Civilization V Demo Release Date: 21st of september

[Tylerryan79]

Pretty lame if you ask me, Im still getting the game(preordered) but was looking forward to getting a taste of it a little early. They couldn't get it out earlier than the 21st? Ya right, I don't believe that one bit.

 

[12agnar0k]

Oh goodie, we finally have the demo date, a bit disapointed that I will only get 3 days use from the demo, 21st-24th, North Americans are even worse off in luck who if they wan't to pre-order and get the bonus from that will get no demo play (although I'd rather be playing the full game instead of the demo come the 21st) so they won't get to test before they pre-order where as internationally we have 3 days of demo play before pre-order ends.
However the main purpose for the demo is not "test before you get a discount on a pre-order" its so that you can "test before you buy", if that means you miss out on pre-order discounts then tough cookies, you can always buy the game in a Steam sale later on down the line of time.

Thanks for the confirmed date greg, I guess I will look forward to 3 days of demo play before I get the full version at the least .

Why do people not believe 2k when they say they couldn't get the demo out earlier? Surely they have no reason to lie about this, the earlier the demo comes out the more potential customers that get to play it, the more potential customers buy the full game, people who are currently hesistant about buying the game, "£10 pre-order discount or not" are not going to be persauded to buy with later Demo release date, so their is no possible fiscal reason to delay Demo release till the 21'st the only reason left is the truth that they won't finalize the demo till the 21'st. Anyone who isn't sure and was waiting for the demo to come out before they buy will still wait, the only thing that is happening here is that we will miss out on some days of Civ5 play, nothing quite near a conspiracy to get your money.

 

[Drake L. Dragon]

I do realize that, but to show such an early build at the major event is not a good sign. And let's face it, there will be no major overhaul of the game mechanics, maybe some fine changes, but I think that's pretty much what we are going to get. And once again I would preorder it, but if I had a demo at least few days before in my hands.

You also, however, have to consider the time constraints of the game developers. They had only announced that the game even existed in around early June. In 2009, people even thought that Sid Meier had already forgotten about the core, Civilization series for his other Civilization projects such as Revolutions and the Network on Facebook. However, after the announcement, they stated that the game would be released in September of 2010, which was a shock to me, because I would've thought that it would be released sometime in 2011. The game developers, from what I heard, only started working on the game after all of the expansions were finished for Civilization IV, and that would have been sometime in 2008. Therefore, it is unfair to criticize the game developers for holding off the release date of the demo, when they clearly made an effort to release the full game as quickly as possible already.

 

[Selous]

is this a world wide release on the 21st? or a north american date?

 

[Iberian]

Look. It's incorrect to say that the game developers are being disingenuous about releasing the demo, because there may be bugs in the game. That's exactly the reason they say they're not releasing the demo. The article says that they haven't completely finished the game yet, and they surely haven't furnished the game yet. However, the game developers have put the best interests of their fans and the honor of this franchise over their financial interests, which says something. You, after all, are a testament that even some Civilization fanatics on this forum will not buy the game for this very reason. This will obviously hurt their sales, as I said. However, they are willing to risk the lack in sales, as long as they please the true fanatics.

In terms of the Mafia II argument, it's not a logical parallel with Civilization V. The Mafia series is new to the gaming community. It is just beginning to garner its identity. Therefore, players are making a bet in experimenting with the game. However, the demos must have hinted to some of those players that the game isn't for them. The Civilization franchise, though, isn't just some new up-and-coming gaming series. The Civilization franchise has ruled over the gaming community for nineteen years. How many gaming series actually have a forum dedicated to modding it with users who actually log in most everday to discuss the mechanics and dynamics of the games? I highly doubt that even a demo full of bugs, which is apparently what many people wanted here, would be as detrimental as the hit that Mafia II received. Nevertheless, I, at least, can tell that financial reasons were not apart of not releasing the demo. Rather, the game developers probably did do so not to disgrace the quality of the game or demo's release into the free market that has made this franchise so good in the first place.

