Looks like Firaxis has two options....

[Sherlock]

1) Go the whole DLC, expansion-packs, patches route with BE and really commit to this game.

2) Throw some DLC at BE and concentrate on Civ VI.


Do you think this decision has already been made? Have they been working on VI for the past year, six months, whatever?

Will be interesting to see. BE is looking more and more like a throw-away 'pick up a few bucks' re-skin job to keep the income generation up while they work on VI.

 

[Eji1700]

1) Go the whole DLC, expansion-packs, patches route with BE and really commit to this game.

2) Throw some DLC at BE and concentrate on Civ VI.


Do you think this decision has already been made? Have they been working on VI for the past year, six months, whatever?

Will be interesting to see. BE is looking more and more like a throw-away 'pick up a few bucks' re-skin job to keep the income generation up while they work on VI.

The decision will likely be made after they see the sales of the first set of DLC.

 

[m15a]

I don't know if the decision has been made, although I'm guessing they've at least committed to initial patch(es). If the decision hasn't been made already, they probably have plans for both scenarios. And the choice might not affect the plans of Civ VI much, although it definitely could.

The reception of BE seems to be pretty good to me. Not saying that everyone likes the game, but people seem to care about it. I wasn't following gaming news or CFC at the time, but it's making a much bigger impact than Civ IV: Colonization, right? And I'm guessing they put a bigger investment into BE already, so that could support option 1.

TLDR: I dunno anything about this business stuff. Why did I even respond?

 

[need my speed]

They should make a Civilization IV 2.0. But that will never happen, of course.

 

[Lucius_]

They should make a Civilization IV 2.0. But that will never happen, of course.

Isn't that called Civ IV:Colonization?

 

[Mustakrakish]

Isn't that called Civ IV:Colonization?

No, it's not. I'd like civ IV 2.0, but why not just civ 6. I want civ 6.

 

[Lucius_]

You know, I'd love to be in Firaxis's office on monday. That meeting should be interesting lol. I almost feel bad for Will & Dave. I feel like they put heart and soul into this and we're mostly ripping it to pieces. And I feel bad for Pete, who is likely reading these forums. So much negativity has to be crushing.

CivBE can be a great game. Lots of us are having fun and can see the potential. It needs some major fixing though. I hope they give it the attention it deserves. After a few balancing patches, some UI tweaks, and an expansion it could be a Civ that stands the test of time.

 

[Kissamies]

Even number sequels tend to be be better than the odd numbers anyways. Keep the hexes and move everything else back toward IV... Maybe finally a spherical instead of cylindrical map.

I would like one expansion pack for BE, though. It doesn't sound like it's completely fixable with just patches.

 

[Tomice]

Actually, all this reminds me an awful lot about the release of Civ5 (Positive and Negative).
It's so similar I actually expected things to be this way.

The main strenght of Firaxis: They improve their games through patches and expansions until they're really, really good.
Sadly, but not unexpectedly, this turns out to be their bigest problem right now. We all compare BE to a prefected, polished Civ5 BNW, just as we compared Civ5 vanilla to a perfected, polished Civ4 BtS.

It is a comparison that's logic from our perspective, because both games compete for our attention and possibly money (new players). But it's not fair from a development point of view. BNW profited from years of community feedback and a vibrant modding scene.

I'm not overly thrilled by BE right now, too. Reinstalling civ5 after not playing for a few month felt better than the first day of BE.

But it is fresh, patches and mods will fix the worst issues soon, and hopefully it will grow to be another great addition to the series. Few around here thought Civ5 would make it this far.

Have hope, my fellow fanatics

 

[Stalker0]

But it is fresh, patches and mods will fix the worst issues soon, and hopefully it will grow to be another great addition to the series. Few around here thought Civ5 would make it this far.

I think there is the feeling of "it will get better with polish". But there is a counter feeling of "haven't these guys learned their lesson by now?"


While BE does have new mechanics, most of its fundamentals are straight from Civ 5. As others have noted we are seeing some of the same mistakes that we saw in vanilla Civ 5...after the devs had years of polishing that game. Why were those lessons thrown out the window for this game?

 

[Sherlock]

I think there is the feeling of "it will get better with polish". But there is a counter feeling of "haven't these guys learned their lesson by now?"


