IGN posted a short preview (http://pc.ign.com/articles/107/1074732p1.html) of CiV today. Nothing mind-blowing here but it does give details on the approach to modding Shafer is taking. The other new piece of info I found tasty was how "the game will help players focus on the information they need to see" by giving "[s]mall icons [that] appear along the edge of the screen to give players notifications of important events or opportunities, and you can instantly snap to any of the relevant locations to get your own appraisal of the situation."

Overall I say :goodjob:

Not much of a preview but it sounds as if the game is getting shaken down to a first installment type production. Removing the "addon" complexities like espionage and religion.

'The advisers are making a comeback, for instance, but won't be pushing each other aside or shouting over each other. ' For shame :'( I hope they'll be like the Civ 3 and change with the times and the civilization. Thanks for the link.

Best article I've seen yet, good stuff. Also love the modding information, calms many of my fears.

Eh I could stand religion not being in the game (though I still dont understand why.) But ESPIANOGE?!? Why is that getting stripped it dosn't make sence to me.

I reads more like the Civ IV 'espionage system' is gone, not necessarily all forms of espionage.

I hated cIV's espionage system for the most part. The passive effects were nice, but overall possibly OP (if only for the human) and imo cIV is better without espionage. I wouldn't mind some new forms of espionage in ciV, though, if it's better/optional. :)

I'm kind of mixed about religion. It was a pretty big feature in cIV...

Best article I've seen yet, good stuff. Also love the modding information, calms many of my fears.

very much so :) XML, visual C++ something for sure, and I will assume python. Sounds like civ5 mods are going to be coming out within weeks or months of civ5's release. Best article yet I agree, and it mentions another one, more about the gameplay next week...

though this is a little concerning;

Of course, not all of Civilization's PC fans had a positive view of the broad style or humor of Revolution, so they'll be happy to know that the designers are moving away from the silliness of the console game to create a more somber PC sequel. The game will still have the trademark Civilization personality, but it won't be as exaggerated as in previous installments.

while we're not gonna get something as lame as civRev, to me it sounds like its not going to be as epic as any of the other Civ's. They want a dumbed down version, no espionage, no complications, something that the average joe can come home and conquer the world in 3 hours. Kinda sounds lame, but since its all the same tools from civ4 it can be easily fixed.

The game has obviously also been influenced by Civilization Revolution for the consoles, particularly in terms of the overall interface.

This quote is going to freak out a lot of people. I personally don't mind since I think Civ Rev did a lot of good things. Obviously I want a more complicated and deep game than Civ Rev, but Civ Rev was smart to strip away some of the unnecessary elements of the game, and Civ V would be smart to follow that to an extent.

A positive article to be sure.

It will be interesting to see what they do with espionage now.

Interesting...with a few new nuggets of information, but the best line of the entire article was:

We'll be talking a lot about the specific features of the game next week.

while we're not gonna get something as lame as civRev, to me it sounds like its not going to be as epic as any of the other Civ's. They want a dumbed down version, no espionage, no complications, something that the average joe can come home and conquer the world in 3 hours. Kinda sounds lame, but since its all the same tools from civ4 it can be easily fixed.

I disagree. They are dramatically expanding the combat system, so much so that something else had to give way. You simply cannot expand all areas of the game as that leads to bloatware. Religion and Espionage were very weak, exploitable and generally unfun systems that honestly deserved the axe.

Needless to say, I am very optimistic about Civ V. They are taking a hard look at the series and holding nothing sacred in the quest to make the game more fun. This, to me, is an extremely admirable pursuit and I think it'll payoff big time.

I'll agree that religions and espionage were poorly implemented... sort of afterthoughts for civ4. I don't necessarily mind that they are gone.

Expanding the combat system... I'm not sure I would call it expanding quite yet. All we really know is its 1UPT and that they copied Dales ranged bombardment from a mod in civ4. The real factor of success I think could be easily measured by how good the AI is in combat. If they took the basic AI from civ4, slap it in a 1UPT environment, it would be a nightmare. Lets hope that the AI takes a giant leap forward in combat.

I think it's a pity that they are going for a more serious style on the advisor level. Their arguments in CII were fun and for the time of that game's release it was pretty clever.

I'm all for a generally serious "sombre" game, but would like some areas of mild silliness.

I do like the introduction of the "go to" event icons on the left of the screen - they work well in the Total War series. One thing that made management tedious sometimes in Civ is getting event notices (like warnings of enemy units near a certain city) and having to navigate your way to that city to address that event.

All the tools have been taken to a whole new level, so the more you know about XML and programmable DLL, the more you'll be able to achieve with the game.

I guess that means you have to have a Masters Degree in Programming to do simple changes...

I've got to say, the more I am hearing about Civ V, the more dissappointed I am becoming. It seems like Civ V is shaping up to be Civilization: Panzer General and taking away everything that makes it Civilization!

I really hope that I hear some mind blowing news next week... otherwise, I may just have to pass and hope that Firaxis comes to their senses with Civ IV (and that it is a fast turnaround).

This is all getting really depressing!

john shafer is HHHOOOOOOOOOOTTTTT!

no Thorburne - XML is very simple, seriously if you give it a try, you will see. Probably about the same learning curve of writing an email or surfing the internet. The DLL is a different story, but you won't need that to make a decent little mod that adds a civ, techs, change some attributes or whatever.

It really should be that way too. To the experienced modders this is the best news about civ5 yet.

I guess that means you have to have a Masters Degree in Programming to do simple changes...

I don't think that is what they are saying. They're providing access for mods to more advanced changes, but they've said nothing about making the access to currently simple changes any more difficult for people without advanced programming skills.

Not to mention that no XML editing is ever going to require a masters degree in programming.

removing the religion and espionage systems. OK, am I the only one bothered by this? I never saw these two as exploitation of more arbitrary game elements, but as reasonably accurate depictions of what happened historically. You want to tell me that two nations wouldn't have a falling out if one nation discovered the other was engaged in sabotage/espionage against them? You want to tell me that-even today-religion doesn't play some role in international relations? I agree with Shiggs-removal of espionage & religion definitely sounds like a dumbing down of the franchise after the High Water Mark achieved with Civ4 & its expansions!

Aussie.

no Thorburne - XML is very simple, seriously if you give it a try, you will see. Probably about the same learning curve of writing an email or surfing the internet. The DLL is a different story, but you won't need that to make a decent little mod that adds a civ, techs, change some attributes or whatever.

