So I got a pm this morning basically saying how stupid my civ selection for the next version is. Normally, I’d just ignore people like that but, well, here’s my completely unnecessary justification for my selection:
Canada, Austria, Poland: Popular request, simple as that. Many people messaged me in the past asking to add one of those in a future version.
Tupi: I wanted to add more native representation, I wanted to add more South American representation, I’m from Brazil myself, Colonization provided convenient art, leaderhead, sound, and XML files.
Akkad: I noticed many other mods just lumped them in with Sumer which you really shouldn’t do. I often check what civs are included or not included in other mods. Additionally, Akkad was significant as the Akkadian language became the lingua franca for trade in the ancient Fertile Crescent.
Vietnam: More Asian representation, additionally in Thomas War 2.1 I had Cham and Mali as really Cham/Vietnam Mali/Songhai. In 2.85 I split up the Mali and Songhai and redid the Cham units and building but in the process didn’t have time to include Vietnam. Basically, it was supposed to be in an earlier version.
Libu: I use Libu as a general term for the Berber nomadic ancient Libya. Not only were they allies of and/or part of the Sea Peoples invasion of Egypt, they have a long standing significant military history with Egypt (see the Merneptah Stele / Israel Stele). I didn’t name it Libya or Maghreb as they are culturally distinct being Northern Africa pre Greek and Phoenician colonization.
Kongo: I wanted to add more representation to mid Africa. The unit, building, leader I had in mind all fit with the Kingdom of Kongo as opposed to Congo in general. Additionally, although not in Colonization, the Kingdom of Kongo was significant to Portuguese colonization, the later slave trade, and Colonization left me in a mood for that era.
Gran Colombia: I wanted to add Gran Colombia mainly because a lot of other mods already had Venezuela and Colombia civs. Additionally, Civ Gold which has a Bolivarian civ really had a unit and then a Colombian (or Chilean I forget) that has nothing to do with Gran Colombia – which was a very short lived specific yet significant ‘empire.’ So I wanted to add an actual Gran Colombia with a specific Gran Colombian building and unit.
Nouvelle France: Why Nouvelle France and Canada? Well Colonization had 2 New French leaders that really wouldn’t work anywhere else. I couldn’t add them to France (as my France already has 4 leaders and I don’t want to have more than 4 leaders per civ) and I know several Canadians that would kill me if I added them to Canada. Since I wanted to use all the Colonization leaderheads and Colonization provided easy asset and XML files, it got in.
Geographically, that’s 2 from North America, 2 from South America, 2 from Africa, 2 from Europe, 1 from Asia, 1 from the Middle East.
Chronologically, that’s 4 states that still exits in modern times, 3 colonial era civs, 2 ancient civs, and 1 native civ.
I thought it was a pretty diverse and interesting mix.
Keep in mind, I’m adding a total of around 30 leaders so a lot of the old civs are getting new leaders as well.