Is CiV a worthy succesor to the Civilization franchise?

[gozpel]

Finally Civ game got rid of the awful stacks, combat has never been so much fun.
Also I like the unique abilities of leaders instead of the 'agricultural/scientific' style traits of past.

But I don't need every week these new polls, it's like their creators try to prove something to themselves like "yeah! did you see that? not everyone loves Civ V!".

Of course Haig, today stacks are dead and the game is better with it. But as I pointed out, "Those we're the days, my friend, I hope it never ends"

The game wen't forward with religions and stuff, played civ4 for 2000 hrs or more, I'm up to 1300 hrs on civ5, so I do still like it. At least the first 150 turns, then it get's so dull, I sometimes wish there was stacks of doom.

I'm afraid to think how much I played Civ3, maybe 5000 hrs or maybe even more with SG's and GOTM. Way too much, I could've made me a new career and made more money for the family. But I don't care, I play games before going fishing or camping, the wife is the same, so I'm happy.

Can't agree/disagree on the abilities, in my opinion it's the same, but called differently and are still hidden in the AI's data. Not exactly like that, but very similar. If you want to play some guy with a fashion for food or "hammers", it's not far from the older games. Just pick your civ and play it that way.

And new polls, there are many new members coming on here every week and I'm sure noone twist your arm to vote. That is your own choice.

 

[Haig]

Gozpel,
yeah sure there's stuff I miss from Civ III and IV, and at the moment I actually play Civ V and Civ III hand to hand (for some reason I have a long break from IV).
And I think Civ V needs absolutely some more features in it, be they espionage, random events etc. to give more flexibility. But still I love it and as it misses some features, it also gave new cool ones I miss in other Civs.
But I'm pumped for an expansion and I read between the lines of 2k Greg that there's good things to wait for.

(You live in Australia, when you go camping doesn't the thought of ghost mantises disturb you..?!)

 

[Naokaukodem]

Useless poll. As in the previous pole there were a majority of "yes", they will say that indeed Civ5 will be a worthy successor to the Civilization franchise...

 

[PieceOfMind]

Civ5 is an ok game in its current state (I say that because my view may improve once DLL modding is permitted and/or expansions come along) but it's too much of a break in the progression of the civ series for me to feel like calling it a worthy successor.

For example the change to 1upt was in my view not thought through as much as it should have been, as it makes the wargame more tactically complex but the improvements necessary for the AI to handle it just never came through. It was never necessary to go to 1upt to eliminate stacking (and especially stacks of doom); just a more effective stacking penalty than collateral damage (civ4's implementation) was needed to effect that.

Combine it with snail-pace patch progress and making us wait an eternity for DLL access so we can start fixing the mistakes ourselves means interest in the game is stagnating.

It has the highest production values by far in terms of visual fidelity, music and leader animations but for a strategy game these are shallow considerations and only complement a solid game rather than make it.

 

[apocalypse105]

^
IIRC, the civ3 AI knew the map + strategic resources right from the start and it knew the positions of all units during the game.
And, Conquests introduced some annoying bugs, submarine dow + the AI didn't create armies anymore nor did the AI attack them.

I am starting to thinx the AI in civ 5 olso know the strategic resources I have seen washington put a city next to alluminium twice !!!!! and he wasn't even on the industrial age.

 

[Optional]

Main complain is that you can't play succession games anymore, which was my greatest delight of CIV3. Civ4 damaged that badly and civ5 killed it.

How come this has happened, you think?

You can of course still play a succession game. I initiated one last year and it went fine. It could happen again, even when we see no core of SG players now; one SG could get the ball rolling.

 

[spider1]

I voted yes. I've played all the Civ versions, and they all have things I just hate and love about them. V is no different in that respect. Civ V is a fun game to play, and that's all I need to know.

 

[gozpel]

How come this has happened, you think?

You can of course still play a succession game. I initiated one last year and it went fine. It could happen again, even when we see no core of SG players now; one SG could get the ball rolling.

I'm in!

But the trend of SG's in decline, really matters on a few factors. First off, in civ3 there was action from the word go, especially on the harder diffs. In 4 and 5, the is VERY little to do, except building stuff and chosing path. In civ3 you had the terrible SOD, which you built up even when you expanded and you could also do ICS. Those combinations together with brilliant minds of the community, made some games absolutely classic. I have a couple in my name and they where awesome games.

