Civilization 5 Rants Thread

Your moaning about how good FFX was and the only positive thing you can name is that it had turn based combat and that it was released on a far less iconic game system? Nice argument bro.

And by all means, repeat my words if you can't think of any of your own.
As you clearly did not bother to actually read anything beyond the 2 sentences you where replying to let me just repeat, FFX gameplay is fine, the story and the entire feel of the game is terrible, the storyline is a complete mess, the characters are juvenile, angsty or downright ******ed and the game feels like it's made for children.

The simple fact that you call your own terrible game overcommercialized crap already says enough, noone can deny that FFX is mindless, even you know this, but with a game like FFVI there is actual depth, characters that don't feel like paper cutouts, genuinly emotional moments, and most importantly, it's not all set in a Jar Jar-esque world where everyone's a surfer and the colors make it look like we're watching Spongebob, not to imagine the terrible idea of making a good part of the game revolve around Drownball, one of the dumbest sports and mechanics ever invented by Square.

Your post seems to imply the only thing you care about is gameplay and graphics (the Playstation was by most seen as a pretty bad console due to the transitional time that game makers needed to adjust to the 3d environment, hence FFVII looking terrible and there being very little iconic PSX games that made use of the 3d beyond pure graphics) in this case I can completely understand how you can like FFX, if you ever start caring for a storyline, play FFVI and be amazed at what you missed.

Anyway, a little rant on my recent experiences with immortal.

For a freaking year or so, practically every game I play I get DoW'ed like crazy, it seemed completely impossible to actually have a diplomatic relationship, and now, the first immortal game I play I spawn next to Kamehameha and Washington and they both want peace with me while warring amongst themselves?
This is completely unprecedented for me so I figure I'd let them war and other civs war for a bit, getting a good amount of hatred for eachother so I can create some meaningfull alliances that hopefully will at least last for the duration of a single war.

So I declare on Washington and the computer emediatly sees me as super Hitler, cascade of denouncements the turn after and Polynesia and the Danes (who are in northern Asia, I spawned South Africa) declare war on me, all my good trading opportunities shot to hell and everyone on Eurasia being hostile, or in one case, guarded.

Why does the AI not give a damn when they themselves do some standard warring but when I go for my first DoW I suddenly become a threat to the entire globe, uniting once bitter rivals to destroy me the moment I as much as look funny at their lands.

Thank god the AI is still terrible enough at combat for diplomacy to really matter, at this point the only way I can see me finishing this game is by actually roleplaying super Hitler and burning my way across the globe.

And as far as not playing this game to make sure they know we think it sucks goes, I don't play this game fanatically anyway, generally a couple of games every couple of months to see if there's any improvements or lasting value to be found, neither have been successfull, and I suspect that after this immortall game it will start to collect dust on my harddrive again.

Bottomline is that much like other franchises like Final Fantasy or Star Wars, complexity and depth get cut for shorter production cycles and mass appeal ( on a related note, George Lucas retired today, specifically because people hated pretty much anything he's recently done, a victory for complaining).

Yesterday I managed to crash the game twice around turn 150-200, which I find just hilarious, I can play SC2 or Rage (terrible game btw, but very pretty) while running a stream on my second monitor in 1900x1200 but playing CiV in 1280x1040 is too much to ask?

Derpy Hooves said:

Your moaning about how good FFX was and the only positive thing you can name is that it had turn based combat and that it was released on a far less iconic game system? Nice argument bro.

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It would be even nicer if you had gotten the point. I can call anything I want bland, overcommercialized crap without having to prove a thing. Here, let me show you:

And by all means, repeat my words if you can't think of any of your own.

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You missed the point. Your words are such a perfect example that any attempt to approve upon them would be a sheer waste of time.

As you clearly did not bother to actually read anything beyond the 2 sentences you where replying to let me just repeat, FFVI gameplay is fine, the story and the entire feel of the game is terrible, the storyline is a complete mess, the characters are juvenile, angsty or downright ******ed and the game feels like it's made for children.

The simple fact that you call your own terrible game overcommercialized crap already says enough, noone can deny that FFVI is mindless, even you know this, but with a game like FFX there is actual depth, characters that don't feel like paper cutouts, genuinly emotional moments, and most importantly, it's not all set in a Jar Jar-esque world where everyone's a surfer and the colors make it look like we're watching Spongebob

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See how easy it is? I provided all the evidence you did. You post opinions as though they're undeniable facts when they're nothing of the sort.

