I love Civilization 6 as much as the next person, but sometimes playing it really stresses me out. There’s so much to manage and keep an eye on! An upcoming new idle RTS called CivIdle streamlines some of that Firaxis charm by turning the whole thing into a hexagon engine.
CivIdle comes from Fish Pond Studio, and it reduces all the base elements of a 4X game like Civilization down to a (relatively) simple grid. All the bits and pieces of your empire, the inhabitants, resources and strongholds, are represented by different colors that feed into each other.
Your mission, if you can call it that, is simply to exist through the centuries, maintaining growth, and making those sweet, sweet stats stack up. I enjoy the novelty of clicker games, and playing the demo of CivIdle, I could see myself progressively putting dozens of hours into it, creating an ever greater scurry of tokens across the screen.
The growth and exchange of resources is represented by little balls that float from one hexagon to the other. After a while, you’ll have a good cycle going, then that urge to make an even bigger, more efficient one kicks in, and before you know it, CivIdle has become part of your digital furniture. Or at least, that’s how I anticipate the strategy game fitting in my life.
According to the Steam page, there will be over 100 skills to research, and the UI is old school by design, favoring how these games would’ve looked around 30 years ago. So, lots of text boxes, but streamlined still, and there will be options to help players read the screen more easily.
In addition to the Steam Next Fest demo, this will be a free game, with optional paid-for DLC if you want to support the one-man team. Honestly, if you’ve grown weary of Civ 6, or just want to take a break but still scratch the itch, this is a solid option.
Peruse our list of the best Steam Next Fest demos for more fine selections. We have a list of the best Civ 6 mods, if you just want to jump back in after reading all that.