Are you sticking with civ4?

[Egnarts]

I can't say I'll go V instantly, but I'm really tired of the fact that they never finished IV, too.

Current 3.19 BTS civ IV is about the quality of a late beta game (although that might be generous), but it's been over 5 years since release. That pisses me off badly, and it might be the wallet talking ultimately. V better show hard evidence that unlike IV, it's actually finished.

Civ IV features that were never finished:

- Vassal state mechanics
- Diplo resolution coding for AI (having it pick from available resolutions at RANDOM is NOT complete)
- Apostolic palace in general (they even admitted that this was not tested competently)
- Unit selection and unselection (you'd think something so basic wouldn't be a total fail after 5 years)
- Unit auto-movement at start of turn, disregarding orders or attempts to change them entirely
- Declaring war, by accident, without prompt
- Coding so that the game is NOT more resource-intensive than graphics whore shooters released years later
- AI strategy (why is it that only in BBAI does the AI try actively toward any victory condition other than culture, which was only added in BTS?).
- GUI. Not only does the GUI under-inform players, but it LIES OUTRIGHT. How is it that this community finds a LYING GUI acceptable in ANY context? Ignorance? Apathy? A golden perception of a beta game that's sold so much? I don't get it.
- Gameplay that is not consistent with stated game rules.
- Spawn balance
- Speed scaling, and diplo code like peace treaties.

That's not even getting into issues like civ balance and tweaks that make sense as post-release fixes. Glaring game interface issues are NOT something that should be in release versions of games. Neither are controls or an incomplete single player experience (that would never bet completed by the company). Having the game's interface lie to us outright on top of that is a major slap in the face and I am frankly amazed at this community's tolerance for a game that is top tier in concept but also carries flaws that are comparable to titles reviewed by the angry video game nerd as among the worst games ever made. It shouldn't be hard to select a unit in modern games, people.

Oh the drama! C'mon, I'm sure it isnt all that bad, why would you even bother playing unless your having fun despite all this. Civ4 is easily the game I've played the most, with and without mods.

I'm also pretty sure that Firaxis isn't the devil when it comes to game developers, and they are one of the better companies when it comes to the quality of games they put out. So why whine when you got a good thing going. Could be worse, have EA or Microsoft buy the franchice, that would mess up the game in no time

I'll admit Ï'm a fanboy, why else would I bother posting on a thread like this, but the way I see it is they havn't let me down yet. There are of course things in civ V which irks me or concerns me, but I'll wait till I got the final product in my hands to make any judgement.

 

[CaptainKapow]

I think TMIT might have a faulty keyboard? =/

I've had similar problems. There seems to be input lag occasionally in Civ4. Kinda like if you are clicking on a large group of units your input and key presses can be delayed and if you go too fast it messes up. Also selecting workers in large groups is totally fuzzed up and I can only usually manage to do what I want one at a time.

OT: I will be getting Civ5 on release from D2D. I know there will be issues but I am really interested in playing the new installment. I like a lot of what I've seen so far gameplay wise, even if I do have some reservations about the DLC.

It really seems like every company except Valve has jumped on the inappropriately priced DLC bandwagon and I've just stopped buying it as my meager attempt at protest. If any other company had made Team Fortress 2, we'd have seen "Class Update DLC: Alternate Weapons!"

I get the first DLC for free anyway, but if the others come out for anything more than 2-3 bucks I'll wait for a steam sale.

 

[Darth Fred]

Are you going to continue playing civ4 after civ5 comes out? There's no way my computer's going to run civ5, and I'm not going to buy a new one just because of that. I hate to admit it, but hopefully as many as possible are in the same position as me.

I'm going to hold out and see what Santa brings me. If V isn't under the tree, I'll probably pick it up some time next year when it's not priced as high and some of the early bugs/patches are resolved.
F

 

[revengeofmakno]

Only one unit is allowed in the city, but the city itself has hitpoints and will be able to attack and defend. As far as I understood, the unit inside the city will not actually fight, instead it melds with the city and gives it a hitpoint bonus. (Not totally sure about the details here.)

Hmmm, you just reminded me of another thing that I am not happy about CIV5, i.e. cities automatically being armed and defended. I like the realism of it being at a player's option with a risk when the decision to have no defences is made but a benefit in that those resources are then put elsewhere.

 

[Psyringe]

Hmmm, you just reminded me of another thing that I am not happy about CIV5, i.e. cities automatically being armed and defended.

