Fall From Heaven mentioned by Sid Meier

Picking my jaw up off the floor now. :D

So awesome that a roomful of developers were sitting there looking at Sez's art up on the big screen.


making a nerdy joke from Kaels Quote given the content of the pic ;)

So awesome that a roomful of developers were sitting there looking at Sez's ars(e) up on the big screen :D
 
So awesome that a roomful of developers were sitting there looking at Sez's ars(e) up on the big screen :D

I wish mor iendi developers received this level of attention.
 
Sid has lost his mind, if you've seen his opinions on letting the player win so they dont feel cheated.
So he's found a way to encourage the average player to NOT reload a saved game every time they lose a fight. I can only suggest searching the forums to see how often that discussion comes up. I think Sid's mind is right where it always has been, thinking progressively.

one unit to one hex..... the dullness if numbing.
A single unit per tile limit is dull? I suppose moving one hundred+ units from tile A to tile B is exciting? Personally, I'm thrilled to know that I won't have to wait while the AI moves monsterous stacks back and forth between two tiles- one... unit... at... a... time. Dull doesn't even begin to describe that :)

Anyway, kudos to Kael & company. It's no wonder FfH needed no explanation, if you look at google you'll see that the search phrase 'Fall From Heaven' is used almost 6x as often as 'Civilization 4' :D
 
I don't get the impression he wants to make Civ5 a carebear game.

psychoravin, is that you?

Sid has lost his mind, if you've seen his opinions on letting the player win so they dont feel cheated. Maybe he's started confusing GAMES with passive entertainment like movies. Games require being able to lose them, or they're not games. Part of the fun comes from knowing you conquered that when you do win. Television turns minds to jelly because it never tasks the brain with anything.

[to_xp]Gekko;9003159 said:
hexes are awesome, but his words are indeed something to be afraid of. I'm afraid hardcore gaming is gonna die soon, and we'll have to resort to modders to give us stuff that's actually worth playing. oh wait, it already happened. too late.

Can't be bothered to watch all 50 minutes of that, so...what exactly did he say that has people's drawers in a knot like this?
 
Well, as I mentioned somewhere, 1 unit per tie make it mach simple to write a good general combat AI. On other hand, writing a good AI for stack of units with multiply possible promotions and special properties is near to impossible.
 
I don't see how one unit per tile is even possible. That sounds like one huge traffic jam.
 
By introducing a limit on the number of units (direct or indirect - i.e. x units/city or not being able to afford a big army because of maintenance cost progression), probably.
 
I don't see how one unit per tile is even possible. That sounds like one huge traffic jam.

Only they have zones of control, but you'd never see that in a Civ game;).
 
Can't be bothered to watch all 50 minutes of that, so...what exactly did he say that has people's drawers in a knot like this?

nothing particularly terrible, just the fact that his words point in the direction the industry is heading, i.e. trying to come up with something that can please the masses of the casual gamers, which results in shallow games ( Spore is a nice example that could have been awesome if it hadn't been dumbed down to the limits, Oblivion too )
 
Can't be bothered to watch all 50 minutes of that, so...what exactly did he say that has people's drawers in a knot like this?

Well, not that I want to seem like I'm agreeing with what they're saying, but it basically comes down to two things:

People don't understand statistics. So rather than help them to understand statistics, lets throw statistics out the window and let players never lose. The three main examples that he gave were "players think it's impossible to lose at 3 to 1 odds", "players realise it's possible to lose at 2 to 1 odds, but somehow think it's impossible to lose at 20 to 10 odds", and "players realise it's possible to lose at 2 to 1 odds, but think that means it's impossible to lose the next battle at 2 to 1 odds". So basically they're eliminating the chance of losing if the odds are in your favour, and they're making the combat system "remember" the results of previous battles so that you won't lose multiple consecutive battles. It's interesting to note that World of Warcraft implemented a similar thing with their item drops, because people kept complaining about exactly the same thing.

The second thing he mentioned was that people are fundamentally irrational. They keep doing things that reduce their enjoyment of the game, or they demand that features be implemented that would make the game incredibly un-fun for them. (I've seen a hell of a lot of posts doing this in this very forum and in the modmods subforum. I facepalm at every one.) People also assume that any time something doesn't go in their favour it means the game is out to get them, or the AI is biased against them. Another example he gave was that if a random event gives the player something for nothing, the player accepts it without a second thought, or assumes that they earned it; on the other hand, if a random event has a negative consequence, the player insists that it is totally unfair and should not ever happen. (Muris clan goblins ahoy!) So basically they're removing the possibility of anything negative ever happening to the player.