Your post seems to imply the only thing you care about is gameplay and graphics (the Playstation was by most seen as a pretty bad console due to the transitional time that game makers needed to adjust to the 3d environment, hence FFVII looking terrible and there being very little iconic PSX games that made use of the 3d beyond pure graphics) in this case I can completely understand how you can like FFX, if you ever start caring for a storyline, play FFVI and be amazed at what you missed.

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No, my post was meant to show that you can call anything bland, overcommercialized crap simply because it doesn't suit your taste. If you ever start caring about a storyline, you wouldn't be playing console games at all, as Torment has beaten them hands down. (Again, see how easy this is to do, no matter what you're talking about?)

Here I should note that the game fell apart piece by piece, with Final Fantasy VII they destroyed the story, the first brooding emo protagonist was introduced, Cloud and they turned the main villain into one as well, Sephiroth, what many people call the best villain.

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If that's all you got out of the story and the characters, I personally will not blame the story.

About all some people have gotten out of Civ 5 is that there are hexes instead of squares, but I'm not going to blame Civ 5 for that shoddy over-generalization, either.

The only thing I see is a kid trying to prove his point with generalized statements without knowing anything about the stuff he's talking about.
By changing out titles and not the arguments you make them irrelevant, it's like saying a Wagnerian opera is just as formulaic and dumb as a Britney Spears song, it only makes you sound stupid while showing you know nothing about Opera, Wagner, music in general and the general concencus about music.


At this point it's obvious you havn't actuall played FFVI or any of what is considered to be the good part of the series, it's understandable as it's fairly old but if you want to discuss these things you should at least have a basic knowledge of the series, it's history and the features that turn it into a great one.

And the example of console games being bad for storyline is absolutely terrible, not that you'd know, as. you know nothing about the subject matter, but FFVI was released in 1994, that's 4 years before the first Infinity engine, the 2d wonder that ran the Baldurs Gate games, Planescape Torment and a couple others that where the first actually fun computer RPG's, the RPG system until that point was always on a console because it was the only system capable of running it.
The idea that the pc was the gaming console is purely based on fantastic Black Isle games, and in 1998, when they became relevant and since then this has certainly been the case, but not about the period of games wwre talking about.

If you want to actually have a discussion about the FF games we can do that, but I'm not entertaining your
nonsense notions of "I know my own preffered game is terrible and therefore so must other peoples be.".
As you must realize by now such a notion only leads to the complete degradation of any quality as X must always be as bad as Y because it's based on opinions, might as well eat popcorn instead of steak and play FFX instead of VI right?

All right, this will be as cool as I know how to make it:

There was no argument.
I'm a teacher. The persuasive writing done here would have likely earned a failing grade.

The idea that a story about finding crystals to save the world is inherently superior or even conflicting with a story with an emo brooding protagonist is incorrect.

The idea that only the middle of a commercial product managed to avoid being commercialized is fallacious.

There is a world of difference between the statements
"One unit per hex makes Civ 5 a piece of crap; previous games had squares, which meant they weren't bland and commercialized"
and
"One unit per hex leads to an awkward interface and longer overall combat, which I feel diminishes the gameplay to the point of unplayability. Because in previous Civ games, the aspects of warring were most enjoyable to me, I feel that the series has gone downhill, and for me this seems bland."

It is very easy to believe that people must have the exact same opinions you do or else there is something wrong with them, their tastes, or their worldview, but this is not the case, as you can never be sure that anybody shares your opinions or worldview, even when they agree with you on a particular point. But it is categorically impossible to tout the undeniability of anything that is a purely subjective view.

Moderator Action: Stay on topic please.

Bandobras Took said:

The persuasive writing done here would have likely earned a failing grade

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It definitely would in the writing class I teach. But then again, a thesis that argues that "finding crystals to save the world is inherently superior [to] ... a story with an emo brooding protagonist" would for sure get my interest .

Your argument is still completely flawed, opinions might be there but there is such a thing as quality.

FFX is just a game with an absolutely horrific storyline, even fans of the game I talked to admitted this or simply said they didn't really remember, if your a teacher I find it hard to image you hadn't noticed this, FFVI might have a some crystals but there is a very rich characterization, a antagonist that isn't a cardboard cutout and the twist in the middle was fantastically constructed and is even still compared to RPG's of the day.

I'll stop now, I could go on but if you really want to actually discuss the finer points of both games, PM me or make a seperate thread in a part of the forum where this kind of discussion is allowed. As it stands I don't actually believe you played the games, have any idea what your talking about, and just trying to antagonize purely for the sake of.

