In anticipation of, in our opinion one of the best games ever, we've come across an eyes-on preview on the upcoming Civilization V, and the game seems to burst at the seams with various new features.

Uncluttered interface, reintroducing advisors, animated leaders that speak in native language with voice audio and their own dedicated screen are all set to come with Civ V. In fact, you'll see leaders speak in front of the city they've just conquered, see Washington casually spinning the globe, and in general act more like their actual historical counterparts both in defeat and victory and much more.

Furthermore, it has been suggested that the game is DirectX 11, and while this would be a welcome move, for once we seriously don't care. Civilization series, as you might now, was never famous for its graphics, and much older sequels are still incredibly fun to play, rendering the whole graphics talk useless. Quite frankly, we don't see how this turn based strategy would even benefit from the new and advanced graphics features such as tessellation.

Graphics aside, Civ V will introduce plenty of new concepts that will definitely prove to be a hit. An interesting feature is the addition of City States, which are neutral, non-expanding regions which player will choose what to do with. Warmongers can claim them and add them to the empire, whereas more peaceful strategists can establish a friendly relationship, which depending on the type of the City State results in rewards such as units, cash or supplies.

Furthermore, you can now purchase land rather than wait for your cultural borders to expand. Be careful though, purchasing more land won't make that AI player more amicable, quite the contrary – land is power after all. The "land is power" argument will prove to be especially sensitive when you start taking workable fields away from the AI, which is quite natural as such areas be sooner settled by your population than tundra or hills. Of course, AI wants it as well, and thus conflicts may ensue. Realistic enough? Still, it's far from being only new features.

Artillery and archers will now be capable of spraying damage on enemies two tiles away, cities will have their own personal defenses in order not to rely so heavily on garrisoned units, etc. No more so called "stacks of doom" as only one unit will fit in a hex, meaning it's time for advanced strategies. We also hear that losing a fight doesn't mean your unit is done for, but details are scarce and we'll have to wait for more detailed, hands-on previews. 

AI players will also get an overhaul and will act much more human – if one of their aims fails or they're beaten to it by other players, the computer player will quickly adopt a different strategy for achieving their goals. The computer will no longer ignore your units amassing at their border, which is a welcome addition as they foolishly couldn't care less before.

There is an official confirmation that the game has been designed for dual core processors with support for up to eight threads, meaning that Sid Meier and his team haven't skimped on any new features. Other details are still a bit scarce and/or hazy but we'll know more as we draw nearer to Fall 2010 launch.

You can learn more here.