It really should be that way too. To the experienced modders this is the best news about civ5 yet.

Sorry, I was being sarcastic with the degree comment. My point is that I don't want to dig through lines of somewhat confusing XML lines just to change a simple attribute. Yes, the basics of XML is easy to learn (relatively), but it is still a bunch of coded lines that is more complicated than email or surfing the internet. Not to mention very cumbersome. What is so hard about a GUI for at least the basics?

. OK, am I the only one bothered by this? I never saw these two as , but as reasonably accurate depictions of what happened historically. You want to tell me that two nations wouldn't have a falling out if one nation discovered the other was engaged in sabotage/espionage against them? You want to tell me that-even today-religion doesn't play some role in international relations? I agree with Shiggs-removal of espionage & religion definitely sounds like a dumbing down of the franchise after the High Water Mark achieved with Civ4 & its expansions!

Aussie.

Hear hear!

I never thought of religions and espionage as being clunky and badly-implemented, but I guess that's just my opinion - I was more than happy to finally conquer the world in a great Buddhist crusade! :lol:

. OK, am I the only one bothered by this? I never saw these two as , but as reasonably accurate depictions of what happened historically. You want to tell me that two nations wouldn't have a falling out if one nation discovered the other was engaged in sabotage/espionage against them? You want to tell me that-even today-religion doesn't play some role in international relations? I agree with Shiggs-removal of espionage & religion definitely sounds like a dumbing down of the franchise after the High Water Mark achieved with Civ4 & its expansions!

Aussie.

I concurr with that... they should have worked on improving the systems instead of yanking them out. I am getting very depressed!

I reads more like the Civ IV 'espionage system' is gone, not necessarily all forms of espionage.

Well thats good but I guess from what they're saying Civ V is going to be a whole new beast so to speak

The real factor of success I think could be easily measured by how good the AI is in combat. If they took the basic AI from civ4, slap it in a 1UPT environment, it would be a nightmare. Lets hope that the AI takes a giant leap forward in combat.

I agree with this statement -- with the new combat system, the AI has to know how to set up formations. They can't just throw random units around to win. The combat is going to be much more tactical, I believe, and it'll be harder to program the AI to fight in formations rather than sending stacks. So the key to whether this combat system works depends on how well Firaxis programs the AI.

Religion I'm disappointed is gone, but the espionage system didn't do much for me. I'm sure spies will still be units, but I think they got rid of the system of spending gold to build up espionage points. I never was a big fan of that system.

. OK, am I the only one bothered by this? I never saw these two as , but as reasonably accurate depictions of what happened historically. You want to tell me that two nations wouldn't have a falling out if one nation discovered the other was engaged in sabotage/espionage against them? You want to tell me that-even today-religion doesn't play some role in international relations? I agree with Shiggs-removal of espionage & religion definitely sounds like a dumbing down of the franchise after the High Water Mark achieved with Civ4 & its expansions!

Aussie.

Thirded.

What is so hard about a GUI for at least the basics?

I wouldn't oppose that, so long as that not the only option. Some of these we already know, but in my opinion the best things they could possibly do to keep ciV as the most moddable series ever:

1) Use the same code from civ4 (XML, C++), hopefully python will be there also.
2) Provide a GUI for editing XML.. nothing special here, just make it easy to change attributes for novices.
3) Release at least as much source code if not more than they did for civ4.
4) Keep the Gambryo graphics so we can still edit in blender and nifskope for free
5) provide an external model/skin editor similar to the one in Spore. This would be the biggest boon to scenario mods and the like.
6) keep using dds textures. not sure what other options there even are, but this is easy enough.
7) maybe the most important, provide a world builder that actually works, and with more options and functions than before

that way for example you could do XML by hand as we all love to do, or you could use a GUI if you are doing simple changes. At least allow us to still use blender, but if not provide something better and more powerful. Seriously its looks like a small graphics change relatively from civ4 to civ5, so why complicate things?


back to the religions/espionage discussion.

If I were to really break it down I would say more like the espionage was an afterthought/poorly implemented. Spies are nearly pointless, commerce is much better spent on research than espionage, the benefits of high espionage is negligible. Until you can build jails, intelligence agency's ect. its a choice between the commerce types. I'd say most people go full throttle research, that is if you are trying to win.

Religion in civ4 was not bad, but just too static of a feel. I guess its supposed to be that way. Maybe all it was missing was more religious events or something like that. I could totally understand why they would remove religion though, its just too complex to truly model it accurately. We always end up with buddist napoleon or some other lame.

I wouldn't oppose that, so long as that not the only option. Some of these we already know, but in my opinion the best things they could possibly do to keep ciV as the most moddable series ever:

1) Use the same code from civ4 (XML, C++), hopefully python will be there also.
2) Provide a GUI for editing XML.. nothing special here, just make it easy to change attributes for novices.
3) Release at least as much source code if not more than they did for civ4.
4) Keep the Gambryo graphics so we can still edit in blender and nifskope for free
5) provide an external model/skin editor similar to the one in Spore. This would be the biggest boon to scenario mods and the like.
6) keep using dds textures. not sure what other options there even are, but this is easy enough.
7) maybe the most important, provide a world builder that actually works, and with more options and functions than before

that way for example you could do XML by hand as we all love to do, or you could use a GUI if you are doing simple changes. At least allow us to still use blender, but if not provide something better and more powerful. Seriously its looks like a small graphics change relatively from civ4 to civ5, so why complicate things?


back to the religions/espionage discussion.

If I were to really break it down I would say more like the espionage was an afterthought/poorly implemented. Spies are nearly pointless, commerce is much better spent on research than espionage, the benefits of high espionage is negligible. Until you can build jails, intelligence agency's ect. its a choice between the commerce types. I'd say most people go full throttle research, that is if you are trying to win.

Religion in civ4 was not bad, but just too static of a feel. I guess its supposed to be that way. Maybe all it was missing was more religious events or something like that. I could totally understand why they would remove religion though, its just too complex to truly model it accurately. We always end up with buddist napoleon or some other lame.

And that is fine by me... they can release all of the advanced methods of modding, as long as they release a GUI for the more basic stuff. Basically, what I want is a GOOD world builder, a GUI for modifying the basic attributes of the various elements (like civs, units, etc.) and a simple GUI for creating basic to moderate scenarios would be nice (including a simple way to create/add new elements (like civs, units, etc). Beyond that, the more advanced tools and scripting should be available as well.

