WWII Pacific side -- What happened to history?

Dale, the Chinese Civil War was basically on hold between 1937 and 1945, with Mao taking control between 1946 and 1949. So Chiang Kai Shek should be the leader, as 1936 is just at the end of the Long March when Mao controlled a tiny bit of mountainous land in northwestern China.

True, it is a game, and I also appreciate that people can spend time to make something better than I possibly could. I'm not posting to downgrade the efforts of the modders, but to point a major historical inaccuracy in a mod that simulates an important part of history.

Dale said:

My decision was based on two things:

- Communist China did actually win the civil war; and
- I had to keep the number of civs down (in the official release anyways).

Not mistake / lack of knowledge.

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As for that, yes, China did win the civil war, but after the timeframe of the scenario. By that logic, having "Russia" with the Russian Federation flag as a civilization would be equally acceptable, as the Soviet Union collapsed after the war like the Republic of China's control over the mainland. Yes, it happened a few decades later, but for the sake of analogy, neither the Russian Federation or People's Republic of China existed during the war.

And for number of civs, it'd still be just China... it's not like it was totally regionally split like America was. Also, Mao's forces were only guerilla forces (as previously mentioned) temporarily allied with Chiang while the Nationalists did the bulk of the fighting, so their contribution to the scenario would be insignificant.

Portrait-wise, a stache-less and slightly recolored Stalin would work for Chiang, similar to what was done for the other leaders.

Zhahz:

Good call on the Sid quote. I gotta remember that one.

BlackJAC:

To be honest, if the only faults folks can find with the mod are "Hitler" and "Mao" and "plane models" then I'm happy.

I find it totally ironic that there's over 1000 posts (CFC & Poly) about leaders, but not one post on the spy bug which renders spy missions impossible.

Dom Pedro:

It was confusing. We didn't do Chinese history at school, and Wiki kept pointing out his name (which as I knew is backwards in Chinese) as "Mao Zedong". It's a simple mistake to make considering we ALWAYS refer to the second name.

RB & Shiggs:

If you need historical accuracy to enjoy a game, then what the hell are you playing Civ for? It abstracts / modifies history so much its not even funny! Seriously, if you want pure historical accuracy (over fun gameplay) go play "Making History: The Calm & the Storm".

TO EVERYONE ELSE:

Please note the following:

1. Remember, RtW was NOT a community mod. RtW is an official mod with Firaxis - Take 2's names on it. As designer, I was only one link in the chain. To that end, I had to work together with a number of other entities to ensure the mod was acceptable to the whole world.

2. As RtW stood at one point during development, there was 200 megs of leader graphics, 200 megs of unit models, and 200 megs of videos. That's 600 megs just for artwork. I HAD to cut it down. Hence, the videos were dropped and unit models were combined to cut the number of different models used.

3. Gameplay versus History. Always an interesting debate. Purists want history, and the average Joe wants gameplay. I wanted to target as many people as possible, and allow for a fun game in the WW2 environment. I believe I have achieved that. Consequently some elements of history were changed to fit the fun gameplay goal. If you want pure history, go play Hearts of Iron or Making History: The Calm & the Storm. If you want a fun game that simulates WW2, then play RtW.

I will comment no further on any of these issues. Please keep an eye on the RtW Forum: http://forums.civfanatics.com/forumdisplay.php?f=265 and the RtW Website: http://rtw.apolyton.net. I am currently working on an add-on which will enhance the historical side of the mod.

Thanks
Dale

I'm not going to put Dale down, and as someone said (as well as Dale himself) he knows better.

If he had to keep the civs down, and didn't want to deal with a static leaderhead or flag I can understand to a significant degree, and move on and enjoy the scenario. Maybe I'll just play as Japan and conquer them?

I'd love to see a later version with the two sides, and being able to play them off each other (as Japan) or as the Allies try helping one (Mao if Russia, nationalists as England/America) over the other while still getting them to fight Japan more. I can understand how it'd be hard to do, and the harder deadline when including it in a release as opposed to a "private mod" like on this website.

I might change the flag, for personal aesthetics, as that's my only true small gripe... I can understand not using a new leaderhead and having a unified China... but I'd rather have just "China" and the correct flag if you're creating a new flag. Personal taste as I said.

Nonetheless, it won't reduce my fun in the mod.As I said, if I am focusing on the Pacific I'm either conquering China as Japan or fighting Japan as America ;-)

This will be one of the first two mods I play as well.

Good work Dale, must've been hard. Besides my personal tastes won't always agree with yours so I look for how it plays.

I am really looking forward to the addon and hopefully future scenarios/more UUs for RtW, but its plenty of fun as is.. people really take this stuff too seriously.

Please fix the spies, though ^^

Coming from a VERY BIASED background - grew up in Taiwan and trust me, they brain wash you on this bit of WW2 history, I have to agree with the "just a game" idea.

Personally I would be hard-pushed to think Firaxis would even include this scenario in the Chinese version of the pack if it is ever released officially there(and that's a big IF), given the official vanilla version released there the leaders Mao, Qin Shihuang were completely wiped out, and Mongolia and Japan were no where to be seen, I won't be surprised if Firaxis will just skipped the whole thing for political convenience.

Let's not turn this into another Charlemagne thread about the historical accuracy of the holy roman empire.

BlackJAC said:

Here's a novelty...

Lets just enjoy Civ for what it is - A GAME????????

It seems some people on here are all too quick to pass judgement when it comes to criticising the work and effort of others.

Like I said, others have obviously spent a considerable amount of their own time and effort to enhance an already great game. So what, it's not historically accurate, it doesn't claim to be, so rather than whining about irrelevant details, why don't you do your own 100% historically accurate mod? No? I thought not, as some people prefer to complain/whine endlessly rather than being productive themselves.

