Things that work, things to fix
- Thread starter TheDanish
- Start date
On the other hand, if you're actually playing the game, it's incredibly slow. I'm guessing they've tried their best to find a sweet spot in between.
I just wish they'd remove the "bonus resources" (the popup resource bubbles). It really is a grind popping them and the income from them is significant.
Wodan
Deity
There needs to be more of boardgame design theory used. By that I mean there are some fundamental ways to design a good boardgame, and a Facebook game has MUCH more in common with a boardgame than it does a computer game or anything else, really.
For example:
1) Come-from-behind mechanisms. If a player feels that there is no way to improve his/her standing compared to those in the lead (let alone actually catch them and rise higher in ranking), then the player is demotivated, rather than motivated.
These mechanisms can be overt or hidden. Overt is an actual feature, hidden is simply that some of the features simply work better if you're lower (or worse if you're higher).
2) Needs Annoyance factor. One of the key components of a good boardgame is the ability of a player to screw with another. This itself is player interaction, which by definition is good and is one of the prime goals of a MMP game (as well as a boardgame). But furthermore it begets additional interaction, as the player in the lead is then motivated to "get back" at the upstart, maybe by invading or something else. Which is further interaction and again more of a good thing. Plus, it sidetracks the player in the lead from pursuing the lead, diverting resources and allowing those in behind more of an opportunity to catch up.
Right now SimWorld has a strong focus on team interactions but very little where one player or one team can sabotage or even simply "mess with" another player or team.
This can also be combined with #1, where a smaller or lower ranked player or team can mess with a higher one, but not vice versa. (Maybe there's simply a cost for the higher ranked, whereas the lower ranked can do it for free; this cost could be scalable by the difference in rank so it could be significant for a player quite a bit higher ranked).
===============
I could go on, but that's the idea. My suggestion would be for the designers to bring in some boardgame design experts to analyze and offer some suggestions. Back when I worked for a game company we were very much into boardgames and design theory. I've been to the world boardgame championships many times. Would be quite easy (and inexpensive) for SimWorld to bring in someone to offer some suggestions.
For example:
1) Come-from-behind mechanisms. If a player feels that there is no way to improve his/her standing compared to those in the lead (let alone actually catch them and rise higher in ranking), then the player is demotivated, rather than motivated.
These mechanisms can be overt or hidden. Overt is an actual feature, hidden is simply that some of the features simply work better if you're lower (or worse if you're higher).
2) Needs Annoyance factor. One of the key components of a good boardgame is the ability of a player to screw with another. This itself is player interaction, which by definition is good and is one of the prime goals of a MMP game (as well as a boardgame). But furthermore it begets additional interaction, as the player in the lead is then motivated to "get back" at the upstart, maybe by invading or something else. Which is further interaction and again more of a good thing. Plus, it sidetracks the player in the lead from pursuing the lead, diverting resources and allowing those in behind more of an opportunity to catch up.
Right now SimWorld has a strong focus on team interactions but very little where one player or one team can sabotage or even simply "mess with" another player or team.
This can also be combined with #1, where a smaller or lower ranked player or team can mess with a higher one, but not vice versa. (Maybe there's simply a cost for the higher ranked, whereas the lower ranked can do it for free; this cost could be scalable by the difference in rank so it could be significant for a player quite a bit higher ranked).
===============
I could go on, but that's the idea. My suggestion would be for the designers to bring in some boardgame design experts to analyze and offer some suggestions. Back when I worked for a game company we were very much into boardgames and design theory. I've been to the world boardgame championships many times. Would be quite easy (and inexpensive) for SimWorld to bring in someone to offer some suggestions.
mitsho
Deity
The Commodities are simply there for getting money. The income by them can be quite high if you get lucky. Before you sign off, invest all your money into them and when you can come back, you might get returns of 100 Gold by selling them, or not, then you just need to wait ;-) I haven't calculated if its better to invest in production or food or stuff, but where would then be the point of the commodities? And yes, they should really raise the happiness...
As for the "Mario Kart Mechanisms", I agree, they should be there. Maybe gift techs to lower players from x eras before...?
As for the "Mario Kart Mechanisms", I agree, they should be there. Maybe gift techs to lower players from x eras before...?
Louis XXIV
Le Roi Soleil
^ The price does seem to be higher later in games than the beginning. I view commodities as something to invest in early and then sell late for lots of gold either to fund an army or an era victory.
You should be fine with one. The only reason, best I can tell, to build a second one is if the distance is so long that they're becoming inefficient.
You should be fine with one. The only reason, best I can tell, to build a second one is if the distance is so long that they're becoming inefficient.
TheDanish
Prince
According to the wiki, Fame is your aggregate score. Whoever has the most Fame at the end wins.
Which is strange, because your Fame (the star in the top-left corner) is different from your little number in the green circle. I have no idea what the number means.
Regardless, overall there seems to be a consensus that the snowball effect needs to be dampened. Once a Civ starts winning it's hard to stop them. The Economic victory demonstrates this well: if a civ achieves it, all that money is still available to contribute to the next economic victory, so whichever civ wins one has a head start on the next. Perhaps the threshold could be lowered while at the same time consuming the gold?
