Civ V graphics

[Xenobenignitas]

I also don't like the static appearance of the landscape and improvements. The trees in CiV look like sprites. And there are the rivers...

The trees really do look like sprites, but if you the debug on you'll see they're partially modelled. The front facade is modelled and it curves, but there's no back to them

 

[code9]

I thought the trees were sprites for sure! I never tried debug mode.

Overall, the Civ5 graphics are OK, but the resources they require to run at a decent FPS are too much for the improvement compared to Civ4. I also miss the animated improvements.

Also, some of the trading posts houses and city meshes actually end up under ground, not to mention stuff appearing in ocean. That's just...

 

[MoonFlare]

Units are good,water is good...everything else is "dead".There's no movement, no soul.And the system req. for THAT are too high.Rivers are the worst part.They're the definition of the word "ugly" for me.

 

[rbj2001]

The Civ5 graphics are definitely worse in a technical sense. The game runs like molasses.

I dislike the way that some developers seem to think high system requirements show that a game is "advanced" and are to be worn as a badge of pride.

No! A game is advanced if it runs smoothly on any system (and don't need a DX11 graphics card just to enable anti-aliasing). Microsoft realised this for Windows 7 after the Vista debacle.

Functionally, Civ4 wins hands-down, since you can clearly see what's going on.

Subjectively, I don't think Civ5's realistic water effects and fog, which are the main things that are different, add anything to the game. Civ4's wonder videos did add a sense of achievement, as well as atmosphere to the game, unlike Civ5's crap pictures. But I might just feel like this because Civ4 is fun and Civ5 isn't.

 

[Zyxpsilon]

Civ4's wonder videos did add a sense of achievement, as well as atmosphere to the game, unlike Civ5's crap pictures. But I might just feel like this because Civ4 is fun and Civ5 isn't.

Yep, but don't forget it's distributed online as well. Steam protects it's bandwidth "efficiency" as much as the Gigabytes worth of splendid Cinematics could induce Oh_Ah_WoooooW & Weeeshhhs from players at home.

It took me about 70 minutes to download a game which i had bought as a DVD, i can't stare at progress bars for hours if there isn't a justifiable wait for more than just (or included as value) animated candies that i'll (anyway) grow tired of seeing eventually.

Static Paintings are Art, not a license fee sent straight to Autodesk for a 3DS-max set of illusions or a budgeted 500,000$ paid upfront to an orchestra for ambient music. I'm listening, nice.
Where's the beef, for a TBS player such as me?

 

[lschnarch]

Subjectively, I don't think Civ5's realistic water effects and fog, which are the main things that are different, add anything to the game.

Especially as the light reflections can easily gild the range indication for ships.
That's really great: the gfx card is running at 80°C only for me to have either to split my move into two or to hover with the mouse of a designated target hex.
Great idea!

Yep, but don't forget it's distributed online as well. Steam protects it's bandwidth "efficiency" as much as the Gigabytes worth of splendid Cinematics could induce Oh_Ah_WoooooW & Weeeshhhs from players at home.

In other words, V should have been shipped solely with the strategic map....

 

[lynxxyarly]

I don't know if anyone here has gotten a chance to play civ 5 with dx11, it looks worlds better than even dx10 graphics.

Buddy of mine just got a gtx 580 and the dx11 graphics make even my gtx 260s' dx10 graphics look like crap.

I was actually impressed at how well it looked. Enough that I just unloaded both of my gtx 260s for a gtx 480.

 

[cdcuase]

I actually like civ3's graphics better. 2d just seems more appropriate for a turn-based strategy game. And in civ3 I can get a quick glance of the map and know instantly what is what. Civ4 required special icons pointing to resources to tell you what it was. Civ5 has just waaay to much clutter for my tastes (thank god for the 2d strategic layer).

 

[Nares]

I like the Civ V graphics and their scaling. However the graphics engine is sloppy, there's no justification for all the resources it uses

This sums up my feeling on the graphics.

I don't mind the relatively static terrain graphics; I know many people do.

I do mind the resource hog these relatively static graphics are; there's no excuse for that.

 

[lschnarch]

I don't mind the relatively static terrain graphics; I know many people do.

I do mind the resource hog these relatively static graphics are; there's no excuse for that.

That's the point.

Give us a resource hog, but then let's have a fully animated map.
Give us a still life as now, but then take away the resource hog.

Currently, we have the worst from both worlds. Did I ever mention incompetency?

 

[manarod]

I'd like to know why the colosseum and the lighthouse are the only buildings shown on the map, are they so important?

 

[lschnarch]

I'd like to know why the colosseum and the lighthouse are the only buildings shown on the map, are they so important?

