Sid Meier's Civilization VI: Gathering Storm

1. drewseph203

   Feb 18, 2019

   10

   Overall: This is the game it was meant to be. The world feels real, diplomacy matters much more, resources are now handled more logically, andOverall: This is the game it was meant to be. The world feels real, diplomacy matters much more, resources are now handled more logically, and the new civilizations bring variety to how the game is played. I actually find myself saying "... just one more turn ...", which was rare before this expansion in Civ VI.
   Civilizations: I honestly didn't know what to expect of the civ selections prior to the leak, because the last several announcements for Rise and Fall were truly underwhelming. This was not the case, for me, with Gathering Storm. The new ensemble brings several needed favorites, and they sre balanced by new and replacement civs that haven't left me disappointed (except maybe Canada, but then I may immigrate there some day, so I'll keep an open mind). More importantly, unlike most of the DLC and Rise & Fall civs, the civs of Gathering Storm feel like they bring unique approaches to how I play the game (even Canada, completely changing early game diplomacy without Surprise Wars). When I play as Mali, I'm working to maximize trade, building walls (because I have enough units and all my buildings and districts have been bought- thanks Reyna and Moksha), and generally feeling like an unparalleled economic powerhouse. As Phoenicia, my empire is built around my "colonies", as my new distant capital citizens refer to them, and I've got harbors out the wazoo. And so it goes.
   Map: Not only has there been a massive and appreciable aesthetic upgrade (my fiancee that doesn't even play commented on this), but the map generation is more interesting and better developed. Additionally, I play with climate settings maxed out, so I regularly get flooded and volcanoed (I've lost many citizens already, once a catastrophe that wiped a 10 pop mega-city of it's time down to a 3 pop rural outpost (remember, in civ games population has an exponential relationship to number of fictional people). Tornados have surprisingly damage my troops, dust storm have wreaked having, droughts have limited me when I really need to grow, and so on. While many of these were setbacks, I put myself in place for them by settling near where the later yields would see me flourish- so I only have myself to blame. And I can't say it was pretty or an interesting event for my people.
   Resources:
   
   Why oh why wasn't always like this? Of my two least favorite changes from V to VI, I'm so incredibly happy to see this one fixed. Resources matter, and it always should have been this way. I'm now engaged with the system, and consider how I'm using and acquiring them. (Now, if you would just readjust movement costs to align with V, we'd be all set)!
   Power: I play carefree enough that I can often make it to the late game, and I enjoy the add costs of environmental and resource challenges to developing my empire. It reminds me that a lot of the progress in the world post-Industrial era was centered in the few nation's that were able to terribly abuse resources for energy. The game now reflects this, and it's a fun and engaging system. Hopefully the real world continues to progressively move on from resource abusing means of energy production too.
   Diplomacy: The grievances system as a coat of fresh paint on an old vehicle, but that new paint job came with some work under the hood which has led to the vehicle running more smoothly. Beyond that, the added late game agendas have added an appreciated additional dynamic to the AI leader charachter, which is appreciated (even if I would just rather have the personality table from V back). Additionally, we have the featured new diplomacy system, with favor and the World Congress. For this, I say thank you. It feels right having a political system in the game, and I appreciate that it's notably different than what we had in the past. It's no longer simple to merely buy votes alone and dominate politically, now you must earn favor with positive relationships with major civs and earning the suzerainty of the minor powers (of course, the better your relations, the easier it is to actually do some of that bribing, in this case for favor rather than direct votes). While I don't always enjoy the lack of variety (getting three identical proposals in a row, IIRC), I enjoy that there are fairly powerful resolutions, contests, a revamped and improved emergency system, and an additional approach to diplomacy. Overall, I'm quite a fan!
   New Era: I appreciate the opportunity to stretch out the game, especially from a science and military game perspective (the two victory paths that have the most potential to benefit from the new aspects). The GDR is interesting, and the added time led to the developers really upgrading the science victory. With a slightly longer game, you also get more opportunity to appreciate later game buildings and events (like climate change).
   Is it perfect? No, but it's the best game for my tastes on the market, and this heavily loaded expansion pack is the reason.… Expand

   • 3 of 6 users found this helpful
2. Syhlcam

   May 14, 2021

   9

   L'ajout de la gestion du changement climatiques et de l'énergie est cool, ça pousse à bien géré ces ressources, à pousser la science pourL'ajout de la gestion du changement climatiques et de l'énergie est cool, ça pousse à bien géré ces ressources, à pousser la science pour trouver des énergies vertes et à faire pression voir détruire les pollueurs quand ont arrivé sur des moments critique. Les catastrophes aléatoires mette un petit plus dans les parties, des avantages peuvent changer, des victoires diplomatiques, vraiment sa apporte plein de petit truc vraiment intéressant.… Expand