While BE does have new mechanics, most of its fundamentals are straight from Civ 5. As others have noted we are seeing some of the same mistakes that we saw in vanilla Civ 5...after the devs had years of polishing that game. Why were those lessons thrown out the window for this game?

The GUI and readability issues are what concern me the most. Unfortunately I suspect they are the least likely of items to be 'fixed'.

But they are the most important to me. Doesn't matter how good/bad the AI is if I'm not playing the game because it gives me a headache.

 

[seancolorado]

You know, I'd love to be in Firaxis's office on monday. That meeting should be interesting lol. I almost feel bad for Will & Dave. I feel like they put heart and soul into this and we're mostly ripping it to pieces. And I feel bad for Pete, who is likely reading these forums. So much negativity has to be crushing.

They are selling a product that we pay with our own money. I don't really see the point in feeling bad for them. But I do see what you're saying in a vacuum on a personal/human level

 

[Leathaface]

My 2 biggest gripess:

1) The difficulty is low. I've only played Medium difficulty so far but I hear people saying Apollo is equal to Emperor at best.

2) The AI is passive with you. No aggresiveness.

 

[Breezin]

We all compare BE to a prefected, polished Civ5 BNW, just as we compared Civ5 vanilla to a perfected, polished Civ4 BtS.

You are right in that regard but they haven't learned anything from the release of Civ V.
Diplomacy was questionable in V and definitely not up to IV's standards. Diplomacy in BE is very bland and some of it doesn't function (favors for example). it's very similar to Endless space - diplomacy is forgettable.

The one thing about the Civ V team is they never really seemed too interested in rounding out the diplomatic part of the game. It's always been an after thought when everyone complains. It's too bad because with better diplomacy, V could be the best game ever. They could have carried over a lot of that into BE to make it better.

Maybe they'll have a new lead designer for the DLC/expansions who will try to take this on. All they have to do is look at how the AI acted in IV to get a starting point. I always liked how the AI would grovel once you defeated them or sometimes treat you like a pet if they were super powerful and toss a gift your way. That was engrossing.

 

[CaptainPatch]

1) Go the whole DLC, expansion-packs, patches route with BE and really commit to this game.

2) Throw some DLC at BE and concentrate on Civ VI.

I can pretty definitively say they are doing both. Just how far along they are with Civ 6, I couldn't say, but its development is pretty inevitable. Any release carrying the word "Civilization" in the title is guaranteed several million dollars in sales, regardless of how much it is anticipated. How well it will be received remains to be seen.

Going back to Civ 4, there has been a consistent pattern for the Civ titles: The current game is released and the reviews and critiques are about 50/50 good/bad. And even most of the favorable reviews suggest that A LOT of polishing is still called for. And the polishing that inevitably follows is 2, 3, 4 expansions and/or content DLCs, each of which have sales on a par with the initial core game release. (DLC sales are nearly 100% initial game sales, in units.) When a follow-up expansion is nearly all favorable reviews -- Civ 4 wasn't "complete" until BTS, and Civ 5 wasn't "complete" until BNW -- then it's time to start getting serious about developing the next Civ installment. [The exception to this was Civilization IV: Colonization , because I think nearly everyone (including Firaxis) didn't view it as being "a real Civ game, having been released initially as it's own genre of 4X that was only "Civ-like" in nature. So no expansions for that one.] I expect that CBE _will_ follow this pattern. It even indicates in the game manual that there WILL be DLCs coming in the future. They wouldn't make such a statement there unless there was already DLC well into development.

In regards to the player feedback in places like here on this forum, pay very close attention to the fact that the voices you hear are from a very _tiny_ percentage of the total number of consumers. But there is a Marketing perception that each consumer that expends the effort to share his views is representative of the attitudes held by at least XXXX other consumers that seldom if ever speak up. That is, the talkers are more motivated to speak out, one way or another. HOWEVER, before making any calculations, a percentage of the "Yay! Love it!" statements should be discounted (tossed out) as they are essentially fanboys that inevitably say nothing but praise for their favorite game or manufacturer. By their very nature, fanboys are outspoken and verbal, so their opinions are pretty much their opinions, not representative of anyone else. So they get tossed out of the equation.

