I have played Civ games my entire life starting with Civ 2. Played thousands of hours across Civ 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. I have purchased almost every expansion for each iteration before it.
I feel like Civ 7 started the same way Civ 6 started for me. I did not like the direction. I thought that civ 6 could not hold a candle to civ 5. I hated how they changed workers and the inclusion of districts seemed really silly. I disliked the art direction. I was wrong. And once the team was able to flush out their vision with Civ 6 it became a perfect game just like the iterations before it. But just like civ 6, I did not like it until the first few expansions were out.
With Civ 7, they took a bold leap and fell flat on their face at launch. But now they have patched, updated, and included new functionality and it is a fun game to play. Completely different than the other iterations and I think that is a good thing. The age transitions are still jarring and I hope that one day they develop the ability to play without them. I am a bit of a completionist and I find that the ages always end before I am able to do everything I want. But once each age gets moving I have a ton of fun.
I think a lot of the negativity surrounding this game is because of the price and that Firaxis has moved away from offering expansions that give a ton of new content and change of gameplay. I am pretty disappointed by this, too. And I think it is impacting peoples ability to take the game for what it is instead of comparing to previous iterations.
Anyway, if you are a lover of Civ like me. Give it a shot. Don't go into it thinking it is a previous civ game. I made that mistake, too. Just like all other civ games, it keeps getting better and that is what makes Civ one of the best franchises.