I'm not sure whether this is actually the case. So far I assumed that cities would start with almost no fighting abilities, and gain those through buildings completed in them. I could be wrong though, I'm not sure whether I actually read that somewhere or whether my mind just made that up because it seemed to make sense.

 

[sadmachines]

I will be playing both. I still play Civ2 and Alpha Centauri sometimes. I don't play Civ3 much any more, I don't seem to enjoy it as much as I once did.

Unit auto-movement at start of turn, disregarding orders or attempts to change them entirely

I'm not sure if I understand this comment could you explain it, maybe with an example please? I don't think I have ever had an issue with changing orders. Are you saying for example: If I use the right-mouse click to give a selected unit a "route to" order then it moves for this turn...are you saying that I cannot change the route on the same turn after it moved?

If that is what you mean then you can change it. Just reselect the unit and give it a new route via the same right-click command. Although there is a slight bug with this! Sometimes you have to press the right-button twice to continue instead of once. However, it always follows the new route as far as I have seen. Or did you mean something else?

I do agree with the other comment (can't find it now!) that the manual/civlopedia isn't detailed enough. It doesn't ruin it for me though as the kind people on this forum seem happy enough to share information on all that I need/want to know.

I hope the new one has the same (or better) capacity for modding and customisation. That option alone is enough for me to overlook the flaws. It would be good to see FFH on civ5 and see what those guys do differently with the new game engine and mechanics (assuming they intend to convert it over *fingers crossed*).

 

[revengeofmakno]

I'm not sure whether this is actually the case. So far I assumed that cities would start with almost no fighting abilities, and gain those through buildings completed in them. I could be wrong though, I'm not sure whether I actually read that somewhere or whether my mind just made that up because it seemed to make sense.

What I seemed to understand of CIV5 is that as a city grows (and builds presumably), its defense strength will also grow. That also seems to be what you are saying.
Certainly the defense potential of a city increases as it grows but that doesn't mean that potential is realized if energy and resources are placed elsewhere. If we look at the modern world, most cities are not garrisoned and have no defenses in place.

CIV5 appears to automatically give cities defense and bombardment strength.

 

[Holycannoli]

The base movement rate of most units will be 2, presumably for the reasons you just mentioned.

I wouldn't presume that at all. I instead presume the scenario I described, since they did say combat would be slower.

There are no axemen in Civ5, their role is taken over by spearmen. Doesn't really influence your argument, but I thought I'd point it out.

Yeah it doesn't matter, I was just making an example.

Only one unit is allowed in the city, but the city itself has hitpoints and will be able to attack and defend. As far as I understood, the unit inside the city will not actually fight, instead it melds with the city and gives it a hitpoint bonus. (Not totally sure about the details here.)

No offense, but for someone who's speaking so decidedly against the changes, you don't actually seem to know them very well. Personally, I'm skeptical about many changes too, but I don't see any glaring conceptual mistakes as the ones you presume. We'll have to wait, play, and see.

I didn't know about the cities. I still don't. I know the others too well which is why I'm upset, because they aren't telling us what changes compensate for these changes (like giving units 2 movement points to prevent the scenario I described).

Combat will be slower. Their words. Well, no stacks and 1 movement per unit for most units will certainly slow it down, to a possible stalemate. Attacker takes hex, defender takes it back, attacker takes it back, defender takes it back, etc. etc. ad nauseum so long as each side keeps winning on it's turn which is quite possible in the early eras. Both attacker and defender will also constantly be bringing new units from the rear, so without at least 2 movement points and the ability to attack more than once per turn nobody will make any progress.

Plus, the whole idea of cities as you just decribed does not sit well with me. It makes no sense (then again neither does longbowmen shooting down a gunship or any of the other crazy combat outcomes).

 

[Holycannoli]

Also, since it's only 2 weeks away, I'll hold off on any further criticism. If combat doesn't wind up like I described, if trading posts don't look like tent cities everywhere, if no tech trading or espionage doesn't take away significantly from the non-combat strategy of the game, I will happily take back my criticisms. I want to be wrong. I want Civ 5 to be an awesome game I can enjoy if I get a new computer.

(I don't think I'll ever enjoy cities having their own defense and units only adding to HP though)

EDIT: I'm right now reading an article/review mentioning and showing ranged units that can fire from hexes behind the front lines (some sort of modern artillery). That's already a potential stalemate-breaker, so I'm a bit more optimistic about that now. Still remains to be seen though.

 

[Whiskey_Lord]

Yes, but only because my computer can't handle C5.

