Asset file hinting at future and/or cut content

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

They promised a lot of British content, so I wouldn’t be surprised.

Yeah, that's the only probable one if they get one in Antiquity, unless they go for something like the Iceni or Picts etc. I'd expect more in the Exploration Age though, like Ireland first.

By the way, if the Norse can be in Antiquity, I think the Franks could be as well. And maybe a Slavic civ.

Maybe. I'd personally would want the Franks, as in the Carolingian Franks, to be in Exploration that way they could go into Prussia or French Empire. But with the Normans in the game, that might not happen.
I guess it's possible that if they are Antiquity, they could then go into a proper HRE/Teutonic civ and Ancien Régime/Capetian France civ. I'd welcome earlier versions of France and Germany, considering I'm not too fond of the way the Modern iterations are designed.

 

[marius_kaparius]

Is the AssetCloud file still available? I'm not seeing it at the path.

 

[Krajzen]

Fun fact: somebody on reddit discovered that in some files the original name for the US civ was "Colonial America".

That seems to be the final missing link of the notion that at one point we're gonna get the 4th age set of civs - it is certainly not accidental that devs went out of their way to name all industrial era civs in the way not colliding with the 2024 naming conventions, and they tend to focus on the period from the 18th to the ww2 era.

 

[Ryansinbela]

Well there are some world war stuff referenced in the game

 

[Evie]

How I foresee the British isles developing, in the long term (ie many years), in order of most likely to least likely addition, based on the comment about "lots of content".

-Anglo-Saxons/Anglia in Antiquity is virtually certain to form an alternate start path to the Romans.

-Ireland or Scotland, maybe Wales in Exploration: the next most likely, and still very likely, as an alternate path to a united Great Britain via the Celtic world. 85% likely to happen. If we get only one I think Scotland has the slight edge but not much on Ireland and Wales is well behind, but I wouldn't sleep on the possibility we get two, in which case Wales actually seems very likely to take the second slot to me, between the chance for dragon banners, longbows and arthurian mythology references.

-Insular Celtic antiquity as a precursor to the one (or two) civs above will probably happen as well. My personal favorite there is Dal Riata, but it could be the Picts, the Iceni, the Brythons, or half a dozen other options. This is more of a long term addition.

-Tudor England probably waits until all of the above are done, and even then may be limited to only adding Elizabeth (or Francis Drake, or Walsingham, or Old Billy S.?) as a leader. And as I previously mentioned, I think we don't see Tudor England until we're up to a lot of civ in every era, like 40 or 50/era.

-A modern celtic inclusion appears very unlikely, since Ireland only appears very late in the modern era and the whole point of Great Britain is that it pretty much united everything else (and Ireland).

Taking a wild guess of one British civ per release cycle (with each release cycle being about a year), I'd say we're looking at Release Cycle I (pre-first expansion DLCs) having Great Britain, of course ; Release Cycle 2 (Rise and Fall) adding the Anglo-Saxons, Release Cycle 3 (Gatherin Storm) adding Exploration Celts, Release Cycle 4 (NFP) or 5 (Leader Pass) adding Antiquity Celts as well, and Tudor England if it happens being held back for a still later Release Cycle 6 or later.

I'm not speculating about any fourth age additions just yet.

 

[UWHabs]

Fun fact: somebody on reddit discovered that in some files the original name for the US civ was "Colonial America".

That seems to be the final missing link of the notion that at one point we're gonna get the 4th age set of civs - it is certainly not accidental that devs went out of their way to name all industrial era civs in the way not colliding with the 2024 naming conventions, and they tend to focus on the period from the 18th to the ww2 era.

I mean, we still don't know if the mystery 4th age was something that they cut earlier in development and just didn't clean up all the references for, or whether it's something they started to work on going forward, but weren't careful enough to not mix up in files. Or, plausibly, both - maybe they had it in, figured they couldn't get it done properly, and cut it, and still have the option to add it back in later.

 

[j51]

I mean, we still don't know if the mystery 4th age was something that they cut earlier in development and just didn't clean up all the references for, or whether it's something they started to work on going forward, but weren't careful enough to not mix up in files. Or, plausibly, both - maybe they had it in, figured they couldn't get it done properly, and cut it, and still have the option to add it back in later.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the zero, stuka, katyusha and maybe the marine as well as the tier 3 units were meant to be for the start of the atomic age.

 

[Ryansinbela]

I wouldn’t be surprised if the zero, stuka, katyusha and maybe the marine as well as the tier 3 units were meant to be for the start of the atomic age.

That was my thought as well

 

[j51]

That was my thought as well

Yeah the crises could be the depression, breakup of empires into nation states, influenza, etc.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Fun fact: somebody on reddit discovered that in some files the original name for the US civ was "Colonial America".

It was also called "Colonial America" with the music theme video released for YouTube.

A modern celtic inclusion appears very unlikely, since Ireland only appears very late in the modern era and the whole point of Great Britain is that it pretty much united everything else (and Ireland).

I do wonder with the case of Dublin being a Modern IP, and the fact that the civ is specifically called "Great Britain" and not the "British" might imply a Modern Age Ireland in the future?
Then again Lisbon shows up too and Portugal is probably guaranteed to get in Exploration. I'd prefer an Exploration Ireland anyways.

-Insular Celtic antiquity as a precursor to the one (or two) civs above will probably happen as well. My personal favorite there is Dal Riata, but it could be the Picts, the Iceni, the Brythons, or half a dozen other options. This is more of a long term addition.

I could easily live without an Insular Celtic Antiquity civ. I think the main draw of one would be the leader, like Boudicca, and that could come without needing a civ for them now. I'd rather them focus on having a Continental Celtic civ like Gaul.