But 4 and 5 limited the options for a player to actually DO something during his/her turns, it was just stringing turns together without losing.

And I read through your game, you did well and had a solid crew, would we be able to find one now?

I start a game tonight and if you don't show up, then this whole post is moot.

 

[Teutorian]

I just recently got bored to tears with the bareness of Civ V and decided to give Civ IV -which I never played before- a shot. After I got used to the slightly inferior graphics and Civ Rev art style, got my feet wet, got a slight understanding for what does what and how this works and that works, I realized how much of a failure Civ V was as its successor. I don't know what Civ IV looked like when it launched but Civ IV complete is infinitely superior to Civilization V. The game is actually pretty fun, unlike V which is only entertaining in the exploration phase. The AI, the choices, the decisions, the complexity of the religions and civil combinations, allies, enemies, etc - the game is just so much better.

Civ V just punishes the player for virtually EVERYTHING. Need to build roads? Costs you gold. Want a building? Hampers your economy. Want another city? Have some more unhappiness. Take so and so as a "friend" and ally? Give him your spare pearls or else.
Everything about it is so counter intuitive to what a Civilization game (an Empire builder game) should be. It finds ways at every corner to make you pay in some way for playing the game (building your Civ).

I love the way Civilization V looks. Visually it's really nice. I love that they went for a more realistic look instead of the cartoon like art style (Iv's not THAT bad), but the game play just flat out SUCKS.

Civ V needs a LOT of work still. Not only could it use things like religion and other things to give your Civ layers of depth, and not only does the AI need SERIOUS help, the entire philosophy behind what it's designed to try and NOT let you do needs to be addressed.

Civ V's game mechanics would make more sense if they renamed the game Rasputin and charged you with the task of driving a nation into the ground. That's the only way the player wouldn't have to fight the developers in an uphill struggle on almost everything regarding growing a Civilization and taking it through history. You'd be going with the flow.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I voted yes.

While Civ V has its flaws and it could definitely better it is, after all, a civilization game and it is fun to play it every now and then. It might not be as addictive, complex and challenging as the previous games in the series as the games though.

The game doesn't run well and the controls don't work. The only way you can possibly define those kinds of garbage flaws as "worthy" is if you realize they also exist in previous titles.

Still, civ V continues the "UI, controls, programming, and game run speed getting worse" trend emphatically.

Useless poll. As in the previous pole there were a majority of "yes", they will say that indeed Civ5 will be a worthy successor to the Civilization franchise...

Actually given the inherent bias existing from the poll being on civ V general discussions and not neutral territory, a split nearing 50/50 is very telling.

 

[Naokaukodem]

Actually given the inherent bias existing from the poll being on civ V general discussions and not neutral territory, a split nearing 50/50 is very telling.

Indeed, the time I wrote this comment there was not such a split.

 

[lschnarch]

Clearly a NO!

"Civ"5 has, after massive patching, become a mediocre game. It still lacks in each and every aspect. Just to mention a few:
tactical AI
diplomacy
providing necessary information
tech tree
.... and much more.

It may have changed many things, which even in BtS still were weak... but it didn't change them for the better. It was change for change's sake.

What it is not, and what the previous games have been, is to be an empire building game.
There isn't any immersion you would be leading a nation through history.

Each and everywhere you feel that the developers' intentions were to penalize you for growth - but finally they even failed in that attempt.

One could play it as some kind of reduced wargame - if not the AI would be so incapable. In every other aspect it is even not worth today's prices.

It is not a CIV game.

 

[Sullla]

On its own merits, Civ5 would be an average game. Not great, not terrible. As the direct sequel to some of the best strategy games of all time, it's a disappointment. The game's mechanics are a major step backwards from Civ4, and there are core flaws in the design that I've explained ad nauseum elsewhere. I'll just put a succinct summary here:

The fact of the matter is that Civ5 is trying to masquerade as a tactical combat game. But it isn't a tactical combat game; the Civilization games are empire-building games, and combat has never been more than one element among many. The designers of Civ5 tried to turn the game into something that it isn't, and they ended up breaking the game in the process. We ended up with a very mediocre wargame mashed together with a subpar empire-builder. I give them credit for trying - they had good intentions, and they were going for something genuinely new. It just didn't work, and we're left with a messy game that plays rather poorly.

