Dislike the direction CIV5 is taking? Tell us how you'd do it!

Hormagaunt said:

I'll take choice 5, build a more complex game where complexity choices can be turned on and off.

Barbarians: None / Normal / Raging.
Religion: None / Simple / Complex.
Units per hex: None / 1 / 5 / Unlimited. (Option 1 = a very odd game.)
Diplomacy: None / Simple (forgets after 5 turns) / Normal (forgets after 50 turns) / Bitter (never forgets a slight)
Happiness: Off / Per city / Global.
Pollution: Off / Per city / Global.

Get the idea?

Obviously it would require more choices than the above, but the idea would be that the player could customize what was in and out. Want religious wars? Crank religion to the wall. Want fewer units? Limit to 1UpT. Want more complex ecology? Turn on pollution. Want ICS penalties? Turn on distance-based maintenance costs.

Start the game off simple with most of the above turned off. Give various "standard" bumps where a selection sets / clears a bunch of choices. Allow into the advanced section where everything can be turned on / off.

Modders will still be able to do their thing, adding maps, scenarios, new units, so on and so forth. This would be the stuff before modders' work is taken into account.

Option 5, definitely.

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dudedellrocks said:

I dont dislike the direction this game is taking if you dont like civ 5 just go back to civ 4 I mean if thats what you like better.

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Bibor said:

If you analyse Sid Meier's games you'll notice that complexity entered the company in form of Brian Reynolds and other developers. I'll start from Beginning:
Pirates! - average complexity game; developer - Sid Meier
Railroad tycoon - average complexity game; lead dev. - Sid Meier
Railroad tycoon 2 - more complex than RRT; lead dev. - PopTop
Civilization - average complexity game; lead dev. - Sid Meier
Civilizaition 2 - more complex than CIV1; lead devs. - Brian Reynolds, Jeff Briggs
Colonization - more complex than CIV1; dev. - Brian Reynolds
Alpha Centauri - most complex Firaxis game (at least in theory); dev. - Brian Reynolds
Civilization III - a bit less complex than SMAC; developers Jeff Briggs, Soren Johnson
Civilization IV - as complex as SMAC; lead dev. - Soren Johnson
C4: Colonization - basically a copy of original
Pirates! - basically a copy of original
Civilization: Revolution - average complexity game; lead dev. Sid Meier
Civilization V - average complexity game; lead dev. Shafer

Sid Meier, personally, always put entertainment over complexity. Even repeatativeness over complexity.

Sid didn't like where Reynolds was going with his designs so Reynolds quit. I don't know what happened with Briggs and Johnson but I guess the issue was the same. Why fire or bid farewell to someone who does exactly what you want?

We have a saying in Croatia, uhh translation goes something like "Why switch out a horse that's already winning the race?" Sid Meier obviously thinks gameyness and goofiness did more for his career than complexity and longevity.

I have my opinion on that and its not pretty. But surprisingly I like CIV5 very much. So sue me

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