Civilization 7 director explains that each sequel is a massive overhaul because iteration and graphics improvements are "not worthy of another chapter"

Civilization 7: a screenshot of a bronze man playing the violin during the trailer for Civilization 7. — (Image credit: Firaxis)

Civilization 7's creative director says that each new entry in the strategy game series has to innovate meaningfully in order to be "worthy of another chapter" in the franchise.

Speaking during the PC Gaming Show Most Wanted, where Civilization 7 was named the most anticipated game of next year, creative director Ed Beach explained that "for us, it's very important that a new chapter in the Civilization franchise has to be just as epic as the game is. We can't just iterate a teeny little bit in certain areas, polish up the graphics. That's not worthy of another chapter in the Civilization story."

"If you look back over the whole course of the franchise," he continues, "[what] has been a constant is that each major new version does innovate, and does take a few things that maybe were standard and were established, and goes ahead and uproots those in the service of getting to the net major milestone for the series."

In Civilization 7, the greatest overhaul is being made in the service of what Beach says is the number-one issue that the Civ games struggle with - players not finishing their games. "We had a lot of data that people would play Civilization games, and they would never get all the way to the end," he says. "They just wouldn't finish them. So we wanted to do whatever we could, whether it was reducing micromanagement, restructuring the game, to really address the problem directly. There are a lot of little systemic refinements that we've gone through, and by and large most of them thoughtfully look at where the player was investing their time, and think about whether there's a better way to make that a little bit more streamlined."

The biggest change in Civilization 7, of course, is the introduction of Ages, which will encourage you to change up your Civ twice during the course of the game, ensuring that you're always dealing with a Civ at the height of its power during the Antiquity, Exploration, and Modern eras. Beach says that "that Civ, moment to moment, one more turn gameplay, we've made sure we've got plenty of that still baked in there," but it does seem as though Civilization 7 will be significantly overhauling the series once it launches in February.

Civilization 7 is "one of the biggest changes" and also "one of the scariest" in the 34-year history of the strategy series.