That doesn't mean you can't like Civ5. It's not a terrible game, you can have fun with it. It's just that this is the Phantom Menace of the Civilization series, compared to the original Star Wars trilogy. It doesn't measure up.

 

[JBConquests]

I voted no because if I had to make that determination at this point in time, then that is what I would say.

My real answer is that it is too soon to tell. It doesn't make sense to compare Civ 5 without expansions to Civ 4 with 2 expansions.

 

[allypower]

Is it possible to make a scenario with all of the following incorporated yet:

a. 50 civs in hot seat mode where you and your friends (or just you) can control 20 of them.
b. on a 20,000 tiles map
(the above 2 without crashing your computers in an hour if not immediately)

c. 300+ unique units
d. 300+ unique buildings
e. globe view
f. religion
g. good diplomacy
h. relatively competent AI

If no, then CiV is no where as good as CIV because CIV can do all that (with possibly the exception of h, but again CIV AI is much better than CiV AI).

I was looking forward to this game so much before it came out.

Before anyone of you say well CIV has a quite a few years before CIV, but note that CiV have had 2 years to fixed its problem but no, instead of focusing on that the developers are making DLC instead, way to go!!!

And also, when a new game comes out you don't compare it to games that was made 8-10 years ago, you compare it to current games as they are now. Here we compare CiV to the current CIV (and the community mods of CIV)

But then again any Civ game with "odd" number is always worse than its immediate "even" predecessor

I found that the only thing worthy to mention that CiV bring into the picture is the hexagonal tile system.

Hopefully Sid will himself take on the role of the lead developer of Civ 6 instead of putting it in the hands of people who has a wrong vision about what Civ games are.

Again these are simply my opinions

 

[gozpel]

On its own merits, Civ5 would be an average game. Not great, not terrible. As the direct sequel to some of the best strategy games of all time, it's a disappointment. The game's mechanics are a major step backwards from Civ4, and there are core flaws in the design that I've explained ad nauseum elsewhere. I'll just put a succinct summary here:



That doesn't mean you can't like Civ5. It's not a terrible game, you can have fun with it. It's just that this is the Phantom Menace of the Civilization series, compared to the original Star Wars trilogy. It doesn't measure up.

Spot on, the game should've been more inspired from the other titles.

"Ok, we take espionage out and religion too, but we add these flavours instead."

A hexmap doesn't cut it, stupid AI'S with denouncements to the left and right, doesn't sort it out. The AI is just as stupid as in other games, the bottomless well of uninteresting choices just grows bigger.

Build a city, scout. Meet an AI who covets your lands, build another city, mentioned AI whinges. Play nice. AI whinges. Kill that AI, the rest of the world is whinging. Kill 2 AI's or another CS, the whole world will hate you.

Rubbish!

But the game is pretty ok, if you play on Chieftain.

 

[Naokaukodem]

But the game is pretty ok, if you play on Chieftain.

I play on Settler.

 

[Derpy Hooves]

As far as the term worthy successor is corcerned, it's basically the question whether or not the game is up to par compared with other Civ titles, the other poll used 'Games' in general as a frame of reference, this one only uses the Civ franchise for that.
Suffice to say the current results (50% 46% with 120 votes) are even more dire then I expected, but easily explainable, let's hope Gods and Kings invalidates that argument.

 

[blasto]

I'm unable to vote as I won't know until 6 is out. 5 would be worthy if Firaxis is able to expand upon the changes they made and bring it up to the level of sophistication of Civ4.

But if there is no 6, or its just more of the same with better graphics, or just worse, then its "no".

 

[CajunAzn]

I propose you add a 3rd option, like "yes, with expansion and tweaking". Civ IV is still the top in the series, but that's with YEARS of modification and bug squashing.

Does anyone remember how Civ IV wouldn't even run on most systems without graphical glitches/black screens when it came out? Civ V performance problems hopefully can be resolved like Civ IV.

Also the expansion packs for Civ III and IV GREATLY added depth to the game. Try playing vanilla Civ III or IV and see if you get the nostalgic feel, or if you feel like the game is kinda bland...sort of like vanilla Civ V eh?

I voted "no" because Civ V in it's current state is not a worthy or succeeding the final iteration of Civ IV, but imo there's needs to be a more open ended voting option for future improvement of the game.