First of all this is a Civilization like game except with cards making for deck building. This makes it feel more like a board game, but a shallower one at that. You start with a city and research/build buildings/build units/choose civics which give certain use cards according to how much you are producing. This game runs like a Civilization lite with hexes to use, which may have food, gold, items gotten by building specific buildings on them like a pasture for cows. You use your cards every turn according to your resources and try to get a certain victory point limit, which ends the game at the turn a civilization passes this point. There is a quite a bit of RNG in what cards you draw and what's around you. One game I quit and restarted as I as very weak and had next to no special resources around my starting area. You can use gold to draw cards and I believe shuffle your cards into the deck.
The gameplay is Civilization at its most basic with really basic by the numbers fights (you may gain tactics from cards, but generally it's a higher numbers wins game), by the numbers resource gathering, a very basic trading which mainly gets gold, and a very straightforward production of everything. I forgot to mention on each card has the resources required to build it and if you have the right terrain/resources you can build it, although I believe it's only one building and one unit per city a turn. The tech tree is tiny as well making games very, very similar. Even Civilization's tech tree is pretty linear, but certain items or something may cause you to prioritize things first here. When researching or gaining a civic you get to choose 1 of so many cards (always the same for the items) to put into your hand and the rest is your discard. I feel the makers of Hexarchy wanted to get the basic Civilization feel (which it does achieve), but it feels so by the numbers it feels like a board game instead, and not the best one either. To make the RNG better you can and should burn cards (the first gets a single science as well as one more anvil I believe) as long as they are not needed or are made to be burned (firewood).
The graphics generally get it done with nice card art, but the art for the field can be hard to distinguish at times. I can't always tell which hexes have special resources. The graphics are basic on the map, but everything is OK enough distinguishable. This isn't like the Civilization games where the units stand out a decent amount. The sound is okay and the music the same. Nothing stood out.
I wish I bought this on Steam, as I would be getting a refund. This game offers multiplayer but I believe the game is extremely aggro. It is likely very aggressive bee lining to certain military units as I mentioned the game is very simplified in battles. This would likely make it very similar, but I'm not 100% sure on this. Overall this is just probably too simplified a Civilization game, and although it plays in a short time (about 30 minute to an hour per game), I don't think it offers enough meat on the bone. Frankly I think Through the Ages, which is a port of a good board game eclipses this game in every aspect and I would choose to play that every time. I would only get this bundled. 6/10
