New Detailed Models Coming To Civilization VI Via New Engine
Details in the art of games can sometimes go unnoticed, while for others its a vital part of the game. For Civilization, they’ve often hovered between great detail, and lesser detail to suit the engine and their desires.
With Civilization VI, the team at Firaxis are not only making another new engine for the game, but also emphasizing things that they’ve never truly focused on in previous incarnations.
“When we went into this, we looked into how people play the game,” says Brian Busatti to IGN, “Typically in a Civ game you want to see the world as a whole, so you’re pulling out a lot. That doesn’t mean people don’t zoom in, but for the most part. Some people even zoom all the way out and play in tactical mode.”
As such, for Civilization VI, which focuses even more on the inner workings of the city and the people making it, they needed an engine and art style that allows them to show just as much detail when brought in close as they did when they were zoomed back:
“You want to make sure that things are readable from that distance, and one of the ways to do that is to really put an emphasis on shape and form. It’s obviously a little more readable if you have different silhouettes to things.”
This also meant that individual units, especially more active units, would need to be redone in a big way as well.
“Warriors are definitely bigger. They’ve got a very thick silhouette and are just big massive guys, and you have smaller guys who are still heroic, but leaner. So you can tell the difference right away between an Archer and a Warrior.”
Civilization VI arrives October 21st.