It's a mixed bag of a game. In terms of mechanics, it's pretty good. But in terms of the storytelling? Eh.

I mean, spoilers for a rather old game, but your endgame choices are organic hivemind, synthetic hivemind, exterminate the natives or exterminate the humans. That kind of frames everything, really. No options for a playthrough rooted in anything sensible. I'm rating it positive overall, but I really wish there was a button for this is a really mixed bag.

To my thinking (and I have played Sid Meier's Civ since version 2.0) this, with the Rising Tide expansion is the best yet; it's better playing on a grand scale strategy than Civ V ad Civ VI. It worked very well with some mods on Win10. As I am now on Linux Mint, I found that Aspyr's version (rework?) tends to ignore at least some mods, and it tends to crash to desktop after a while. <sad face> I have nearly 1000 hours in this Beyond Earth alone. I was nowhere near as enthusiastic about the mere base game, but the expansion really brought the game to life for me.

Ima be real. Some of the hate is deserved, but it's a solid game.

Personally, I love having an alternative to traditional civ without super modding and BE comes in clutch.