To clarify what I mean about "basic to moderate scenarios", basically:


Basic Scenario - Scenario using on-hand/default resources
Moderate Scenario - Scenario with elements not found in basic library. In other words creating new leaders and units not found in core game. May require some scripting (for events and such) or knowledge of rendering (for leaders and units, unless basic tools are released allowing the creation of these elements... would be nice, but not pressing)
Advanced - Scenarios with game changing elements that require coding.

I hate the Civ espionage system. Good riddance.

I hate the Civ espionage system. Good riddance.

Taking it away isn't improving it!

"removing the religion and espionage systems". OK, am I the only one bothered by this? I never saw these two as "exploitation of more arbitrary game elements", but as reasonably accurate depictions of what happened historically. You want to tell me that two nations wouldn't have a falling out if one nation discovered the other was engaged in sabotage/espionage against them? You want to tell me that-even today-religion doesn't play some role in international relations? I agree with Shiggs-removal of espionage & religion definitely sounds like a dumbing down of the franchise after the High Water Mark achieved with Civ4 & its expansions!

Aussie.
I think you're over-reacting to claim this as 'dumbing-down', I view it more as a shift in focus towards diplomacy. Religion limited diplomacy a lot, thus it's gone. I must admit I'm completely unfazed.

I can't comment to much on espionage as I really didn't utilise it much in Civ IV. I'd be surprised if there were no forms of espionage in Civ V, even if it's a simple spy mechanic similar to Civ Rev.

Sometimes I have to remind myself that Civ4 vanilla was actually missing quite a few elements that were in Civ3 such as espionage, armies, pollution, bombard, as well as many of the civs, leaders, wonders, units and buildings.

Some of these have since been reinstated, some have been replaced and some will never return (we hope). I'm sure the same will happen with Civ5, the vanilla release of any new version will always be missing some of the features of the previous fully expanded one.

Will I miss those dropped features? Probably, but trying to balance them all in one massive initial version would be dangerous at best and at worst (the way an experienced doom monger like me would see it) a sure fire recipe for disaster.
After a few months of experience with the vanilla version in the field, and at least one essential patch, work will begin on an expansion pack that will: reintroduce some of the dropped features, fix some of the balance issues introduced with vanilla, and wow us with some shiny new features.
If we are lucky there will be another expansion to finish the version off (because the first expansion always sucks!).

I'm looking forward to trying another take on the Civ brand, I hope the journey will be as enjoyable as it was with 1 through 4. I know that for some it will be a huge disappointment and I really hope I'm not one of them. Still, I will go out on a limb here and predict that:

some people will upgrade and be happy,
some will not be happy until the fully patched fully expanded Civ5 is available,
(at which point Civ6 will be announced and there will be something else to grumble about since Civ5 is now perfect and Civ6 will be a hollow shell in comparison because it is missing feature X)
some people will only be happy when their favourite mod is available
...and of course...
some people will stay on Civ4 and claim it will always be superior.

Life goes on.

. OK, am I the only one bothered by this? I never saw these two as , but as reasonably accurate depictions of what happened historically. You want to tell me that two nations wouldn't have a falling out if one nation discovered the other was engaged in sabotage/espionage against them? You want to tell me that-even today-religion doesn't play some role in international relations? I agree with Shiggs-removal of espionage & religion definitely sounds like a dumbing down of the franchise after the High Water Mark achieved with Civ4 & its expansions!

Aussie.

Seriously, if you ask me, the religion gameplay in Civ4 was terrible. Whether or not you founded an early religion was entirely based on luck (unless you play at low difficulty levels). The mechanics of actually working with the religion once you had it were lame, too.

You build a bunch of generic buildings that are all identical to each other, separated only by their religion name and icon. These buildings give you some pretty minor bonuses, adding little or nothing to your strategy unless you plan to exploit the stacking of cathedrals for a cultural victory.

Overall, I could live without it. Actually, I'm glad it's gone.

To each his own.

Personally I'm really angry at the loss of religions - really really really really really really angry, but I'm pretty sure it'll still be a great game regardless. Plus, they finally kicked Mao out (no offense if you like and/or support him, I just hated having a modern leader for China all this time), so it can't be all that bad. If worse comes to worse I'll just hope someone makes a good religion mod. :D

Chongli, you will get *no* argument from me that Religion in Civ4 had its problems, but so did culture when it made its first appearance in Civ3. They didn't get rid of it, though, they improved it instead-I want them to do the same with Religion. Make it less random by requiring you to found it with a Prophet (which in itself would require you to make early religion a strategy, by focusing on improvements & social policies which boost the production of Prophets); make religion-based diplomacy penalties more based on the social policies & in-game actions of the civs involved (so you might get no penalty for having different religions, but a large penalty if you have a habit of performing Inquisitions against cities which contain the other civs religion-i.e. religious persecution). See what I mean? Plenty of room to make Religion even *better* than it already was (& it was already pretty good to begin with, IMHO-an opinion strongly backed by several polls at this site), rather than just chucking it away.

I also can't understand people's issues with Espionage. Vanilla definitely had a "tacked-on" feel about it, but by BtS it was *really* good. You didn't have to use gold for espionage, you just needed to divert money into espionage if you wanted to be exceptionally good at it (just as with culture & science). If it lacked anything, it was XP & promotions for spies.

So, sorry, but I *do* see the complete removal of religion & espionage as a dumbing down of the franchise-& I don't see how it will significantly improve diplomacy.

They are dramatically expanding the combat system, so much so that something else had to give way.

But some of us don't like to fight all the time. Some of those some of us are worried now because everybody keeps talking about something called "Panzer General" and religion is gone and espionage, too (which, to be fair, was pretty useless).

We need some sort of a demo video soon.

Chongli, you will get *no* argument from me that Religion in Civ4 had its problems, but so did culture when it made its first appearance in Civ3. They didn't get rid of it, though, they improved it instead-I want them to do the same with Religion. Make it less random by requiring you to found it with a Prophet (which in itself would require you to make early religion a strategy, by focusing on improvements & social policies which boost the production of Prophets); make religion-based diplomacy penalties more based on the social policies & in-game actions of the civs involved (so you might get no penalty for having different religions, but a large penalty if you have a habit of performing Inquisitions against cities which contain the other civs religion-i.e. religious persecution). See what I mean? Plenty of room to make Religion even *better* than it already was (& it was already pretty good to begin with, IMHO-an opinion strongly backed by several polls at this site), rather than just chucking it away.