Please do not derail the RANTS thread. All of you who, like me, are highly dissatisfied with the latest iteration, please remember that soon enough this thread will be a harsh testament of the quality of the product. Do not respond to provocations clearly aimed to derail it. As the mods said, please stay on topic. Ignore the derailers.

Derpy Hooves said:

Your argument is still completely flawed, opinions might be there but there is such a thing as quality.

FFX is just a game with an absolutely horrific storyline, even fans of the game I talked to admitted this or simply said they didn't really remember, if your a teacher I find it hard to image you hadn't noticed this, FFVI might have a some crystals but there is a very rich characterization, a antagonist that isn't a cardboard cutout and the twist in the middle was fantastically constructed and is even still compared to RPG's of the day.

I'll stop now, I could go on but if you really want to actually discuss the finer points of both games, PM me or make a seperate thread in a part of the forum where this kind of discussion is allowed. As it stands I don't actually believe you played the games, have any idea what your talking about, and just trying to antagonize purely for the sake of.

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FFX has a flawed storyline? I do not agree with that. Actually it is my favorite FF game. Now if you were talking about XII, I could see your point. I thought FFVII was better than FFVI. So my favorites were FFVII, VIII, and X

It sounds like CiV is off the hook right now, how did the conversation sway all the way, somehow on God's green earth to Final Fantasy??? !

Well, how it started was me making statements comparing CiV to FFX and the Revenge of the Sith, figuring noone could be as tasteless as to actually defend these monstrosoties, much like with CiV, I was wrong.

Anyway, if we wanna discuss Final Fantasy or Star Wars we can make proper threads for them in the games section of the forum or something, which I would be glad to participate in if I'm still even here, but I'll get to that later, let's get this thread back on topic.

As defenders of the series might have noticed, I've not been prosecuting their opinions much last week.

While playing my first immortal game I started noticing an increase in tedium, civs dislike you much more and single you out more severely then the other difficulties, while conquering was still easy, the inability to sell spoils for a decent price and the higher tech and unit numbers made me waste even more time to get to my intended goal
And then I asked myself if I was actually enjoying this game, and I couldn't say yes, I'd danced this dance too many times before, the only reason I was still playing was because then I'd "Achieved" the ability to beat immortal, to prove to myself and the internet that I was good at this and get the ego reward of superiority.

And after formulating it like that you can't just go on, I felt no more desire to continue playing, the game gave me no more enjoyment, even those little bastions of joy, like placing your first cities or meeting the first few civs just seemed dead after having repeated it far too often.
The game was not entertaining me, just my drive for perfection and bettering myself, and instead of wasting that time on a dead end effort I figured I should throw it into something constructive.

As such I havn't played recently and I doubt I will within the next few months, and even then only if some structural improvements have been made, be it through mods or Firaxis (yeah right).

As such I expect my posts to start declining, I might go for an occasional rant if I got nothing better to do at work(like now) but because I'm not playing anymore their relevance and my motivation for writing them will wane.

This ia my vicious cycle of CiV, get interested by potential, try see if the potential has been obtained, a process that which due a games length takes a while, dissapointment, hoping to make it work via mods or special tactics, give up.

This is the end of my cycle, ofcourse the forums help in solidifying the idea that the current Firaxis studio is run by a bunch of crooks that long ago fired anyone with any talent, but this always happens.
Where a good game will have me wanting for more at the end, CiV leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth and an aura of disbelief "Can a game which a lineage like this really be this bad?".

Derpy Hooves said:

While playing my first immortal game I started noticing an increase in tedium, civs dislike you much more and single you out more severely then the other difficulties, while conquering was still easy, the inability to sell spoils for a decent price and the higher tech and unit numbers made me waste even more time to get to my intended goal
And then I asked myself if I was actually enjoying this game, and I couldn't say yes, I'd danced this dance too many times before, the only reason I was still playing was because then I'd "Achieved" the ability to beat immortal, to prove to myself and the internet that I was good at this and get the ego reward of superiority.

And after formulating it like that you can't just go on, I felt no more desire to continue playing, the game gave me no more enjoyment, even those little bastions of joy, like placing your first cities or meeting the first few civs just seemed dead after having repeated it far too often.
The game was not entertaining me, just my drive for perfection and bettering myself, and instead of wasting that time on a dead end effort I figured I should throw it into something constructive.

As such I havn't played recently and I doubt I will within the next few months, and even then only if some structural improvements have been made, be it through mods or Firaxis (yeah right).

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Well derpy I agree with you totally. The game is more frustrating to me than fun. I have been waiting patiently for them to fix issues. In the meantime its total war games for me. Take care.

