Civilization 7’s multiplayer is the smoothest version I’ve played across any game in the series. It’s much better than Civilization 5’s buggy experience, and while Civilization 6 ran better, it doesn’t come close to the optimisation Civ 7 has received – not just in terms of performance, but in the way the actual game is structured to lean into multiplayer matches.
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Civilization 7 Review – Classic Civilization With A Few New Twists
An excellent art style, fantastic sound track, and great leaps forwards for replayability, Civilization 7 is a great game. But it will prove divisive.
The Dreaded Live-Service
Civilization as a live-service game deeply upsets me, but the writing has been on the wall for a long time. Civilization 6 had its full-on season pass and leader releases for many years. 2K will be keen to replicate that success in Civilization 7, so expect plenty of DLC over the coming years.
What sort of game works best for a live-service model? A multiplayer game, where players can show off their purchases. I wouldn’t be surprised if they started releasing leader skins. We’re just a few small steps away from Gandhi hitting the griddy.
As a result, it seems like Firaxis has put more effort into its multiplayer mode than before. I played a short game with the developers in pre-release and was shocked how smoothly it all ran. After a couple of games over the weekend in Advanced Access, it works just as well on a live server. I’m excited, because multiplayer Civilization (when it works) is one of my favourite ways to play the game.
Ages System
The new Ages system, while proving a little divisive in the community (personally I think it’s a great addition), is perfectly suited to multiplayer. I jumped into some matches over the weekend via the game’s Discord, and we agreed to only play the Antiquity Age. We didn’t have much time, not enough for a full-length game of Civ, but we had enough to play through the first of the three Ages and reach a true ending instead of a mutual stopping point.
In the current state, I’d say that the Antiquity Age is the best of the three. It has well-balanced victory conditions that don’t feel as railroaded as the Exploration and Modern Ages. The leaders, civilizations, and units are also balanced better than they are in the later stages of the game. You don’t need to ride out a game of Civilization for nine hours anymore. Each Age is its own distinct game.
Even if you choose to start in the Exploration Age, the game has some cool systems in place that let you start with cities, pick from a range of different Legacy Points immediately, and let you establish an empire that otherwise would’ve required you to play the entire Antiquity Age. As the game goes through its development cycle, I can see the Ages system being one of the main focus points for future DLC.
Micromanagement
One of the most frustrating parts of multiplayer Civilization has always been the absolute nightmare micromanagement that begins to take over, especially as you approach the endgame. There have only ever been two options: play with no turn timer and spend the rest of your life playing the same Civ game, or play with dynamic turns that cause hapless, frantic clicking as the board slowly fills with more units than you could ever possibly move.
Much of the tedious micromanagement has gone from Civilization 7. Anyone who complains about there not being enough micromanagement in the game is an idiot – and I have seen one or two people claim in Steam reviews that they just loved moving their builders and workers around over and over again. Absolute rubbish. Less micromanagement means less pointless clicking. Great for the health of the game, especially in multiplayer.
While Civilization 7 is definitely in its infancy, I think this will turn out to be one of the best in the series after DLC updates. A couple of years down the line and I can see multiplayer matches played across individual eras rather than full games being a massive hit. We never love Civ at launch, but this one has the best chance yet of going the distance.
- Released
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February 11, 2025
- ESRB
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