I also can't understand people's issues with Espionage. Vanilla definitely had a "tacked-on" feel about it, but by BtS it was *really* good. You didn't have to use gold for espionage, you just needed to divert money into espionage if you wanted to be exceptionally good at it (just as with culture & science). If it lacked anything, it was XP & promotions for spies.

So, sorry, but I *do* see the complete removal of religion & espionage as a dumbing down of the franchise-& I don't see how it will significantly improve diplomacy.

I don't know. I'm not a fan of GPP (great people points) either. They are way too abstract. I think the game should focus more on realistic quanta and minimize abstract ones. Gold, lumber, iron, copper, stone, food. Hard resources that you should be able to stockpile and put towards real projects.

Also, get rid of the distinction between :commerce: and :gold:. That's just silly.

OK, so this is my own feelings about the announced features to date

Things I *really* love about Civ5:

-improved diplomacy (esp. the ability to trade land)
-AI Civs who pursue different agendas than simply "winning" (even better if they combine it with the civ-specific victories from Rhye's Mod!)
-Hexes instead of Tiles.
-Differential rates of land acquisition.
-Graphics.
-City States. (Though I really hope they make them like the minor races of BotF!)

Things I *really* dislike about Civ5:

-removal of religion.
-removal of espionage.
-only 1 leader per civilization.

Things I'm still on the fence with about Civ5:

-Social Policies. I *really* loved civics, but often found them too limiting (esp. economic & government civics). However, I'm still not convinced that SP's will be a good replacement.
-1 unit per hex. I would love to see an end to Stacks of Doom, but I'm not convinced that such an extreme, hard cap is the way to go.

Aussie.

Sorry, Chongli, I simply cannot agree with you. It is the abstracts (Great People, Culture, Golden Ages, Religion, Civics) which truly make Civilization IV such an amazing addition to the franchise. Before that, it was really just a numbers game-who had the most cities, the most units &-by the time of Civ3-the most resources. How else do we deal with all those individuals that had such a massive impact on society-a far greater impact than all the money, cities & armies combined? What you've described sounds like a return to the relatively boring "nuts & bolts", number crunching affair we had from Civ1 to Civ3. If thats all you want from your civ games, then I recommend you go & play them instead.

Also, as someone who was often behind in the lead-up to the Industrial Era, I found Espionage to be *very* important. Especially due to the fact that I could often do it in such a way that it looked like one of the leaders who did the act ;)! BtS Espionage was often a really *great* game leveler :)!

Aussie.

Sorry, Chongli, I simply cannot agree with you. It is the abstracts (Great People, Culture, Golden Ages, Religion, Civics) which truly make Civilization IV such an amazing addition to the franchise. Before that, it was really just a numbers game-who had the most cities, the most units &-by the time of Civ3-the most resources. How else do we deal with all those individuals that had such a massive impact on society-a far greater impact than all the money, cities & armies combined? What you've described sounds like a return to the relatively boring "nuts & bolts", number crunching affair we had from Civ1 to Civ3. If thats all you want from your civ games, then I recommend you go & play them instead.

You seem to have mis-characterized my position. I found most of those abstract concepts to be extremely exploitable and totally out to lunch in the realism department. Now don't get me wrong, I know it's totally unreasonable to expect a perfectly realistic experience.

What really bothers me is the totally nonsensical idea of running a hodgepodge of seemingly disparate civics in order to maximize specialists and farm great people and lightbulb them or save them for a perfectly timed golden age. The effects you can achieve with such a strategy are nigh-indistinguishable from magic.

Please tell me, at what point in history did any leader ever do this? The answer is none. No leader has ever done this. In real life, you cannot farm "great people" because in real life, such "great people" do not exist. Even the greatest minds in history do not have the magic powers of Civ's great people.

What I really want from a Civ game is an experience that truly feels like I'm leading a real civilization. I'm not all about "nuts & bolts". I'm all about strategies, tradeoffs and problem solving. Real resources, if properly implemented (and not infinite like Civ4's) lead to real challenges and require real problem solving skills. These are among the toughest challenges real life leaders have to face. Abstract resources that grant magical powers are a cop-out, something that would've led to the downfall of any of the historical leaders this game idolizes.

Sorry Chongli, again I disagree with you. I found Civ4 to be the most *realistic* of all the Civ games to date-i.e, the one in which I felt I was running a *real* civilization, rather than a loose Confederation of City-States-religion & Great People definitely went a long way towards achieving this goal-as did the shift away from strait-jacketed governments (Republic & Democracy-great for peace, Monarchy & Communism great for war). I agree that implementation of Great People, Civics, Religion etc wasn't perfect, & could be improved-but show me any game system which is implemented perfectly in realism terms (just look at the economic & military systems of the game-for Pete's Sake), but sometimes realism must be sacrificed for gameplay purposes. So, yes, implement the things you mention (like non-infinite resources), but *not* at the cost of removing the things which have truly defined civilization over the millenia-like religion, ideology & great people!

We need some sort of a demo video soon.

Agreed.

I also can't understand people's issues with Espionage. Vanilla definitely had a "tacked-on" feel about it, but by BtS it was *really* good.

This would be my argument for why I'm ok with religion and espionage not being in Civ5 Vanilla. Obviously they are extensively reworking combat, and I'd rather wait for a 'really good' religion and espionage system in an expansion pack than have it feel tacked onto Vanilla.

Now if they don't include them in an expansion pack, I'll gladly join you in a tirade on why we need religion and spies in the game. :)

So far for me the core of the available info boils down to:


Clearer and more realistic field combat (positioning, movement and terrain), but less realistic city combat (hardly need for walls and castles anymore with only one unit to hold)

More realistic presentation (graphics, advisors), but less realistic content (no religions, no espionage, no tech trading)

More thinking and micromanaging of armies for positioning, movement and terrain, but less thinking and managing of other concepts

I appreciate the efforts of making the game less complex and more attractive to RTS players, board game players, combat orientated players and lovers of 19-20th century scenarios. But - sorry for being negative - being a more peaceful player with a preference for human aspects, deep diplomacy and ancient and medieval scenarios, so far I cannot find the overall impression of Civ5 more tempting than Civ4. :sad:

So far for me the core of the available info boils down to:


Clearer and more realistic field combat (positioning, movement and terrain), but less realistic city combat (hardly need for walls and castles anymore with only one unit to hold)

More realistic presentation (graphics, advisors), but less realistic content (no religions, no espionage, no tech trading)

More thinking and micromanaging of armies for positioning, movement and terrain, but less thinking and managing of other concepts

I appreciate the efforts of making the game less complex and more attractive to RTS players, board game players, combat orientated players and lovers of 19-20th century scenarios. But - sorry for being negative - being a more peaceful player with a preference for human aspects, deep diplomacy and ancient and medieval scenarios, so far I cannot find the overall impression of Civ5 more tempting than Civ4. :sad:Less realistic city combat because you can't cram in 50 units into the cities anymore?! I believe this will be more realistic, hopefully with more defensive buildings, walls and things to improve city defense.