I bought this game on the pretext of it being "the most moddable civ game ever". Love how 16 months after release it's still nowhere near as mod-friendly as Civ4 was.

As a fan of Civ 5's basic engine, there's one big beef I have:

The achievements for Civ 5 are inexcusably dumb. I would make a better list au gratis if Firaxis asked me (I wouldn't program them in though). 90% of the achievements are pure 'whoring': "do X thing that requires no skill but you have to go out of your way to do". You know, that's fine how they wanted you to explore all the things you can do, except so many of those achievements are 'do it X times'. Build 100 of this, build 100 of that.

For the non-'whoring' ones, most of them can be done on Settler difficulty anyway. So... no challenge for anyone willing to go out of their way for them. The only achievements that require any real skill that I can think of are the difficulty level achievements, and even then, there should be "default settings" versions of those ones. As it is, you read an FAQ, see which settings to cook, follow a build order, and have a much easier time with them (though Deity wouldn't be a pushover anyway).

Now if someone wants to go out of their way to earn achievements, more power to them, but it's supposed to be used to gauge how good someone has gotten at the game (and a few that help the player learn new things). "Hey man, I saw you got X achievement. Good job, I always get my ass kicked trying to do that one". How many like that are in Civ? Look at Bastion for example. "Beat X sidequest. Beat X sidequest with 5 difficulty modifiers on. Beat X sidequest with all difficulty modifiers on". That's the way to do it. Sure, leveling-up and finding stuff will help you in that game, but only so much. in Civ 5, anyone with patience and the drive to earn achievements can get most of them with very little strategic thinking.

Then again, who plays Civ 5 without mods anyway?

P.S. FF13 rules.

Sync said:

I bought this game on the pretext of it being "the most moddable civ game ever". Love how 16 months after release it's still nowhere near as mod-friendly as Civ4 was.

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"Yeah, but we have a mod portal! Sure, any mod that does anything useful *cough*NiGHTS*cough* can't use it, but still!"

I've never like the wonder race system. In my mind, there needs to be a way to simply progress towards building an "unknown wonder" and choosing it when you get enough build points like Colonization. If you don't get the wonder you want, you can pick up another one instead, instead of getting gold (that may or may not be valuable to you).

Great game, the Baldur Gate series. I wonder if there is a similar thread somewhere ranting over the new Dragon Age series as not being an acceptable replacement. I see similarities here..

Both series lost content in more than one area to support one or more technologies.

Are there any forums where the developers actively participate? Because they seem oblivious to all of these rants. I just saw a tidbit from Sid that he did, on Wired I think, and of course he touts CiV as the greatest thing yet.

blasto said:

Are there any forums where the developers actively participate? Because they seem oblivious to all of these rants. I just saw a tidbit from Sid that he did, on Wired I think, and of course he touts CiV as the greatest thing yet.

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Dennis Shirk's last post on CFC was a little over five hours ago. Here. He's even posted in this thread.

Well, I think it is really encouraging that the developers are reading our threads and commenting. It means that what we say here is at least being heard.

As far as V being the greatest thing yet...my understanding is that in many ways it is...in terms of the game engine and how the AI makes decisions. It is not surprising that it needs more work. We can alll think of combat and diplomacy. But here are my big rants.......
1) It does still feel incomplete...when i finish a wonder or win the game i would like a bit more then just a screen...sorry, but my games usually takes weeks to finish since my time is limited.
2) more tech's and wonders. I still look at the tree and see it as unfinished.
3) Combat...it could be better, this is true (although i never see ranged units leading unless i have killed everything else). and i understand the combat idea I proposed in another thread would take a lot of programming...I'm an engineer, not a programmer but i have done some programming, and I think what i proposed would add a couple thousand lines of code to implement. So go easy on the developers, it is quite a challenge to program these games...that is why not everyone can do it
4) Diplomacy some options need to be added to get the computer controlled players to like you again and enough with the backstabbing...or at least they should face consequences for it in the world. It would be nice to see major alliances formed again...it was fun in IV to go to war with 1/2 the world with he other 1/2 on your side (again, i have to say i like the idea of the major changes they did on engine of it all).
5) I would like to advisers to actually advise us on some real things. for example, when RA is about to finish, it would be nice for the science adviser to mention it. Or diplomat to give some warning on how relations are going......maybe like "you should try trading spices with Gandhi, it would make Delhi have a 'We love the king day' and would increase relations with him." you know...like they would give us advice

Civ5 on SP does have many problems. The enemy AI isn't very aggressive or cunning. Diplomacy is reduced to taunting and luxury trading.. its of no use otherwise. The User interface is cluttered, and most of the infographics seem to have been made more complex than in previous games. For example, I often find myself wondering who is allied with who and what deals do they have with each other... finding that info is part guess and part piece together the puzzle. I don't remember if it was civ II or III that had the relationship web but that was a much better way of organizing that data IMO.

