leave it to T.A Jones to open up a thread like this in the civ4 forums
well done fella
i remember how excited i was when i read about all of the new features that were planned for civ4. all of the supposed fixes and such. needless to say, i was very, very excited about it all. and then i bought the game and the illusion disipated
i actually put civ3 down for a while and tried to get into civ4. i played a few quick epic games and some of the stock scenarios. i was not impressed in the least. the epic game was just
okay. i mean, the newly introduced concepts were neat. however, i was very turned off by the gfx, especially the unit gfx and their multi-figure configuration. the funny thing about this is that multi-figure units (most of them at least) in civ3 were nearly universally shunned by the community. so it was puzzling to me that the developers added in this sort of MU configuration for civ4. also of a disappointment to me was the new system for arty and naval guns (why scrap a decent working system? why not enhance an existing model instead of scrapping it in favor of what imo is a less realistic model?). i was also very, very disappointed in the game engine performance of civ4. now, i've got a pretty buff computer and the games were lagging significantly (way more than what large map scenarios for civ3 would do). so i was very disappointed about this. the stock scenarios for civ4 are garbage also. i certainly hope that firaxis or take2 did not pay someone to make them b/c quite frankly, i'd never even release those versions as
betas if i were the creator. my gripes included the use of out-of-place gfx as 'placeholders', poor gfx for other units, and just a lack of attention to detail that is so important w/ themed scenarios.
although highly disappointed, i allowed for my displeasures of civ4 to recede a little before trying to pick it up again and give'er another go-round. i mean, the open source thing for modding is very, very enticing...at least to me it is. however, after playing some more after my self-imposed break from civ4, i found that i was left w/ that "soulless" feeling that a few here have already noted. i have not picked the game back up and as a matter of fact, i gave it to a friend of mine - for good. and last i was at his house, it was on his shelf collecting dust.
anyhow - my main problem lies exclusively in the
un-user friendly nature of civ4 modding. some may say - whah
whah - learn how to use Python you dummy! well, that's not the case. i mean, i can teach myself that stuff and learn how to do it all. after all, there are few, if any, civers out there who've spent as much time w/ the guts of the civ engine in front of them
so the 'work' part of it is not the issue. what
is the issues is that the war system for civ4 and its undeniable problems w/ larger maps/empires precludes me from making scenarios for civ4 b/c of
performance reasons. of course, there's other things like the low-poly units, the lack of a true naval combat system, and the arty problems. however, these are all second to the performance issues imo. so i guess what i'm getting at is that civ4 just demands too much CPU usage. hell, why should i need to have the equivelant of a NASA computer to run a decent civ4 scenario?
i don't like to get involved (anymore at least) w/ the 'what's better? civ3 or civ4' debate any longer. i mean, to each their own i say. however, for all of the civ3 haters out there, i remind you all that civ3 creation is as good as it's been in quite a while. sure, it ain't what it was, say, 2 years ago. however, scenario creation for civ3 is still quite vibrant w/ new stuff coming out pretty regularly. the same can not be said of civ4 scenarios/mods. sure there's a few really popular ones out there. but my point is that the inherent downfall of civ4 is its
game engine performance and until that issue can be rectified, i highly doubt any civ3 scenario will be able to be transferred over to a civ4 format. and that much is a shame, not for me perse but the community as a whole.