I don't think they're taking out espionage or religion altogether, and both systems could probably be improved. Were they really that much fun in civ4?
And techtrading, the way it worked in civ4 and 3 for the matter can hardly be seen as realistic, it was a bad and boring feature that I'm glad they're removing/changing.

I'm optimistic about the changes. Hopefully they get the core-game right and can expand it with deeper concepts later if needed.

But - sorry for being negative - being a more peaceful player with a preference for human aspects, deep diplomacy and ancient and medieval scenarios, so far I cannot find the overall impression of Civ5 more tempting than Civ4. :sad:
I'm more a peaceful player than anything else and I'm very much looking forward to what Civ V has to offer, a large part of that is simply because it's going to be new and different. I feel like I've exhausted the fun potential of Civ IV and haven't played it in months.

I'm more a peaceful player than anything else and I'm very much looking forward to what Civ V has to offer, a large part of that is simply because it's going to be new and different. I feel like I've exhausted the fun potential of Civ IV and haven't played it in months.
Seconded. Personally, I'm pretty confident the developers know what they are doing and I haven't seen a single thing that worries me, on the contrary.

I'd like CiV V to be a different game then its predecessors. No point in buying it otherwise. Looking forward to more news.

Jaca

Hey, this is Steve from IGN.

When I called religion arbitrary and exploitable, I meant that it was just another tool in the diplomacy bag. The only practical thing it really did was add one more love/hate flag to each of the civs. I think the new idea in Civ V is to let diplomatic relations evolve based more on the changing strategic situation. If you're building up cities along my borders and refusing trade, that should influence my reaction to you more than whether or not we share the same religion.

I definitely agree with Steve here. Religion was always a small part of my games, and the only thing I used it for was to make people like me. I don't mind that religion is gone at all. But I would welcome it in an expansion if it was done in a less generic way.

Religion was clearly more than just another love/hate flag. Found a religion in your capitol, use bureaucracy and spread your religion around and say its just a love hate tag. Then build the AP and all the temples and monasteries. Religion actually can be quite powerful.

When I play an earth game as the Arabs, the most critical part of my strategy is founding Islam (of course partly due to my need to roleplay). Found an early religion, and then get "Sailing" so you can have all these magical trade routes even if you haven't explored at all. Then watch your treasury go thru the roof as Islam spreads everywhere your trade routes reach. Its the difference between 60% science and 100% science sometimes. Its easily exploitable I'll admit, but its certainly more than just a love/hate tag.

The only practical thing religion really did was add one more love/hate flag to each of the civs. I think the new idea in Civ V is to let diplomatic relations evolve based more on the changing strategic situation.
I have a different opinion here. IMHO Religions in Civ4 brought far more than just love/hate flags, it brought an entirely new way to play Civ, at least in my games. Especially the Apostolic Palace of BtS and its rich diplomatic consequences turned my Civ4 games from Gold to Platin.

I understand that many combat/competition-orientated players had no need for religions and their sometimes strange consequences, but all that has been part of history. And I am afraid that without religions Civ V could go back to be more like Civ III, and so to be played more mathematically like Chess again and less human as Civ IV. I can accept this designer approach to attract more RTS-, board game- and combat/competition-orientated-players, but I am afraid this could cost historic-, human- and diplomacy- orientated players.

I think the problem with religion's effect on diplomacy was that it was AI only. Ideally, you should have the same effect whether or not you're playing against a person or a computer.

I have a different opinion here. IMHO Religions in Civ4 brought far more than just love/hate flags, it brought an entirely new way to play Civ, at least in my games. Especially the Apostolic Palace of BtS and its rich diplomatic consequences turned my Civ4 games from Gold to Platin.

I fully agree.
But I’m even more concerned about the lack of espionage in Civ5
Why did we get the Civ4 “Beyond the Sword” expansion then?
I love Panzer General and its concepts which will add depth and tactics in combat which I missed in previous versions of Civ – but there is no reason to me to remove such fundamental elements as espionage and religion - and go backwards.

Will we have to pay for them in expansion pack AGAIN?

I can only conclude with a comment I’ve seen on IGN:
“I hope the scrapping of religion and espionage is not indicative of a larger trend. The BtS systems weren't perfect but the idea was solid. I was very happy when this game was announced, but now I'm dreading how it will maim the Civilization game.”

Also, get rid of the distinction between :commerce: and :gold:. That's just silly.Actually it's an important piece of information. It differentiates between gold yet to be allocated to treasury/science/culture/espionage :commerce: and gold simply to sit in the treasury :gold:. +50%:commerce: can be much more valuable than +50%:gold:.

I thought Religion was more a track for how you develop your country now, getting certain bonuses for being a theocracy/evangelical nation vs. some other kind. That sounds pretty good to me. As far as espionage, I'll miss that. That's probably X-pack material. Let's face it, there will be X-packs.

I thought Religion was more a track for how you develop your country now, getting certain bonuses for being a theocracy/evangelical nation vs. some other kind. That sounds pretty good to me. As far as espionage, I'll miss that. That's probably X-pack material. Let's face it, there will be X-packs.

I don't mind having to develop your country towards an evangelical nation, but what does kind of anger me is that it is considered "evolution" to go from polytheism to monotheism. What that does is it basically just takes all the religions and lumps them into vague, lifeless blobs.

Oh well. Can't have everything. :lol:

Oh well. Can't have everything. :lol:

Ain't that the truth. I want the Iroquois back for this installment, but I do realize it probably ain't gonna happen.

As for religion, I think less important than founding a religion is defining the role religion has on your empire. So I'm okay with this change, in theory.

I don't mind having to develop your country towards an evangelical nation, but what does kind of anger me is that it is considered "evolution" to go from polytheism to monotheism. What that does is it basically just takes all the religions and lumps them into vague, lifeless blobs.

Oh well. Can't have everything. :lol:

I thought the way it was handled in Civ4 also was pretty lifeless, becaue they were all so generic. Anyway, I would like the evolution of religion to end in atheism. But somehow I don't think that will happen...

