Sid Meier on CNN.com

I was incredibly skeptical of CivWorld based on how things were handled with CivNetwork.

But now I'm intrigued!

The concept of managing a single city that's part of a larger regional network offers a lot of potential. And diplomacy will be extremely rich - the one aspect of the game that keeps me from playing single player (if CiV had better MP support I'd be playing that right now instead of my 5 concurrent games of cIV).

I worry about the potential for abuse with paying real money into the game. Smart play and efficient use of resources should be rewarded - not brute force gold farming or 12-hour straight gambling. But then again I'm not trying to monetize things on the facebooks.

I do wish, however, that the look and feel of CivWorld wasn't so cheap. I mean, it looks like a settlers of catan sort of thing.
 
It does look better than most Facebook games though. I think they used simplified graphics for the sake of performance, but that's just conjecture on my part. The purple mask image is almost directly from Civ Rev, as is the image of the male peasant. At least it's Civ-series art, I guess. I don't mind. XD
 
There's no reason to hope it will fail, other people may like it.

Do you remember adventure games? Flight simulators? Side-ways scrolling shooters? Computer RPGs with turn-based, tactical combat? They used to be thick like grass. These kind of games didn't practically disappear from the market because people no longer wanted to play them. They disappeared because there was more money to make from other types of games.

A lot of people like first-person-shooters or real-time strategy games. For me, though, the rise of the FPS and RTS are more important as the reason why the kind of games I like declined. I'd rather not see the rise of "Civ's more social, less geeky cousins" mark the decline of "real" Civilization games.

So, yes, I am hoping that Civ World will turn out not to be a success. Mind, I'm not hoping for that outcome out of spite, just plain, old self-interest.
 
Civ World does not need to be any threat to traditional Civ games. The player numbers for Civ V are strong on Steam which shows there's still a market there.

Flash games are a completely different kind of programming from traditional PC games, and there's no need to have to pick one over the other.
 
It's a game platform with a genuinely bad reputation

Intrigued by the concept.

Does that mean I can't invite the game platform home to meet my mom? Guess that's why she hasn't taken me up on that Lucky Train invitation yet.

Or is the game platform a bad influence on future generations. I really need to stop playing Backyard Monsters with my own little backyard monsters.

Or is it just that any game platform that popular, profitable and yet offered for free can't be up to any good?
 
Facebook games let you get advantages by spending extra cash. They spawned a massive backlash with the "rope your friends" in game style - to the point where Facebook had to add ways of blocking such invitations. And, in general, they feature ultra-simple and repetitive game mechanics. Those are all actual problems. Sarcasm aside, you have heard that people have pointed out problems with facebook games, no?

A good article (mostly focused on MMOs, but also including Facebook games) is

http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html

and another specific to Facebook games, which gets at the specifics of problems folks have with Civ World and the like, would be

http://www.cracked.com/article_18709_6-devious-ways-farmville-gets-people-hooked.html
 
Do you remember adventure games? Flight simulators? Side-ways scrolling shooters? Computer RPGs with turn-based, tactical combat? They used to be thick like grass. These kind of games didn't practically disappear from the market because people no longer wanted to play them. They disappeared because there was more money to make from other types of games.

A lot of people like first-person-shooters or real-time strategy games. For me, though, the rise of the FPS and RTS are more important as the reason why the kind of games I like declined. I'd rather not see the rise of "Civ's more social, less geeky cousins" mark the decline of "real" Civilization games.

So, yes, I am hoping that Civ World will turn out not to be a success. Mind, I'm not hoping for that outcome out of spite, just plain, old self-interest.

From what it Seems, Civ World will have a distinctly different market.

In Civilization, single player dominates. You manage an entire civilization, and have maybe a dozen opponents. Military wins eliminate civs. You proceed 100% at your own pace.

In CivWorld, Single player is not an option. You manage a city, and help to coordinate a civilization with ~199 other players. Military wins switch which team you are on. The game develops without you.


Civilization games may have a declining market, and they probably will stay fairly simplified (while hopefully retaining depth).
Complex mods will be available (Rhye's).
Multiplayer ease will probably drop.

But this new version will be good for the rapid type game play.
 
From what it Seems, Civ World will have a distinctly different market.
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Civilization games may have a declining market, and they probably will stay fairly simplified (while hopefully retaining depth).
<snip>
But this new version will be good for the rapid type game play.

I somewhat disagree with the above. I think too many people are looking at this as an Civ vs. Civ World, when it shouldn't be. I'm thinking that they went both the iphone game (Civ Rev) and now Facebook (Civ World) not as a means to enter a new market, but to help build their customer base. How many new players do you think Civ World is going to gain by going through Facebook? More importantly, how many of those are going to be curious enough to try out one of the PC/Mac versions?

For any who have tried Facebook, they know that friend invites are sent out massively, so I'm thinking 2K is using Facebook more as a "TV commercial" then turning to a new gaming platform.

This begs the question on what effect Civ Rev had on the Civ games.
 
Not a lot mind you. The opportunity was there so I decided to check it out. Mostly because I hate Civ 5 (haven't started a game since before Christmas) and I was desperate for any new Civ experience. Civ IV is still great but my friends and I have never had anything but huge problems getting it to work online for all these years.

My wife and daughters play Facebook games incessantly but they have never interested me. I agree that Civ World is way better than any Facebook game I've ever seen. But, unfortunately, that's not really saying much IMHO.

It's pretty dumbed down but you can definitely see Sid's mark on the game. It definitely has that one-more-turn feel to it even though it's not really turn-based. Now if we could just get him to turn his attention to Civ V and make it a game worth playing. :cry:

So, I find Civ World interesting. I have nothing against it. But I doubt I'll ever be playing it. Mainly because you have to team up with other players to really have a go at it and I have absolutely no interest in teaming up with a bunch of strangers. No one I know that I would want to play the game with will ever go anywhere near Facebook.

If Firaxis has decided to chase a larger market with Civ V and Civ World then I wish them luck, but they have lost me as a customer. I just hope some small game developer somewhere decides to jump in and fill the void for people like me instead of trying to make a bazillion dollars.

I feel I was duped out of $60 and I am very disappointed in what used to be my favorite game franchise. Ah well, they keep cancelling my favorite shows on TV too while the airways are filled with hours and hours of ridiculous reality crap. The public has been dumbed down. Those of us who want something more substantial are probably going to be niche market from now on. Expect to pay dearly for intelligent entertainment.
 
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