Which real life civs won which victory conditions

Wasnt a joke. US culture is absolutely dominant. Its the corporatocracy I'm talking about - brand recognition. We're all wearing American blue jeans and listening to their "pop music" aren't we? We all eat at Mcdonalds every now and again. I'm from the UK but travel widely - there are Starbucks and Mcdonalds in nearly every country on earth - from Ghana to Afghanistan - or their alternatives or copies.
 
Sacred sites are great, probably the best thing in the game particularly with large empires.
 
I realize the spirit of the OP was that of which civs have already "won" and by what condition(s). But I thought it would be interesting to examine each VC in turn. I don't know how to define the parameters of a "civilization" vs. the more ephemeral dynamics of a "nation", so grains of salt disclaimers probably apply :dunno:

Time: This might be the only condition where existing civilizations could apply if a given duration was provided. Two obvious regions based on reliable age estimates are the Mesopotamian and Indus valleys. But the nations of Iraq (Mesopotamia), Afghanistan and Pakistan (Indus) are very new geopolitical constructs and remain under assault. While some culture may remain intact, waves of militaries and religions have redefined these areas and their resident cultures. That would probably leave us with India as the oldest, most coherent civilization that remains viable to this day.

I don't know how colonial rule or outright invasion would affect the calculation, however. India only recently reclaimed its sovereignty from the British empire. Likewise China from Japan. And then there's Egypt whose true age is anyone's guess.

Science: Let's assume this condition would be satisfied by a successful colonization of a planet in another star system (e.g., Alpha Centauri) or by technology so advanced as to make the very idea of civilization -- or even individual identity -- essentially meaningless. It's highly unlikely that this would be accomplished by any one nation, nor would it carry with it the same arbitrary political significance.

I view interstellar travel as a barrier of entry for budding civilizations of intelligent lifeforms. It's perhaps fortunate that the distances involved require the same technological progress that could also be used to end (or significantly set back) civilizations who are not yet ready for galactic-level citizenship. When (if?) humans are ready, I don't think we'll be waving flags of nations or corporations. We'll need to evolve psychologically and sociologically such that these fixations no longer serve as such lethal obstructions.

I've not played Civ:BE, but I can speculate on one of its affinities. I believe that terrestrial evolution is following a progression from random mutation (asexual; cloning) > natural selection (sex and death) > artificial selection (forced / manipulated breeding of traits) > genetic engineering (creation / manipulation of traits and organisms) > cybernetics (approaching real-time adaptation to environment which once would have taken generations through previous evolutionary means) > ??? (perhaps no biological, or ultimately, no physical form at all) :think:

I sense that life will eventually fully transcend its biological origin and ensuing limitations. I assume its worldview would be entirely alien and inaccessible to us. I suppose its victory would be enlightenment -- or the realization that it is literally the consciousness of the Cosmos as it becomes self aware. I digress.

Domination: This VC seems the least plausible and the least interesting to me regardless of technological era. To satisfy its requirements, the capital (or equivalent seat of power) of each coexisting civilization would need to be captured and controlled at some point (not necessarily at the same time?) by a single civilization. I also suppose this would apply even if the conquering civ were allied or otherwise participating in a coalition. Germany and Japan made formidable advances on a global scale, and had they access to nuclear technology at the time . . . :scared:

Cultural: This one is impossible to quantify. Culture is an evolving dynamic -- not a collection of static relics in a museum. Insular societies may have preserved and sheltered their culture for longer than others. I'm thinking classically of Japan, but more recently maybe of Iran or North Korea? Or perhaps the Great Firewall of China trying to filter and control access to information from something as boundless as the Internet? Nothing seems impermeable to cultural pressure and influence.

The issue I have with this VC is that no culture exists in a vacuum unique to itself. America is famously the "melting pot" of cultures, and ultimately, the Earth will be as well. Eventually, any distinct qualities of race, ethnicity, and "culture" will homogenize. There will always remain (and newly evolve) regional characteristics, but as time goes on, they will become much less fundamentally distinct. Monoculture FTcvW??

Diplomatic: I would like to think that such a victory could be achieved through mutually beneficial diplomacy, but instead, I fear it's the proxy for the "true" domination victory. Global hegemony. It'll be achieved primarily through the consolidation of economic control, and could be a runaway phenomenon that dictates all other aspects of civilization. Even though nations participate with varying degrees of diminishing autonomy, this victory will be awarded to the multinational global elite who have basically usurped governments to legislate (and enforce militarily and through espionage) on their behalf.

This is the classic struggle that humans have faced since we began trying to civilize ourselves. In CiV, we're presented with three overriding ideologies: Freedom, Order, and Autocracy. Which translate to Capitalism, Communism, and Fascism. It seems that there are barely just two competing ideologies today -- capitalism and vanishing communism. Either social order can descend into authoritarianism, and we've seen it happen. While capitalism might market itself with the banner of freedom, it's indistinguishable from fascism if taken to its nth degree. A truly just and egalitarian society remains a noble goal, but one which we've never seen on any significant scale. That, IMO, would be the only real victory for civilization itself, and the one aspiration any otherwise fledgling civ should be aiming for.
 
Time: No Civ has won this yet, it's still at least 35 turns from the 500th turn in the game. (My games don't go long enough to know if on standard speed the last turns are 1 year each or if they become sub-year)

Candidates have to still be around in 2050 AD. After that, it's how much territory they own and their population in 2050 that will dominate everything else if we are using the Civ V scoring system.

