How well has your country been represented in game?

Moderator Action: This thread is supposed to be about how well your country is represented in the civ series. This thread is not about a fight to get it included nor is it about who deserves to in or out. Please come back to the topic at hand or this thread will be closed. Too much trolling going on here.
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Is anybody honestly expecting anything more than a shallow portrayal of their country? This is Civilization, not a Paradox game.

Sonereal said:

Is anybody honestly expecting anything more than a shallow portrayal of their country? This is Civilization, not a Paradox game.

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That is a mistake. All countries function the same in all Paradox's games just like in Civ, they just have different decisions and some smaller or bigger buffs. Besides even in their games not all countries are portrayed very well, many countries have simply been put in so called "generic" class.

On the thread topic.. well Serbia is not in-game so I cannot say anything. As for other civs some are better portrayed than others, simple as that.

Seeing as Hungary isn't in, I'll comment on America.

I voted okay.

Leader: Tired of seeing Lincoln and Washington as the only influential presidents in Civ. Would have much preferred Teddy Roosevelt perhaps.

UU 1: Minuteman is a decent choice.

UU 2: I think the B-17 wasn't the best choice and that they could have gone with something else, perhaps a UB along the lines of a National Park.

UA: Manifest Destiny is alright, and I like the cheaper tile purchases, but +1 sight seems less useful later in the game. I'd have liked something more akin to a "frontier" type bonus.

My parents are both from Malaysia, so I'm surprised that Kuala Lumpur and Malacca are both in as city-states. Kuala Lumpur is such a recent city, formed in the 1800s. I guess you can say the same for Singapore (I have relatives there too). I don't expect a Malay/Malaysia civ in the future, because of Indonesia . I rather have another civ from the Southeast Asian mainland instead (Vietnam, Khmer, Burma) or even the Philippines instead of Malaysia.

As for my ancestral homeland, no Hainan and Fujian (both provinces of the PRC) are represented in the Chinese city-lists, instead we have insignificant or rather minor Guangdong cities (Hurray for the Cantonese?)

THE INCAS

Leader: they used Pachacuti instead of the most common "Pachacutec" (slight difference) and i didn't even know it is supposed to be the first one so that's nice, and yes he's the more iconic leader the incas had, the one that started the empire, and the only one with a cool nickname; BUT i have a problem with his personality, if he was Atahualpa i would be fine with it (Atahualpa's cockyness got him captured by the spaniards) but when i think of Pachacuti i don't see him like that, someone that annexed so much land and people to his domains can't be like that; his leader screen is good, not awesome but good.

UU: they tried, incas didn't have something so representative as the jaguar warrior, and civ IV Quechua was something invented (what is this and why is it so strong against archers?), i don't like the slinger ingame, a stone is not gonna hurt as much as an arrow so it should have less power and you can't throw it far so it should have reduced range.... so it would suck, a Cumana would have been a better weapon for this unit, maybe if they could shoot and then runaway or throwing stones could be an addition to the normal warrior, something along the lines of the impi, maybe when being attacked.

UA: This one is nice, to live successfully in the mountains (and to conquer) was a great achievement and they managed to connect long distances with their roads(all the way from Quito to Cusco), although ingame it doesn't seem interesting at first glance and you need some experience to recognize it's power.

UI: Terrazas are awesome, a great invention to make those montains sustain farms, someting iconic and still in use today, also they are a terrain improvement and there aren't much of those so A++++ here

I was sad when vanilla came out and there were no Incas in it, but since they were in civ 4 i had hopes, and they finally came and they're awesome so i voted pretty good.

NeoNio said:

Leader: they used Pachacuti instead of the most common "Pachacutec"

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Pachacuti seems to be the common name in English sources , which is what Firaxis apparently defaults to. Pachacutec is used in the other language versions of civ at least, isn't it?

Beaver79 said:

I kind of like Paul Hogan as the leader of Australia. You know, Crocodile Dundee. When he declares war on you he could say that's not a knife, this is a knife and then DOW you. It would be awesome.

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I'd go to war with them as often as possible just to see this

As a Finn I'm quite pleased with it, makes sense that we are part of the Swedish empire and we still get an unique unit for it in the hakkapeliitta. Yeah they kinda suck but at least they exist.

My bigger complaint is with city names, I wish they had used the Swedish city names instead for consistency, since every city in Finland also has a Swedish name. For example Helsinki could be called Helsingfors instead. Also Turku (Åbo) should be higher on the city list than Helsinki since it was the Finnish capital city at the time of Gustavus Adolphus.

EulerMcE said:

Pachacuti seems to be the common name in English sources , which is what Firaxis apparently defaults to. Pachacutec is used in the other language versions of civ at least, isn't it?