I'm pretty sure I read somewhere (I can't remember where now) that the number in the little green circle is how many hours the person has played.
CustodianV131
Prince
- Joined
- Apr 2, 2004
- Messages
- 353
Wonder or there should be a limit on the size of Civilizations. Looks like 1 civilization can just become to big at the moment and its pretty much game over after that. IE Romans in game 130 at max population winning every era.
Small interface-readability issue:
The white text on top of the resource icons is difficult to read (especially the gold one). It's hard to distinguish a 3,5,8 from each other.
The white text on top of the resource icons is difficult to read (especially the gold one). It's hard to distinguish a 3,5,8 from each other.
CommandoBob
AbstractArt
- Maybe if the Civlopedia opened in another window? I would rather Alt+Tab than scroll down.
- And howabout a tool (like on Google Maps) to let you recenter the map without having to click on a tile? Sure, that works for the PC game, when the whole screen belongs to the game. But here my map size is 6x6 (?) in small window that I cannot resize.
- I really don't care to watch my minions work. It is distracting eye-candy.
EDIT
I'm in game 129.
Hmm.
The last patch to CivIII vanilla was 1.29f. The numbers are the same; I hope the letter means nothing!
mitsho
Deity
You can open the wiki in a separate window, it's on their 2k site. Just google civworld and wiki, alternatively also 2k. the site was when I first googled it on the lower part of the first page, now it's number one ;-)
Random nitpicks numbering going on:
4) Every Bonus Ressource should have a sound when appearing, or I just haven't recognized the culture one yet.
Random nitpicks numbering going on:
4) Every Bonus Ressource should have a sound when appearing, or I just haven't recognized the culture one yet.
r_rolo1
King of myself
Besides the gripe about the tech/ growth displacement and the issue with big civs groping all the wonders thus snowballing, I think that a option to resize the window would be nice ...
Oh ,and as we are in it, stop resetting the sound definitions everytime i enter a screen ...
Oh ,and as we are in it, stop resetting the sound definitions everytime i enter a screen ...
donsig
Low level intermediary
Interesting comments. I agree that there seems to be too much emphasis on food and hammers, the early game makes or breaks you and once a big civ gets going it can snowball. But we can say the same thing about the Civ games and I'm not sure if that'll change. I've played similar MMP games (Travian and a similar fb game, Kingdoms of Camelot or something) and they also have the same early game/snowballing problems. I have no suggested solutions, sorry.
Mechanics wise in this closed beta I find it difficult to move around the map of my city. I miss zooming in and out like in civ. But then again, I wonder why I have to move around so much on the map. It doesn't seem as though you need a large area to be productive. In fact it seems the more compact your city is the more productive it is. I do find I have to move around the map when I move all my houses around to cash in harvests. If I want to concentrate on science I move all the houses near the library, if I want gold I move them near the bank. Should we really have to do that?
The biggest problem with the game IMHO is the difficulty in figuring out how things actually work. I know I want the number associated with each citizen to be high (and of the correct type resource) when I cash in a harvest, but I can't figure out how resources are accumulated between harvests. I can't predict how many resources I'm going to have when I come back to the game so I can't plan so I don't really know what to focus on. Battles are confusing, teching is confusing, wonders are confusing. Of course there is a learning curve but that should be mitigated in this type of game where there are more experienced teammates to help each other. Teching is also confusing. It seems teammates pool their research efforts but a team can be working on several techs at once. I find it difficult to find out what is being worked on.
I agree the civ chat should be the default. There doesn't seem to be much interaction between team mates, at least in my game. Travian had a chat and a message system. I think CivWorld needs team messages as well. In Travian the team founder controlled who was allowed to send messages to the team. CivWorld could do something similar by allowing the king and ministers to send out team messages. Of course this might make the snowballing effect even worse by allowing larger teams to better coordinate their efforts.
I'm not at all sure about the goals of the game. THE winner will be one player, so what good are team era victories? There isn't a team victory? I'm not that interested in playing a game with 100 people when only one can win. I think there should be a system kinda like the GOTMs where different types of achievements are recognized. In Civ World the top farmers, workers, scientists, etc. could be recognized. I'm kinda wary about a scoring system based on just one type of score (fame) though I have no idea what all goes into calculating the fame score. Since this fb game seems to be designed to have a rather quick end perhaps a ranking system is needed where new games only accept players within a certain ranking. This would pit good players against good players and average players again average players making each game more competitive and hopefully more fun. As players get better their rankings rise and they would move up to play better players.
Finally, I want to play CivWorld with some of my CivFanatics friends. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to do this yet.
Mechanics wise in this closed beta I find it difficult to move around the map of my city. I miss zooming in and out like in civ. But then again, I wonder why I have to move around so much on the map. It doesn't seem as though you need a large area to be productive. In fact it seems the more compact your city is the more productive it is. I do find I have to move around the map when I move all my houses around to cash in harvests. If I want to concentrate on science I move all the houses near the library, if I want gold I move them near the bank. Should we really have to do that?
