The Kingmaker
Alexander
- Joined
- Jan 18, 2004
- Messages
- 1,971
Okay, I have a few moments to post some comments, but I don't have time to answer you all immediately, so please don't be upset if I don't get to you yet. I will answer each comment in the order it was posted.
awesome: Kush is most assuredly not covered by Egypt and Ethiopia. It was its own culture and civilization, located in Sudan. It was (for part of its history) conquered by Egypt and it did (for part of its history) rule Egypt itself. The same can be said of many other civilizations and their neighbors. Ethiopia on the other hand, refers to the civilization of Aksum, which occupied territory in the region currently claimed by, well, the modern nation-state of Ethiopia, which is most assuredly not the same civilization as Sudan.
For a time in the medieval ages, Europeans called all of Subsaharan Africa "Ethiopia," (including Sudan) but that confusion is not reflected in Civ games.
Oda Nobunaga: Gran Colombia grates me a little bit too. I suggested them simply because it was the best example I could think of for an amalgam Latin American civ without resorting to calling it "Latin America." Their region is grossly underrepresented, and that was the best way I could think of to include them. If you can come up with a better, more satisfying way to represent them, then by all means share it with us.
Canada on the other hand would not go over very well because people would view it as yet another iteration of Anglo-Saxon civilization when we already have two (America and England) included. Civ games usually try to represent every region at least a couple of times, and South America is more underrepresented than any other region except Oceania, which has never been represented at all, while North America has four civs.
That being said, the game is "Civilization" and not "Nation-States," so just because Canada has been an important nation for the last century does not qualify them to be a civilization. The USA barely qualifies, IMHO. Latin America as a whole qualifies, IMHO, but not any one particular Latin American nation-state. The goal is to find an iteration that is as inclusive as possible. I hope you at least understand my thinking a little bit better now, even if you don't agree.
Eastwinn: Indeed, you make a very good point. Several "civilizations" in the game do not technically qualify by virtue of their not meeting the definition. That is the paradox of Civ games. Sometimes such groups are included for diversity's sake alone even though they don't merit it under the rather specific definition of a civilization.
Now I must apologize to the rest of you. I'm out of time for now, so I'll return and answer your comments a little bit later. Please be patient with me.
awesome: Kush is most assuredly not covered by Egypt and Ethiopia. It was its own culture and civilization, located in Sudan. It was (for part of its history) conquered by Egypt and it did (for part of its history) rule Egypt itself. The same can be said of many other civilizations and their neighbors. Ethiopia on the other hand, refers to the civilization of Aksum, which occupied territory in the region currently claimed by, well, the modern nation-state of Ethiopia, which is most assuredly not the same civilization as Sudan.
For a time in the medieval ages, Europeans called all of Subsaharan Africa "Ethiopia," (including Sudan) but that confusion is not reflected in Civ games.
Oda Nobunaga: Gran Colombia grates me a little bit too. I suggested them simply because it was the best example I could think of for an amalgam Latin American civ without resorting to calling it "Latin America." Their region is grossly underrepresented, and that was the best way I could think of to include them. If you can come up with a better, more satisfying way to represent them, then by all means share it with us.
Canada on the other hand would not go over very well because people would view it as yet another iteration of Anglo-Saxon civilization when we already have two (America and England) included. Civ games usually try to represent every region at least a couple of times, and South America is more underrepresented than any other region except Oceania, which has never been represented at all, while North America has four civs.
That being said, the game is "Civilization" and not "Nation-States," so just because Canada has been an important nation for the last century does not qualify them to be a civilization. The USA barely qualifies, IMHO. Latin America as a whole qualifies, IMHO, but not any one particular Latin American nation-state. The goal is to find an iteration that is as inclusive as possible. I hope you at least understand my thinking a little bit better now, even if you don't agree.
Eastwinn: Indeed, you make a very good point. Several "civilizations" in the game do not technically qualify by virtue of their not meeting the definition. That is the paradox of Civ games. Sometimes such groups are included for diversity's sake alone even though they don't merit it under the rather specific definition of a civilization.
Now I must apologize to the rest of you. I'm out of time for now, so I'll return and answer your comments a little bit later. Please be patient with me.