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oh is that so? only version i've played is the english one, still i learned that "Pachacutec" is no accurate.

Bagi said:

As a Finn I'm quite pleased with it, makes sense that we are part of the Swedish empire and we still get an unique unit for it in the hakkapeliitta. Yeah they kinda suck but at least they exist.

My bigger complaint is with city names, I wish they had used the Swedish city names instead for consistency, since every city in Finland also has a Swedish name. For example Helsinki could be called Helsingfors instead. Also Turku (Åbo) should be higher on the city list than Helsinki since it was the Finnish capital city at the time of Gustavus Adolphus.

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Does it go the other way around? As in, what is the Finnish name for Stockholm?

seancolorado said:

Does it go the other way around? As in, what is the Finnish name for Stockholm?

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Google Translate says Tukholma. Also, I'm fairly sure there's another (athough presumably outdated) name for Stokholm in Swedish that the element Holmium was named after.

seancolorado said:

Does it go the other way around? As in, what is the Finnish name for Stockholm?

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Not really, Stockholm is called Tukholma, but other than that no major Swedish cities have a Finnish name as far as I know.

Finland does have a pretty big swedish-speaking minority and its compulsory to learn at high school level, but most of us are still really bad at it.

Förlåt, min svenska är inte så bra!

Bagi said:

Förlåt, min svenska är inte så bra!

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"Pardon, my Swedish is not that good" for those of us who don't speak Swedish. Like me, but I will speak fluent Swedish eventually.

Sir Parker II said:

I am also from America, and I am fine with both UUs and the UA, but I really don't like having George Washington as the leader. There were a lot better presidents. I like having FDR, like in Civ IV, or maybe Lincoln.

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Newly back on the forum, so late to the thread. I'm not American, but the B17 fits - not because the B17 was special, but because US military strength in the latter half of the 20th Century was exemplified by air power - an air UU suits the US better than anybody else, and is certainly a better choice than a slightly inferior tank like the Sherman.

If the US of the game is intended to be expansionist, the Minuteman doesn't fit at all - perhaps US cities should get a bonus to their garrison strength to reflect them, but minutemen were a defensive militia, and properly not a US unit since they were raised to fight the British for independence.

As for my country (England), it's another of those civs that gets the general themes right but doesn't execute them terribly well. It also suffers from a terrible voice actress and a misnamed UA ("Sun Never Sets" was a phrase used of the much later British Empire, on account of its territorial extent).

England has two UUs, one a ranged medieval unit, one a warship. This captures the essential English stereotypes, which are somewhat justified - England, and later Britain, genuinely did have a strong emphasis on training superior ranged soldiers, from the famous longbows through to the rifle drills of later centuries and as late as the artillery of the First World War (though in all of these, Britain's training and technology emphasised higher rates of fire than their rivals more than longer range).

The Ship of the Line is a characteristic ship of Britain's (not England's) era of naval dominance; despite the civ name, the British Empire is a major reason England's deserving of inclusion in the game, so I'm okay with representing it this way.

The UA is less fitting - England, as opposed to Britain, was not an especially notable naval power, and the one naval accomplishment of Elizabethan England, the defeat of the Spanish Armada, was not a result of England having a superior ability to cross oceans. A naval UU or a naval UA would have been sufficient, rather than both. And the free spy is a bit sad, actually - of everything they could choose to represent England, they chose a fictional character?

The one omission I feel is glaring is the absence of any reference in the civ to what is probably the single most important contribution the island has made to global civilization: the Industrial Revolution. It's not unfair to portray England as a militant civ, as the dual UU implies, but there would certainly have been scope for replacing one with a UB.

Note, Kubilai is another noteworthy name, but won't make a distinct difference.

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Kublai Khan would be more suitable as a leader for China than Mongolia, though.

It does seem like whenever the Celts are depicted they always focus on the "British" ones (not sure what else to call them) and Gaul doesn't get the same representation.

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I suspect the major reason the Celts are in Civ at all is that there's a large segment of the American population who identify with Scottish and Irish origins, so focusing on the Gauls would rather defeat the point. But even by the standards of Civ games, and given the lack of any historically coherent "Celtic" civilization to begin with, Civ V's treatment is dire. And that's before even tackling the manifold issues with the city list (few of which are actually Celtic).