I have a different opinion here. IMHO Religions in Civ4 brought far more than just love/hate flags, it brought an entirely new way to play Civ, at least in my games. Especially the Apostolic Palace of BtS and its rich diplomatic consequences turned my Civ4 games from Gold to Platin.

I understand that many combat/competition-orientated players had no need for religions and their sometimes strange consequences, but all that has been part of history. And I am afraid that without religions Civ V could go back to be more like Civ III, and so to be played more mathematically like Chess again and less human as Civ IV. I can accept this designer approach to attract more RTS-, board game- and combat/competition-orientated-players, but I am afraid this could cost historic-, human- and diplomacy- orientated players.

I agree with you here. Religion brought a whole new aspect to the Civilization franchise. As has been stated many times, the system needed some work, but it was a great addition that added flavor to the game. The same thing goes with espionage... it wasn't perfect, but with some tweaks and such, it could have been much better. The other part of espionage is that it is an important part of diplomacy.

Hey, this is Steve from IGN.

When I called religion arbitrary and exploitable, I meant that it was just another tool in the diplomacy bag. The only practical thing it really did was add one more love/hate flag to each of the civs. I think the new idea in Civ V is to let diplomatic relations evolve based more on the changing strategic situation. If you're building up cities along my borders and refusing trade, that should influence my reaction to you more than whether or not we share the same religion.

While your example is well stated, still, there are many factors that can affect diplomatic relations. Yours is one example, Religion is another. Espionage would be, yet, another. It would have been better for them to rework the weights instead of ripping a whole important feature out that brought a very interesting new dynamic to the franchise.

In regards to your article next week, I must admit that I am both looking forward to it and dreading it. I fear the direction they appear to be going with Civ V. After the rocky road of Civ III, Civ IV really set them on a good clear road. With Civ V, however, instead of seeing where that road led, they just took a sharp left turn toward very uncertain skies. While, in the end, it may come out fine, at this point, I just see nothing but danger up ahead.

Religion was clearly more than just another love/hate flag. Found a religion in your capitol, use bureaucracy and spread your religion around and say its just a love hate tag. Then build the AP and all the temples and monasteries. Religion actually can be quite powerful.

I agree it can be powerful and a fun way to play the game. One of the best things about Civ is that people can approach it from many different angles but, speaking just for me, religion's main function in supporting diplomacy is more significant in the big picture than the civics bonuses and unrest issues. If these other practical benefits of religion are more important to you, hopefully their absence will be redeemed by some other new feature.

I fully agree.
But I’m even more concerned about the lack of espionage in Civ5
Why did we get the Civ4 “Beyond the Sword” expansion then?

For Civ4. This isn't Civ4. Civ4 still exists if you want it.

Will we have to pay for them in expansion pack AGAIN?

Assuming they will. Maybe what made sense in Civ4 won't necessarily make sense in Civ5. Then again, there's a difference between no espionage and no espionage as we know it. I'm still going to wait and see, to be honest.

I must admit I'm disappointed a bit about the news on religion in ciV. However, it might be something they address in Expansion packs.

However, if the game is as mod friendly as they say it is, it should be easy for a modder to put religions back in. Hopefully with a twist and not the exact same system as cIV.

Firaxis does pay attention to mods and if the mod has a new take on religion that works, it may well be implemented down the road.

So, the question would be, how do you alter religion to make it still fun and less cheesy? Perhaps if everyone put their heads together then it could be implemented in a mod quickly after release.

I disagree. They are dramatically expanding the combat system, so much so that something else had to give way. You simply cannot expand all areas of the game as that leads to bloatware. Religion and Espionage were very weak, exploitable and generally unfun systems that honestly deserved the axe.

Needless to say, I am very optimistic about Civ V. They are taking a hard look at the series and holding nothing sacred in the quest to make the game more fun. This, to me, is an extremely admirable pursuit and I think it'll payoff big time.

I agree. Religion was a distraction and I didn't like it. Espi was annoying and a money sink. Civ 2 did spies pretty well.

Plus there is always expansions. Espi wasn't even in the game till BTS

Plus there is always expansions. Espi wasn't even in the game till BTS

was thinking the exact same thing. they gotta leave room for expansions!

was thinking the exact same thing. they gotta leave room for expansions!

That's a pretty poor attitude to have towards stuff like this.

For example (a tad extreme, but it gets my point across):

Civ6:
Units have been removed.

Hey, they got to leave room for expansions!

I agree. Religion was a distraction and I didn't like it.

I beg to differ. Religion was well implemented in the way that you could ignore it and still have fun, create your entire strategy around it or something between those extremes.

Actually it's an important piece of information. It differentiates between gold yet to be allocated to treasury/science/culture/espionage :commerce: and gold simply to sit in the treasury :gold:. +50%:commerce: can be much more valuable than +50%:gold:.

I'm pretty sure this confuses the heck out of anyone new to the Civ series. It also doesn't seem like a very meaningful distinction and the difference feels rather artificial to me. Plus, does it really add something to the game? Thus, +1 from me to scrap this "feature". You probably won't even notice it's gone.

I'm pretty sure this confuses the heck out of anyone new to the Civ series. It also doesn't seem like a very meaningful distinction and the difference feels rather artificial to me. Plus, does it really add something to the game? Thus, +1 from me to scrap this "feature". You probably won't even notice it's gone.What? No this isn't a "feature"! They are simply two different symbols representing two different things. The commerce you get from your tiles is represented like this :commerce: it is split up between that which goes directly to your treasury, that funds culture, science, and that which funds espionage. :gold: is that which goes straight to your treasury, whereas :commerce: is that which is being extracted from your city's tiles, yet to be split up. So +50%:commerce: will boost everything whereas +50%:gold: will only boost the treasury.

This is hardly a "rather artificial" difference, it's the difference between merely adding money to the treasury on the one hand, and boosting science, culture and espionage (mostly science) on the other. Scrapping this "feature" would simply mean you wouldn't know whether a wonder was boosting a cities commerce (funds everything) or merely the left over bit that goes to the treasury - it would be like using the same symbol for commerce as for science and just having to guess whether only science was boosted or whether everything was boosted.

(it's worth noting also that other multipliers come into play, so if +50%:gold: is on top of :gold: which is already boosted by multipliers, then it could be better than +50%:commerce:)

Now this OT diversion is far more long winded than it needed to be. I don't see why my original, short reply was so hard to understand.