So, taking the feedback here as being a good sample, it looks to me that the reactions are about 50/50. Toss out the fanboys and I'm thinking 40-45/55-60 in favor. With nearly everyone indicating the game needs a LOT of work before it's as good as Civ 4/BTS or Civ 5/BNW. That suggests to me that we will be seeing 2-3 expansions and about a half-dozen content DLCs, spaced out over nearly two years. That would put Civ 6 on track for an initial release late 2016/early 2017.

 

[Tabarnak]

We all compare BE to a prefected, polished Civ5 BNW, just as we compared Civ5 vanilla to a perfected, polished Civ4 BtS.

The civ5 engine was completely new and the creator of the game admitted that it has been on market too early. It was kind of understandable.

But...now? They had no excuses.

 

[CaptainPatch]

But...now? They had no excuses.

As a business consideration, a project doesn't make the company a single dime until people start to pre-order it -- which they won't do until the game is in sight of the projected release date. Prior to that, the development project is a money pit, sucking up company assets and cash. Just for the company to remain in business it MUST either be independently wealthy or else release products in a timely fashion. That's why for the last several years it seems like the majority of games have been released in a "Ready or not, here I come!" condition. "Close enough to complete" has become close enough to release. Inadequate alpha testing, oddball hardware combination incompatibilities, insufficient copy editing, continuity flaws, et al, have become acceptable by manufacturers giving assurances that they WILL make the necessary corrections post-release. In the meantime, the final customers become a legion of _free_, unpaid betatesters. And just to make the whole approach all the more lucrative, all of those corrections and adjustments can be bundled into a DLC or expansion that the manufacturer can sell to all of the people that were adversely affected by their willingness to buy the shoddy initial release. (Actual game-crashing bugs will of course be corrected by a patch, for free even! Doesn't that show just how wonderful and caring we are?)

Not a pretty picture, but that pattern has become increasingly something that gamers are being conditioned to accept as "the norm". Pretty much, "It is what it is, and there's nothing we can do about it."

 

[m15a]

Not a pretty picture, but that pattern has become increasingly something that gamers are being conditioned to accept as "the norm". Pretty much, "It is what it is, and there's nothing we can do about it."

Well, you can also wait until all the patches and/or DLC are released, which be similar to the situation that would occur if patches weren't an option. Although if everyone did that, that would be bad for the game company, which I guess would mean ultimately that fewer, simpler, and/or safer (i.e., wider appeal) games would be made.

 

[nephrahim]

I hope we get DLC. The idea of this withering on the vine is a terrifying idea. Like many others, I like what it does, it just needs a little more love to get to where it could be.

I mean, even X-com got an expansion and that was mostly a console game.

 

[Sherlock]

As a business consideration, a project doesn't make the company a single dime until people start to pre-order it -- which they won't do until the game is in sight of the projected release date. Prior to that, the development project is a money pit, sucking up company assets and cash. Just for the company to remain in business it MUST either be independently wealthy or else release products in a timely fashion. That's why for the last several years it seems like the majority of games have been released in a "Ready or not, here I come!" condition. "Close enough to complete" has become close enough to release. Inadequate alpha testing, oddball hardware combination incompatibilities, insufficient copy editing, continuity flaws, et al, have become acceptable by manufacturers giving assurances that they WILL make the necessary corrections post-release. In the meantime, the final customers become a legion of _free_, unpaid betatesters. And just to make the whole approach all the more lucrative, all of those corrections and adjustments can be bundled into a DLC or expansion that the manufacturer can sell to all of the people that were adversely affected by their willingness to buy the shoddy initial release. (Actual game-crashing bugs will of course be corrected by a patch, for free even! Doesn't that show just how wonderful and caring we are?)

Not a pretty picture, but that pattern has become increasingly something that gamers are being conditioned to accept as "the norm". Pretty much, "It is what it is, and there's nothing we can do about it."

Twenty years ago (yes, I go back that far) the quote was, 'are you going to buy it or wait for the patch?'

'Wait for the patch' was a good option twenty years ago and it looks to be a good option now.

I don't watch tv shows on cable, I wait a year for the dvd box to come out and watch them without commericals or 'bugs' on the screen. I guess if I can wait a year for the next season of 'Grimm' I can wait a year for a new game.

I confess I did buy 'Endless Legend' before it was even released. But it was thirty bucks, not fifty.