Solidarity
Yeah... This one is... Um...
In sociological terms, Poland is an extremely underdeveloped country. Xenophoby and homophoby are not only widely accepted in Poland but views to the contrary are often met with open hostility, blatant verbal attacks, even with violence of late. It's also said, mostly by Poles themselves, that they prefer harm to their neighbor over their own gain.
There is no "solidarity" whatsoever in this country but there was "Solidarity"
Solidarity is a reference to labor union-national movement of the same name, and to Carnival of Solidarity: 2 years of pro-democratic actions ended by martial law introduced in December 1981. Carnival of Solidarity was the first rock that started the avalanche of democracy in Central/Eastern Europe. Why does it offer a free social policy? Don't ask me.

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The mechanic is only intended as a representation of the game's ideology system, hence taking its name from Solidarity. Ideological tenets are just social policies, so how to give a civ an ideological advantage? Extra social policies. But ideologies themselves are very late game - how to make a UA that's both linked to ideology and helps in the early game, since it doesn't make sense for a country as long-lived as Poland to have a UA that hits later than Brazil's? The Polish UA is the answer.

Indonesian here

The prologue, is way too bad.

Majapahit did not represented as a good Empire, what they said is just "the unifier, unifying the archipelago of modern Indonesia" and so on. It pisses me off

Pronunciation is bad, the worst part of the prologue. We did not use weak 'j' in our pronunciation. Gayah Mada and Mayapahit ? sounds awful. Hope Firaxis changed this

now the Civ itself

About the Leader, I got nothing to be complaint. Rice paddy, "Wringin Lawang", the gate that made of red bricks. And then Gajah Mada. Looks good, one of my favourite leader screen. (biased a bit hehe)


UA is good, while Indonesia is the seller of 70% nutmeg worldwide, Majapahit, as a trade civ, could use this resources as trade power. Too bad it's waay to hard to get it


UB again, is good. Even in the civilopedia, it's a gate, not a candi, ancient Hindu/Buddhist building always called a Candi. The effect is also good. No complaint

UU is the real problem. Keris/Kris, is used in war as last weapon because the warriors primarily fought with spear or mace or sword. Now it is used as accessory or ceremonial stuff. No such Keris produced that big. The costume design is from the Balinese warrior. And as you can see the size of the keris, the in-game one is oversized



for exchange, I said Bhayangkara / Bhayangkari might be suit to be unique unit, but since they used a lot of weapon (sword, bow and arrow and common weapon), maybe, they can put :

Bhayangkara with a Keris, both is symbol of Indonesia and Majapahit
or
Javanese Jong with a cannon called cetbang. Not powerful as the europans, but they regarded this as advanced technology too


the last but not least, is the city names.
they use the modern Indonesia one (Jakarta, Bandung, Surabaya) instead of Majapahit.

I understand this because not much city from Majapahit is known except Trowulan, the capital of Majapahit. But some province are known, here is the list I got from wikipedia since I'm not living in Java (I'm in Bali, the place of ancestors from Java when they fled because of Muslim's rise of power)

- Trowulan, Daha, Kahuripan, Tumapel, Pajang, Jagaraga, Kabalan, Keling, Kelinggapura, Kembang Jenar, Matahun, Singhapura, Tanjungpura, Wengker and Wirabhumi

the level of the city is only arranged from Trowulan to Kahuripan, the rest, I dunno XD

I rate Indonesia at B

1 question, why firaxis make so many cities when we are not building that alot ? I mean, 20 cities +/ civ ? I stuck at 6 cities in my last game.

that's all, sorry for ling reply

antaratma said:

- Trowulan, Daha, Kahuripan, Tumapel, Pajang, Jagaraga, Kabalan, Keling, Kelinggapura, Kembang Jenar, Matahun, Singhapura, Tanjungpura, Wengker and Wirabhumi

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The modern city list for Indonesia is my one big complaint about the civ.

I am yet to see in other cultures an entire war period romanticized to the point it becomes overused in modern culture and almost every citizen gets interested in it (Sengoku is the only thing that comes to my mind).

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The fetishisation of the American Civil War over here (I live in the US) shows the hallmarks of developing into the same sort of romanticised 'origin story' that China's Three Kingdoms period has become, but obviously is in a much earlier stage.

Worst of all, unlike, for example, Oda, Rammy's Thai is completely modern and the language the man himself used is completely different from ingame.

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He wasn't Thai, for a start. He probably spoke a language closer to Khmer.

Leader : Well, not that I don't like her, King John II, King Manuel I, or the Marquis of Pombal would have been much better choices (and certainly not Prince Henry the navigator : he has never been a leader, and the only battle he commanded, it was disastruous.

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A near-disaster - he did actually win, which mitigates it to some degree...