Falcon, this has been in since civ2... or earlier, I never played civ1.

You work the tiles in your city, and get trade (civ2), or commerce, (civ4) or whatever it was in civ3. Then that is divvied up according to your sliders: If you have a gold mine with let's say 10 :commerce: and you have 80% :science: and 10% :culture: that means you get 1 :culture:, 1 :gold: and eight :science: out of that tile.

This "feature" is a core component of the game, capish?

Civ6:
Units have been removed.

Hey, they got to leave room for expansions!

:goodjob:

I beg to differ. Religion was well implemented in the way that you could ignore it and still have fun, create your entire strategy around it or something between those extremes.

The fact that you could ignore it and still do reasonably well, shows imo that it was poorly implemented.

The fact that you could ignore it and still do reasonably well, shows imo that it was poorly implemented.

For me, that depends on preference! In any case, many who support religion in the game admit that the system wasn't perfect. It was a good introduction of a new feature and there was plenty of room for it to be expanded and improved. It is a bit sad that instead of working on the system, they decided to yank it out and throw it in the garbage bin (Probably, in part, because of the 19th century focus). To me, it's a little like having a child, and after a year or so, you decide that the child isn't turning out the way that you were hoping, so you give them up for adoption and have new kid.

I'm just happy that they announced to bring more exclusive information next week!! :goodjob:

Looking forward to that.

While I agree that "vanilla" religions were somewhat useless, they provided a good backbone for mods. Religions in Fall From Heaven, for example, have a much bigger impact. I'll be sad to see it gone :(

You're dead right Cilpot. For all the blandness of Vanilla religions, the stuff they did with religions in various mods was spectacular. I'm currently working on a Mod which will place greater emphasis on National Pantheons & Animist faiths as both a prelude to founding one of the 7 main religions & as a long-term option if you decide to eschew any of the main religions.
My civics mods, in the past, have also been about introducing various benefits & penalties to religion based on Dogma (like Reformist vs Fundamentalist) & your relations with other religions (like Insular vs Evangelist). These kinds of things could have made Civ5 religion *really* superb!

Aussie.

I thought having a religion system in Civ4 would be controversial, but not in this way.

Personally, I never thought religion was a fun aspect of the game. It felt like feature creep to me. It's pretty silly to complain about added features in an expansion pack, but the beyond the sword pack had a bit of that problem, too. The espionage system, events system, and corporations thrown in made the game bloated and confusing.

That's one of the reasons why I liked CivRev. Sure, it was super simplified, but it was refreshing to play a game that distilled Civ down to what made it fun. I think they're trying to keep that same kind of focus for the new Civ, but at the same time making sure it's still strategically deep.

Getting rid of religion is fine by me. But if I hear they replaced health and maintenence costs back to corruption, then that'll be an issue.

If simple is all you want in a Civ game, then by all means play CivRev or Civ2, because they sound more up your alley. Some of us want the depth that has been the hallmark of Civ over the last 2 major releases (CivIII with culture, resources & differentiation between Civs & CivIV with Religion, Civics, deeper Diplomacy & Great People)-& this feeling I get that CivV is taking a backward step is not a *Good Thing* IMHO!

Aussie.

A lot of people argue that the simplicity of Civ, especially when compared to other games, has everything to do with what makes it Civilization. Even in CivIV your ability to micromanage cities was expanded while making it simple to perform and less of a need to have to.
Proof, that it is possible to both expand and simplify at the same time. Maybe there was no clear way to simplify religion without making it a meaningless feature. And a more complicated way would result in WAY more people complaining that they ruined religion. Better to axe it than have every game critic writing how much it sucks now.

Inspired by another website, I've re-read Soren Johnson's afterwords in the back of the Civ IV manual. I thought it was interesting to read what he has to say about religion in regard to diplomacy, particularly in the context of the IGN article.

"The most important reason to be proactive in the spread of religion is diplomacy. A problem that diplomacy suffered from in previous Civ games was a lack of motive - it often felt quite arbitrary that one civilisation might like you while while another hated you. Religion provides a useful back-story to give diplomatic dealings more logic. Choosing a different state religion than your neighbour may lead to animosity and possibly war. However, some well-placed missionaries in their largest cities could sway their people to your own religion, winning a long-term ally."

It's going to be interesting to see what other 'motives' there are to explain a civs reaction to 'you', particularly the first time you meet.

Religion was clearly more than just another love/hate flag. Found a religion in your capitol, use bureaucracy and spread your religion around and say its just a love hate tag.

Bad example - Shrines provide :gold:, and Bureaucracy doesn't provide a multiplier for :gold:. :)

What? No this isn't a "feature"! They are simply two different symbols representing two different things. The commerce you get from your tiles is represented like this :commerce: it is split up between that which goes directly to your treasury, that funds culture, science, and that which funds espionage. :gold: is that which goes straight to your treasury, whereas :commerce: is that which is being extracted from your city's tiles, yet to be split up. So +50%:commerce: will boost everything whereas +50%:gold: will only boost the treasury.

This is hardly a "rather artificial" difference, it's the difference between merely adding money to the treasury on the one hand, and boosting science, culture and espionage (mostly science) on the other. Scrapping this "feature" would simply mean you wouldn't know whether a wonder was boosting a cities commerce (funds everything) or merely the left over bit that goes to the treasury - it would be like using the same symbol for commerce as for science and just having to guess whether only science was boosted or whether everything was boosted.

(it's worth noting also that other multipliers come into play, so if +50%:gold: is on top of :gold: which is already boosted by multipliers, then it could be better than +50%:commerce:)

Now this OT diversion is far more long winded than it needed to be. I don't see why my original, short reply was so hard to understand.

Yes, but why can't you take :gold: out of your treasury and re-allocate it back into :science:, :culture: or :espionage:? Does the :gold: somehow get transmuted into :nuke: that scientists and entertainers and spies will no longer accept it for their wages?

Yes, but why can't you take :gold: out of your treasury and re-allocate it back into :science:, :culture: or :espionage:? Does the gold somehow get transmuted into radioactive gold that scientists and entertainers and spies will no longer accept it for their wages?

Well most of the time you can, by running at a deficit. The issue only arises if you are running a profit at 100% research.

I guess it does beg the question, why can we not assign more than a 100% of commerce with the deficit coming out of the treasury?

Of course, there are some obvious issues with how bonusses to gold income are counted, etc. But these could easily be overcome. I guess the biggest problem would be that such a feature sounds very exploitable. Binary research is already very exploity and I'd imagine such a mechanic makes it even worse.

