Civilization: Beyond Earth – Rising Tide expansion announced

Firaxis has just unveiled Civilization: Beyond Earth's first expansion. It's called Rising Tide, and it will do pretty much what you might expect from that title. As with Civilization V's expansions, Rising Tide will add new systems on top of the existing game—in this instance, allowing you to colonise and mine the seas of the game's alien world.

Building floating settlements and accessing natural resources hidden beneath the seas of the alien planet, while alien beasts with unique abilities inhabit the water and challenge players in distinctive ways
Shaping the diplomatic landscape by upgrading traits, changing diplomatic relationships, and leveraging the benefits of your allies, all with political capital
Unlocking a dynamic set of Diplomatic Traits while activating different combinations in response to the changing world
Playing as one of four new factions, including the Al Falah, a group of nomad explorers descended from wealthy and resilient Middle Eastern states
Investing in multiple Affinities to unlock hybrid Affinity units and upgrades for the first time;
Collecting and combining alien relics via a new Artifact System that unlocks powerful benefits
Exploring one of two new biomes, Primordial world, an untamed biome rife with volcanic activity and indicative of a chaotic landscape still forming in the new world

Civilization: Beyond Earth – Rising Tide is due out in Autumn, and will cost £20.

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.