You don't seem to understand how programming works. If the demo would have bugs so would the release. It isn't like they code a whole new program named demo. They simply alter the features in some cases or turn the turn limit down to 100 in others. The full version of the game is already done being pressed into DVD's and being shipped.

What you are probably right on is that there are bugs that will be somewhat substantial come release date. Past performance and the scope of the changes of this product almost assure it. Publishers don't like to pay programmers to fully polish games. This is why it was for financial reasons. They don't want to lose sales over people who find it buggy who find the hype has worn off in the two weeks prior to the release date.

 

[krunsh]

The full version of the game is already done being pressed into DVD's and being shipped. .

I could be wrong, but I beleive there is nothing more than a key and a steam instalation on the DVD and you still have to download the game. So yeah they could be working on it to the last few hours before release.

But I get your point.

I understand why they are unable to release a demo 2 week before the game come out. But unable to release it one our two day before the full game, that`s marketing.

But that`s okay... We will wait I guess, I just hope they will be releasing some interesting podcast and stuff before release.

By the way 2K, Bismark is cool and all... But some more Wallpaper would be great!

 

[12agnar0k]

We've seen game footage, the game is not utterly bug riddled and looks amazing so "buzzzz" invalid answer.

Krunsh, on the DVD you get the game data as well, you link your CD key to your Steam account and then you can download it (say if you lose/break your DVD) like any Steam game, but if you have the DVD or other form of game back up, then installation is much quicker.

 

[Zhahz]

What you are probably right on is that there are bugs that will be somewhat substantial come release date.

Doubt it. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a zero day patch but I doubt it'll be due to lots of bugs, more like balancea and/or alterations.

There have been way too many previews from a huge variety of sources and nobody has said anything about bugs, and 2k/F couldn't surpress that many people, especially a certain someone who went slightly overboard with "previewing" and was revealing a lot of stuff that he probably wasn't supposed to.

If those older preview builds aren't buggy it's unlikely the game suddenly became bug ridden closer to release. Usually when previewers DO have buggy versions of games to preview they mention it and remind that it's an early build.

 

[Auncien]

We've seen game footage, the game is not utterly bug riddled and looks amazing so "buzzzz" invalid answer.

So why then can a demo not be prepared sooner, particularly since it would be distributed digitally?

 

[Iberian]

Doubt it. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a zero day patch but I doubt it'll be due to lots of bugs, more like balancea and/or alterations.

My guess is it won't be gameplay bugs but rather system incompatability bugs/steam bugs. Of those "bugs" about half will be user error misidentified as bugs. But still there will be a lot of people in the first month with issues. The fact that many of them will be there own problem is probably the only good reason to not release the demo.

 

[Boris Godunov]

So, who here spouting off about how simple it is to make a game demo has actually done so for a major game release?

 

[Infiltrator]

I knew it would be right in front of the release date

 

[Drake L. Dragon]

You don't seem to understand how programming works. If the demo would have bugs so would the release. It isn't like they code a whole new program named demo. They simply alter the features in some cases or turn the turn limit down to 100 in others. The full version of the game is already done being pressed into DVD's and being shipped.

What you are probably right on is that there are bugs that will be somewhat substantial come release date. Past performance and the scope of the changes of this product almost assure it. Publishers don't like to pay programmers to fully polish games. This is why it was for financial reasons. They don't want to lose sales over people who find it buggy who find the hype has worn off in the two weeks prior to the release date.

Well, I never did argue that the demo version is a completely different version of the game. I did argue, however, that, if the demo were to have been released in, per say, seven days, two things would happen.

(1) Quality would decrease. A demo has to be a finished version of the game with limits on the length of time to play it. However, based on the fact of the already hurried production of the game and the reports of how horribly unfinished the game was at the recent conference, the production would have to be rushed to finish the game completely in the timeframe of those hypothetical, seven days. The game developers couldn't make any major changes after that, or else the fans would scream about how the demo was a lie and did not represent the final release. The demo, if released in the next seven or so days, would probably have many, many bugs in it, and that would not be a better solution than allowing the game developers to have an extra two weeks to make sure that the game is indeed finished for the free market.
(2) Reliability in the franchise would decrease, or at least more than it has in delaying the release date of the demo. I'm sure that a lot of people would be a lot more angry, if the game developers were to have released a faulty demo that would probably, largely have to represent the fully released game.

