Civilization 7's new features: a revamped three-age structure, towns, navigable rivers, and more

Civilization 5 was controversial for ditching unit stacking, forcing players to space out their armies on a new hexagonal grid. Civilization 6 got heat for altering the art style, and added a new city district system to mixed reviews. Eight years later, Firaxis hasn't opted to play it safe for Civilization 7: Get ready for some long Reddit threads.

The most fundamental change, and the one I think will be the most controversial, is a revamp of the game structure. Instead of lots of eras—Ancient, Classical, Medieval, Renaissance, and so on—a game of Civ 7 is divided into just three ages: Antiquity, Exploration, and Modern. At the start of each age, you'll be prompted to pick a new civilization, with options that depend on your current civilization and the choices you've made so far. One example given was that Mongolia might show up in your Exploration age options if you've developed powerful cavalry units.

This also means that Civ 7's leaders are no longer locked to the civilization they're known for leading. 2K flew me out to the Firaxis office earlier this month, where I spent three hours building the Roman Empire as Egyptian pharaoh Hatshepsut. 

I explain how that went in more detail in my hands-on preview. However, I know that Civ fans will also care about all the little changes and additions in Civ 7, so below I've listed absolutely every new thing I noticed. I'm told that some features are exclusive to the other two ages, so I wouldn't have seen them, and even though I've tried to be comprehensive, there's no way I clocked every new thing in my short session, and I wasn't able to dig too deep into anything. Firaxis may also make tweaks before Civ 7 launches on February 11, so consider this a partial and not at all final list of what to expect.

Without further ado, here's (some of) what's new in Civilization 7:

Big structural changes

• Games are now divided into three longer ages: Antiquity, Exploration, and Modern
• The Antiquity and Exploration ages climax with Crisis events, which require players to adopt more and more Crisis Policies—negative effects that we'll have to deal with
• You pick a new civilization when you enter a new age
• Leaders no longer have to match their civilizations
• Leaders aren't necessarily historical heads of state; Benjamin Franklin is a leader, for example

New feature: towns

• Settlers now found towns instead of cities
• Towns have no production queue: they convert Production directly into Gold
• You can use Gold to purchase units and buildings in towns
• Towns can be turned into cities by spending Gold; the cost increases with the number of cities you already control
• Towns can adopt permanent specializations with bonuses: farming town, mining town, military fort, trade outpost

Changes to cities

• Cities no longer expand onto new tiles automatically. When a city grows, you're prompted to select an adjacent tile for it to annex. (You can still purchase tiles, too.)
• Workers are gone. Improvements like Farms and Mines are added to new tiles automatically
• City tiles are now classed as "rural" or "urban." Rural tiles contain improvements (Farms, Mines, etc), and become urban districts if you add buildings to them. There are no longer predefined district types; you can place any combination of buildings in an urban district.
• Some buildings are now classed as "Warehouse" buildings and work differently than in previous games: Granaries, for example, now provide +1 Food per farm improvement (In Civ 6, they provided a flat +1 Food/+2 Housing)
• Walls can now be built in each urban district; to capture a city, an invader must breach all of its fortified districts
• When you enter a new age, old buildings lose their special effects and adjacency bonuses, encouraging you to replace them with new buildings

Changes to units

• When told to fortify, military units actually build a little fortification (I didn't jot down exactly how this affects their stats, I was too excited)
• Scouts can now construct temporary watchtowers to see further
• Units can embark over shallow water by default (I tested this with some early units, not sure if it applies to all units)
• Units no longer gain XP and receive promotions, except for new Commander units

New unit type: Commanders

• Commanders are special military units and are the only units that gain XP and can be promoted
• Commanders provided passive bonuses to nearby units, which is one of their attributes that can be upgraded with promotions
• Units can also be stacked "inside" Commanders and moved as a group, and then unpacked at their destination
• Commanders can issue orders to all nearby units, such as to focus fire on a single enemy—with an attack bonus for using the special command

New feature: Influence

• Influence is a new yield that is spent on all kinds of diplomatic actions
• Influence can be used for positive actions, such as gaining the loyalty of city-states and making agreements with other civs, such as making a military pact which provides a bonus to both civs' units
• Influence can also be used for negative actions, such as sanctioning a civilization, or attempting to infiltrate its military
• In some cases, you can spend Influence to avoid negative effects, for example to stop another leader's relationship with you from worsening

Misc features

• Navigable rivers! Navigable rivers! Navigable rivers!
• There are new narrative events of the kind popularized by other recent strategy games. Example: An artist painted a portrait of me that I found unsettling, and my options were to hang it up (+25 culture), destroy it (+50 gold), or pay to have it redone (+2 culture on the palace, -25 gold).
• Barbarians have been replaced with Independant Powers, which may or may not be hostile, and whose camps can turn into City-States
• Religion and natural disasters are back, as well as other features from Civ 5, Civ 6, and their expansions (I don't have a comprehensive list, and I expect there'll be tweaks to these systems, but I didn't have time to dig into them)
• A fact sheet about the game promises "progression bonuses for your leaders across multiple gameplay sessions"

Multiplayer and launch info

• Civ 7 is releasing on a ton of platforms at launch: Windows (Steam and Epic), Linux (Steam), Mac (Steam), Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S
• There will be online multiplayer with PC/console crossplay. The 2K Launcher is being ditched, though you'll need a 2K Account for online multiplayer
• Multiplayer matches can span all three ages, or just one age "so you can enjoy an entire game in a single session"
• On Xbox, PlayStation, and PC, five players are supported in the Antiquity and Exploration ages, and eight players are supported in the Modern age (I'm not sure why this is!)
• The Switch version supports fewer players, four in Antiquity and Exploration, and six in Modern