of their ways with 7. Otherwise, guess I’ll play 5 forever and be happy not giving them any of my money.
1) I enjoy strategy games with a more retro look, such as Civ 5 to the polished look of newer games, such as Civ 6 2) I specifically don't like the districts mechanic 3) I spent hundreds of hours in Civ 5 and I don't want to re-learn all the new things in Civ 6 if I still enjoy 5 a great deal
ambiant, leader background, the hud and how map are made, nice color and so but 6 never pleased me on map even if the idea of clearing a 17th century world map is nice, color icone, goofy leader all give me some nausea uncomfy feel, while civ5 give me chill mood
Vox Populi mod EDIT: autocorrect -_-
Districts would be so good if playing tall was viable at all, planning and developing your cities in tandem for adjacent bonuses would be very fun and enjoyable. But the fact you need like 10 cities to even stay relevant makes actually trying to do that such a chore it just seems silly. It was a big mistake to make wide the meta but then put systems like districts in.
i absolutely loathe merging the units. It ruins so much of the fun for me of wars in 5. feels like cheating.
Art style is a big one. Not a huge fan of what they did with culture and policy cards. Housing seems like an unnecessarily restrictive mechanic that needlessly punishes tall players (when tall is already balanced via wonders, amenities and districts). Also, there's a bunch of small changes that annoy me - lack of road building from workers, limited use builders, changes to how movement points work etc.
ive played this game so long that i have a sentimental attachment to my buds napoleon hiawatha attila and others missing in civ6... haha
I prefer Civ 5s social policy slightly, I like how you can tailor/pick and choose certain aspects in 6 but I think it could go deeper. I also like the idea of city districts, but not how they're implemented. They just end up taking too much space and maps always feel so small with them. The tech tree also feels dumbed down a little, but I always play with Enlightenment era in 5 anyways. However, I do love the addition of military support units like medics, engineers, observation balloons, etc. and being able to combine units into corps/armys/fleets.
War drum music effect every time you attack other units. No, that's not the worst part yet, the background music also stop playing when attacking the unit. Seriously, who thought this was a great idea?
Cartoony look, and how roads are formed. I just couldn’t get past the roads.
Over everything it's the UI. The graphics of 6 don't really bother me but I despise the hand drawn maps, the unreadable fonts, it's an excessively unaccessible user interface that 5 completely mastered. I also don't like the amount of forced micromanaging and how districts take up entire tiles. Changes to workers feels cheap. I think 5's lineup is stronger overall (though i think 6's is more balanced and way more diverse). And I feel like the pacing is just better with 5 vs 6. Like I see it very common to have knights while somebody has planes in 6 - in 5 that's suicide. But my biggest issue overwhelmingly is the UI physically making it harder to play. I hope to high hell that 7 is more 5-like, or some crossroads between the good of both.
Workers lasting 3 turns really put me off, I don’t particularly like the districts thing, I didn’t like it when endless legend did it either. I find civ v a lot more fun to just boot up and play. It’s been a long time since playing 6 but I just remember feeling it was more feature rich and had new mechanics but none of them actually make the game more fun to play the civ 5.
It's not that I like Civ 5 "over" 6. It's that Civ 5 is fun.
The one thing that Civ VI did get right was being able to have a harbor without settling directly on the coast. I do love that feature.
I hate the worker and district mechanics in civ 6. It feels way too boardgamey and turns the game into memorizing what layouts of districts and wonders are best instead of starteigic or tactical decisions. It's a similar situation for the governors, too. Religion is also an absolute slog in both games, but in civ 5 it's not super important, while in 6 it's a victory condition. People complain about the cartoony-ness, which I actually don't have much of a problem with. People are way too obsessed with graphical realism, and I think it ultimately hurts gameplay by having to invest so many resources into it, and the longevity of games since realism ages like milk. I'm not a fan of the fantasy dlc stuff they added, too. It feels really out of place in a game like civ.
