Month: July 2025

First impressions: Civilization VII

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This entry is part 2 of 2 in the series Civilization VII

I’m midway through my first game of Civilization VII, having recently started the Exploration Age, the second of the game’s three eras. Thoughts so far:

My empire early in the Exploration Age of Civ VII. I sent off the damaged Cog in the top-left to explore in search of new continents — what the game calls “distant lands”. Divodurum in the south, of Asterix fame, was an independent city that joined me through diplomacy. Assur in the northeast started as an independent city, thwarted my early expansion, and leagued themselves with another civ — I eventually conquered them.

1a. This is a breath of fresh air for the series. It feels new and original, far more than Civ VI did. The gameplay has been engaging turn-to-turn, whether building up my military to defend against hostile independent cities (incidentally, I think this is the first Civ game where barbarians/independents have been challenging by default — at times this felt more like fighting the stroppy minor factions in Shadow Empire or the tribes and barbarians in Old World), waging war later on, or focusing on internal development.

1b. The design feels pared back, but in a good, elegant way. Each turn moves at a brisk pace. Playing it side-to-side with Old World is an interesting experience. Even in the early game, Old World feels much grander: it has a bigger and more-zoomed out map (even playing Civ VII on a “large” map versus Old World on a “medium” map), more distance between settlements and factions, and more moving parts.

For a scale comparison, this is my very early current Old World game. Note the distance between Babylon and the barbarian camp in the west — there are 9 empty tiles in between on a Medium map, whereas there are only 6 empty tiles between my capital, Chang’an, and Divodurum, the nearest formerly-independent settlement, in Civ VII on a large map.

2a. It feels rough or unfinished. Others have pointed to examples such as auto-explore only just being patched into the game. For me, the giveaway is non-functional, vestigial bits of the interface — there is a “form alliance” button on the screen for independent cities that does nothing.

2b. Other parts of the interface still seem inadequate — by clicking the down arrow I can find an itemised list of everything that increases city happiness, but just where can I find the corresponding list for deductions? Similarly, when examining or changing social policies (“+1 influence on science buildings”), it would be good to know what exactly the effect would be.

There is an opportunity to add more detail to Civ VII‘s UI. I’ve picked a simple example — why can I itemise happiness income but not deductions?

3. I’m glad I bought Civ VII — so far I enjoy it a lot. But I’m also very glad that I waited for a discount (more than 50% off a boxed PC code, before shipping), because I would be much, much less forgiving had I paid full price for this at launch.