Compendium of Fake Tech and Wonder Quotes

[CaiusDrewart]

While I understand redoing some of the quotes with Sean Bean is cost prohibitive there is no reason they can't get someone else to do quotes (Civ4 did this with their expansions rather than pay the big bucks to bring back Leonard Nimoy for the new technologies). I myself want to hear a female give the tech quotes. It's about time. It doesn't have to be someone famous, in fact, I'd rather it not be someone famous. But I do prefer a professional voice actor (unlike the person who gave the tech quotes for Civ4 expansions- he sounds like a computer programmer LOL).

I'd like a redo of the erroneous quotes, and also some additional quotes so there are at least 2 quotes for each technology. Some already have 2, but not all.

Haha I believe that was Sid Meier himself doing the Civ 4 expansion quotes! The results were... not great. They should have hired a professional to do it.

As for Civ 4's tech quotes, at a quick glance I can catch four significant mistakes. The game uses the same made-up da Vinci quote for Flight that Civ 6 does. The Einstein quote for economics ("Compound interest is the most powerful force in the universe") is probably made up. The Buddha quote for Alphabet ("when words are both true and kind, they can change our world") is definitely made up. The quote for Monarchy ("A multitude of rulers is not a good thing. Let there be one ruler, one king") is incorrectly attributed to Herodotus. Herodotus did say this, but he was quoting Homer, who said it first in Book 2 of the Iliad.

I'm also rather skeptical that Oscar Wilde said "the bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy," just because I can't find any reliable confirmation that he said it, and Oscar Wilde is the sort of person to whom witticisms are incorrectly attributed. But hey, maybe he said it. I couldn't pin that down either way.

I'm a bit more forgiving of Civ 4, though, because in spite of these missteps the game also had quite a few gems in there. The quotes for Literature, Philosophy, Nationalism, Theology, and Mathematics are really great. I also enjoy all the Homeric and Biblical quotes, which give a nice epic and archaic feel.

 

[joncnunn]

Moderator Action: Merged both fake quotes threads

 

[PhilBowles]

I'm also rather skeptical that Oscar Wilde said "the bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy," just because I can't find any reliable confirmation that he said it, and Oscar Wilde is the sort of person to whom witticisms are incorrectly attributed. But hey, maybe he said it. I couldn't pin that down either way.

This seems widely considered unattributable (many seem dubious it's attributable to Wilde) but may be a pithy restatement of Parkinson's law ("Work expands to fill the time available for its completion") which dates to 1955. Alternatively P J O'Rourke wrote the similar "Bureaucrats want bigger bureaus. Special interests are interested in whatever's special to them." in 1994.

Looking into the historical usage of the word, it was almost certainly not in common enough currency as a perjorative term in Wilde's time for this to be a plausible attribution, and the 'red tape' concept appears not to have existed as such. This seems to date to the 1940s. Searches for Wilde quotes don't turn up any other indications that he ever referenced the word 'bureaucracy'.

I'm not sure why the Civ series seems mortally afraid to note when a quote is unattributable - or to specify an author but note that it's a misattribution. The quotes themselves are often fine (and this one's very good).

 

[narmox]

Civ2 for life for me. It all just went downhill after that. *waves cane to chase the kids off my lawn after boring them with stories of walking every day to school barefoot in the snow uphill both ways*

Ah, so you were an avid user of the Alpine Troops I see!

 

[Patine]

Ah, so you were an avid user of the Alpine Troops I see!

Oh yes, and I was envious that they got the luxury of skis...

 

[God of Kings]

I agree that some of the quotes can be replaced. There's even someone willing to re-record the quotes: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/quote-supplementation-replacement-interest.606344/

We could also find an alternate quote for "Early Empire" to replace the "air conditioning led to the downfall of the Roman Empire" quote.

 

[PhilBowles]

I agree that some of the quotes can be replaced. There's even someone willing to re-record the quotes: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/quote-supplementation-replacement-interest.606344/

We could also find an alternate quote for "Early Empire" to replace the "air conditioning led to the downfall of the Roman Empire" quote.

If Nimoy's narration of it in Civ IV wasn't so memorable I'd go with the Ozymandius quote.

