hey we're back with another episode of before you buy that show we give you some straight up gameplay and our first

impressions of the latest games releasing as usual it's me Jake along with our behind the scenes guy Eric here

co-writing uh we're the civilization fans on the team so we both spent the weekend diving into this seventh

installment in this long running series they're making some pretty significant changes to the formula this isn't really

like a civ6 situation where like there was a lot of these good incremental improvements they are really like

swinging for the fences here with this one I guess to make it feel like a proper sequel they changed up quite a

bit so after spending a few days with the game we're not entirely convinced that all of these changes or shakeups

really work or are necessary or even feel quite like Civilization not to say that this game feels totally different

from your average C it doesn't go that far there's a lot of positives but some of the things that they've done with

civ7 are pretty drastic alterations to the usual formula look even as more casual Civ enjoyers here some of the

stuff they've done here feels like they're moving the design away from the things that we all loved about

civilization in a way that feels counterproductive it's a complicated thing because in a way you got to

respect the hustle I mean like we're at the seventh entry of the series and like if you're going to have to charge

between $70 to $130 for the game which is already rough I mean seriously trying to pull like NBA

2K style inflated prices for Civ games of all things that's bad enough but like if they are going to charge that much

then I get that they want to make the game feel unique and offer something truly new compared to previous entries

in this long running series but I'm just not sure if this was the way to do it so what did they change well there's a lot

so stick with us the biggest and the most controversial at least to us is the new ages system which splits any given

Civ game you play through here into three distinct ages the age of antiquity the Age of Exploration and the Modern

Age I'll get into more detail later but this completely UNS the usual structure of these games by making each era have

their own special mechanics and objectives and more importantly every player advances to the next era at the

same time there's a lot I have to say about this but uh let me let me finish running down all the other changes

before trying to dissect all that so uh leaders and civilizations are chosen separately here that's another big thing

with with leaders no longer being representative of their civilizations and instead have their own unique

bonuses that they bring in separate from each Civ so now you can kind of mix and match them for maximum Synergy or weird

strategies or just make wild history combinations like like Benjamin Franklin leading the Mongol horde or whatever and

speaking of a significant change here a lot of the leaders you select in civ7 like the AFF forementioned Benjamin

Franklin you know you know he was more of a thinker uh macavelli Harriet Tubman all leaders and Pioneers in their own

right but not necessarily commanding massive armies or Empires I think it's pretty cool I think it's like we've

we've had a million Roman emperors and stuff like that at this point so shining a light on different historical

characters is always cool but an odd thing about the leaders is that there are more than one of the same guy

sometimes like I I get the basic idea that leaders wear many hats and there were different eras of leadership in

them but it still feels kind of cheap like this is how they're going to sneak in lots of DLC with the game like with

alternate leaders rather than making entirely new ones with new models and new voices and animations and stuff uh

anyway but the rest of the changes are smaller but still significant for longtime series fans like the removal of

Barbarians and changing up how city states work uh replacing them with new independent Powers which sort of combine

aspects of both and are generally just more interesting and like some are hostile to you while others aren't and

it's Poss to become allies with these groups and eventually incorporate them into your Civ a little bit in a way that

feels kind of natural and makes the early game experience more interesting than just like uh-oh another Barbarian

Camp time to kill it or avoid it completely like credit to them how the independent Powers work now like it

feels natural it feels like something that's kind of been around already uh Warfare has been very smartly

streamlined here in our opinion with uh the addition of the commander unit that can combine several units into one to

allow faster movement but then to do this uh you need to pack units together to move and unpack them to fight while

an army is still in formation it's vulnerable the commander can level up and each one has their own skill tree

that's a little awkward to navigate but I'll get into the UI issues later for the most part we really like this change

like it adds a pretty nice strategic layer to combat and makes moving your army less of a chore so that's always a

win and uh and another positive to combat you can actually flank enemies now like attack them from the sides or

back and lock them in to get damage bonuses now this is something the series has needed ever since it changed up like

how the individual units work other Civ games have had flanking Buffs as like a like a promotion or like bonus type

things if I do remember correctly but here the way it's implemented it just feels like a more tangible full mechanic

diplomacy has been reworked to use the new resource called influence rather than just gold uh this is another change

that I mostly like along with the removal of Builders which streamlines city building somewhat that's that's

really good uh the the thing is religious Victory conditions are out and the entire religion system has kind of

been simplified into Oblivion it's a mechanic that really is seemingly only relevant in the Age of Exploration for

whatever reason and it's much much less complicated than how it works in Civ 6 which is for the best to us cuz religion