It is clear, however, that the demo was not released for not financial reasons, because the franchise already knows that Civilization V will get enough sales at least to be successful on account of the already loyal fans to the series. However, a buggy demo would cause these core fans to lose faith in the series as a whole, be a blemish on the series, and the expansion of the Civilization franchise into more gaming communities might be halted for that reason. Basically, I don't see the evidence that the game developers are these evil, Dr. Evil, money-grubbin' executives that people are making them out to be. I see reasonable people that are willing to delay the demo's release date for the quality of the game and the continued support of the fans.

 

[Tylerryan79]

Do people honestly believe they can not release a demo before the 21st? It's the most moddable civ game ever, surely the devs could mod it for 100 turns . Or do people think on the 19th they are going to send the file over to steam for download, wiping the foreheads and saying phew just made it! This is a calculated move, and a reasonable scenario could be that north America is their largest target for sales, and the allure of waiting for the demo is far out shadowed by the loss of potential preorder bonuses, and with d2d and it's discount it's practically a no brainer for 2k. However regardless of their motives I do not believe that they are unable to produce a demo before they release the whole game, I'm just not buying it.

 

[Boris Godunov]

Look up: Argument from Personal Incredulity Fallacy.

 

[EmpireOfCats]

First, thanks for posting the info here. It's always better to know then not to.

Second, I really, really, really don't like this . And to be honest, I don't understand. The demo doesn't have to be pressed in plastic, put in a cardboard box, shrink-wrapped, and sent to stores, it just needs to be uploaded to Steam. If the demo needs to be worked on until September 21, how is the complete game supposed to be bug-free and finished? Its time-frame is a lot shorter. This sounds like a zero-day patch at least. Call me paranoid or suspicious, but I think I'm going to wait a good while now and see how it turns out before I buy my copy.

Third, now that we have the demo date out of the way, what's the word on the Mac version? It's getting hard to believe that Firaxis or 2K still don't know what they are going to do.

Fourth, thanks again, and please keep the news coming.

 

[Thormodr]

First, thanks for posting the info here. It's always better to know then not to.

Second, I really, really, really don't like this . And to be honest, I don't understand. The demo doesn't have to be pressed in plastic, put in a cardboard box, shrink-wrapped, and sent to stores, it just needs to be uploaded to Steam. If the demo needs to be worked on until September 21, how is the the complete game supposed to be bug-free and finished? Its time-frame is a lot shorter. This sounds like a zero-day patch at least. Call me paranoid or suspicious, but I think I'm going to wait a good while now and see how it turns out before I buy my copy.

Third, now that we have the demo date out of the way, what's the word on the Mac version? It's getting hard to believe that Firaxis or 2K still don't know what they are going to do.

Fourth, thanks again, and please keep the news coming.

I would assume that any boxed version you buy with discs won't actually have the actual game on it any more. It will merely allow you to download it on to your computer from Steam. So, they could rush out the boxes to all the retailers and still have the game in an unfinished state. As long as the game is good to go on the 21st, they don't care.

Not releasing a demo seems to indicate that the game isn't ready yet. I suppose it's better to delay the demo as they could lose $$$ with a buggy demo.

It's still a piss poor job all around though.

 

[Dearmad]

I thought this thread and the date was a joke at first... but it's not. However it could be a lot more "funny" if the next thread by 2k says they've had to push back the release date by a week... that would be really funny.

 

[Minmaster]

this is lame... are they scared people will play the demo and cancel their pre-orders?
i was hoping to play the demo and decide on whether to pre-order or not... it's rather important since the pre-orders have the bonus goodies. if i wait for the demo, then i can't get in on the pre-order goodies...

 

[Grunthex]

While I think this is a less than cool decision from 2K, I look at it like so.

Even if the game was ... not very good on release, am I really not going to buy it? In 3 months it will be better. In 6 months, better yet. Hell, if I buy it and throw it on a shelf for a year, I've lost nothing.