Mojotronica
Dec 02, 2002, 01:51 PM
Maybe this is a thread for the Stories section -- but in my humble opinion it would be very cool if the game Civ was capable of simulating Earth history. In fact, it would be perfect if the "default" AI playing against itself version of the game was typically similar to Earth...
Then the game would be useful as a fun historical model to play around w/ in the broadest sense.
I think that this idea is beyond the scope of the designers who primarily use history more as window dressing.
To implement this, the core game would have to be re-imagined:
a) Civs, Barbarians and Goody Huts would be integrated into a single system. Barbarians found villages (Goody Huts,) villages develop the Agriculture tech, the Agriculture tech enables a village to spawn a Settler, which in turn found cities capable of researching other techs.
b) Players start the game in charge of a barbarian icon, one of a 100 or so such icons (depending on world size.) Development of agriculture is more or less random, but rare, and based on founding a certain number of villages . The human player(s) automatically develop agriculture at 4000 BC.
c) The game would start earlier to allow players time to develop agriculture... Maybe 10K or 8K BC.
d) Barbarian warriors wander around the world attempting to conquer capitol cities and steal Agriculture for their people, enabling them to spawn a settler.
e) The Forbidden Palace concept is expanded. As a civ grows, so does it's corruption. In order to fight corruption civs tend to move their capitol city around. Each time it moves to a new location, the name of the entire civ may be changed. In this way the AI gradually updates the name of it's Civ name f/ for example Viking to German to English to American, or Roman to Portuguese to Brazilian, or Roman to Spanish to Spanish + Aztec to Mexican.
f) Also the old capitol retains a Provincial palace. This palace controls corruption as the Forbidden Palace, and there is no limit to the number that may be spawned.
g) A provincial capitol may be built more cheaply than a capitol moved, just as Forbidden Palace is now. There is no limit to the number of Provincial caps that may be built...
h) However, each provincial capitol has the possibility of inciting a civil war, splitting the empire. Thus, rival civs are often spawned as the consequence of expansion. It's very difficult to hold together an empire larger in geographic size than China for any length of time. Reference Roman, Mongol and Soviet empires for examples of "too large" empires in history... For the AI, civil war spawned civs are named after their capitol city. (E.g. city of Mexico splits f/ Spanish Empire, becomes capitol of "Mexican" civilization.)
i) When a rival capitol is taken, it becomes a provincial capitol under the same rules as above. Perhaps more prone to civil war, however... as well as more vulnerable to culture flipping.
j) Slavery, simulated by rival Civ's workers captured in conquest or trade, should cause unhappiness in the civ that is exploiting them. Only by "joining" such workers into cities can this be alleviated. And of course the presence of diverse cultures w/in a city makes it more susceptible to flipping/civil war involving the origin civ.
k) As a civ conquers large populations of alternate cultures, the conquering civ is changed too, and often "hyphenates" (E.g. Roman-Egyptian Civ, Roman-Germanic Civ or Spanish-Aztec Civ.) It remains under political control of conqueror but it's cultural norms incl elements of both cultures...
Given the above changes, I think it would be quite easy to create a game that would nicely simulate Earth's history of civilizational/cultural fusion and fragmentation...
Then the game would be useful as a fun historical model to play around w/ in the broadest sense.
I think that this idea is beyond the scope of the designers who primarily use history more as window dressing.
To implement this, the core game would have to be re-imagined:
a) Civs, Barbarians and Goody Huts would be integrated into a single system. Barbarians found villages (Goody Huts,) villages develop the Agriculture tech, the Agriculture tech enables a village to spawn a Settler, which in turn found cities capable of researching other techs.
b) Players start the game in charge of a barbarian icon, one of a 100 or so such icons (depending on world size.) Development of agriculture is more or less random, but rare, and based on founding a certain number of villages . The human player(s) automatically develop agriculture at 4000 BC.
c) The game would start earlier to allow players time to develop agriculture... Maybe 10K or 8K BC.
d) Barbarian warriors wander around the world attempting to conquer capitol cities and steal Agriculture for their people, enabling them to spawn a settler.
e) The Forbidden Palace concept is expanded. As a civ grows, so does it's corruption. In order to fight corruption civs tend to move their capitol city around. Each time it moves to a new location, the name of the entire civ may be changed. In this way the AI gradually updates the name of it's Civ name f/ for example Viking to German to English to American, or Roman to Portuguese to Brazilian, or Roman to Spanish to Spanish + Aztec to Mexican.
f) Also the old capitol retains a Provincial palace. This palace controls corruption as the Forbidden Palace, and there is no limit to the number that may be spawned.
g) A provincial capitol may be built more cheaply than a capitol moved, just as Forbidden Palace is now. There is no limit to the number of Provincial caps that may be built...
h) However, each provincial capitol has the possibility of inciting a civil war, splitting the empire. Thus, rival civs are often spawned as the consequence of expansion. It's very difficult to hold together an empire larger in geographic size than China for any length of time. Reference Roman, Mongol and Soviet empires for examples of "too large" empires in history... For the AI, civil war spawned civs are named after their capitol city. (E.g. city of Mexico splits f/ Spanish Empire, becomes capitol of "Mexican" civilization.)
i) When a rival capitol is taken, it becomes a provincial capitol under the same rules as above. Perhaps more prone to civil war, however... as well as more vulnerable to culture flipping.
j) Slavery, simulated by rival Civ's workers captured in conquest or trade, should cause unhappiness in the civ that is exploiting them. Only by "joining" such workers into cities can this be alleviated. And of course the presence of diverse cultures w/in a city makes it more susceptible to flipping/civil war involving the origin civ.
k) As a civ conquers large populations of alternate cultures, the conquering civ is changed too, and often "hyphenates" (E.g. Roman-Egyptian Civ, Roman-Germanic Civ or Spanish-Aztec Civ.) It remains under political control of conqueror but it's cultural norms incl elements of both cultures...
Given the above changes, I think it would be quite easy to create a game that would nicely simulate Earth's history of civilizational/cultural fusion and fragmentation...