A great amount of work continues to be done on Civilization VII, as a new update just dropped with another wave of major changes and new features.
Update 1.2.3 has added a new option to make the new Age-based gameplay flow better. There’s now an option called Age Transition which players can toggle between the default or the new Continuity option for Age Transitions. The gist of it is that you can carry over most of your units (upgraded to the next Age’s equivalent). So you won’t lose a good number of units just because they don’t have an Army Commander that can be packed into and will be lost during transition.
On a similar note, there are now End Of Age warnings to really get you ready for transition. By default, it will warn you when you’re left with 10 turns, but you can extend it to 20, or turn it off.
The biggest highlight of the update is Auto-Explore. As much as the game designers want players to actively explore the map, Civ VII, like most Civ games, will eventually reach a point where you don’t need to be invested in exploration (most of the areas have been claimed by other civs, and you’re realistically can’t settle there anyway) so it’s more efficient to let scouts, and other units that can serve the role, to just automatically explore and passively reveal the map. It’s now here, as they should.
Lastly, a big new feature is associated with one of the base game’s Leaders, Trung Trac. Now she has a unique Army Commander, her sister Trung Nhi, complete with a unique model and unique skill tree. This will replace Trung Trac’s ability of awarding 3 free promotions for her first Commander to be this unique unit. Lore accurate and more pronounced differentiations between Leaders and Civs, neat!
You can find the full patch notes here.
Civilization VII Right To Rule DLC First Wave Out Now
In addition to the free update, Civilization VII is now ready to release its promised rollout of paid DLC with the first wave of The Right To Rule Collection. The full Collection DLC includes 2 new Leaders, four Civs and four Wonders.
The first wave features the following:
- New Leader: Genghis Khan
- New Civs: Assyria (Antiquity), Dai Viet (Exploration)
- New Wonders:
- Mausoleum at Halicarnassus – Antiquity
- Wat Xieng Thong – Exploration
- Grand Bazaar – Exploration
- Ubudiah Mosque – Modern
Genghis Khan and Assyria are returning civs and leaders. The Mongols are already in the base game so now it has its canon Leader in as well. The addition of Dai Viet means Trung Tac gets her canon civ now as well, an another option for a Southeast Asia civ during Exploration Age should the Majapahit doesn’t tickle your fancy.
The next wave of the Right To Rule Collection DLC should be interesting, as all of them features new-to-Civ Leader and civs.
Update 1.2.3 and part one of the Right To Rule Collection DLC for Civilization VII is out now. Check out our review of Civilization VII here.