LESS IS MORE: scrap the modern age!

It’s my belief that the Civilization series has always been unable to represent the modern age in any way realistically. This is not meant as negative criticism on the creators of Civilization: it is simply impossible to represent all the different societies in the millennia of human history well.

Let’s have a look at some basic characteristics of the Civilization series:

• It’s a tile based game. Production is derived from the land (and seas).
• Population growth is related directly to food production.
• Raw materials are immediately converted into finished products, with no steps in between.
• The player is a god, omnipotent and omniscient about his civilization, and can guide his civilization independently from what’s happening in other civs.

This is a pretty decent system to represent pre-industrial societies, After all, roughly speaking those are agricultural and the size of the population is closely related to the food production in the area. The economic value added to raw materials to get to finished products is fairly limited, so abstracting that to shields + resources = finished good isn’t too far-fetched. On top of that, most production is for local use, and trade is mostly limited to luxury goods, as anything else is too hard and too expensive to transport over long distances. (Though it would be nice to have a trade route system to represent in-between traders such as Venice, the Dutch and Portugal, who didn’t always control the production – ie in civ terms, the tile the resource is on - but did control the trading of the good to their great advantage.)

This model can still function to some degree during the Industrial Revolution, as – at least in the colonial period – the focus of governments lay not in promoting free and international trade but in building up their own national and cohesive economy and obtaining effective control of the necessary raw resources. (Though of course here too the period is much better represented by games that focus specifically on this time period, eg Victoria with its factory system.)

However the system completely fails for the modern (post)industrial societies. To give a few examples:

• There’s overproduction of food, and population size or growth is no longer related to it, as the economic value of a child has declined, and there’s wide access to contraceptives.
• Most of the economic value is added in the production process. To say it simple, economic power lies where the factories, banks and research labs lie, not where the raw resources lie, as would be the case in Civ.
• There’s a very large mobility of capital, and the biggest corporations are multinationals unbound to any country, investing where it suits them best. So the idea of a player-god in control of the entire economy, without any money flows to foreign countries, doesn’t work anymore.

That’s why I say: Limit Civilization to what it can represent well: pre-modern societies, the age of states and kingdoms! Limit the technology tree to 1945, so that we can still play in the end with tanks, bombers and nukes, but no further. If there still needs to be a space race, make it the Apollo Program and the journey to the moon, instead of a journey to Alpha Centauri, which would require many more techs. Cutting off a piece at the end would allow the game to mold more around the earlier periods, and focus more features on the early areas. After all, that’s the part of the game we play most, as many rarely finish a game because by the end they’ve become so powerful there’s no decent competition left.

So while on most aspects of the game I’d disagree that “less is more”, here I think limiting Civilization’s timespan to pre-modern times would add to the game.

u make some strong points about comparing the real modern to the replicated modern, but as it is, no matter what goverment u think u have, the ultimate one is the monarch system. since the player assumes total control over his land, its monarch/dictatorship all the time. almost like fidel castros cuba.
so when a player gets to the modern age, it is a modern kingdom.

finish a game because by the end they’ve become so powerful there’s no decent competition left

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i dunno if u have ever heard of the illuminiaes(sp) they have been rumored to secretly control the world. they have been noted to playing ww1 and ww2 in the late 1800's. they probaly seen the world with no decent competition,
so they created it. maybe instead of wiping out every civilization, empower one so greatly, that in the end u will have a little fight on your hands...or play a harder level...

Ok point 1: In China, people pay large taxes if they have more that one baby. America is not the whole world.
2. If you have resources, you don't get enough for everything. You still need banks&factories.
3. Most of the multinationals' money still goes where they can have profit. So where the economy is best, lots of population, banks,... You don't establish companies in civ, you only see money coming.

And the game isn't ment to be completely historicly correct. How could America be in 4k BC? It's first goal is good gameplay. And they did it.

anyways maniac welcome to the club,!

brinko

brinko said:

u make some strong points about comparing the real modern to the replicated modern, but as it is, no matter what goverment u think u have, the ultimate one is the monarch system. since the player assumes total control over his land, its monarch/dictatorship all the time. almost like fidel castros cuba.
so when a player gets to the modern age, it is a modern kingdom.

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Does this not prove my point that the game badly represents the modern age, as in reality today's big powers aren't ruled by Fidel Castro's?