 

[CornPlanter]

I am never very eager to play new games. They are usually full of bugs, imbalances, even lack of content of sorts. I will wait and see for at least a few months. But eventually, yes, I will move to civ5, no doubts.

 

[none]

I've watched some videos and it looks really nice. I'm not sure my computer can run it though so I'll probably have to wait.

What I find irksome is trading a full game like civ 4 for a game that lacks many aspects (no spies, few leaders and few civs). I wouldn't mind if we were told that it would be fleshed out in an expansion but all the DLC and special edition nonsense is boring to say the least.

I prefer buying expansions instead of downloadable content and I don't like the idea of Babylon being only playable with a DLC.

Since my computer is probably a bit too slow I'll wait until I upgrade and the game goes gold for a complete edition so I won't have to deal with the DLC stuff.

 

[CornPlanter]

- Gameplay that is not consistent with stated game rules

What do you mean?

 

[Darth Fred]

I am never very eager to play new games. They are usually full of bugs, imbalances, even lack of content of sorts. I will wait and see for at least a few months. But eventually, yes, I will move to civ5, no doubts.

I have similar thoughts. I also need to sit down and figure out if I can run it in the first place. We'll see. As tried and true as IV is though, I'm not in a rush.

F

 

[plasmacannon]

I am never very eager to play new games. They are usually full of bugs, imbalances, even lack of content of sorts. I will wait and see for at least a few months. But eventually, yes, I will move to civ5, no doubts.

You got it.
Sadly, that's the way game devs do things for PC games.
They expect us to buy their off the shelf products full of bugs and help them through the Quality Assurance part.
Sorry, Not my job.
Get it right, and I'll buy it. I still have to wait a few months just to be certain they would all be fixed.

In the case of Civ5, financially, it is cheaper to buy multiplayer xbox or Playstation3 games, then, it will be to pay for Civ5, and its presumable 2 later expansions they will try to add on later in the next 2-3 years (like Civ2,3,4 did) adding back things they took out of the initial product that were already in the previous versions of the game.

I still hope they will bring back stacking units into at least small stacks of 2-4 units to show some tradition with their product, instead of just this new version which seems to vary from Civ4 almost as much as MOO3 did from MOO2.

 

[Shrielkul]

I will be sticking with playing Civ4 for awhile for most of the reasons stated above such as waiting for expansion packs to be released and patches to fix all the release version bugs. Also, systemrequirementslab.com gave me a rather unfortunate evaluation of my PC of being able to run Civ5 so I'll either need some upgrades or a whole new system when I do decided to start Civ5.

 

[yanner39]

Some good info here. I watched a walkthrough and I thought it looked really good. There are some changes but some of them I don't mind so much. One thing that does concern me a little is someone mention that in Civ 5, there is more emphasis on warmongering. I really hope that 's not true. Warring should be important, but I don't think it should be a focal point. Can someone state otherwise?

I'm like the empire-building more than the warring, although I am getting better at going to war.

For me, I will stick with Civ 4 for now. Hell, it took me few years to get Civ 4 after its release and I've never played the other Civs. Plus, I'm just starting to get really good at Monarch level as well.

My wife will probably get Civ 5 for me for Christmas and I'm make the switch then.

 

[Darth Fred]

To those of you (Us) that are going to hold off on V for a while, will you be playing the demo?

I'm planning to (System requirments pending).

F

 

[City Builder]

EDIT: I'm right now reading an article/review mentioning and showing ranged units that can fire from hexes behind the front lines (some sort of modern artillery). That's already a potential stalemate-breaker, so I'm a bit more optimistic about that now. Still remains to be seen though.

I was watching a video yesterday that showed cannons shooting over the front lines, I thought that was pretty cool, and the one unit per tile seemed more natural and I don't know, maybe more strategic or tactical, which ever the video/walkthrough convinced me to make the preorder and get it out of the way.

Now, I'm quite jazzed up about Civ 5, even though the Civ games have always just sort of been a sideline game for me when I'm bored with all my games that have become routine (mostly city building games) and I want to give my brain a bit of a workout, I turn back to the Civ games, although looking at the handful of videos that I've now seen on C5, it may become a regular staple for me to play. At least until my brain goes into brain fart land from too much exercision.

 

[yanner39]

To those of you (Us) that are going to hold off on V for a while, will you be playing the demo?

I'm planning to (System requirments pending).

F

I will definately download the demo. As I said, I will eventually make the switch. I've been reading Anticoch's Civ 5 analysis website and it looks pretty cool. I am really looking forward to it.