just kind of needlessly complicated things in that game and always felt kind of vestigial so maybe cutting off that

extraneous extra limb was the right move uh lastly they did decide to go kind of full Paradox and add in this emergent

narrative system right out of something like Crusader Kings sometimes the game gives you a narrative choice that pops

up that you can make to change the direction of your Civ which might sound like a big deal like a game changer but

it's it's not it's pretty Bare Bones a very simple implementation of this idea just it shows up pick whichever reward

you want for these choices and move on it seems like they don't really add too much more one way or the other now

there's a lot more little things that got changed but those are the big ones I think worth highlighting top level and

overall while together they sound like positive changes they might be for some people but like and yes the incremental

stuff I like a lot of this stuff does feel inspired by Civ competitors like humankind and Age of Wonders games and

all those Paradox Grand strategy games it makes Civ feel a little bit like it's not the innovator it's not the Pioneer

like this series used to be the trend Setter but now it kind of feels like gets borrowing ideas from other games

and not necessarily really convincing us that the stuff they're borrowing fits what people really actually want out of

this series of course that's pretty subjective and like I said this change up for Civ might be for some people it

might be a good different flavor for them but we're not necessarily convinced that the stuff they're borrowing fits

what people actually want out of the series but of course that's pretty subjective because all different types

of people play Civ games and may want different things out of it but before we get into the like the real negatives uh

do want to give praise to the visuals here which at least on the map screen do look pretty great I like how detailed

your cities are now and how each City really looks like it belongs to your chosen civilization and how they put a

lot of work and detail into making each type of City look distinct and feel different and we like that the leaders

also look better than last year yes they still look a little cartoony you know and the way they animate and stuff like

that it's kind of just a Civ thing at this point I know some people don't like but hey it works and performance-wise I

did have one hard crash to desktop transitioning from one age to another which was kind of hilarious but I didn't

lose my save and uh I wasn't able to get it to happen again I had no other issues so uh like other than that performance-

wise on our ends on two computers we didn't have any issues of course everybody's rig is different so make

sure you look into some other reviewers uh but also the ultrawide looks nice uh it it's really nicely laid out the music

also is very well done I don't think it's quite as iconic as some of the classic game soundtracks and I think

that goes down to the narration as well uh with gwendelyn Christie doing the voiceover this time still like they're

definitely going for this classical but cultural Vibe with the soundscape which we do like uh but the actual sound

effects less so it feels like a lot is missing it's very flat the audio cues for a lot of things just aren't really

there anymore and it makes the game feel flat and incomplete like I said like the lack of sounds and the weirdly bad U U

design really damage what is otherwise a NIC looking game now again we've brought it up a million times the UI the user

interface the layout of everything like really how things are organized and readable and legible all that stuff it's

pretty rough normally it's something that we give a pass for but because we're in game seven of this series this

is not their first rodeo and they already have the template for creating a better UI with the old games which had

far more usable presentation very little information is given to you in an easy to find way sometimes popups just don't

show up or even worse certain tutorials just will not go away with no option to remove them seriously this is a game

primarily about looking at a map and clicking on things in menus how are the menus this inconsistent and confusingly

organized some of them have completely different looks and feels and Vibes to them we understand that they're trying

to make the game look more streamlined with less visual clutter and of course it's an uphill battle because these

games add more and more mechanics and information but still here the end result is that they've made a UI that

just feels half finished it like like it looks like it's like a placeholder in An Early Access game this is something

fraxis has already said they plan on fixing in March at the earliest and who's to say their fixes will actually

make the UI that significantly better this is one aspect of the game for us here personally like it's just a

straightup downgrade from the previous games the UI is rough it doesn't render the game unplayable or anything but we

just think it should be a lot better now the UI is not good but that whole ages system we alluded to earlier on that

system is more complex we've definitely got mixed feelings about it look I like that each age has its own mechanics

