Flutes, clarinets, and a delicate piccolo flutter like birds trying to find each other across a mountaintop. The trumpet blinks out another proud melody as violins, dark and heavy, cluster like ivy.

You do, in fact, gotta hand it to Firaxis. Though its last game – 2022's super card-based strategy Marvel's Midnight Suns – didn't sell as well as expected, the studio hasn't stopped taking big swings ...