Leftovers from initial planning.
They had to cut graphical display of many things since their engine turned out to be sub-par.

 

[Dedrytus]

I do not know what is wrong with graphics (or with graphic engine), but my laptop is trying to "fly away" after a 2,3 minutes of game. When I use strategic view, heat is going down and fan works in normal way. I made test with Crysis and situation was not so bad.

But graphic itself... rivers are ugly, unfinished and finished improvements are very similar. Rest of things, I do not know how to explain this, details are ok, but whole image is not very nice and clear.

 

[JohnnyW]

Of all the complaints possible for civ5, I think they actually made it a better looking game. Some of the graphic details like worked tiles may be gone (a step back), but overall the style is more appealing to me.

The UI needs needs some work though, even if it is prettier.

 

[KingMackem]

I preferred 4's graphics- especially with BlueMarble. Civ 5's graphics do not justify the power needed to run them...

 

[Polish]

Unit graphics are clearly too small. Zooming in to see them better is not the answer since then you can't see anything else on the map. I want to be able to play the game zoomed OUT and still see what is going on. The problem is that the units are too small to see and the city lables are so big they block the board.

I play with graphics set for DX9. My mouse will not point correctly on DX10/11 no matter what resolution I try. I was playing with a freind last week who runs DX11 and I absolutely could not see any difference.

I think they should have concentrated more on gameplay and not so much on eye candy which really contributes very little to the expeience and in some cases contributes less, while at the same time requiring an upgrade to my quad core system to even get it to play. I spent around $250 US to get the game running. I am still ahead on the $/entertainemnt hour since I have not stopped playing since release and am still enjoying the game, I just wish the graphics were a little more functional. I mean, the ragdoll soldiers actually falling and fighting as they should are cute the first couple of times you watch, but it gets old and I would rather have functional graphics I could actually see while zoomed out.

 

[Zyxpsilon]

In other words, V should have been shipped solely with the strategic map....

Do NOT put words in my mouth, however wise-cracking your interpretation may get.
Firaxis_2K made their choices for both the Online distribution path and minimal (or acceptable) design along with features.
I'm - as everyone else - only the customer who purchased their product.
Had to wait it all out through Steam and was enforced into a DRM scheme which adds nothing of value as far as gameplay is concerned.
It kinda somehow protects this specific investment long term though.
We all know what the other advantages are - better graphics and Eye-candy included.

 

[Andoo]

I think Civ 4 definitely has the best leader animations. I like the Civ 3's units the most. For world map though I think Civ 5 is the most beautiful and realistic thanks to hexagon and DX11. Arguably Civ 5 on DX10 with low settings look worse than modded Civ 3 however.

 

[lschnarch]

Do NOT put words in my mouth, however wise-cracking your interpretation may get.
Firaxis_2K made their choices for both the Online distribution path and minimal (or acceptable) design along with features.
I'm - as everyone else - only the customer who purchased their product.
Had to wait it all out through Steam and was enforced into a DRM scheme which adds nothing of value as far as gameplay is concerned.
It kinda somehow protects this specific investment long term though.
We all know what the other advantages are - better graphics and Eye-candy included.

I'm not putting words in your mouth, I'm only showing certain consequences of statements.
DL'ing Civ5 means dl'ing ~5 GB currently (complete Steam installation, no DLC included). How much of this may be pure game data without "eye candy"?
Around 1.2 are textures and other graphic data. 1.5 GB are sound data, around 1 GB are terrain data. In total this means ~3.7 GB of gfx and sound data.

Now we can ask ourselves: is that too less, too much or just right?
Civ4's wonder movies for instance are around 10 MB each. Actually, I don't see the problem of adding another 250 MB.

And if 250 additional MB are too much then we have to ask ourselves if the decision for a Steam distribution was really in the player's interest?

 

[Zyxpsilon]

Now we can ask ourselves: is that too less, too much or just right?

Considering what gets off&in bandwidth "Limits", i'd say just right if that's what it takes to please consumer'ia. The trick is to decide what exactly fits the much and less.
RADTools' Bink movies are (were in our Civ4_case) indeed wisely compressed and should for efficiency reasons not only in D/L terms but also runtime accessing.

Somehow sadly, wmv creeped in. Cannot hold them responsible nor would i critic designers for the switch as proven by the superbly optimized system for Diplo screens and how Leaders feel remarkably real.

Now, there's an area where a choice had to be made; interactive or splashing?
I wonder what's best.
Mega or Giga, end results have some serious implications.

I'm simply from the school (been coding since the mid 70's, yep that old!!) of thoughts that never took 16k worth of Ram for granted. So, a USB stick doesn't exactly feel like a Floppy - to me.

Thus, the awareness for size or useless oversize.