Sid Meier Civilization: Beyond Earth is yet another Civilization game in the long line, and that might be both a positive and a fault at the same time, as it’s easy to compare Beyond Earth with all the other Civilization games.
That’s a comparison though that must be made. This was the game between Civ 5 and Civ 6. It plays very similar to Civ 5, so that’s a game I’m going to consider when talking about this game.
The biggest thing to note when playing Beyond Earth is how strange, almost alien it is. In the original Civ, everything is an era or placed in a very well thought out linear fashion. You have a bronze age, an Iron age, the information age, and so on. You evolve as a species as much as you build new tech.
In Beyond earth the tech has an interesting new web system to grow through, and this is a good improvement, creating an interesting path with leaves and branches as the game calls it. The downside is it’s not connected to anything. What is “Xenobiology” Much of the game has terms made up, and most of the desirable tech is spread across the board, it just doesn’t feel like it maps to reality.
In addition, the tech has this new system called “Affinity” eventually you’ll gain affinity points that will let you unlock upgrades to units, and once you get high enough you’ll get a way to achieve victory. This is actually kind of interesting because now your victory is tied to your tech decisions. But sadly these decisions aren’t really felt. You can change your units and how they work based on the Affinity you choose but it doesn’t feel that impactful. A harmony unit is very different than any other.. I’m sure people who really deep dive into the stats can talk about major differences but people who are just enjoying the game won’t feel a big difference.
Speaking of victories, I was surprised how many were passive. In fact, they all might be able to be gained “passively” as the military victory is supposedly able to be done with spies, so even there. You don’t really have to attack directly, and since the combat is somewhat similar to Civ 5, defense tends to beat offense with a few exceptions.
As for non-military victories, there are four others besides time. Three are based on Affinities (get them to the 13th level and you get something that wins the game after a set amount of time), as well as one that feels like an exploration based achievement that’s somewhat hard.
The one victory I was sad to see missing was the diplomacy victory, there were a couple big strides in diplomacy in this game, but I really wanted to see a UN-style system, like Alpha Centauri, had, an old game that Sid Meier made, similar to beyond earth. But Diplomatic victories didn’t seem to be part of the game. In fact, much of diplomacy seemed lacking. Other leaders will offer “Favors’ which seem to be tokens to get them to do stuff later, but most of the time I didn’t see anything I wanted them to do for me.
The issue I have with the victories that are in the game is none of these feel overly difficult. You get to a level based on your tech, and then you build an object, usually able to add an object or two to speed up your victory, and then 20ish turns later you win. The AI doesn’t seem to try to stop you directly, and even in the Transcendence victory that says “The aliens will be mad” nothing tries to stop me. I had two enemies approach, both were murdered by other factions and nothing else ever approached me. But I won the game, it wasn’t a group victory, did they just accept my supremacy?
That’s really the base issue I have with this game, the AI is very old. In Civ 5, (with the expansions) I feel the AIs were too aggressive at times. But that’s a good thing, countries go to war. A tech country should at least try to have a military otherwise a military country will smash them. This is all normal but missing here.
The military itself is interesting though, tech and more importantly affinities are what makes the military strong. Affinities allow upgrades so your soldiers become strong. The downside is there are no obsolete units. All upgrades are taken instantaneously around the globe. Interesting idea, but that means that soldier you built on turn one just magically grows strong capabilities over time. The names change but it’s still the same unit with more stats.
And then where are the nukes, where are the massive wars. As I said I rarely play military factions in this game but I like showing my technical (science) superiority in the end game and show up with a B-52 when the opponent shows up with his chariot. You can’t do that in this game as you both have similar units even near the end but one has more stats.
There’s a new quest system as well, most of these seem to be repeated per game, but you can make decent changes by choices. If you want to chase Food (growth) or money, or science, there are subtle small changes in the decisions made in quests, or which goals you pursue. They also give sizable boosts to your Affinities.
The issue though is the quests don’t really present meaningful options. You choose either a food boost or a energy (gold) boost. You choose more harmony or more purity. It’s almost always a single value. I would have loved to see more personality in the choices or more of a reason for the decisions. Maybe some multiple changes, where I might get more energy but weaker units, or more food, and more energy. But every quest is a bonus only.
In fact, that meaningfulness is lacking in the entire game. Diplomacy seems wasted. The AI is passive, the alien natives are questionable about when they attack and when they ignore you. You can gain power but still use the same unit, nothing really has a big impact on the player. Your civilization will ask you questions and you’ll usually choose A or B and it’ll only affect one thing. I’d love to see major changes. I’d love to feel that at the end of the game I build my own civilization. And while I will have run the “KP” faction very well, it’s just not the same as running the Greeks all the way through Civilization 5 and conquering the other civilizations.
I feel like I’ve been negative in this review, and I have. But Beyond Earth is a problematic game, it’s just not as good as Civ 5 for a number of reasons, mostly it’s relatability. I don’t connect to this game like I connect to Civ 5 or even potentially Civ 6. (I have not played it yet) The terms in the game and the world it presents is odd and unique.
Yet I recommend Beyond Earth in an odd way. I believe Civ 5 is a better game to start with. I think Alpha Centauri is a better Space exploration game (at least in my rose tinted glasses version of the memory of it.) but I’m sure Alpha Centauri has not aged well. Beyond Earth though offers something that Alpha Centauri lacked. Alpha Centauri was a reskinned Civilization, where it played the same way and was really “Civ in space”. Beyond Earth is “Civ on an alien world.” and plays differently because of that.
So in that way, I recommend Beyond Earth because it’s different. It’s not Civ 6 which is an improved version of Civ 5, which is an improved version of Civ 4… It’s not yet another game of the same lineage. This is different, and it’s unique, and it’s good because of that. But I prefer Civ to this, yet I can’t say I’m unhappy playing Beyond Earth as well.
If you enjoyed this review or want to see my opinion on other games you can find my curator page at this link.
http://store.steampowered.com/curator/31803828-Kinglink-Revi... Give me a follow.
3.0