Recent content by _hero_

This is a good point. I think it would be accurate to say that Millenia is targeting the "lapsed" Civ 4 and earlier audience. Maybe it is no coincidence that the people with younger accounts on CFC are the ones complaining about Millenia's graphics.

Hot take: I think the obsession with pretty graphics is why so many AAA games fail to live up to expectations. These companies blow their budgets on beauty at the expense of gameplay, then they try making all their money selling cosmetics. Meanwhile, you have low-budget indie games that focus on...

I think the focus of the two games is very different. Civ 6 seems focused on creating a very flavorful, diverse experience. They want every civ/leader to feel as unique as possible. There seems to be an active attempt by the developers to avoid the need for the sort of hyper-focused min-max...

It isn't about the number of bonuses, but the quality of them and the timing of them. Most of the things you mentioned provide some small trivial buff, while your leader ability is often game-breaking. I'm saying we need fewer bonuses but the ones that exist throughout the gameplay should feel...

Sounds great. Seems unlikely to happen. A massive overhaul is needed if they keep districts. Every city having the same 3 districts every game because there were clearly superior districts is a major reason why the game felt so repetitive to some. If districts are to remain, they need to not be...

The downside to announcing dates as a developer is that you're expected to follow through. This leads to unfinished games hitting the market.

I think these companies have learned that PC/Console audiences often react negatively to announcements of mobile games when they are waiting for a PC/Console announcement. No one wants to be the next Wyatt Chang saying "Do you guys not have phones?" to an upset player base.

Yeah, I am not a fan of it, although their model doesn't require them to launch games bare-bones. That is simply a poor decision they have made.

The longer perspective and games-as-a-service lines have me thinking they might be adopting a model similar to Paradox games. Multiple DLC a year with a subscription model as an alternative to buying all the DLC.

This is on a North America map. Worthwhile canals on actual randomly generated maps are extremely rare.

2 was the best for me. This got me thinking about why that is. Ultimately I think it comes down to sandbox vs theme park game design. By sandbox I mean the player has far more control over what happens in the game and by theme park I mean the game design actively pushes players to certain...

Way back in Civ 2 I think it was, if you were a Democracy you couldn't even declare offensive wars without justification, and having units away from home caused unhappiness. While that was a bit extreme, I think the notion of the player losing control over some aspects of their nation to the AI...

Yeah the ability itself is fine IMO. It is very much a pro gamer™ ability though. Depending on how it calculates there may be ways to seriously cheese it. For instance, if you use Darwin to pop +2000 science on a 4 hex natural wonder, which in turn grants you your first tech of the era, will you...

Thinking about how these abilities will play out on Diety: Ramses- The culture boost from buildings will be a nice trickle. You're not going to be getting wonders early on Diety though. Cleopatra- If you happen to have a starting location that can take advantage of this, extra yields are always...

Steamcharts has Civ 5 having 20-25k players consistently over the past year with Civ 6 consistently 50-60k. While it isn't perfectly representative because Civ 6 has a much higher console representation, to act as though the Civ 5 player base is just a squeaky wheel is a bit unfair. Consistently...