An alternative could be:

"the vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave.” - Edward Gibbon

"Empires inevitably fall, and when they do, history judges them for the legacies they leave behind." - Noah Feldman

 

[CaiusDrewart]

I agree that some of the quotes can be replaced. There's even someone willing to re-record the quotes: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/quote-supplementation-replacement-interest.606344/

We could also find an alternate quote for "Early Empire" to replace the "air conditioning led to the downfall of the Roman Empire" quote.

I will make a little suggestion for Early Empire:

“To tame the proud, the fetter'd slave to free / These are imperial arts, and worthy thee.”

--Vergil's Aeneid, Book VI, as translated by John Dryden (1631-1700).

I think it would be nice to have a positive quote about empire--I'd rather most of the game's tech quotes be made by people who were proponents of the technology. I think Civ VI's quotes are way too snarky or even outright hostile in tone. Also I'd put more poetry in there. It's so much catchier!

 

[PhilBowles]

I will make a little suggestion for Early Empire:

“To tame the proud, the fetter'd slave to free / These are imperial arts, and worthy thee.”

--Vergil's Aeneid, Book VI, as translated by John Dryden (1631-1700).

I think it would be nice to have a positive quote about empire--I'd rather most of the game's tech quotes be made by people who were proponents of the technology. I think Civ VI's quotes are way too snarky or even outright hostile in tone. Also I'd put more poetry in there. It's so much catchier!

That's a good option as well. I thought to look further to the foundations of the thing:

"When Marduk sent me to rule over men, to give the protection of right to the land, I did right and righteousness in ... , and brought about the well-being of the oppressed." - The Code of Hammurabi

or from the epilogue:

"If such a ruler have wisdom, and be able to keep his land in order, he shall observe the words which I have written in this inscription; the rule, statute, and law of the land which I have given; the decisions which I have made will this inscription show him; let him rule his subjects accordingly, speak justice to them, give right decisions, root out the miscreants and criminals from this land, and grant prosperity to his subjects."

 

[God of Kings]

There's this one that can replace the "Distractions" quote by TS Eliot for Social Media:

"Most people depend on the Internet and cellphones to survive, but what happens when they stop working?"

Hayao Miyazaki

 

[PhilBowles]

There's this one that can replace the "Distractions" quote by TS Eliot for Social Media:

"Most people depend on the Internet and cellphones to survive, but what happens when they stop working?"

Hayao Miyazaki

Since it can be completed multiple times Social Media needs multiple alternative quotes - if I'm not mistaken an earlier Civ did this with Future Tech.

BrainyQuote offers:

"Social media are a catalyst for the advancement of everyone's rights. It's where we're reminded that we're all human and all equal. It's where people can find and fight for a cause, global or local, popular or specialized, even when there are hundreds of miles between them." - Queen Rania of Jordan

 

[God of Kings]

Here's a few more:

• "By giving people the power to share, we're making the world more transparent." - Mark Zuckerberg (American businessman, co-founder of Facebook)
  
• "I tweet, therefore my entire life has shrunk to 140 character chunks of instant event & predigested gnomic wisdom. & swearing." - Neil Gaiman (American comic book writer)
  
• "Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing." - Jimbo Wales (American businessman, co-founder of Wikipedia)

Interestingly enough, Wales and Zuckerberg are friends.

 

[GhostSalsa]

It goes beyond air conditioning, really. And beyond fake quotes etc

Many are anachronistic in more subtle ways:
STATE WORKFORCE: "It is equally important to have a happy and engaged workforce as it is to have a profitable bottom line." - no no no no one in my primitive republic is having fun and if they are i'm probably about to throw them in the coliseum. this has no conceptual place before late industrial. God! Why is a contemporary private CEO's HR babble being used to represent the absolutist precursors of public works

Many just send a confusing message that might have the right tone, but suggests the attached techs/civics have a game function other than what is the case:

CRAFTSMANSHIP: "Without craftsmanship, inspiration is a mere reed shaken in the wind." - ok, this civic just teaches my people to hustle a bit when making mines and farms, not devote their life to artistic technique. I mean I guess it's good that they're not just running around saying "Crops! Yeahhhhhh!" anymore...
GAMES: "People who cannot find time for recreation are sooner or later to find time for illness" - ok, there's no illness in CiVI. And apparently my people had lots of free time, because they are taking 30 turns to build everything and aren't procreating at all.
Even POTTERY: "No man ever wetted clay and then left it, as if there would be bricks by chance and fortune." Ok, so before I learned this my people were incorrectly leaving wet clay? No, they never did that. But they also never wetted clay. In conclusion, I dropped some water on that clay. This is too artsy and not down-to-earth enough. Honestly, this could have been intelligently and ominously used for a later-era civic like Nuclear Program instead.

