The new trade system begins very early, with the discovery of Animal Husbandry, a tech that allows civs to build the Caravan. I wasn't very excited about the new trade route system in Brave New World. Overall, the new civs are very solid, much more of an attraction than I expected.Ĭivilization V: Brave New World Review: Trade The others (Poland, Brasil, Zulu, Morocco) are less exciting, but nice additions. Assyria, the most ancient civ, throws back to ancient Civ games: when they take cities, they steal a tech. Portugal can claim resources in territory belonging to city states. Indonesia gets bonus luxuries for expanding overseas. And their cities start with tons of territory. One Shoshone Unique Unit is a Scout that can pick any result from a goodie hut. The other new civs are interesting, but less dramatic than Venice. It's weird, but experimentation is great. Firaxis has said Venice is their favorite addition, and it's easy to see why: I've never seen a Civ play this differently from the others. They have a unique playstyle and several new mechanics (double trade routes, a unique Great Merchant that can puppet city states, the ability to buy units in puppeted cities), and they'll need it. That's right: Venice is One City Challenge deluxe, the ultimate test for a Civ fanatic. Their Unique Ability is not being able to build settlers or annex cities. You'll read about the big one in every Civ V: Brave New World review, I'm sure. Alright, let's dive in.Įnrico Dandolo, Scourge of God. It goes much farther, and I believe it takes Civ 5 to its apex. It was a solid expansion, and it made Civ 5 much better.īrave New World does the same thing, with a focus on the late game and the builder's game. Gods and Kings, the first expansion, added a Religion system that was much more robust and interesting than Civ 4's. It had some great new mechanics, but lost a lot of the depth of Civ 4 (full disclosure: Civilization IV is my favorite game of the 2000s), and the builder game - my personal playstyle - was heavily broken. UPDATE: check out our review roundup and see what everyone else is saying (they all like it too).īefore we dive into the Civilization 5: Brave New World review proper, let me say this: I didn't love vanilla Civ 5. It's more than that: it's the best thing that's ever happened to Civilization V. I would be doing Brave New World a disservice to call it Civ V's best expansion pack. And Archaeology adds something truly new to the Civ series. The World Congress and the Ideology system make the late game much more exciting. The new trade system and Culture Victory transform and revitalize the builder game. I've been playing the expansion for a few days now, and I am very, very happy to report that Brave New World is fantastic. Civilization 5: Brave New World review time! The latest and most likely final expansion to Civ 5 is out tomorrow (July 9) for North America, and July 12 worldwide for both PC and Mac.

Brave new world civ 5.