It’s Coming…

Late Spring 2012.  Civilization V’s first expansion pack, Gods and Kings. As historically, I have been sucked into a Civ binge during this time (it started back just when school got out), this is good timing.

As with most expansions, this one will add new units, new wonders and new game mechanics. Many of these seem to be the ones they’ve already added in some of the scenario packs you could buy. I’ve picked up a couple of those, but not all of them so that dilutes the value somewhat. But the Civ 3 and 4 expansions really added worthwhile game mechanics, so I’m not to worried about that.

Developer Firaxis is also tweaking existing game mechanics via the Gods & Kings expansion. According to 2K, the expansion brings a “reworked” combat system, as well as more educated artificial intelligence. Further, 2K said the game’s naval component will be split in two with the new update, allowing for both melee and ranged types.

This interests me. Naval combat is currently better than many previous games, but still lacking. Hopefully these “melee” units help.  Improved AI in the combat system is always good. The computer can be impossible to beat on higher levels because of the extra advantages it gets. But it’s still really dumb with combat strategy.

From the 2k Announcement:

Enhanced Diplomacy, with Espionage. In addition to being able to establish embassies with your rival civilizations, spies will now be an important part of how you conduct your foreign affairs. Surveilling foreign cities, stealing advanced techs, and garnering influence with city-states are some of the things you’ll be able to do with this new powerful mechanic.

Enhanced Espionage sounds good. It is overall pretty weak in Civ 5, but much nicer than it has been in previous games. Let’s just hope you can’t get screwed so much by it like you previously could.

Religion. That’s right; quite possibly the most requested major addition to the game is coming in the Gods & Kings expansion. Using the new “Faith” resource, you’ll be able to found your own religion and grow it from a simple Pantheon of the Gods to a world-spanning fully-customized religion.

Religion seems interesting. The religion mechanic in Civ 4 was a nice extra flavor piece, but it didn’t really add much. This version looks much more involved.

The biggest problem with this expansion is the ambiguous release date. “Late Spring” could mean June 19th.  That is quite a distance away. However, Civ will probably be an ideal game to play with a small child around. It’s turn based so you can get up at a moments notice with zero consequence, unlike SWTOR.