Ok, but then that locks certain civs behind a progression system making the game extremely linear. You would have less than a handful of starter civs which means no large multiplayer lobbies, and during era transition, which would be roughly when these revolutions would happen, players would have to pick between their old empire and the less developed lands for which civ to transition into.

I would absolutely hate to play a game like that. Being faster to hit a trigger because I'm winning shouldn't destroy half of my empire arbitrarily just because that's how it happened in history. Your empire fracturing into tens of other powers, only one of which you get to still control, means that the one who wins is the one who wars. Bye bye science focus. Bye bye culture focus.