Certainly a genious naval engineer,

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This however is entirely a myth. There never was a naval academy created or sponsored by Henry the Navigator, as elaborated on in a recent interesting popular history of Portugal (it's called The Last Crusade: The Epic Voyages of Vasco de Gama, but de Gama is only the event around which the narrative is loosely framed - it covers pretty much the full period from Portuguese independence through to almost to the end of colonial Portugal).

UB (Ceilidh hall) is OK I guess. I like that there's at least some acknowledgement of a continuing Celtic culture past the Roman era.

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Well, all the cities seem to be post-Roman, and the Pictish warrior is medieval (yes, they're mentioned in Roman texts, but they're best-known from the era of William Wallace, stereotyped blue war paint and all) if that helps...

Camikaze said:

The 'two city-states' probably narrows it down somewhat.

Australia, for the record.

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You're Malaysian?

.it probably can't really be refuted that it is more "Anglo-Saxon" than Celtic....

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The major influence on Scottish culture was Norse (as reflected very recently in suggestions by some in the Scottish independence movement to align the putative nation with Scandinavia); this is, in fact, historically true also of most of northern England. "Anglo-Saxon" influence in England is a product of moderately recent (largely post-Civil War) centralisation of the country under a southern elite.

Canada has CN Tower, Australia has Opera House. *Hint* Are these the only wonders that are not represented by a Civ *yet*?

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Uffizi and Sistine Chapel are associated with city-states, Leaning Tower of Pisa is homeless in the game, as is Angkor Wat. And who counts as owning the International Space Station?

Norwegian ski infantry... uh.. I'm somewhat skeptical about this, rather have had a longship.

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Ski infantry is bad, but I have to give Firaxis credit for settling on a much more appropriate treatment of the longship than they could have - the UA + embarked unit graphic represents it ideally, as a fast troop transport. This was not a ship that engaged in boarding actions or naval battles, it took warriors long distances rapidly.

Brazilian here.

UA: well... it is... okay I gues... considering that other Civs in the game were even less lucky... but no one like stereotypes. If you had to point to the single biggest contribution Brazil does to the modern world, it would be our unbelievebly huge food production, not the Carnival. They could have made a UA similar to the Moroccan one, giving other civs food in trade routes with Brazil, and something like science or hammers (to counter the awful jungle starts!) to Brazil.

UU: Yes, they did some research, okay, I'll give you that. But saying that the Pracinhas were relevant in World War 2 is a bit of a stretch. They were few and they arrived just months before the end of the war. The Bandeirantes would be a more appropriate UU, imo. They were not exactly warriors (altought they were very violent), but they were literally Scouts, so there it is, easy to place in the game. A Scout that can act as a Settler after you research Civil Service or something like that (that is pretty much what they did).

UI: this one is pretty good. Nice touch to put the thing that gave the country its name. I understand that they wanted Brazil to be cultural and they wanted synergy, but if you had to make them more realistic, I would change the "culture after accoustics" (really, that makes no sense) to "science after scientific theory", to represent the new stuff that our scientists are finding all the time nowadays in the Amazon forest.

Leader: Pedro II is a perfect choice, any other leader would be lacking in comparison. The other contenders are Getulio Vargas, Juscelino Kubitschek and Pedro I, Pedro II's father. Getulio is really controversial, as many people noted, while Pedro II is widely loved by pretty much everyone. Juscelino is the guy who ordered Brasília to be built, which is pretty neat, but... that is all. Also, he had a very non-Brazilian surname, people could get confused . Pedro I is good, he is the guy who declared Brazil's indepence. Only problem: he was Portuguese, while his son was born in Brazil.
A shame they made such an awful choice of voice acting for such a good leader choice...

And one last thing, I have mixed feelings about the intro texts of Brazil and Portugal. They both speak too much of each other. It just sounds weird for a young Brazilian like me, because for the last 100~150 years, Portugal has had few relevance to Brazil. It is like the relation between USA and England.

Hiberno-Scottish mission and the Scottish Reformation seem to suggest a religious bent is not unfair. I suppose I should mention at least that Scottish Presbyterianism has a bit of a puritanical reputation in Ireland.

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Religion was very significant for the Scots - it was at the root of much of the conflict with the English, including the Second Civil War, and the bishops of the Scottish Kirk long had greater influence in Scotland than their English equivalents.

My parents are both from Malaysia, so I'm surprised that Kuala Lumpur and Malacca are both in as city-states.

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I read recently that SE Asia is the fastest-growing market for computer games; this was explicitly given by Firaxis as the major reason for adding Indonesia. I suspect that's the reason why there are so many SE Asian city-states, and probably also behind the choice to have a Siamese instead of a Khmer civ (Thailand is the largest consumer of computer games in the region, if I recall correctly).