The Future Of Strategy Games: An Interview With Sid Meier at GameInformer

The_J

The_J

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Yesterday GameInformer released an interesting video interview with Sid Meier.
He talks about the game development in general, advances in development in the last 10 years, his work at Firaxis, the value of the community (CFC is even named ;)) and about his games and Civilization in general.
Every fan should take a look at this interview ;).
Thanks to Thorburne for this news hint :).
 
Well, Sid probably gave the answer to the future of civ.
So, we won't see the depth + complexity of civ4 returning.
 
I don't think Civ4 is particularly deep or complex, Civ series were always relatively simple games. And I don't believe SoD combat is more "deep" than 1upt combat.
 
Really, he gave me hope when he expressed the "problem" of what to leave out vs. what to put in. Don't leave anything out (with an ability to leave parts out ourselves) and we all will be happy.
 
What I thought was interesting is that he heeds what chronic complainers like myself have to say about CiV. I do complain about the shortcomings of the game, because I do love it and always have. I feel it should be better than it currently is. On the other hand I feel the game has very good points about it too. Positive and negative reinforcement do need to work hand in hand. If an opinion is left out when discussing the game, good or bad, its very hard to determine what should be looked into and what should not be looked at, to make the game better. CiV as I have said needs to continue evolving, but not past what it really is designed to be.

My main gripes are about the AI and diplomacy, especially the AI. The AI seems to be the main issue. Perhaps they will make it a bit better coming up.

The best thing about the video interview, was realizing that Sid is still around and has a part to play in development. To me thats the best news I have heard in a long time. :)
 
Great Interview, but why do they sit so far apart? Does one of them have a cold or something? they're like 10' apart, I'd have a hard time hearing the other person without yelling.

Wish he had of asked about future DLC as well. Didn't have to be specific, but just an 'Are you planning any more DLC for civ 5?' would have been nice.
 
nokmirt said:
The best thing about the video interview, was realizing that Sid is still around and has a part to play in development.
Click to expand...
Maybe you should listen to it a few more times.
Sid mainly gave vague answers and I've noticed he has done it in more interviews when he was talking about civ.
So, I must conclude he's not participating in the development of any civ game anymore.

Also, there was zero talk about CivWorld and Sid is the lead designer of it.
All and all, an average to poor interview.
 
Tatran said:
Maybe you should listen to it a few more times.
Sid mainly gave vague answers and I've noticed he has done it in more interviews when he was talking about civ.
So, I must conclude he's not participating in the development of any civ game anymore.

Also, there was zero talk about CivWorld and Sid is the lead designer of it.
All and all, an average to poor interview.
Click to expand...

Well, I had been acting under the assumption that Sid was now completely disconnected from the development of the series. That Civ was the large focus of the interview, and that he is still working out of the very same office as the rest of the development team, is nice news, for me.
 
Tatran said:
Maybe you should listen to it a few more times.
Sid mainly gave vague answers and I've noticed he has done it in more interviews when he was talking about civ.
So, I must conclude he's not participating in the development of any civ game anymore.
.
Click to expand...
You should give it a listen again too. ;) He indicated that he had been hands off the last two Civ games. It almost sounded like he was hinting that it was time to jump back in.
Of course, maybe I should listen to it again as well. :mischief:
 
Tatran said:
Maybe you should listen to it a few more times.
Sid mainly gave vague answers and I've noticed he has done it in more interviews when he was talking about civ.
So, I must conclude he's not participating in the development of any civ game anymore.

Also, there was zero talk about CivWorld and Sid is the lead designer of it.
All and all, an average to poor interview.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it doesn't sound like Sid plays a major role in most of Firaxis' projects, and CivWorld is embarrassingly bad.
 
Thorn said:
You should give it a listen again too. ;) He indicated that he had been hands off the last two Civ games. It almost sounded like he was hinting that it was time to jump back in.
Of course, maybe I should listen to it again as well. :mischief:
Click to expand...

I don't think he will ever be lead designer again of a core Civ game. He will most likely continue in the same direction bringing Civ to other platforms like he did with CivRev and CivWorld. He will still provide design input for the core games, but not lead designer.

I kind of see his point about the changes in Civ V though. Each Civ game they are trying something new. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. The whole point is to try something different and see what happens. With Civ V the main focus was the combat system, and I think it does well in that area. The diplomacy and AI need a lot of work, but they succeeded with the combat system, and that was their intent.
 
Well, the bad AI makes the new combat system less enjoyable (except multiplayer games). But I think AI and diplomacy were never any good in any Civ game... (in Civ4 the AI is better at combat only because the SoD combat system is easy for it to handle).
 
Tatran said:
Maybe you should listen to it a few more times.
Sid mainly gave vague answers and I've noticed he has done it in more interviews when he was talking about civ.
So, I must conclude he's not participating in the development of any civ game anymore.

Also, there was zero talk about CivWorld and Sid is the lead designer of it.
All and all, an average to poor interview.
Click to expand...

I know, but I try to be optimistic. I wasn't even sure if the guy was alive. Like he's lost in time or something.
 
PawelS said:
Well, the bad AI makes the new combat system less enjoyable (except multiplayer games). But I think AI and diplomacy were never any good in any Civ game... (in Civ4 the AI is better at combat only because the SoD combat system is easy for it to handle).
Click to expand...

This isn't an excuse, but AI is rarely good in ANY game.
 
"Change is essential. We have to move the game forward"

If that was the case, then I would have embraced Civ V.
Problem was, they took more than a few steps BACKWARDS :(

Sure the graphics was upped (in some parts downed though), but that required a powerhouse of a computer. (and tbh : its a TBS game! Must have been terrible optimization :()

In all other aspects I think Civ 5 was a setback.

Civ World was just horrible. Even for a FB game it was awfull.

I think they had their 15 minutes (years) of fame, and lots of changes have to happen before Firaxis becomes a respected gaming house again.
 
that was an interesting interview. i didnt expect any real ground-breaking info from it though. it was 15 minutes that was more a retrospective on Sid and strategy game genre and the new world of mini-games and tablets and less about Civ and Railroad.

it was a nice fluff piece, no more no less.
 
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