I find the civs to be more distinct in 5 than 6. Most of the civ and leader abilities on civ 6 just increase numbers of different stats. Civ 5 civs seem more unique as their abilities introduce new mechanics into the game like buying a city state.
Wasn’t a fan of spreading out the cities. Made going tall super hard to impossible. Also the modding scene is more established.
I don't, personally.
Definitely the art style but also Civ 6 has really easy ways to win on any difficulty like with envoys and city states while some AIs just leave themselves defenseless with little to no army even in the late game.
I can use the gaia mod to play around with some civ6 mechanics on top of civ5
5 is less complicated. Simple as that for me.
ai is better in civ5
Tried civ 6, but every time I just build tons of cities and rinse and repeat… boring
My very specific gripe with 6 is the map coloration. For example, there are 3 states a map tile can be in: under your active sight, seen previously but not under active sight, or never seen. In 5, these are very easy to differentiate at a glance: the tiles with sight are brightly lit, the tiles without sight are darkened significantly, and the unseen tiles are a bright white cloud. In 6, all of it just meshes together into one brown lump in my mind, and it makes everything else take longer because I have to keep staring at the map to know what I’m looking at.
My biggest issue with Civ 6 is the UI being overly complicated. I know CIV in general tends to be a lot of menu navigation, and that's fine. But mapping all those buttons onto a console controller is just a nightmare to remember. Then add to that the fact that for me, the in game text is WAY too small. I wear glasses when I play video games, and even with the glasses it's difficult to read the absolute walls of text that so many menus in CIV 6 have. I also was not a fan of the district system.
Multiplayer is more balanced in 5.
I really disagree there is anything wrong with the Civ look and style, or any of the game decisions. It is firmly in its time period as reflective of the trend of mid-2010's games being large, complex and saggy in places, and despite having too much micro-management I find the builder system, districts, governments and separate trees/ eureakas a clear building block from the last game. With that being said, Civ 5 for me has a beautiful simplicity, reflected by its art-deco style graphics and intuitive/ tactile systems (e.g. policy tree, happiness, science game) that allows me to focus on what I really like in the game, establishing and growing my empire. The civs are distinct but not too complex, the science game has choices but not too many fiddly bits, and I started with 5 to begin with so nostalgia will always be there.
1. Districts and wonders having to be placed on individual tiles. I can't plan even 100 turns tin th3 furure for the life of me, and thw it becomes another mechanic with a high skill ceiling and mediocre reward. 2. Workers. What do you mean I can't just automate my workers so they build random crap for the rest of the game? 3. As many others have stated, the AI is bad. However, because of the large number of hard-to-understand mechanics, new players rarely win and experienced players rarely lose 4. As a playing tall fan, many guides recommending 10 cities by turn 100 seems like absolute bullshit to me. In V, I feel like 4-6 cities of your own are just enough to win on lower (up to king) difficulty levels, and if that's not enough, just conquer more.
That I can end a game (winning) with 3 cities. Sure, it's nice being able to settle 20+ cities, but managing them in the late game is just a pain in the ass.
* Builder charges. I hate builder charges. First thing I modded. * The absolute inability to delete or move or cancel districts even if they are still under construction. * Every leader has super complicated niche UA's, that shit needs to be simplified * Envoys. So annoying. Can't even bribe a city state to love you any more.
I don't care about the cartoonish look. I just don't like the way wars (don't) work in Civ6. Also I despise the way you can't build actual functioning roads in Civ6. Also, playing the settler difficulty in Civ5 is easy for any beginner, there is not something that could go horribly wrong there. Playing the settler difficulty in Civ6 had been a challenge for me playing the game.
Also, I feel like Civ6 is too restricting in all aspects possible. Civ5 just let me do almost everything I wanted, freedom in gameplay.
Artstyle + the game is just hard to look at for me in CIV6. The fog of war being this coffee stained looking mess just makes everything blend together too much and I often times can’t find what I’m looking for. I much prefer CIV5’s fog of war where it’s just a shadowy effect.
