So there was a post on Reddit talking about Civ V and VI arguments in the community, so I thought I'd add my answers to the poster's questions. It ended up being a long write-up. As a result, I decided to post it here as well since I haven't posted here much in a while anyway! My entire post, along with the quoted questions I'm responding to, are down below.
Alright, avid Civ V player here - I respect both V and VI for what they bring to the table equally, however, and play both. I'll answer your questions the best I can.
Is this a consequence of any long running video game series? One example I can think of is in the Pokémon games, where there are "genwunners" who swear to the point of toxicity that Generation 1 of the series is the best. Is Civilization no different?
Sort of. When it comes to Civ games, the arguments tend to lie between the most recent 2 entries. When V was still recent, it was critiqued for removing Unit stacks of death, having overall less core features than the previous entry like Faith, among many other things. Civ VI Vanilla arguably kept a lot of things that made BNW so damn good, despite the absence of a World Congress, but it has a lot of other core mechanic changes that rub people who transition over the wrong way. (Districts, gaps in the tech tree and Unit paths, Workers, etc.) In Pokemon, it's not as recent as Gen 6 vs 7, it's more so that everyone picks their favorite Gen (1, in the case of "genwunners"). While some say that IV or III or even I is still their fav, it's just not the same as franchises like Pokemon or COD.
The transition between Civ V and Civ VI was most drastic in both gameplay (esp. unstacked cities) and aesthetics (described favorably as "expressive" or unfavorably as "cartoony"). Is this simply a personal preference or could it be a case of change aversion?
Depends on the person, I suppose. As an example, I absolutely despite Workers having charges. I hate having to build Workers over and over to improve everything around my Cities. Civ V Workers on the other hand? Great. That's a personal thing, though. I come from an RTS background, and that's how a lot of my youth was spent when it came to Strategy, so I like micro-managing Workers, and clicking them to finish Improvements on that exact turn when I could, or finding a way to utilize them to improve tiles I may have forgotten about that could prove useful. IMO, it definitely is a personal preference thing in general - I haven't seen a global distaste for any specific Civ VI change unless I'm forgetting something. Some people are just more vocal about their preferences than others.
There are also several criticisms of representation and politicization. To name a few, a Korean gaming community complained (probably because Seondeok was chosen to represent Korea) that the game was merely meeting a quota for female leaders even though, historically, there are disproportionately more male leaders than the female. Also, Cathering de Medici, an Italian, leading the French was frowned upon by some. Firaxis including the climate change mechanic in Gathering storm was accused of pushing a political agenda. Are these criticisms valid?
Here's the thing with female Leaders;
When we say we don't like a Leader that happens to be female, 99% of the time, the person does not dislike them purely because they are a woman. It is because Firaxis and their choices of female Leaders in particular are highly questionable compared to Civ V or prior.
Catherine de Medici (France), Seondeok (Korea), and Kristina (Sweden) are the ones so far that bother me specifically. Gorgo is questionable too, but she's grown on me to be honest. I'm okay with all of the females beyond that so far in Civ VI. The 3 that I mention aren't particularly great choices at all for Leaders. While yes, Firaxis, does seem to have a certain quota they follow in their Expansions (At least 3 females in both RF and GS), female Leaders aren't the problem. Their choices are.
Civ V's only really questionable choice IMO is Maria I of Portugal. That was weird. She was the only female in that Expansion, however. They just needed to make a smarter choice. Maybe instead, they could've used Joao II for Portugal - and then used Gitarja for Indonesia, to get a female in as a better choice.
Medici? How about Louis XIV, and then Ana Nzinga for Kongo? Kristina, someone who is frowned upon Swedes? Why not give us Carolus instead, or save Sweden for a different expansion entirely if you can't get a proper female Leader in?
I could go on about this, and don't want to rant or anything, so I'll end with this. Does Firaxis have a political agenda? No. Trying to raise awareness for climate change? Yes, at least a bit. Female Leader quota? Yes. Although, I think they choose Leaders based on personality more so than achievements or greatness, which is what the majority feels like should be the case.
On the topic of AI, I hear Civ IV is the best and others are just "stupid" though there are mods for those who seek the challenge. Not really a question but it seemed important to a lot of people.
The AI is pretty dumb, yes. In V, they were very passive after BNW unless they were a warmonger, and never utilized Naval combat well in my experience. Don't have much more to say besides "use mods if it bothers you".
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