Just like with every Civilization game before it, Sid Meier’s Civilization 7 shakes up the entire formula with a slew of new features. From splitting up leaders and civilizations to the introduction of army commanders, Civilization 7 will feel quite new to even veterans when the game launches. However, of all the changes made to Civ 7, one new feature goes off in a completely unique direction: the game’s new emergent narrative mechanic.
In a recent interview with Game Rant, Civilization 7‘s lead designer Ed Beach shared his thoughts on this new system and why he’s excited to see it get into the fanbase’s hands. Specifically, he talked about how it builds upon Civilization 6‘s gossip system and just what players can expect when they get their hands on it.
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Sid Meier’s Civilization 7 takes the franchise’s core formula, overhauls many of its features, and delivers another stellar strategy experience.
Sid Meier’s Civilization 7’s Emergent Narratives Is A Game-Changer
Civilization 7’s Emergent Narratives Stem From Civ 6’s Gossip
The idea behind this new emergent narrative system came after Firaxis took a long look at Civilization 6‘s gossip system. That system would notify players about various things happening in the world, like wonders that were being built or discoveries that were made. While that did give them better insight into the world around them, Beach felt like it was ultimately a failure and wanted to craft something better.
“That system we found in Sid Meier’s Civilization 6 was just probably a little bit too noisy. There was just too much churn there for the players to really be able to engage with it and pay attention to it. There were some interesting tidbits in there, but they kind of got missed by players. We took that out for Sid Meier’s Civilization 7, but what we did is the same technology that informed the game systems about what was going on in the game world got fed into our new narrative system.”
Now, instead of hearing gossip, things happening in Civilization 7‘s world build into these new narrative events. For example, if a city is flooded multiple times, there may be an event that is triggered to go along with that. Some can be as simple as that, while others can be triggered by massive chains of stories. With each playthrough, there will be a slew of new events depending upon what is going on, making it so that no two games are alike.
The Emergent Narratives Could Lead to Something Special
These emergent narrative events make for a fantastic new addition to the Civilization formula. Not only can they add some unexpected excitement to a playthrough, but their addition could also give the game endless replayability. According to Beach, Firaxis cannot wait to see what players do with it.
“We actually can track in our new game engine how many times certain stories are shown to players, so it’s going to be really interesting, right after our game launches, to figure out if people are seeing these complex chains of stories. It’s definitely been a pretty interesting journey to get all that in and working, but we’re really excited about the potential, not only for what we can do with it to further expand the experience for Sid Meier’s Civilization 7 players, but also what the mod community is going to be able to do with it.
The studio is able to actually track these events, so it will be able to see which ones are happening and how they are happening. Additionally, Civilization modders will be able to take the concept and run with it, adding a slew of unique events to the experience. Because of that, players may be in for some wild stories from both Firaxis and the community as the years go by. And if the system is a hit, it may be built upon for even more years after that.
Grand Strategy
Turn-Based Strategy
4X
- Released
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February 11, 2025