good depth
irritating war system - like if vicky(3) swung a pendulum but it was still bad

Fun vampire game

Hirez should just turn the game over to literally any other human/entity at this point. Another embarrassing entry in a series in long-decline.

You can be forced to auto-surrender wars with no alternative

I want to clarify this review - because it's deeper than just losing a war.

The way diplomacy in this game works after the early modern era requires the participation of all cultures in the congress of humankind. This is fine on its face, but there is a mechanic for conflict resolution that requires that for a war to be "legitimate" that a majority of the representative powers' leverage be on one side of any given issue.

This means that war after a single player, any player, reaches the fourth era becomes impossible to wage in a primarily AI-player game. As soon as a surprise, or otherwise illegal war, is declared, every other player gains a free grievance they can press on the offending party. For people (players) who otherwise would have no stake in a war, this means they can (and in the case of the AI, will) immediately press that grievance as an international crisis. Players who otherwise have no just cause for war gain an immediate surge in war support and begin a ticking clock against whomever declared the original war.

Again, on its face, not necessarily inaccurate to how history has played out. What follows is.

Inevitably, these demands reach fruition and the vote happens. An ultimatum is posted to the warmonger: surrender your war, or YOU declare war on ME. They will have lots of war support now, interestingly, the player warmongering will have generated none. This means that in the two-button situation they find themselves, they will not have enough war support for option 2. As such - and against all record ever posed by humanity on this earth, they CAN ONLY SURRENDER THEIR WAR AGAINST A DIFFERENT UNRELATED POWER. Logically they will do this, forfeit their lands, money and claims.

What a cool game. Want to wage war for a long-disputed piece of territory? ♥♥♥♥ yourself, Albania says no.

I never in my lifetime thought I would long for the civ 5 AI just banning every luxury ever. I didn't know how bad it could get. I'm sorry, Sid.

a depressing and horrible game with one of the most toxic communities I've ever seen. Awful on every level

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♥♥♥♥ this game and paradox and their ♥♥♥♥♥♥ plan of having the worst AI

Paradox needs to stop making games

Firaxis seems to be incapable of performing testing for their Civ releases. DLCs are consistently overpriced, non-functional for large segments of their "supported" userbase, and hardly enhance the base game content to begin with, assuming there aren't just new and wild exploits that won't be patched for years. Of course maybe those are the features we're paying for?

Trash AI acts like you're the greatest threat to the ancient world when you're just AFK Syracuse. Go home Sparta, you're drunk.

So, say what you like about the various iterations of the show; I am personally quite a big fan of the many Star Trek series that have run from the sixties to now. That said, this game tends to favor the very grind-heavy approach that plagues games in the genre.

Space combat is its chief draw, and it's actually pretty fun. The way they represent the systems and flavor of everything is very Star Trek in design. It's the thousands of hours of missions and instances you need to run that put a damper on things. Outside of this, it is a simplistic system, and I gravitate towards FTL (if you like indie titles) or EVE (if you like hating yourself) for more depth.

Ground missions are all very combat-centric and I don't feel represent the brand as well as they could (take this with a grain of salt, the plot is focused on a huge quadrant-spanning war, to begin with).

Granted, I never reached endgame, so go ahead, give it a try!