Antiquity is early game Civ like you'd expect but the Age of Exploration brings in colonization mechanics and this whole

distant lands thing where you're actually incentivized to send ships out over deep water and explore and exploit

and exterminate in the new world it's like a new way of encouraging you to get out there where in a normal Civ

playthrough you you have your own free will and you can either do it or not every map is generated with continents

separated to allow for this type of thing in uh Age of Exploration the Modern Age switches things up again with

trains and industrialization in theory these are great changes because it makes each age feel much more distinct than in

older games it really feels like your civilization is advancing in this system but there's a lot about it that can get

in the way of the fun the fact that everybody advances at the same time just doesn't feel quite Civ to us now with

each age everyone starts on the same playing field all units are automatically converted into whatever

tier one units are available in that next age and it's still kind of hard to understand how this actually works like

your commanders always carry over but some of your units don't it's just not clear to us after a couple players like

you know we don't really know how the game determines what does and doesn't carry over between ages I mean I know

that ageless buildings remain but what about certain resources I don't know the way it seems here it just seems

needlessly complicated and some of it just kind of hidden or vague the idea with the game being reset to an extent

with each new age is to spread out those first few magical hours of a Civ game across an entire campaign as a pacing

thing and but I don't know like I I half expect a lot of people to just kind of give up once they hit the next age

because the big reset for the first time is kind of confusing and disheartening if it's like wait what what just

happened I have to figure all this crap out now what happened to all my stuff it's not that bad once you actually dive

in and assess the damage uh from the transition but at first it can be kind of weird and that's not even like our

biggest issue with the whole system yes mechanically it can be kind of confusing but you just have to learn and figure it

out but it just kind of feels like it flies in the face of what Civ stands for at least to us you know like one of

those defining elements of Civ is just sending Navy SEAL soldiers to fight cavemen you know they specifically

designed ages to eliminate that snowballing where one player can potentially have this massive advantage

over another but that's just part of the magic of these games it's a problem that in our opinion didn't really need to be

fixed that feeling of an unbroken passage of time just like isn't in this game anymore you don't really get to

feel like you're playing this cohesive lengthy Civ because every civilization is unique to each age so you can't just

play Rome from ancient times up to Modern instead you're almost always forced into bizarre combinations like

Greece and then suddenly you're Normans and then like your Imperial France look I know it doesn't make any sense but it

seems like it's all in service of changing the gameplay like shaking things up keeping the pacing fresh but

you know again it just doesn't feel quite right look at the end of the day this is also still civilization and once

we got past that initial annoyance with the UI and my dislike of some of the big picture changes I we still ended up

spending way too long playing the game and getting stuck in that one more turn mentality that this series is so famous

for it got its hooks in US despite everything which really is just a testament to the power of the core game

there is still Civ here and it is still good enough like the fact that we just complained about all those things and

then still ended up dumping a ton of hours in it does say a lot also the fact that they throw this like annoying popup

ad at you every single time like you're in the main menu to sign up for a 2K account look you can play the game in

offline mode but there is no need for that kind of aggressive advertising in a Civ game man come on look again we've

spent a lot of this review complaining but there is a lot we like about the game combat is the series best the

changes to barbarians has been a long time coming the new Mechanics for each age are generally pretty interesting and

thematic and we like the idea behind each age ending in a crisis that you have to weather technically but there

are a lot of things that drag they experience down like we mentioned like the bad UI the practically non-existent

World Generation options man like we didn't even really get into that but like you can't even make a large world

map it cuts you off at normal it just feels very content light options light in general there's not really a lot of

customization options you can't even name your cities yes you can name your religion but that barely even matters

anymore again the core Civ stuff is still fun and honestly if this was called anything other than civilization

we'd probably be fine with a lot of it H maybe even enthusiastic about it but the civilization name it comes with a lot of

expectations lumped on it and we're still not sure if that ages system change up is a good idea that needs some

work or if it's just fatally flawed the agis system I think is something if you're like a Civ player you've enjoyed

a couple of them uh you have to be in the mood for this because it is a shakeup and I feel like you need to go

into it thinking it's like an alternate game mode if that's enough for you like if you really want to go out and spend

full price on that we ain't stopping you I I I think it's current state like it just deviates a little too far from the

sort of thing that we're looking for in these games and look at a more reasonable price point we might be

willing to recommend it but with so many caveats as of right now we're marking it as like a maybe weight or at the very

least if you're a Civ fan and you've heard some of the things and you're not too sure about it maybe read a couple of

other reviews watch a playthrough or something like that because it's unconventional long story short a new

flavor or variant of Civ that may or may not be for you it's really down to the individual player but hey that's a

Before You by you know how this works by now I give you some pros some cons and some personal opinion and now we want to

hear yours down in the comments I'd love to know your experience with the series maybe you started with the early days

maybe you're in four five or six let's talk about anything Civ at all down in the comments if you did jump into seven

would love to hear your first impressions as well and if you like this video and maybe it helped inform your

purchase or anything like that clicking the like button helps us out we really appreciate it but thank you for watching

and we'll see you guys next time greeting things I am Benjamin Franklin doctor scientist writer and full of

advice whether you will listen or not mhm [Music]

mhm huh a [Music]