Pentium said:

Ok point 1: In China, people pay large taxes if they have more that one baby.

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Does this too not prove my point that population growth is little related anymore to food production?

America is not the whole world.

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I know that: I don't live in the USA. However the USA is an example of a (post)industrial society, which form the big powers today. Of course the third world and especially Sub-Saharan Africa could perhaps still be represented decently by the civ model, but in those civ terms one could say those countries aren't yet in the modern era, so my point isn't about them. It's about the US, Europe, Japan, China, NICs...

2. If you have resources, you don't get enough for everything. You still need banks&factories.

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In the real world, you only need banks and factories to be a big power. Your "shields" and resources you can extract from the poor and exploited developing countries.

3. Most of the multinationals' money still goes where they can have profit. So where the economy is best, lots of population, banks,...

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Not completely true. Multinationals can have profit and therefore these days are investing & moving a lot of their production to low wage countries. How can you represent foreign capital flowing into China and NICs? Or to give 19th century examples, how can you represent British capitalists investing in the USA, or Belgian and French capitalists investing in Russia? It's impossible, as the player is in complete control of the economy, so giving cash to another civilization would be nuts.

And the game isn't ment to be completely historicly correct.

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I know that. But personally I'd like to have at least a bit the feeling that the game represents the subjects it's about well. At present playing the modern era in Civ is like playing Chess without chess pieces, or playing a space game without space ships.

As to model the modern era well, one would have to invent a completely new game system, the second best option seems to me to just limit Civilization to the pre-modern era.

brinko said:

anyways maniac welcome to the club,!

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Thanks!

I don't want to see the modern age go. Improve things a bit, by getting rid of worker micromanagement in the mid-industrial age thru PW, and add new things like global alliances vs the player and their allies, (WWI, WW2), more sophisticated trade concepts later on to allow for difficulty in achieving economic and production supremacy, and the introduction of a REAL nuclear holocaust (i.e. a game-ending nuke exchange, too much damage) to make war in the modern age a real nail biter, and the end game will be far more interesting.

Maniac said:

Population growth is related directly to food production.
Raw materials are immediately converted into finished products, with no steps in between.

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I agree that the city-only world is a disturbing one for any period. That is why I have proposed a system that fills in some of the gaps. Look at the bottom most link in my signature.

It's first goal is good gameplay. And they did it.

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This is the statement that I have the audacity to agree with. And I will also praise the audacity of this thread to call for the outright elimination of something that has never worked in the history of the franchise -- if only to force people to do some really hard thinking. I'd sooner praise someone who begs for Civ to make progress than to stay the same.

There's a lot of problems in the modern age due to lack of competition and what not... but one of the most interesting observations that M@ni@c makes is actually about population.

All the way through the middle ages, you can judge a society's well-being by how much their population was growing. This represented innovations in health, a strong agricultural sector, a fair government, and intelligent, careful war.

But in the modern age, countries that produce more kids are generally "backwards". They experience serious economic problems. The cause and effect are blurred here, with countries who undergo serious amounts of economic progress actually finding their population growth stabilizing. In other words, too much population growth is a sign of weakness.

This ties into one of my biggest beefs with the modern age: when land and population are the two biggest determiners of success in the game, the modern age has ZERO suspense.

If they can't find other factors for success, the modern age is pointless.

(Either that, or they have to slow down the land grab so it unrealistically lasts until 1950 and beyond.)

For the current, this suggestion is the best I have seen. HOwever someone will eventually have to make a Civ-ish modern age game. Of course that game will play different in terms of interface, meaning of player, etc.

Assumign that second goal comes to pass, here is my suggestion. Technologies only real impact in Civilization is the products of it. IN history the impact of many of the important technologies was changing the way people interact with the world and ideas. The game result would be changing what the player controls, adding \things while taking away others that just are not practical. The result would be by circa modern age the game you were playing would be compeltely different in terms of control versus the game you played in the ancient era.

sir_schwick said:

The result would be by circa modern age the game you were playing would be compeltely different in terms of control versus the game you played in the ancient era.