The biggest problem with the game IMHO is the difficulty in figuring out how things actually work. I know I want the number associated with each citizen to be high (and of the correct type resource) when I cash in a harvest, but I can't figure out how resources are accumulated between harvests. I can't predict how many resources I'm going to have when I come back to the game so I can't plan so I don't really know what to focus on. Battles are confusing, teching is confusing, wonders are confusing. Of course there is a learning curve but that should be mitigated in this type of game where there are more experienced teammates to help each other. Teching is also confusing. It seems teammates pool their research efforts but a team can be working on several techs at once. I find it difficult to find out what is being worked on.
I agree the civ chat should be the default. There doesn't seem to be much interaction between team mates, at least in my game. Travian had a chat and a message system. I think CivWorld needs team messages as well. In Travian the team founder controlled who was allowed to send messages to the team. CivWorld could do something similar by allowing the king and ministers to send out team messages. Of course this might make the snowballing effect even worse by allowing larger teams to better coordinate their efforts.
I'm not at all sure about the goals of the game. THE winner will be one player, so what good are team era victories? There isn't a team victory? I'm not that interested in playing a game with 100 people when only one can win. I think there should be a system kinda like the GOTMs where different types of achievements are recognized. In Civ World the top farmers, workers, scientists, etc. could be recognized. I'm kinda wary about a scoring system based on just one type of score (fame) though I have no idea what all goes into calculating the fame score. Since this fb game seems to be designed to have a rather quick end perhaps a ranking system is needed where new games only accept players within a certain ranking. This would pit good players against good players and average players again average players making each game more competitive and hopefully more fun. As players get better their rankings rise and they would move up to play better players.
Finally, I want to play CivWorld with some of my CivFanatics friends. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to do this yet.
Hi Donsig!Speaking of BUGS :grr: I have been trying to send Donsig a chat message in-game for the last hour or so. But my keyboard isn't being recognized.. or something. I can't type, I can't use the directional keys in the maze minigame.
I've tried quitting the browser and reconnecting. Several times.
I've tried restarting the computer. Several times.
This has happened before, but it's never taken more than one or two re-loads to rectify. I'm not sure why it's different tonight.
In any event:
DONSIG - I'm in Game 135. You may be able to join. Connect to the app, then mouse over the window that has your face in it in the upper left corner. It will change to a throne icon. Click it, which brings you to your throne room. Then you may see an icon that looks like 3 chess pawns. That is your Game Screen. It will show you your current games and games that you're able to join. As of about 20 minutes ago 135 still had about 20 slots open.
If you find a civ you'd like to join just let me know either here or by PM
donsig
Low level intermediary
Darn it, I didn't see this earlier. I can only join 136 now. This system seems to make it tough for groups to join the same game. Also, the one game I can join has already begun. It's only in 1738 BC but it really seems as though you have to be in when a game starts if you want to be top dog. The later you enter the more difficult for you to catch up. It's like playing a civ game and settling your first city 10, 20 or 50 turns after everyone else. They should think about queueing up a few games, letting people sign up, then when all slots are filled send out an announcement saying this game will start in 24 hours. They could even let everyone make their initial builds before the game starts. The point is to get a full game started with everyone having an equal start. If they want to keep people (especially competitive CivFanatics types) playing over and over again then balance is very important.
I've gotten on, now... but I'm not sure how much/if I'll bother to do more. It seems to be a lot of "click the flashing icon", play the minigame and get X, put something here, put something there...
I guess I just don't see any strategy in it. Civ without strategy? Hmmm... maybe too early to pass judgement. Right now my initial judgment is "Tedious".
But how's it work with folks who drop out of a game and drop back in? Does it become strategic as you progress? Or is it just a matter of who can stand playing the most minigames?
I'm not enthusiastic about the game. But I suppose I'll probably try it a few more times just to see how it works in the later stages.
I guess I just don't see any strategy in it. Civ without strategy? Hmmm... maybe too early to pass judgement. Right now my initial judgment is "Tedious".
But how's it work with folks who drop out of a game and drop back in? Does it become strategic as you progress? Or is it just a matter of who can stand playing the most minigames?
I'm not enthusiastic about the game. But I suppose I'll probably try it a few more times just to see how it works in the later stages.
KrikkitTwo
Immortal
- Joined
- Apr 3, 2004
- Messages
- 12,418
Well to stop the snowballing, teams with more players or individuals with bigger cities can get happiness penalties
GambleFish
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2010
- Messages
- 67
That's not true, that's how individuals win games. Whoever has the most fame points wins at the end. I guess that isn't worth much, true, but fame points do have some purpose. Also if you win a contest you may be promoted to king, which helps win you more fame if you win eras, and gives you more votes.
GambleFish
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2010
- Messages
- 67
Yeah, TheDanish already corrected me.
Ach, my bad. I didn't read the thread. Obviously.
By the way I caved and joined Rome, shame eternal will be mine.
Similar threads
