Civilization: Beyond Earth's Latest Patch Introduces Cross-Game Connectivity

2K Games on Friday announced the latest patch for Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth. The major update serves two major purposes, 2K explains. First, it features additional balance updates and general improvements. Second, it lays the foundation for integration with upcoming strategy game Sid Meier's Starships, which was officially announced last month.

"Both the Starships and Beyond Earth teams have been interested in the idea of having two separate games able to pass information between them, and what that might mean for players," 2K wrote. "This is our first experiment with this cross-game connectivity."

Cross-game connectivity between Beyond Earth and Starships will be handled through my2K, which comes to the game through the new update. Players who don't already have a my2K account will need to sign up for one. 2K even teased that it may extend cross-game connectivity to future titles down the road.

Players who log into Beyond Earth using their my2K account will also receive an exclusive map for the game: the Glacier planet. Cross-game connectivity between Beyond Earth and Starships was teased in January.

Starships is due to launch in early 2015.

The Beyond Earth update also adds a new "Incoming Transmission" slide to the game's main title screen. This will feature key information about future updates to the game. In addition, the Beyond Earth update makes "major revisions" to game balance, especially in the area of Wonders.

"One of the most consistent pieces of feedback the team received was that certain Wonders were built only rarely, and players reported that some felt like marginal upgrades over other resource buildings," 2K explained. "The Beyond Earth team took a general cost pass on all the Wonders in the game, and changed the effects of most of them."

2K has also implemented changes to trade routes, squashed bugs, adjusted AI, and more through the new Beyond Earth update. See the full patch notes below. 2K did not say when the patch will roll out, but presumably it will be soon.

LOCALIZATION:

• Added support for Simplified Chinese

WONDERS:

• General cost pass on all Wonders
• Xenodrome - Provides a small positive influence to alien opinion each turn, and negative alien opinion recovers twice as quickly
• Panopticon - Gives +1 unit sight and +5 anti-orbital strike range on city
• Mass Driver - Gives +1 city strike range and +25% city strike damage
• Gene Vault - Gives free worker to new cities
• Ectogenesis Pod - Gives 1 Food per 4 pop in its city
• Quantum Computer - Gives free orbital unit maintenance and +50% orbital unit duration
• Drone Sphere - Gives +50% speed to worker builds and explorer expeditions
• Cynosure - Gain +1 Science for every 3 population in its city
• Ansible - Affinity XP is gained 25% faster
• Stellar Codex - +8 Orbital Coverage range
• Master Control - Free Maintenance and +1 Movement for Workers
• Precog Project - Military Units can achieve two additional levels of Veterancy
• Human Hive - City immune to Covert Operations
• Holon Chamber - Gain Science equivalent to 10% of global Energy income each turn
• Archimedes Lever - Any hostile unit within 2 tiles of the city suffers 10 attrition damage per turn
• Memetwork - All Affinity Level requirements for buildings, units, and wonders reduced by 1
• New Terran Myth - +2 Culture from Trade Routes
• Markov Eclipse - Military Units attack at full strength even when damaged
• Promethean - City no longer produces Unhealth
• Nanothermite - All air, ranged, and city bombard attacks 25% stronger
• Xenomalleum - +5 Titanium, Petroleum, and Geothermal resource
• Xenonova - Penalties due to Unhealth reduced by 50%
• Bytegeist - All Virtue Tier synergy bonuses require one less point to complete
• Armasail - City suffers 50% less damage from ranged attacks
• Deep Memory - +1 Culture for every 3 Population in every City
• Tectonic Anvil - +5 Production from Canyons
• Crawler - +25% Production for buildings and wonders
• Daedelus Ladder - All City Yields +10%
• Resurrection Device - Benefits from positive Health effects increased by 50%

GENERAL BALANCE:

• Domination victory is now won by controlling all original player capitals including your own.
• Veterancy Promotions: All combat boost promotions add +10% strength
• Veterancy Promotions: All unit heal promotions starting at level 4 heal 75 hp
• Veterancy Promotions: Adding level 5 and 6 unit veterancy promotions to work with Precog Project
• Virtues: Replaced Applied Aesthetics virtue with Applied Metasociology virtue - City Intrigue decreases faster when an Agent is present
• Virtues: Settler Clans virtue now gives +1 population in new cities
• Trade Routes: Trade route slots now primarily unlocked based on city population. Trade Depot allows building trade routes and gives 1 slot, all others unlock at population thresholds
• Trade Routes: Added option to auto-renew Trade Routes
• Covert Ops: Lowered intrigue level required for affinity covert ops
• Friendly aliens no longer prevent city citizens from working plots

UI:

• Added tech filters for Units and Orbital categories
• Victory progress tooltips show explicit status of quest objectives
• Re-enabling yield for canyon plots (2 production, not improvable)
• Added "Incoming Transmission" on main menu for in-game messaging

AI:

• Fixed an issue where Victory Wonders could be built by AI in captured territory, and not be able to be interacted with
• Fixed an issue that could cause the AI to not aggressively target rival planetary Wonders
• Fixed an issue where non-Harmony AI players were not clearing Miasma properly
• AI is now more selective about desiring alliances
• AI will now form alliances to counter a strong shared neighbor.

OTHER:

• Added my2K functionality to title, allowing cross-game connectivity and unlocks with other Firaxis titles (starting with Sid Meier's Starships), along with other future perks
• Added Glacier map that unlocks when signing in to my2K for the first time

BUGS:

• Fixed an issue where Covert Ops panel could go blank in the middle of a game, or after a coup
• Fixed an issue where AI aircraft city UI was displaying in Fog of War
• Fixed an issue where resource pods and relics where not placing properly on the Taigon map type
• Fixed an issue with the Growth Potential quest failing when the AI would destroy a target station
• Fixed an issue where an AI leader would sometimes propose an offer that they would not accept when you agreed
• Fixed an issue where a player might not be able to restart a Victory wonder (like the Beacon) if a Victory wonder was attacked after the countdown had started
• Fixed an issue that was causing the skeleton to not drop when a Worm was killed (still only a chance, but now works properly
• Fixed an issue that was causing Xenomass under an existing alien nest to not be counted when the nest turned friendly
• Fixed misc crashes as reported by Steam error reporting
• Additional misc bug fixes