Science: So far, only one civ has even built the prereq small wonder (Apollo Program) to even start building the space ship and it hasn't started construction on a single SS part yet. Several techs are still missing so its questionable that the techs needed for the last two spaceship parts will even be discovered before time expires. It does not help matters that Hubble's two free scientists appear to have been wasted on academies instead of being used to bulb techs.

Domination: At all points there has been at least one civ in the game that still had their original capital so no one has achieved it yet. It's looking doubtful it will be acheived by 2050 either.

Diplomatic: All civs are continuing to vote for themselves. So far at least the city states have been split enough to prevent someone from winning, but there will be some more elections before 2050 and each time, the top two get a couple more votes each, so stay tuned.

Culture:
"Blue Jeans": if anything in the past couple of decades the countries in which these are made have increased. (For instance being made in Central America when a few decades ago would have been made in South Carolina)

"Pop Music": Artists from US & UK are very much competing with each other and the best from both countries are played in each others country in addition to their own.

Perhaps its possible that pre "British Invasion" lead by the Beatles that US had dominated the UK via culture but that's not the case now. It's clearly the case that in the 50s, the US did NOT dominate USSR culturally.
So it doesn't look like in modern times that culture has been won.
The next point back to check is Roman empire, but their goods were "unknown" in China while Chinese goods were "exotic" in Rome. Meaning that if anything China actually had a small lead then.

There have been many, many countries though that have suffered a Conquest loss; but my money is that real life will be won a time victory rather than any of the other conditions.
 
Science: So far, only one civ has even built the prereq small wonder (Apollo Program) to even start building the space ship and it hasn't started construction on a single SS part yet. Several techs are still missing so its questionable that the techs needed for the last two spaceship parts will even be discovered before time expires. It does not help matters that Hubble's two free scientists appear to have been wasted on academies instead of being used to bulb techs.
Did you know that "Apollo Program" is called "Soyuz Programme" in Russian localization and USSR was equal to USA in space achievement before Moon landing? ;)

and EU, USA, Japan, China, India and USSR/Russia has a successful unmanned landing on the moon if you use "Soyuz+" criteria
 
Did you know that "Apollo Program" is called "Soyuz Programme" in Russian localization and USSR was equal to USA in space achievement before Moon landing? ;)

and EU, USA, Japan, China, India and USSR/Russia has a successful unmanned landing on the moon if you use "Soyuz+" criteria

That was the point I was gonna make - With Mangalayaan, Curiousity, and the other Mars rovers
The US, Europe, Russia, China, Japan and India are the leading powers in space.

So all are roughly equal now. Whoever colonizes this "new earth" we discovered - we'll find.
 
The new earth is barely being discovered in today's times. Science sections in newspapers could often reveal the astronomical research that countries are doing and not only the US. Mars has been revealed since pathfinder has been sent and has brought back photos of Mars today. Pluto and other very cold planets that are faraway from the sun have been discovered also. Most modern day space missions have taken years to achieve and colonization to Mars was also announced to commence some year in 2018 even since it already had land rovers and cameras sent to it that brings back photos to earth about it.
 
The most realistic science victory goal we having is Colonization of Mars.

Because, you know. That Kepler earth-like planet is very optimistic HYPOTHESIS that got really out of hand.

Some scientist found a piece of rock at somewhere life COULD happen (it even be a mini-gas planet ) and hired an photoshop artist to imagine what would this hypothetical "earth-sized" planet would look like if it was rocky. Cue some netizen asks why we have picture of planet from light years away when it took 20 years to take a picture of Pluto. That, my friend, is a prove why some are unable to read more than 150 characters. :facepalm:
 
There are resistances to USA's hegemony. So while US is closest in cultural victory. They aren't won, and those who resist them can be called in many names. Communist and Terrorist is just a few extreme.

Okay, somebody take the drugs away from this person
 
I agree with Zuben's post - Culture is almost impossible to quantify because how do you define it? Music, art, religion, literature, language, food, history? Unlike the actual Civ game, you can't count culture by adding up how many Cathedrals and Museums a country has but in my opinion, the most culturally significant countries in the world are those that have rich histories with many ruins and artifacts that attract people to come and visit. Having unique foods, wines, music and things like that also helps - people want to feel like they are in a completely different place when the go there. It looks like there won't be any agreement here about that, especially if people are making claims yet have never even left their own country to actually see a bit of the culture of the World
 
I am not on any kind drug or anything that cause the same delusion as western media, and let us leave it at that. For "in-topic"-ness sake. :)

Okay, I didn't realise your previous post was a joke, I thought you were being serious!! In that case, I agree with you - I am a 'Western' but I also think some of their views on the World are delusional! :lol:
 
The CV motto itself is a reference to the american culture. So, yeah, United States won this game culturaly, since everyone is buying their blue jeans (since James Dean) and listening to their pop music (since jazz era).

They created a lot of great works in the late game (20th century) (pollock, motherwell, andy warhol, gershwin, cage, ramones, all the great broadway songs, all the great hollywood movies) plus a bunch of agressive social policies and they have pretty much won this game by (literally) bombing their culture everywhere.

Which was not fortiotous. It was planned. Like it or not, it worked. Anyone can argue and desagree with that - but in english, so everyone can understand.
 
And I guess USA was the first to research internet, which really helped them.
It was a fine militaristc-cultural game. Now we're on the 'Wait...just one more turn' times - which can lead to the total fall of the winner. But I say the game will be reseted before it happens.
 
Top Bottom