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I don't know if this would be such a bad thing. I agree that if no one can figure out how to make the modern age playable, scrapping it should seriously be considered, but I would prefer to see it playable (ie. meaningfull to the outcome)

I agree with your points abous the modern age, but I think that calls for revamping not destruction of.

i too was intrigued by the assertions made...the modern era is a bit of a dissapointment compared to say the ancient- uu's are few and ur either too far ahead or behind to stir the imagination- however, the solution proposed-scrap it- does not really answer the question -"is nothing better than a flawed something" - it makes the assertion that less may be better -
and this i am not sure is true- i suggest that the end of the line dissapointment of say getting mech infantry (knowing that this it is as far as it goes-the end of looking forward to advanced units) would be simply replaced by getting infantry as the "as far as it goes" . Likewise the obvious winner may still remain-one will just get there faster.....
In-so-far as solutions i think the observation that food and economics make a shift in the modern era (real world) may look obvious on the surface- and yet - what is the ecclasiastes (sp) quote-- "nothing new under the sun"-
population worldwide continues to expand due mainly to increased food production/distribution and in spite of contraception/education. Small standing armies instead of large - body armor- ect. ..these "new" aspects have been around before....
I think that the actual problem is any generation's ability to see itself clearly/accurately without the benefit of time passing- (which reminds me of one historians line that i liked "history is a joke the present plays on the past" - the lament that the modern era does not mimic actuality as well as the other eras may be grossly innaccurate- what may in fact be at play is that our reading and interpretation and the presentaion of what we believe to be the past - is a better formed lie than the current one.....

The reason I suggested scrapping first is b/c of the complexity of radically evolving gameplay. Even a basic system could take dozens of reworks, something better left for Civ 6 or Civ 7.

M@ni@c said:

Does this not prove my point that the game badly represents the modern age, as in reality today's big powers aren't ruled by Fidel Castro's?

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All this means is that Governments need to be revamped to better reflect a transfer of power from the state to the people. If you take a look, you'll clearly see that despotism already recieves a penalty in the Civ world to show its relative inneficiency.

Does this too not prove my point that population growth is little related anymore to food production?

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The reason that China has imposed the child-Tax is to combat overcrowding, which is a problem due to lack of food to support the population. In Civ terms, population control is already represented by the fact that all your major cities will be leveling off in population by the modern Era (as they hit the food limit, and the Gov has to intervene to prevent starvation.)

I know that: I don't live in the USA. However the USA is an example of a (post)industrial society, which form the big powers today. Of course the third world and especially Sub-Saharan Africa could perhaps still be represented decently by the civ model, but in those civ terms one could say those countries aren't yet in the modern era, so my point isn't about them. It's about the US, Europe, Japan, China, NICs...

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Not in the modern Era? Aside from the horrible insult to 3rd World Countries, you forget to take into account that these people have aquired 'modern' technologies through charity (tech Gift), commerce (Tech trading), and conquest. (Stealing)

In the real world, you only need banks and factories to be a big power. Your "shields" and resources you can extract from the poor and exploited developing countries.

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...which would be represented by allowing international trade of food/shields. I don't want all that poluting industry in my homeland? I'll just call up my good friend Ghandi and offer to buy a few surplus shields...

Not completely true. Multinationals can have profit and therefore these days are investing & moving a lot of their production to low wage countries. How can you represent foreign capital flowing into China and NICs? Or to give 19th century examples, how can you represent British capitalists investing in the USA, or Belgian and French capitalists investing in Russia? It's impossible, as the player is in complete control of the economy, so giving cash to another civilization would be nuts.

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SMAC already covered this one: Create an ammount of "commerce" which occrus automaticaly between all peacefull nations behind the scenes. The ammount of commerce could be increased by improved connections, and the discovery of various trade-related techs.

I know that. But personally I'd like to have at least a bit the feeling that the game represents the subjects it's about well. At present playing the modern era in Civ is like playing Chess without chess pieces, or playing a space game without space ships.

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What?

As to model the modern era well, one would have to invent a completely new game system, the second best option seems to me to just limit Civilization to the pre-modern era.

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...Or we could impliment a system of gradual change, (a Schwick suggested) or better yet, just accept the system as it is!

I know that: I don't live in the USA. However the USA is an example of a (post)industrial society, which form the big powers today. Of course the third world and especially Sub-Saharan Africa could perhaps still be represented decently by the civ model, but in those civ terms one could say those countries aren't yet in the modern era, so my point isn't about them. It's about the US, Europe, Japan, China, NICs...

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'Those countries', as you refer to them, are in an even worse place than the industrial era. They are considered 'under-developed'. This means they have most if not all the woes of an industrialized society but without any of the benefits.

