Civilization: total war?

[aronnax]

There is a reason why I have stopped playing Civilisation IV but I still play Total War Games.
Total War Games immerse players in a specific era and place and everything, from technology to events, to diplomacy and economy is invested to try, to the very best of their ability, to model it.
You can't do that in a game that spans 4000BC to 1815AD. Civilisation games lose alot of detail because their attempts to model a history game is very cosmetic at best. Spanning 6000 years and the entire continent means that you have to be broad and that you have to be selective in the "Civilisations" you choose. It's already bad enough the way MTW2 sums the Holy Roman Empire as one faction and Italy as Milan, Venice, Sicily and Papal States. Imagine it for the world!


Lastly, I always hated the way borders worked in Civilisation. I hated that it was based on Culture and that is incredibly random and that when you take a city, you usually don't take any land around it. This frustrates me entirely. It also makes the game even less historic by having randomly placed blobs instead of bluntly accurate provinces.

 

[Joecoolyo]

And that's what I loved about civ compared to the Total War games! The ability to create my own history, in my own world, with my own unique borders. The thought of doing so has actually given me an itching to play CivIV with the Revolutions mod recently. I loved the fact that empires could collapse into a bunch of small, arguing states, with their own funky borders.

 

[aronnax]

And that's what I loved about civ compared to the Total War games! The ability to create my own history, in my own world, with my own unique borders. The thought of doing so has actually given me an itching to play CivIV with the Revolutions mod recently. I loved the fact that empires could collapse into a bunch of small, arguing states, with their own funky borders.

That's where we differ I suppose. I'm not a strict "scripted History" gamer. If Paradox Interactive games represent anything, it's the ability for gamers to change the path of a nation. I do however like historical realism, which is something Paradox Interactive games excel at (with a few mods) and Total War games are good at when it comes to detail of units, terrain etc.

Civilisation is a game that happens to have history rather than a history-inspired game.

 

[Ajidica]

Some civ mods do a better job at following history and being historicaly accurate then most total wars games. Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire and Sword of Islam come to mind.

 

[sophie]

Lastly, I always hated the way borders worked in Civilisation. I hated that it was based on Culture and that is incredibly random and that when you take a city, you usually don't take any land around it. This frustrates me entirely. It also makes the game even less historic by having randomly placed blobs instead of bluntly accurate provinces.

lolwut? Total War has "accurate borders"?

 

[aronnax]

lolwut? Total War has "accurate borders"?

bluntly accurate provinces!

Sure they aren't the best but they will always be more accurate than Civilisation 4 on World Map. You can at least find a blob on the map that resembles France or Germany.

And the Shogun 2 Total War map is beautiful and quite accurate!

 

[sophie]

Seeing as how I've never played S2TW, I don't really think I was talking about it....

But yeah, totally accurate map:

 

[aronnax]

Seeing as how I've never played S2TW, I don't really think I was talking about it....

But yeah, totally accurate map:

Again, vague shape is better than random shape any day.

 

[Elta]

To be honest, TW really needs to add at the very least the option of Randomly generated maps.

Tyronia and other user made maps added to the replayability of M2 immensely, if Shogun 2 had it I'd get more out of it to.


I understand the reason why some fans don't want it, but just the option would not effect their experience in any way.

 

[aronnax]

To be honest, TW really needs to add at the very least the option of Randomly generated maps.

Tyronia and other user made maps added to the replayability of M2 immensely, if Shogun 2 had it I'd get more out of it to.


I understand the reason why some fans don't want it, but just the option would not effect their experience in any way.

I don't think that is possible to achieve given the way maps are made in Total War games in which they have an actual map to base it on and several layers of other maps compiled into one. Like a terrain map, a river map, a province map. And then specific coordination to said map to see where various things pop up on the campaign screen.

 

[Dachs]

Randomly generated maps are lunacy in a TW context, but modability is essential.

 

[Elta]

I don't think that is possible to achieve given the way maps are made in Total War games in which they have an actual map to base it on and several layers of other maps compiled into one. Like a terrain map, a river map, a province map. And then specific coordination to said map to see where various things pop up on the campaign screen.

I haven't done any serious modding since M2, but it was really easy to do in M2. The warscape engine is different, but I am pretty sure it can be done.

Randomly generated maps are lunacy in a TW context.

What in blazes is that suppose to mean?

Not everyone is roleplaying as a kindom/state. The map get repatitive and is essentially meaningless to me. Playing total war for me is just the same as playing starcraft or something like that.

If you like to roleplay that's cool, random maps will not result in a loss of your "realisim". No one is forcing you to play on them.

- I understand that I implied a lot of what I think you me and you might not mean any of that.

 

[Dachs]

What in blazes is that suppose to mean?

Not everyone is roleplaying as a kindom/state. The map get repatitive and is essentially meaningless to me. Playing total war for me is just the same as playing starcraft or something like that.

If you like to roleplay that's cool, random maps will not result in a loss of your "realisim". No one is forcing you to play on them.

- I understand that I implied a lot of what I think you me and you might not mean any of that.

Yeah, it has nothing to do with RPing. Well, okay, RPing is part of it, but it's not the insurmountable part. The map's just too huge, has too much stuff on it, and requires too much context to be randomly generated. It'd be like making a Civilization map with a helluva lot more tiles.

 

[Elta]

Fair Enough, at the very least I'd buy some DLC map packs

 

[Maniacal]

*facepalms*

Screw everything about overpriced DLC map packs.

 

[jtb1127]

Double face palm

 

[Matty R]

I would love this game to be made. I suggested something similar in the Civ 4 forums years ago, without actually knowing of the existence of the Total War series.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=240642