Others are just weirdly negative, but not in a clever way:
SAILING: "Vessels large may venture more, but little boats should keep near shore." - Ok, well, my people don't know how to make a large vessel yet. I guess you kind of just threw water on their whole parade with this one, Ben...
Military Tradition: Oops, warfare rules are bad actually! Mysticism and Theology: Ooops, sorry I learned these I guess! Bronze: Wow, this sword is great it will last 1000 years. Archery: Ok, well, the arrow was supposed to fall to earth on that barbarian. That was why you had the arrow you are my literal army. Wheel: Yeah! That's what's cool. about the wheel we just invented. the turning... Industrialism: Oops, I learned another bad one again! Plastics: THIS SOFT CURVY STUFF IS GARBAGE YOU RUINED EARTH

Overall the lot of them just aren't thoughtful, they don't tell you about the game, they don't make you feel like your civ learned a "real thing" from history and the bonuses are following from that real thing, they might as well be the imaginary techs in BE.

A few of course are very good.

 

[Turquoiside]

Civ V had no more misses than Civ IV, which treated us to a Johnny Cash quote for Railroad and decided the most insightful thing it had to offer on a technology as momentous as the wheel was "Put your shoulder to the wheel".

I don't know what you mean, that one is one of my favorites.

But really these VI examples are all hilarious. Reminds of CiV where half the tech images were taken straight from Google, but this is far more embarrassing.

 

[Returning Lurker]

We're going to make the quotes great again.

And we're going to make Sid Meier pay for it!

 

[PhilBowles]

I don't know what you mean, that one is one of my favorites.

Rock Island Line is a perfectly good song, but it suffers when a line is taken out of context as it's hardly profound. It's also one of the very few where Nimoy seems out of his comfort zone, as the delivery falls flat. Mainly, though, it's just an anachronism - like many of the criticised quotes in Civ VI.

 

[Europa Victrix]

As I said in another thread, many quotes feel forced or "witty for the sake of wit", not appropriate for the tech or simply just inspiring. When I research something, when my civilization makes a great advancement (Since the tech tree is pretty small anyway so each tech is important) I want to read something inspiring, not something borderline-insipid or dismissive. I honestly try not to think about the quotes too much because they lessen my enjoyment of the whole game on a conceptual level. Like having somebody whisper in your ear "lol u dumb" constantly.

 

[Mr. Shadows]

• "I tweet, therefore my entire life has shrunk to 140 character chunks of instant event & predigested gnomic wisdom. & swearing." - Neil Gaiman (American comic book writer).

That's a good quote, but Gaimon was born and raised in the UK. He also writes a lot more than just comics.

 

[KrzTeKILL]

The quotes are just stupid, like a stupid person chose them.

The research in this thread is very surprising, I can't believe how lazy/stupid some people at Firaxis are.

Firaxis have always positioned Civilization as a celebration of human spirit and progress, etc. and these quotes go to show how poor our own Civilization is. When someone can so blatantly dump this crap in a AAA product that is supposed to be of the highest quality, I really don't see what hope we have of anything being done properly.

I wouldn't trust whoever was responsible for these quotes to pick their own nose without fudging it up.

 

[Gorbles]

Fun exercise:

Find mistakes in quotes in previous titles.

I find it difficult to believe that given the size and scale of previous games (Civilisation has been a heavy-hitting franchise for some years now) that mistakes like this haven't been commonplace since well before Civ. 6. Nevermind the everpresent fact that QA won't catch everything, and Arioch's well-made point about the costs of redoing quotes, this thread feels a lot like a vehicle to bash on the development team and the product itself more than the quotes. I've read a not-insigificant number of posts that castigate developers' competencies for these oversights, when the severity of these oversights wouldn't probably even make "minor" on a bug list.