For example, there is no infrastructure for an kind of economy. The only real business that occurs in most of Africa is the arms trade, and various black market operations. Governments earn barely enough money to buy guns to combat the rebels who are buying guns. They have absurd growth rates without the ability to provide proper medical, educational, water, or nutritional support. Now lets add in ethnic conflict caused by European map-makers who liked right angles in the last five hundred years.

The only nations that have escaped this burden of under-developement are those that have stable economies and decent wealth. Examples include South Africa, Egypt, and um....someone help me out.

I am not sure how to simulate this legacy, a practical sin of the European continent, when Civ does not even simulate an trade based governments. Mercantilism would only be the base of such a simulation.

Not to put too much stock in negativity, but I *do* think that nothing is better than a flawed something. Have you ever watched a movie that you were enjoying and that was absolutely perfect, and then started to drag in the last half hour? If they can't find a way to make that least half hour good, why not make it short, punchy, and sweet?

But I think the modern era should stick -- if gameplay can evolve, as Sir Schwick said.

More of the same -- playing with units and techs, land being the main factor for success -- is a waste of time. If they refuse to make significant changes to gameplay, I think it might be better to make the land grab phase longer and modern techs come sooner -- make the game shorter.

sir_schwick said:

I am not sure how to simulate this legacy, a practical sin of the European continent, when Civ does not even simulate an trade based governments. Mercantilism would only be the base of such a simulation.

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I would use corruption. Thats why many countries are in the situation that you describe now.

Lets see..who are the super powers China America ..Russia hmmm all have alot of land , fairly stable infrastructure...in otherwords land and happiness DO equal points (the game abstraction) - britain and japan are still doing fairly well but not as well as when they owned more land........which increased trade and resources..(happiness). Now of course this does not answer ol dh epic's nice line about a bad last half hour of a good movie-(the assertion being that better to shorten the movie-
the analogy given for the game- ) this one i find hard to refute-
The anti-climax after hours and hours of play is indeed dissapointing-Space ship perhaps is suppossed to be the surprise at the bottom of the box but i for one don't even use that as a winning option (space ship? maybe if it was a death cruiser or super sattelite that can reign horror atop everyone there would be somekind of perverse pleasure) The ending of something , at least in story telling- is either a summary, aftermath or climax. Perhaps the Nuke or aformentioned space ship were suppossed to provide that last bit of exicitement, but the problem is if ur behind u can't win any space race and u can't nuke larger opponents into oblivion. What would promote a fun modern era- something along the lines of hope or surprise i would think.
Hell, a cool movie might even work.

I read about half of this topic so sorry if I missed anything. If you cut out the modern age you could introduce a few new victory conditions!

Democratic victory: The goal here would be to become a pure democratic nation where you are no longer needed. This development of Democracy would start in the enightenment age when you research the tech "Democratic Theory". After you research this you would need to build up an acceptance to the Theory and then start a revolution. The revolution will fail if you havn't influenced the citizens enough (You could influence the citizens with great leaders, wonders, and maybe even techs?). Of course if you have never went to war you would have a better chance at this type of victory.

Cold War Victory: Basicly you need to win a race in nuclear arms with an enemy civ. 1,000 nukes is the limit for the entire world. If you are 500 nukes ahead of your rivals or have 50% of all the nukes in the world you win.

There could also be losing conditions such as.

Socialist Revolution: When you research Communism or Democratic Theory you pave a path for socialist revolutionarys. If these socialists gain massive support (That means if you neglect to use propaganda and promote nationalism or Democracy) they will overthrow your government and form a nation without a leader.

Nuclear holocaust: If the world reaches nuke limit then an age of Nuclear War could begin. If a war is started by any nation then there is a 75% chance that one of those nations will use nukes which would cause nuclear holocaust.

To use corruption to describe the situation in the third world now is really just begging the question. You need to ask questions like why there are more corrupt tyrranies in charge of those nations. You can trace that back to colonialism.

Civ should let you colonize other people, instead of outright conquering them. Of course, this would mean that colonizing them would have to be more profitable than outright conquering them (otherwise, what's the point of giving the user a choice that is always second best?) Also, if colonization were more useful than conquering, then domination would be more complicated by the industrial age.

But a little more complexity in this department could be a very good thing.