They say it's a mash-up of a bunch of different Civilizations, the best elements brought together for a new game. It's not Civilization 5 and they're quite clear to point out it isn't Civilization Lite. It's just different. The character models are playful looking and upgrade over battle. The interface is completely streamlined and every major event is represented by a full character model animations. The map we saw was very small and packed with cute animations. The whole game seems streamlined for consoles but they say a regular game should last three hours.
There are four ways to win the game which are standard for Civ players (Space Race, Military, Economic and Culture). When you win all your troops dance (big butch medics do a conga) and even the battleships do a little dance while shooting off canons. The game seems very different but familiar to any Civ player. It looks to be another version of the well known franchise trying to open up the game to players who want a strategy game, but don't want the implied weight that the PC version of Civ brings. The game will be out spring of 2008.