While I do like the empire wide happiness vs.individual city happiness during war I find.myself jumping around.cities.looking frantically trying to find one that doesn't have a happiness building in order to not suffer the 33% hit in combat. Again I like empire Wide happiness but managing it can be a pain esp. During MP matches.where quick attack is important.

The graphics aren't good enough or really even needed to justify the heavy tax on my Cpu and Gpu. my guess is civ 4 is just programmed better as it is so less taxing its like night or day and the graphics aren't that different.

Turning off battle animations should be available during game play and the option before game should be remembered and retained until changed again.

I don't miss revolting cities, founder of religion being able to see in my cities, I don't miss needing a hospital to go beyond 13 citizens, I don't miss culture flipping, I don't miss the pyramids giving you access to all government types, I don't miss government types. I don't miss turns of anarchy, I don't miss not being able to automate explorers or workers, I don't miss seeing and dealing with every tile on the map.containing a railroad, I don't miss having to build transports to move 7 troops at a time across the English channel. I don't miss having 500 fanatics fortified around everyones cities so they can move, improve or grow and Ithe number 1 thing I don't miss is unit stacking and how it was the only way you could battle. If you wanted to defend a city better stack 50 units in the city and hope the enemy didn't bring 100 to the tile infront of you. That is the biggest thing I don't miss, and the reason I wont look back when it comes to civ.

Combat has become so much more realistic and strategic while most of the micromanagement has been streamlined and eliminated. Actually bottle necking a enemy and bombarding it with artillery is a valid and effective military strategy in real life and is just as effective in civ. Using Terrain to your advantage can even the odds and smaller forces can defend against larger ones its great! Esp. In MP games. Combat is where civ 5 shines above all the rest and in MP this makes the game very enjoyable. Even if you don't want to war monger, you might have to fight off one in your quest for a space or diplomatic victory. You may have to protect city.States to count on their votes later on, and if someone takes your capital you better not take the last players capital or its game over. This adds a.layer of complexity and increases player interaction while at the same time forcing.g you to engage in these as well as thinking about and solving these problems.

The great wonder pentalty is.good because you now need to ask is it worth it? Is it? Not just well ill production stack because statue of liberty will be.open in 20 turns and ill switch to that. Nope its great the consaquences for attempting a great wonder and.failing are finally equal to the benefit for completing it.

While ill agree its not a.perfect game, I do feel its the best of the.series thus far because its not just the same old civ with better graphics, different wonder bonuses and a few less annoying things. I was growing tired of civ when 4 came out after.playing since civ 1 I'm glad they got rid of religion kept a civic system and changed combat finally, it makes the.game feel fresh and new again.

Everyong who doesn't like it, you can still play the.older ones and do your thing.. many of the.complaints ive read were also leveled at the first 3 games.. there.were many annoying quirks about those.. but I think its going in the right direction.and using steam.for.MP was a a good move, its never been easier to connect and play against a human where.many of the AI problems don't exist.

EDIT I do miss being able.to burn any.city.to the ground. I know it doesn't make sense.for combat in this game, but pulling back and burning cities so enemy.couldn't use them as bases.to heal troops.was always.a.satisfying strat in previous games... typed on a kindle sorry for.formatting errors or typos.

Played 50 hours of civ 5. All I can say is that, albeit a pretty game, it's not solid enough for being a good civ game, in my humble opinion.

The game appears unbalanced, with an AI that is clearly stupid, and no match even at highest levels. The strategic management is nearly absent, overly simplified for a CIV game (but I see that most enthusiasts appreciates this simplification, perhaps they simply don't like all the management fun that made great the CIV serie).

My thought is that CIV 5 is not a 4x game. This is a tactical war simulator with beautiful graphics, but a very poor AI, intended above all for noobs of strategic games.

All the strategic aspects seems to have been neglected, or striped out, causing a boring experience for the expert players that have no fun to happily slaughter an helpless AI.

Furthermore, the game appears to suffer still too much bugs and random crashes that spoils the fun (On a very stable W7 system, with a powerful pc and graphic card, and updated drivers).

I will wait and see what happens, but I'm not so confident in Firaxis anymore, after more than a year...