Humankind - the Civ killer?

[Syt]

Btw, the full cultures list:

Neolithic Era
Nomadic Tribe

Ancient Era
Assyrians – Expansionist
Babylonians – Scientist
Egyptians – Builder
Harappens – Agrarian
Hittites – Militarist
Mycenaeans – Militarist
Nubians – Merchant
Olmecs – Aesthete
Phoenicians – Merchant
Zhou – Aesthete

Classical Era
Achaemenid Persians – Expansionist
Aksumites – Merchant
Carthaginians -Merchant
Celts – Agrarian
Goths – Militarist
Greeks – Scientist
Huns – Militarist
Mauryans – Aesthete
Maya – Builder
Romans – Expansionist

Medieval Era
Aztecs – Militarist
Byzantines – Merchant
English – Agrarian
Franks – Aesthete
Ghanaians – Merchant
Khmer – Builder
Mongols – Militarist
Norsemen – Militarist
Teutons – Expansionist
Umayyads – Scientist

Early Modern Era
Dutch – Merchant
Edo Japanese – Aesthete
Haudenosaunee – Agrarian
Joseon – Scientist
Ming – Aesthete
Mughals – Builder
Ottomans – Expansionist
Poles – Militarist
Spanish – Expansionist
Venetians – Merchant

Industrial Era
Austro-Hungarians – Aesthete
British – Expansionist
French – Scientist
Germans – Militarist
Italians – Aesthete
Mexicans – Agrarian
Persians – Builder
Russians – Expansionist
Siamese – Builder
Zulu – Militarist

Contemporary Era
Americans - Expansionist
Australians - Builder
Brazilians - Agrarian
Chinese - Merchant
Egyptians - Aesthete
Indians - Aesthete
Japanese - Scientist
Soviets - Expansionist
Swedes - Scientist
Turks - Agrarian

[DGuller]

He does that and then he stops & just YOLOs for awhile.

I admit I prefer that to the relentless of min/maxing of other let's players.

I don't like min/maxing either.  I unsubscribed from Taueror a while ago, because all these videos with Order 66 got old really fast, and that seemed to be the only tool in his toolbox.  Okay, I get it, you can break the game with a stupid trick, it might be interested to see once, but it's not interesting to watch time and again.  I actually want to see someone enjoy playing a game the way it was intended, and parking your troops in the country so that they instantly occupy it the moment the war is declared is not it.

I guess the sweet spot is someone who really tries to play the game the way it's meant to be played, but can also show you how to play it better than you can figure out on your own.

[The Brain]

Swedes are scientists? The science of bork?

[Josephus]

So do you switch cultures each era?

[crazy canuck]

So do you switch cultures each era?

Yeah, that is the main claim to fame for the game. 

Each epoch you choose a new culture.  You could stay with the same one, at least in an earlier beta version, but I am not sure why you would want to.

[Tamas]

So Youtubers got the release version, except as I understand the modern era is disabled for them. Which seems a huge warning sign.

Luckily it'll be on Gamepass from day one.

[Josephus]

So Youtubers got the release version, except as I understand the modern era is disabled for them. Which seems a huge warning sign.

Luckily it'll be on Gamepass from day one.

I haven't seen the whole thing, but I thought Quill said in his game that he's got the full retail version.

[Tamas]

This guy is saying at the start that modern era and some other stuff are locked

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27GmRfE5dzY&t=822s

[Josephus]

This guy is saying at the start that modern era and some other stuff are locked

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27GmRfE5dzY&t=822s

I think it's just under embargo, not locked.

https://youtu.be/tUKSogj_3zA?t=48

[Tamas]

That's still an admission that the late game is untested, though. Or, even worse, tested, but couldn't be made to work.

[DGuller]

This game sounds great on paper, but I have to say, I just found every LP to be a bore to sit through.  Something about it just doesn't engage me at all, at least not when watching it.

[Tamas]

This game sounds great on paper, but I have to say, I just found every LP to be a bore to sit through.  Something about it just doesn't engage me at all, at least not when watching it.

I'll definitely give it a try (once I am back from holiday) but yeah Endless Legend I desperately wanted to like but couldn't. I hope this won't be the same.

[crazy canuck]

That's still an admission that the late game is untested, though. Or, even worse, tested, but couldn't be made to work.

Not sure that follows at all.  The developer has a youtube video showing how it works.

[Syt]

Nate Crowley on RPS:

Humankind isn't perfect, even discounting my personal feelings about the relative efficacy and fun potential of different playstyles. There were a lot of small but weird bugs in the review build: notifications informing me that the Olmecs had advanced to the Ancient Era no less than five times; the narrator expressing his shock at my building five, fifteen, and then thirty farming quarters on consecutive turns, when I had done no such thing; a boat panicking when set to auto-explore.

There was nothing game-breaking in there, but there were a few too many noodles out of the soup for a game so highly polished in other regards. It did lead me to wonder how many other cracks were hidden below the waterline of this weird, mixed metaphor noodle boat.

Beyond that sort of thing, my only real problem with Humankind is the issue I alluded to right at the start: that despite really liking it, I'm not 100% sure of what it is. It has set out to prove itself as a historical 4X that is emphatically not a Civ clone, and it has succeeded. But in bending itself around the monolithic bulk of Big Sid's baby, it has grown into a strange shape. There's just a lot going on, is the best way I can put it. At times, this makes for an extremely rich strategic play. At other times, it makes for an experience verging on information overload.

Indeed, and especially in the later stages of a game, Humankind can feel more like a puzzle game than a 4X, with the business of hexes and multipliers abstracting it from its central theme of humanity. Still, if the worst things I can find to say about Humankind are that it sometimes makes me think too much, and that I need to play it more, it's hardly a bloody disaster, is it? Go make yourself some harbours, and tell the Olmecs I said hello. If they ever make it out of their Ancient Era time loop and invent writing, that is.

PC Gamer's Frazer Brown says it's a solid 4X that lacks personality and gives it 71%.

Even with more enthusiastic opponents, the momentum falters in the endgame as Humankind runs out of new tricks. It gets familiar late additions like the space race, nukes and pollution, but all of them are disappointingly perfunctory. I sped to the end of the very traditional tech tree in my first game, and acquiring all of humanity's knowledge only left me hollow. Perhaps there's a valuable lesson in there, but I'd rather have more neat things to do with fancy technology. There are only so many times the numbers can grow before you crave something a bit more substantial.

Old World serves as an interesting comparison. Like Humankind, Civ's influence is everywhere, but while that gave Old World a starting point, where it ended up was a lot more unusual. It found a new place to focus on—people—and all sorts of surprising crises and obstacles as a result, like being murdered by your nephew. While Humankind has reconsidered and reconfigured Civ's features, it's been more reserved. Being able to adopt new cultures and nurture continent-sized cities is certainly novel, but it isn't transformative. It could probably do with being 20% weirder, I reckon. I've done the maths. And I've had lots of practice, given Humankind's aforementioned love of big numbers.

The End Turn button still beckons, however, and Memphis needs more oil for its battleships. I also need to try out a lethal militant build I've been considering, in the hopes of quickly throwing the world into an apocalyptic war. Humankind has still spawned some great ideas that I'm not done with, and can't wait to see imitated and iterated. But now that Amplitude has made its Civilization, I really hope it goes back to making Alpha Centauris.

[Darth Wagtaros]

Not sure if I want to pull the trigger on this.  Is it a blander Civ-lite or an unpolished gem that needs a year of bug fixes and expensive DLC?