Civilization 6 artist mods it to look more like Civ 5
Party like it's 2010
Ah, 2010! Lady Gaga and Beyoncé were tearing up the dancefloor with Telephone, Inception was fuelling one million drunk 'philosophical' conversations, Jackass had gone 3D, and Civilization V had yet to reach that point in every Civ game's lifespan where it's declared superior to its successor. If you wish to party like it's 2010, you might enjoy a new Civilization VI mod made by actual Civ 6 art director Brian Busatti. It aims to make Civ 6's landscape, buildings, and units look more like Civ 5, less vibrant and more 'realistic'. Yeah, but like, what if we're still dreaming we're playing Civ - does the game ever stop or will "one more turn" keep going forever? Makes you think, maaan.
"We challenged one of our artists to dig into the SDK tools and create an example environment skin using only the tools and off the shelf modelling software (no internal dev tools) to help the tools team continue to iterate and improve the SDK," senior producer Dennis Shirk explained on the CivFanatics fan site forums. "He went full nostalgia..."
"This example mod changes the visuals of the game to better match the colours and tones of its predecessor, Civ V," Busatti detailed on the mod's Steam Workshop page. "Changes include multiple terrain texture modifications with more Civ V like details, a colour key that puts the buildings and units into a more neutral palette, along with a number of other small changes."
It's meant to demonstrate and explore what's possible with the mod tools, and as a bonus we get to play with it too.
If you want it, hit the Steam Workshop and subscribe to it. That page also gets more into the nitty-gritty of what exactly it changes. The mod does not require any expansion, and should work with them all too.
Let's meet up again in 2022 to wish for mods which make Civ 7 look like Civ 6, and to reminisce about how this is still a stone-cold banger.
God damn.