   • 0 of 0 users found this helpful
4. bassman2112

   Feb 16, 2019

   9

   A thoroughly enjoyable experience, and a wonderful expansion to Civilzation 6. It makes the game feel fresh, and the new mechanics are largelyA thoroughly enjoyable experience, and a wonderful expansion to Civilzation 6. It makes the game feel fresh, and the new mechanics are largely successful. There are a few problems with the newest content only playing into late-game, and not having them influence your decision-making enough; but the quality is very high, the new leaders are really cool, and the new diplomacy and disaster systems are wonderful. The climate change system is really neat, but it is so out of your control that it's difficult to plan around.… Expand

   • 3 of 6 users found this helpful
5. Bloodnes

   Aug 22, 2020

   7

   Очередное дополнение, глобально ничего не вносит в игру 7/10

   • 0 of 0 users found this helpful
6. Hurrrr

   Feb 16, 2019

   6

   Game is decent, but needs a lot of balancing and bug fixes until I can recommend it at this price.
   40 eur? Nope.
   Diplomacy is broken: AIGame is decent, but needs a lot of balancing and bug fixes until I can recommend it at this price.
   40 eur? Nope.
   
   Diplomacy is broken:
   AI is making silly choices and demands left and right, if you play with more than 6 civilization you will go crazy with the amount of stupidity AI offers you each turn (not to mention trade offer spam which mostly is ridiculous)
   
   World congress:
   Very disappointed. It's unrealistic and deals mostly with resources.
   Imagine all the world leaders coming together and deciding what to do with extra spices or camels.
   Basically, you will see this:
   A: Resource X brings +1 amenities.
   B: Resource X brings no amenities.
   
   Needs a lot of improvement
   
   And finally, environment effects: YOU DONT FEEL THEM.
   The most advertised feature is really underpowered and you hardly notice it.
   Just click away notifications and build the right improvements.
   
   Anyhow, until these things are fixed, I can't recommend getting the game at 40 eur, wait for a discount.… Expand

   • 8 of 9 users found this helpful
7. ScienceAdvisor

   Feb 17, 2019

   5

   Mediocre early access for an unfinished DLC that is being packaged and sold as an expansion. The new AI needs work, the new systems needMediocre early access for an unfinished DLC that is being packaged and sold as an expansion. The new AI needs work, the new systems need proper integration in a meaningful way, and a balancing pass (or three) would not hurt. It is 20% off after only a few days, but I would be patient and wait for a 50%+ off sale.
   
   The news on 2K that hit in mid-Feb (2019) is correct, if a little late. They are, and have been data mining you since early 2018. The worrying fact is that unlike good companies, they do not promise the information is for their own, internal use, and will not be sold to third parties. If you avoid Twitter or Facebook for their policies, then 2K is on your blacklist. At least until they update it with the appropriate promise of privacy for us in their Privacy Policy (where they hid these clauses instead of integrating them in their EULA where it would be highly visible).… Expand

   • 4 of 6 users found this helpful
8. TsukasaHiiragi

   Jun 3, 2021

   0

   + Disasters look cool?
   
   - Bugs - Feels like a beta - Diplomacy is still broken -- Not casual/ New player to the franchise friendly --+ Disasters look cool?
   
   - Bugs
   - Feels like a beta
   - Diplomacy is still broken
   -- Not casual/ New player to the franchise friendly
   -- severe balance problems
   --Loyalty is still a horrendous mess
   
   April 2021 update has made Civilization 6 entirely unstable and prone to crashing.
   
   I've played the entire civilization series since the original, and I'm sad that 6 is just so bad in general, Its difficult not to re-iterate what other people have said, but from the Rise and Fall expansion, CIV6 has became a literal disaster, loyalty broke the game for me and for many others, with Gathering Storm nothing was done to give the player any choice to enable/disable any potential game changing additions in fact the problem is made worse by having OP civilizations like Phoenicia.
   
   Rise and Fall added alot of balance problems, which was never really addressed and 2K doubled down even more by adding a holy crap down of even more balancing problems and bugs, and that leads me to the decision to say that unfortunately the expansions have made it much harder for the casual fans to enjoy the game, and feels like these are more catered to the hardcore fans of the series, you know the ones...who play on king or higher difficulties and willing to micro manage pretty much everything down to each individual tile.
   
   The disasters again, are nothing really new in terms in the Civ series in an earlier version of the series but not on this grand scale, all the disasters look quite decent and can have a dramatic impact on the game, whilst I can appreciate the developers trying to bring in real life situations such as climate change, you have to remember that this is still a game and making it fun for everyone is paramount to a successful game.
   
   Speaking of balance, it is quite bad for both multiplayer AND singleplayer with some civilizations being exceptionally overpowered, and others having fairly useless abilities that are very situational and make it far more difficult to be able to win or even survive for that matter.
   
   In closing, doesn't fix many of the issues that even from vanilla, fixes even less issues that came from Rise and Fall and add a whole bunch of its own bugs and balance issues, just feels rushed and genuinely like a beta than a full release. The really only good news is that this expansion actually doesn't need Rise and Fall to be installed so potentially you could bypass some of that mess.
   
   I seriously hope that for Civilization 7 that more options are given to the players to tailor make a custom game to everyones tastes, some features people like, and other features people don't like - giving everyone a toggle option benefits everyone.… Expand

   • 0 of 0 users found this helpful

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