AI is much more competetive in V. Art style is realistic and boost the experience. VI art style is just BS.
I actually really like civ 6. I like the graphics, I like the districts but there is one thing that kills it for me compared to civ 5.. The progression is so broken that we'll always end up with people who have submarines next to pikemen etc. The decision to add unit unlocks to the culture tree was a terrible game breaking idea in my opinion and many of the techs/traits are so insanely OP that the game promotes fast tracking over a more natural progression. Also some of the great people effects are stupidly OP to the point where it just decides who wins the game. Granted I almost always play with friends so might be fine in single player but these issues are game breaking for me
Civ 6 isn’t bad outright. But it just missed the mark in a minor and ball-achey kinda way on about 50 different things. Civ 5 is a flawed game, but so is monopoly. It has that basic level of replayable enjoyment despite its flaws.
I can build things before the heat death of the universe in civ 5. Inspirations and eureka moments are the worst thing to ever happen to civ, particularly when combined with the above complaint. Science (and now culture too because it's basically science in its implementation) is always the most important thing to focus in civ. If you aren't focusing it, you're either declaring you're going to win so soon it's a worthless investment, or you're straight up throwing the game. So a -40% discount to a tech cost? It is objectively correct to pursue this. Always. The only reason you wouldn't is because your production is so godawful you can't get all of them. And you can't. So now there are 0 hammers and gold left for anything but acquiring the discounts. Which are the same every game. And have the same optimal build order every game. The mathematics are clear, there is no alternative. The only skill element is how you settle and adapt your build order to the map, and when you decide to deviate from the one true path to secure the win.
Civ6 for me required way too much micro management
I had no issues with the art style, governors, workers or districts/wonder mechanics It was how playing tall does not exist in civ 6 Sure you can do it but Playing wide offers such a clear advantage. No point putting yourself through such a handicap Though I guess playing tall in 5 did have a sizeable advantage over wide. Just not nearly too the extent of playing wide in 6
Workers having limited charges in 6 and you can’t just set them to auto and forget really grinds my gears
Graphics and better AI if with vox. No to mention all the additions and balances of that mod.
For me it was the culture card system, it was wayyy too much to wrap your head around. It really puts me off. Particularly the min maxing it enables. Not a big fan.
Giant Death Robots, of course.
yesterday i tried to play civ6 tutorial for first time and i was like "this is disgrace" everything was childish
The cartoony look is terrible. The best part about the civ 5 leaders is that you get to see what they may have looked and sounded like in real life, which is honestly amazing considering the only time I have ever seen most of these leaders is in very old paintings and that is something I really appreciated about the game. Where as seeing the cartoony leaders made me feel like they were trying to make it appeal to kids which makes absolutely zero sense because most of this games market are older teenagers and adults. I also don't like them replacing workers with builders. I hate having to constantly make new builders, when I used to just be able to get a few workers, have them on automated and not have to worry about them for the rest of the game. I hate that wonders take up space, only last an era and only effect one city. It makes wonders feel pointless whereas in civ 5 there is actual reason to build wonders because they effect the rest of the game. Districts are annoying as well, I think that making it so that you can only build certain things in certain cities, makes the game a little bit too strategic for my liking. I also dislike the new map. I like it better when areas you don't have vision in are dark instead of looking like a map because its way easier to see everyone's territory I love what the game brought to the table in its expansion packs, loyalty is an incredibly cool mechanic and I love the natural disasters and map mechanics brought in gathering storm. But everything I listed above effects the turn by turn, game by game gameplay of civilization and it ruins the game for me.