Dale, whenever you have dealings with the general public there will always be those that like nothing better than to pick holes in what you do, so I wouldn't take it to heart. It's what we humans do.

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Dale I don't need historical accuracy to enjoy it, but it does add to the flavor having a scenario which is based off history to be correct. You did a great job and I really dont want to be a complainer, just a few small things needed adjusted. Please don't take suggestive criticism offensive, it is part of creating something and putting it out to the public. Obviously not everyone is gonna be happy, but you should know your contributions here are great, if not invaluable.

Thanks

Shiggs713 said:

Dale I don't need historical accuracy to enjoy it, but it does add to the flavor having a scenario which is based off history to be correct. You did a great job and I really dont want to be a complainer, just a few small things needed adjusted. Please don't take suggestive criticism offensive, it is part of creating something and putting it out to the public. Obviously not everyone is gonna be happy, but you should know your contributions here are great, if not invaluable.

Thanks

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Seriously no offense taken. Like I said above, if leaders are the only things people are talking about, then I'm happy.

As I've said previously, (even in the intro text to RtW) that the add-on will fix things in many ways. That's the beauty of after-release changes. There's no legal department, no "official stances", no disc-limits, and no "minimum spec" criteria.

EDIT: And HoI / Making History are great games, jam-packed full of history. (Just more scripted than fun).

I'm glad to hear it's still being added to!

If that's the case, then I give a major thumbs up. Just like the main game itself, it's something to be built on... and it sounds like a strong foundation!

Any advice on a good civ to play to get the feel of it?

I believe Hearts of Iron II was banned in the PRC because they felt it underplayed Mao.

Depravo said:

I believe Hearts of Iron II was banned in the PRC because they felt it underplayed Mao.

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You can't win, can you? Somebody is always offended.

I think this is why the Geico commericals (where the cavemen get offended) are the most popular commercials on TV here in the US right now.

Breunor

I'm not going to fault Dale for this or anything else, because I don't think a lot of casual players understand just how much work goes into making even a simple scenario these days. Kudos to Dale for making it and doing a fine job overall.

Now, on topic, Chairman Zedong, seriously? I'm still one of those old-types who prefers Tse-tung, but I guess that's just me... at any rate, it seems really odd not to have Kai-shek in the game. But whatever. To me this just proves how modern PC people often behave stupidly (not you Dale) when it comes to issues like this.

The Pacific always gets the short end of the stick in just about every WWII scenario anyway. The global map is inevitably drawn with the Pacific just as big or smaller than the Atlantic (?!), and many of the major island campaigns are left out. It's also very hard to recreate the naval battle sequence because the AI doesn't fight naval wars as well as humans.

Oh, and to those who keep saying "it's just a game," if it's just a game then why can't YOU-KNOW-WHO be in? Or Hirohito? Or Mussolini? (Not "the duce.") Evidently it's not just a game. Politics and modern issues get wrapped up in it as well.

It kind of reminds me of an old joke about a map of the U.S. that was made in Texas. In their version, Texas stretched almost all the way up to Canada and nearly touched the east and west coasts, and all the other states were crammed in between.

EDIT: And if the Pacific campaign still annoys you, just wait a little while, till I get ahold of it...

One more thing to note in Dale's defense: China's "ideologies" (the mod's version of religions) seem to correspond roughly to the historical location of the KMT and the Communists. Lots of "democracy" in the south; some "communism" in the north.

Personally, my only gripe with the most excellent RTW mod is the lack of unit icons... those grey boxes are dull!

Shiggs713 said:

well if you don't like it, I'm sure there are plenty of mods and such that will cover it eventually. Fireaxis is picky of what they will release, so most of the really creative stuff goes into the mods. My take on the pre-built in mods such as Rise of Rome or Vikings, even this one, is just to be a simple little example of what we as modders can do. They will never overdo it and always try to keep things as simple as possible, to keep those on the lower spectrum of pc performance, still able to play.

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This is partially it. Most of the mods and scenarios in the game are examples of what can be done with the game engine, and then people go out there and do amazing things with it, some of that (everything from mods to scenarios to interface changes like the Demographic graphs) being reincorporated into the game in future expansions. Afterworld is a good example: not a particularly strong stand-alone scenario, but the concept and sheer amount of art design for this one simple scenario is amazing. Art, both 2D and 3D takes a very long time, and having taken a dozen courses in 2d art, 3d computer modeling and animation, I have a strong appreciation for the number of work-hours invested in that scenario.

neither CCP nor KMT will agree on using Mao as leader of china in WWII.
it is just historically wrong and it is not like PRC would oppose KMT, KMT isn't Nazi;
in fact CCP is working toward building ties with KMT in hope for a peaceful reunification.
it wasn't needed... other then to save a few dollars on an animated head

Pfft. I bet Garret wished he got paid for the leaderheads.

Can any one mod this? It's WWII, I'd rather have the ROC flag and a non-animated Chiang Kai-shek.

lobster said:

Can any one mod this? It's WWII, I'd rather have the ROC flag and a non-animated Chiang Kai-shek.

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Download add-on pack 1.

I'm beginning to sound like a broken record.

lobster said:

Can any one mod this? It's WWII, I'd rather have the ROC flag and a non-animated Chiang Kai-shek.

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Well of course you can mod it. Like Dale said, the non-official expansion on his site addresses many of the issues people have had, but if you want to go further, like adding unique buttons for each unit, its really not that hard. Keep in mind though, you won't be able to play MP if you mod it.

PS what happened to all the tech buttons on the expansion? about 90% of them disappeared when I updated from your site (not pink blob, just non-existant), So when you initially start the game it appears that you cannot do any tech, but if you open up the tech advisor then you can.