A couple weeks ago, there were rumors swirling about Civilization VI adding a new content pass similar to the New Frontier Pass from 2020 - 2021. Firaxis confirmed these rumors and provided the full details yesterday in a post outlining the new content. Essentially, they're adding 6 new DLC batches that include 3 leaders each, without adding any new nations to the game. According to the Steam page, you can get this pack for free if you purchased the Anthology Edition of the game, or it's available separately for purchase (price TBD). Some of the content depends on having purchased prior expansions and/or DLC, which is something to watch out for (same as the New Frontier Pass).

The reason I'm conflicted is that the New Frontier Pass felt like a good sendoff for the game, and it's been 18 months since its final content released. We all sort of figured Firaxis was moving on (to a spinoff like Beyond Earth or maybe a 7th mainline entry), or at the very least tying a bow on this game. I'm clearly a mark for Civ games, having purchased every bit of DLC for this and Civilization V, so I'm almost certainly taking the plunge on the new leaders. However, I've found that I've kind of moved on from the game, not having gone back to it since the final New Frontier pack dropped. Moreover, I wonder what this sudden spurt of new content for Civ VI means for those future plans, and if I should expect a Civ VII any time in the next several years. Curious to hear how others feel about this news, and what you think of the new DLC content-wise as well.

I wouldn't read that much into this. These kinds of things often happen because a studio is working on a new project but they don't have work for everyone to do based on where the project is in development (maybe the tools for creating content aren't finished etc...) so to keep those people productive they make some DLC for an older game.

I don't have a problem with them making new DLC because it's not like Civ VI wasn't feature complete beforehand so this is just more stuff for those who want it and those who don't can ignore it. It keeps some people employed, makes some fans happy, and I doubt it's slowed down development on whatever is next.

Seems like a good thing overall.

Every Civ cycle these days leads off with a base game that is feature incomplete in some way. I don't anticipate Civ VII to break that trend, so if they want to extend the life of Civ VI and all the good work done on it, more power to them, I say.

I have not played a Civ extensively, since Civ 2. I might have played a demo of Civ 3, but no more than that. I have always liked Civ, but some of teh past few have always seemed "too hard". It is not like I enjoy playing a "cheetah pace" (do they even have that anymore), but games where you need to check twenty-two things before I make a choice are not really where my happy time place exists.

I always like to hear people are still enjoying game series i liked, but I think my patience level for playing a game of Civ is long in my past.

I think it's great. Civ VI will always be a fantastic game, and, as you said, there hasn't really been a reason to boot it up for a year and a half. I'm also pretty happy that it's free for anyone that already has all the DLC since they usually tend to make you buy their all-in pack to get it.

It also takes an extremely small team to create a new leader so it's not going to affect anything else they're working on. Perhaps some of the leaders will have crazy abilities or gimmicks that they want to beta test for whatever they're doing next.

This feels cheap and unnecessary even if it's free for owners of the Anthology. The base game already has tons of leaders to provide variety and outside of some few people who really think that they have to play as Abe Lincoln or some of the lesser know leaders in these packs, I don't see who this is for.

The base game still has bugs, it always crashes on my computer if I play on large maps and the game eventually gets too big and the only way to avoid it is to reload a save and immediately declare war on somebody(!) or give up on several hours of progress (I have 32GB of RAM so it's clearly not that). There are also some poorly thought out design choices that I feel would be very easy to fix without breaking anything, but what do I know about programming because somehow these haven't been patched in over half a decade that the game's been out. Like how you can't see your resources when somebody offers a trade deal, so you don't know if you can afford it or not unless you always memorize everything you have. You can decline the offer and then make the same offer on your turn, but the AI might have changed its mind about the deal already.

What I'm trying to say is that this doesn't feel like a priority and it almost makes me irrationally angry given that the game already has tons of potential that will likely never be unlocked, only for Firaxis to be messing around with this type of irrelevant content.

Thanks for the input, y’all. I think I’m just going to try and enjoy the fact we’re finally getting more leaders for more than a few nations, even if I don’t end up touching most of them. No point in wringing my hands about some theoretical opportunity cost; Civ VII could be well underway for all I know.

Also, looks like Julius Caesar is being added for Rome as a bonus leader on Monday as well, provided you link a 2K account to Steam or your platform of choice. Seems like a really good one for early expansion, with bonus gold rewards on capturing barb outposts and cities.

It 100% is, or something similar. They had job postings last August (2021) for a bunch of stuff, but one of them was for a narrative lead with knowledge and passion for world history to work on their next AAA strategy game. So they've been working on it for a while.