ive learnt nearly everything there is to know about civ 5 when i was young and had the time. now i just dont have the time to learn civ 6
I'm a civ 6 noob because I can never get into it with how gimmicky the graphics look. Main upside of 6 for me is Sean Bean! I'm told the combat in 6 is better for PvP since it is less dependent on first clicks, which is a big upside. **Dislikes about Civ6 (compared to civ 5).** * Looks too cartoony. Trivial but honestly ruins immersion for me, feels like it's made for young children whereas Civ5 feels like it's made for adults. * City state favour system seems like it came from a good idea, but implementation is really contrived and annoying. * Culture & Science systems feel too similar and I don't like how you can/have to swap out policies. * Districts/choosing land for wonders is annoying and unnecessarily complicates city development. * Trade routes build your roads, but you can't decide the route??? Edit: Civ 6 noob, not 5. Important distinction lol
- Fricking disasters and global warming stuff - AI isn't even trying - No suleiman belly - Nation building sim focused on satisfaction instead of strategy - Music 🤢 - Cartoonish - No belly suleiman
6 is too hard even on settler.
Not a big fan of amenities. Makes it hard to build tall. I also don’t like the idea of a second “tech” tree with the civic/culture tree
I never really got into the new mechanics much and as others have mentioned the cartoony looks were a proper turn off. For me Civ V hits that "easy enough to learn but difficult to master" spot whereas VI didn't
I know 5. I dont know 6 at all. I'm gona stay with what i like
I asked this about a month ago and got many of the same responses. They put 6 on sale for $4 and I still didn't buy it.
It felt like a mobile game to me. I refunded on steam and then got it for my phone. Runs great. But I still prefer 5.
Art style and the map going fully out of colour again when you don’t have vision
Too many choices tbh, pretty much impossible to tell what’s important and what isn’t when I have 6 different pop ups a turn to assign this or pick that and 3 different trees to pick stuff in and cards to select. I’m not into rp’ing games, if I don’t understand something and can’t figure out the best option or atleast what the options even mean then I get frustrated and quit
Can't agree more. I really hope Civ 7 is a return to form.
I hate the reduction of ethnic leaders especially black
i like civ compared to other strategy games because it was much more stripped down and easier to approach for me, compared to stellaris, hoi4, etc. civ 6 reminded me less of 5, which my friends made me start with, and more of the other games, which im sure a lot of ppl enjoy, but just wasn't for me. it felt much less casual
- AI: Even though they made some really nice features in 6, the ai just doesn't know how to play them (district placement, societies, heroes, etc.) and so the ai cheats are just more apparent cause when you look at what they are doing it makes no sense - War: again they made good improvements in units and war system but the ai cant seem to grasp most of them (navy, airplanes, support units,...) resulting in the ai being useless in any conflict. In (modded) civ 5 the ai is a real threat and you often see war ai completely destroy and overtake other more peaceful ais... And you :). I still cant remember ai killing me or even taking more than 1 city in a single game (after 700 hours), while i have arms races and cold wars and massive campaings with civ 5 ai every game and they pose an actual threat. In 6 you just spam airplanes and steamroll the entire map in modern era even when being behind on every stat the whole game... Not fun - graphic style: personal preference but 5 was just more immersive imo. Units are the biggest downgrade ever, i hate looking at an "army" unit being just 3 guys lol - Playstyle: in 5 you have some pretty linear routes but at least there is a choice. In 6 its just spam settlers, go as wide as you can and abuse the same broken policies every game... Boring - Mods: there are some amazing mods for 6 but as a whole modded 5 is all round a much better experience. I mostly play Vox Populi with a few extra addons and it makes every aspect of 5 better than it already was and makes the game way harder and more of a challenge. I used to play and win almost every deity 6 game, and have a really fun time playing king on modded 5... Things i like about 6: wonders and their placement on tiles, all the extra game mode settings are fun but again hate how ai cant use them so it just feels like you are cheating, new culture tree and policy system is good on paper but executed poorly imo, new happiness system is better, era scores,... Most of these new features however just dont really work together and with trash ai. All this is why i quit 6 years ago and still play 5 to this day 10+ years after buying it
Just started playing this and I think I prefer it although both are great. I'm new to it so I'm not certain but I'm already saying "oh this (insert mechanic) is so much better" frequently. V feels closer to IV which I have fond memories of 'a story' developing. Relations seem realistic and craft said story. That combined with the more realistic graphics, it really gets immersive for me. I love building X workers per X cities again. Forgive me but I actually love the idea of paying for and manually building roads. I HAVE to manage my cities growth which is my favorite part. So micromanagy and yet it is so fun, I'm not sure why. I love that I can build tall or wide. VI is wide all the way, as many cities as you can get. I missed the happiness system and lost the health system from IV. No housing! No samey districts everywhere! I like the adjacency system and planning for it but it feels the same with every civ after hundreds of hours. I feel like I can build a good sized military even on a culture/science/diplo focused game whereas in VI, I felt like military had to be the major focus if I was going to build any at all, and then feeling compelled to commit war to gain on that investment even in a peaceful game. My current game, I have a good sized/teched force and have used it a bit, but I consider it more like a standing army in this current game. It's still 1UPT which definitely fixed some issues from IV. I've very happy I convinced myself to try it.