Yeah the crises could be the depression, breakup of empires into nation states, influenza, etc.

My idea was that triggering the current victory condition might cause a crisis into the next age: Operation Ivy would start the Cold War, World Bank starts Stock Market Collapse etc.

 

[Evie]

I think Antiquity Insular Celtic is more likely than Modern Celtic, although yes, obviously if we get Modern Celtic, it will be Ireland.

 

[Xefjord]

My idea was that triggering the current victory condition might cause a crisis into the next age: Operation Ivy would start the Cold War, World Bank starts Stock Market Collapse etc.

This sounds so cool, and I wish that it was something that actually was being considered.

 

[Evie]

Agreed ; that woudl actually be pretty awesome.

 

[Xandinho]

I think that if they had added America now as "Colonial America," it would have been a clear indication that they are planning a fourth era for the future. And since they might want to keep some mystery and not make things too obvious, they decided to stick with the familiar America naming convention that we always get.

Still, "Colonial America" feels quite odd—why not "Industrial America" and then "Contemporary America" instead?

Everything suggests that a fourth era with a full roster of new civs is the direction we're heading (as opposed to the speculation that it would just be a new era without additional civs). This might explain Meiji Japan, Prussia, and the French Empire instead of simply Japan, Germany, and France.

However, this intrigues me quite a bit. I'm not sure how deep they could go with their civ choices for a fourth era, considering that most potential options would likely spark endless debates about their representation.

 

[wesplaysciv]

I think that if they had added America now as "Colonial America," it would have been a clear indication that they are planning a fourth era for the future. And since they might want to keep some mystery and not make things too obvious, they decided to stick with the familiar America naming convention that we always get.

Still, "Colonial America" feels quite odd—why not "Industrial America" and then "Contemporary America" instead?

Everything suggests that a fourth era with a full roster of new civs is the direction we're heading (as opposed to the speculation that it would just be a new era without additional civs). This might explain Meiji Japan, Prussia, and the French Empire instead of simply Japan, Germany, and France.

However, this intrigues me quite a bit. I'm not sure how deep they could go with their civ choices for a fourth era, considering that most potential options would likely spark endless debates about their representation.

When the new age DLC comes out, they'll just rename the current America to "Colonial America" or "Industrial America" and have a new "USA" or Modern America or what have you.

 

[pokiehl]

I don't quite understand the logic here. The thought in support of a 4th age is that they simultaneously planned it well enough to have "Meiji Japan" and "French Empire" and "Prussia" but not well enough to call the civ Colonial America?

 

[Mudokon Pop]

I do wonder with the case of Dublin being a Modern IP, and the fact that the civ is specifically called "Great Britain" and not the "British" might imply a Modern Age Ireland in the future?
Then again Lisbon shows up too and Portugal is probably guaranteed to get in Exploration. I'd prefer an Exploration Ireland anyways.

British wouldn't cover Ireland anyways since British generally refers to the island of Great Britain anyways (the UK's full name is United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland). So i don't think modern Ireland is suggested there at all.

Being from Ireland, I agree that there's no need for antiquity Ireland.

 

[Menocchio]

I think that if they had added America now as "Colonial America," it would have been a clear indication that they are planning a fourth era for the future. And since they might want to keep some mystery and not make things too obvious, they decided to stick with the familiar America naming convention that we always get.

Still, "Colonial America" feels quite odd—why not "Industrial America" and then "Contemporary America" instead?

Everything suggests that a fourth era with a full roster of new civs is the direction we're heading (as opposed to the speculation that it would just be a new era without additional civs). This might explain Meiji Japan, Prussia, and the French Empire instead of simply Japan, Germany, and France.

However, this intrigues me quite a bit. I'm not sure how deep they could go with their civ choices for a fourth era, considering that most potential options would likely spark endless debates about their representation.

On the other hand, I'm not sure if these indicate anything, given that "Colonial America" comes from the name of its theme on the soundtrack, where (for example) Hawai'i's theme is given as "Ancient Hawai'i" and Han is "The Han Dynasty" (as opposed to, say, "Han China"). I suspect it's not much to do with mystery and future plans.

If anything, my belief (with the limited evidence we have) is that the 4th age was planned or thought about in a limited, internal testing environment, but development of it was ultimately cut. Whether we will see something similar in the future is up in the air, but I wouldn't be surprised if we saw it in some fashion in an expansion much as Civ VI did with Gathering Storm. I think some refining of the ages is a shoe-in, given how truncated Modern and Exploration are already—going from steam engines to tanks (and potentially airplanes) within a single tech is pretty wild!

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

When the new age DLC comes out, they'll just rename the current America to "Colonial America" or "Industrial America" and have a new "USA" or Modern America or what have you.

Nothing about the final design of America feels Colonial America anyway. It definitely has a 19th century Manifest Destiny to Gilded Age feel to it.

British wouldn't cover Ireland anyways since British generally refers to the island of Great Britain anyways (the UK's full name is United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland). So i don't think modern Ireland is suggested there at all.

Being from Ireland, I agree that there's no need for antiquity Ireland.

I was thinking more along the lines of 19th century British Empire, which would have included the whole island of Ireland. But yes, specifically calling it Great Britain will mean they will be leaving the Ireland out in the design of the civ.

 

[Mudokon Pop]

I was thinking more along the lines of 19th century British Empire, which would have included the whole island of Ireland. But yes, specifically calling it Great Britain will mean they will be leaving the Ireland out in the design of the civ.

Fair enough - but I still don't think it implies a modern Ireland civ. I hope we're an exploration civ if we're in the game.