STACK #244 February 2025

GAMING FEATURE

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There’s a new art style this time out.What was the inspiration for Civilization VII ’s look? The art team developed a new look for Civilization VII called “readable realism” which, as the name suggests, leans more on the realistic side, but also prioritises the ability to easily understand what you’re looking at from a distance. As part of this art style, the team was inspired by many things – dioramas, as well as the paintings of Albert Bierstadt and Thomas Cole. How involved in the development is original series creator Sid Meier these days? Sid continues to be a great mentor to many of the folks at Firaxis, often acting as a sounding board for many of the designers.

The king of strategy-based empire building games returns this month in the shape of Sid Meier’s Civilization VII .We had a chat with Andrew Frederiksen, the game’s senior lead producer at developer Firaxis, to learn more of what’s in store. Words Amy Flower EVERYBODY WANTS TO RULE THE WORLD

There’s a complexity to the Civilization games not found in other genres. How have you gone about making Civilization VII accessible for those new to the series, and the 4X genre generally? It’s a tricky balance, as what some people find complex, others may find deeply rewarding. For us at Firaxis, we benefit from having some strong design principles that Sid laid out right from the start – the one third rule, to make sure the player is having the most fun in the moment. One of our design principles specifically for Civilization VII is the idea of depth, not complexity. Complexity can be there in the form of having to click through lots of menus, but that doesn’t necessarily make for meaningful gameplay. Depth is all about giving you meaningful choices, whether that’s small ones like which narrative event decision you’ll go with to big ones like which civ do you want to swap into in the new Age.

out to understand why this happens and figure out what we can do about it. We looked at past Civ games, player data, community feedback, and we identified a few reasons why we think this is happening. One of the big reasons is scaling complexity – the concept where the more you play the game, the more complex it gets – to the point where it becomes too difficult or frustrating to manage. Ages is our solution to this challenge – dividing the game into digestible chapters, designing deeper mechanics for each Age, reducing the importance of antiquated units and mechanics in later periods, and balancing our civs on a per-Age basis. That last point is particularly important – veteran Civ players know how frustrating it can be to wait many hours for your civ’s unique units to become accessible,

What would you say are the biggest improvements that you’ve brought to the game? There are plenty of quality-of-life improvements and new systems and features added to Civilization VII , but by far the most important and consequential system we’re adding is Ages. Ages represent a new way to play Civ, which will take some time to get used to, but that’s also part of the appeal. We want to make sure that a new Civ game feels meaningfully different from past ones, especially because so many people still actively play older Civ games. Can you please tell us more about Ages, and what advantages it brings? Civ games, and 4X games by

A top tip for aspiring empire builders Advises Andrew: “Don’t neglect your early military, especially if you’re playing on a harder difficulty. Study the Discipline Civic for a free Commander unit, and level that unit up by completing combat within its radius to get those powerful buffs!”

extension, have a challenge where many players don’t finish their games, usually opting to restart rather than complete them. While that doesn’t stop a game from being fun, it does indicate that the late game is probably not as fun as the early game, and we set

maybe only becoming available when most of the exciting things

have already happened. Now, you’ll always be playing as civs at their height, making each Age feel like an epic clash of historical powers.

• Sid Meier's Civilization VII is out Feb 11

10 FEBRUARY 2025

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