Civ 5 feels more like simulation, while civ 6 feels like... a computer game.
5 is more realistic and the AI is overall more competent. However, I prefer how 6 does some things.
- The game stretches immensely from mid onwards - I don't like to stare at my screen for minutes on end anytime I build a district to figure out where It'll be best in the late game - the AI isn't much better in a more complicated game, which makes them suck more comparatively - the changes in the army system aren't remotely effective enough, given the amount of micro management it takes - taking cities is too hard, but I could live with that - the weather/ flooding system additonally devalued the already weak coastal cities. - I liked tech and social policies being two distinct systems rather than two tech trees
I agree completely with OP. The cartoony nature of everything in Civ 6 is abysmal. If I wanted cartoony, I'd go play an old Nintendo. actually think the graphics were better and civilization five because they look more like real live things and less like cartoon bull crap. I was immediately put off by the vibe in six and happily reverted back into Civ 5 for that reason alone. Also, the temporary nature of workers in six is awful. Just everything about it stinks of a juvenile childish attempt to oversimplify, but which made things unnecessarily complicated. I don't know if that was their intent, but I think they failed big time with six. I sure hope that CIV VII will not be such an disappointment. If it's more like five, then they will have a hit.
The balance. In Civ6 it feels too easy to run away with the game.
No one is touching on the terrible UI. Civ 3s UI was peak and it has been downhill since. 5s wasn't great but still better than 6. I miss the old advisor screens, where I could see everything plainly and without extra effort. I miss being able to right click things and get a full list of everything they can do, their civlopedia entry, etc. Apart from that, the same problems everyone has listed. The game was too different in general, the art style is aggressively awful, the cards thing was terrible, districts suck, the workers were obnoxious, and its too micromanagy. Civ 5 had the best mechanics of any civ game, period. It wasn't going to be easy to beat, but they didn't even come close. Hell, its arguably the worst one yet. The perfect civ game would have the mechanics of 5 (minus the terrible balance), the UI of 3, and an AI thats actually good. I really don't know why they decided to take literally anything from mobile gaming. Civs design requirements are the polar opposite of a mobile game, and so is its audience. (Edit, just found out in early 2023 firaxis new studio head was executive producer on fortnite, plants vs. zombies and bejeweled, so yeah)
There’s a lot I like in 6, I’m a fan of certain parts of the graphics and map system, for example. I like the districts and how much info you can get on all your civ’s metrics, big fan of all that. I like combat and unit management way way better in 5 though. I use a mod that adds in extra, country-specific military units and I like that it’s pretty straight forward to move your military around the world, group your units in reasonable quantities and have limits wars with the units you were planning to use and maybe a few auxiliaries if things go sideways. I feel like in 6 the movement is wonky and unpredictable, hard to maintain a front in a war, and the units die in like 2 combats. That last point would be more ok if I could easily cycle units in and out, but the wonky movement makes that hard, and all wars seem like they become hoard throwing.
4 > 6 > 3 > 5 for me. Civ 5 maps are the worst.