That's a very good point cf_nz. Civ4 definitely moved diplomacy along a fantastic path by giving you *GOOD REASONS* for why a Civ felt the way they did. Religion, good treatment in trade deals, close borders, Civics choices-all of these things mattered. So rather than being attacked for no good reason, you could normally make a good guess at which nations would attack you-because maybe you're a bunch of "heathens" who routinely turn down reasonable requests for help, build cities close to their borders & routinely attack their friends ;)!

If I had a problem with religion & its impact on diplomacy, it is simply the fact that the "different religion" penalty was so high to start with. The size of the penalty should depend more on in-game decisions relating to the relationship between these two religions, rather than a high, arbitrary penalty!

Aussie.

Hey, this is Steve from IGN.

When I called religion arbitrary and exploitable, I meant that it was just another tool in the diplomacy bag. The only practical thing it really did was add one more love/hate flag to each of the civs. I think the new idea in Civ V is to let diplomatic relations evolve based more on the changing strategic situation. If you're building up cities along my borders and refusing trade, that should influence my reaction to you more than whether or not we share the same religion.

This statement is demonstrably untrue, both as the the effect of religion on the game, and as to the effect of religion in the real world on diplomacy. Anyone who doesn't think so needs to do two things: play as someone like Isabella with a determination to maximize the effect of religion on such things as culture growth and happiness control, and review the history of the diplomacy of Central/Western Europe during the period 1500 to 1800. ;)

I agree it can be powerful and a fun way to play the game. One of the best things about Civ is that people can approach it from many different angles but, speaking just for me, religion's main function in supporting diplomacy is more significant in the big picture than the civics bonuses and unrest issues. If these other practical benefits of religion are more important to you, hopefully their absence will be redeemed by some other new feature.

I think he understands

I've got to say, the more I am hearing about Civ V, the more dissappointed I am becoming. It seems like Civ V is shaping up to be Civilization: Panzer General and taking away everything that makes it Civilization!


On the contrary! If they manage to meld the best of Civ and PG, they will have a really superlative game!

Also, from the infos we have to date, I don't see them 'taking away everything that makes it Civilization'. The uniqueness of Civ lies in building up a civilization - combat and war are an integral part of that, but the mechanics were always unsatisfactory. If they manage to meld the empire building and research of Civ with fun combat like PG, plus a better resource system - and this is what it looks like they are trying for - then this will be the best Civ game ever! I can see myself playing that for decades.... :D

While I agree that "vanilla" religions were somewhat useless, they provided a good backbone for mods. Religions in Fall From Heaven, for example, have a much bigger impact. I'll be sad to see it gone :(

True that. The problem with the religion system was that they were always afraid to give the religions unique benefits - much too 'hot' a topic, with all the fanatics around! I'm sure they had visions of boycotts and/or firebombings by fundamentalist Christians/Muslims/whatever if they put a foot wrong.
I'll be interested to see what the new system of blended civics and religions will be like.

No reason for doom-crying already, to some of you Cassandras! IMHO, each new incarnation of Civ has been, overall, better than the last - though individual features have been missed, like the funny advisors from Civ2 - and I'm optimistic that will be so with this one, too!

I only hope we won't have as many bugs and crashes as with Civ4 at the beginning - that would suck big time.

Yes, but why can't you take :gold: out of your treasury and re-allocate it back into :science:, :culture: or :espionage:? Does the :gold: somehow get transmuted into :nuke: that scientists and entertainers and spies will no longer accept it for their wages?I've already said why it's important: +50%:commerce: is a very different thing to +50%:gold: when applied to a city as a multiplier.

I've already said why it's important: +50%:commerce: is a very different thing to +50%:gold: when applied to a city as a multiplier.

Yes, but I am questioning the entire approach. Real money is fungible, why is the money in Civ 4 non-fungible? Why can't you spend >100% of your income? Why can you only spend your income one way (on :science:, :culture:, :espionage:) and your treasury another (rush-buying and giving to other civs)?

The entire approach is flawed and totally different from how real governments work. In the real world, all tax income goes into the treasury. All spending comes from the treasury. There is no special requirement that certain spending must only come from income and other spending must only come from the treasury.

The entire approach is flawed and totally different from how real governments work. In the real world, all tax income goes into the treasury. All spending comes from the treasury. There is no special requirement that certain spending must only come from income and other spending must only come from the treasury.

Civilization, fortunately, has nothing to do with reality. It's a game and gameplay comes before realism. That approach, while probably not very "realistic", worked very well in Civ4.

Civilization, fortunately, has nothing to do with reality. It's a game and gameplay comes before realism. That approach, while probably not very "realistic", worked very well in Civ4.

Yes, but a more realistic and more strategically flexible approach would not be any more difficult to implement.

It seems to me that the entire system and its flaws stem from the use of multiplication (that's all a % is, really) and the mathematical precedence (order of operations) problems that arise when you add percentages together.

This whole problem could be avoided by eliminating multiplication from the equation. One alternative is the approach used by Master of Orion 2, which features addition but not multiplication.

The fact that you could ignore it and still do reasonably well, shows imo that it was poorly implemented.

Not really. People have gone games without building military units ), or without focusing on domestic improvements, or without fighting wars.

Yes, but I am questioning the entire approach. Real money is fungible, why is the money in Civ 4 non-fungible? Why can't you spend >100% of your income? Why can you only spend your income one way (on :science:, :culture:, :espionage:) and your treasury another (rush-buying and giving to other civs)?

The entire approach is flawed and totally different from how real governments work. In the real world, all tax income goes into the treasury. All spending comes from the treasury. There is no special requirement that certain spending must only come from income and other spending must only come from the treasury.Oh I see what you mean - so you should always have large amounts of money entering your treasury, but also huge demands of science on your treasury.

Well originally, in Civ I, since there was no culture or espionage, there was no science rate - there was simply the "tax rate" and anything not taxed went to science (so that was your science rate).

Later, they kept the mechanics the same but the idea changed from a tax rate to various rates (mostly a science rate), but they never changed the mechanic so that it all went to your treasury first. Actually the idea of having a tax rate with science being constrained by higher taxes does seem to make more sense than a science rate, science has largely progressed as a result of private innovation, especially earlier in history. Though, actually, we don't know what the science rate in Civ IV is, it could simply represent the degree to which science isn't constrained by taxes, same with culture rate, in this case it would make sense that it doesn't come out of the treasury.