Basically, Sid Meier is far too polite to say it, but watching that video and reading between the lines, the whole thing read to me like he was saying "People are stupid. How do we idiot-proof our game?" Saying that, I still agree with what Freesmog said, that it didn't seem like he's trying to make a carebear game. In fact he even mentioned people saving/reloading important battles as a very carebear way of playing (although he didn't use that word), and he pointed out that a) it makes the game un-fun, because it takes all the challenge away, and b) it removes the hardcore strategy aspect of the game, which he explicitly mentioned as being the way that he wants people to play the game. The change to one unit per tile also reinforces the idea that the game is moving towards a more hardcore style of play, since it opens up so many amazing strategic elements.

Of course, the most important thing he said was that modding is awesome! Hopefully this means that shortly after Civ5 is out, we might see a mod that "fixes" (i.e. removes) all of the idiot-proofing systems, so we can have a real game.
 
People don't understand statistics. So rather than help them to understand statistics, lets throw statistics out the window and let players never lose. The three main examples that he gave were "players think it's impossible to lose at 3 to 1 odds", "players realise it's possible to lose at 2 to 1 odds, but somehow think it's impossible to lose at 20 to 10 odds", and "players realise it's possible to lose at 2 to 1 odds, but think that means it's impossible to lose the next battle at 2 to 1 odds". So basically they're eliminating the chance of losing if the odds are in your favour, and they're making the combat system "remember" the results of previous battles so that you won't lose multiple consecutive battles. It's interesting to note that World of Warcraft implemented a similar thing with their item drops, because people kept complaining about exactly the same thing.

If the AI had more focus, that would eliminate many player expectations. One friend was upset cause he believe the AI cheated.

The second thing he mentioned was that people are fundamentally irrational. They keep doing things that reduce their enjoyment of the game, or they demand that features be implemented that would make the game incredibly un-fun for them. (I've seen a hell of a lot of posts doing this in this very forum and in the modmods subforum. I facepalm at every one.) People also assume that any time something doesn't go in their favour it means the game is out to get them, or the AI is biased against them. Another example he gave was that if a random event gives the player something for nothing, the player accepts it without a second thought, or assumes that they earned it; on the other hand, if a random event has a negative consequence, the player insists that it is totally unfair and should not ever happen. (Muris clan goblins ahoy!) So basically they're removing the possibility of anything negative ever happening to the player.

Humans are fundamentally flawed is one way of looking at the scenario. I like reasonable challenges. Sometimes I win, or lose.

Basically, Sid Meier is far too polite to say it, but watching that video and reading between the lines, the whole thing read to me like he was saying "People are stupid. How do we idiot-proof our game?" Saying that, I still agree with what Freesmog said, that it didn't seem like he's trying to make a carebear game. In fact he even mentioned people saving/reloading important battles as a very carebear way of playing (although he didn't use that word), and he pointed out that a) it makes the game un-fun, because it takes all the challenge away, and b) it removes the hardcore strategy aspect of the game, which he explicitly mentioned as being the way that he wants people to play the game. The change to one unit per tile also reinforces the idea that the game is moving towards a more hardcore style of play, since it opens up so many amazing strategic elements.

It seemed Sid could use more public speaking experience :king:

He mentioned difficulty levels in a way that led me to think that they would more or less remain the same, or at least harder levels would still be in place in Civ 5.

Of course, the most important thing he said was that modding is awesome! Hopefully this means that shortly after Civ5 is out, we might see a mod that "fixes" (i.e. removes) all of the idiot-proofing systems, so we can have a real game.

I'm all for making a FFH3 or another Fantasy mod.

psychoravin, is that you?

Nah, just a gamer who likes this mod. I would like to see it continue with Civ5. Kind of looking forward to Guild Wars 2, as Dragon Age storyline kind of sucks (plus their paid content sucks).
 
Three thoughts.

- Woot! It's good to see FFH2 get its props.
- Entirely deserved. I personally bought a copy of Civ4 gold just so that I could play FFH2. I bought a new computer just so that I could run the copy of Civ4 just so that I could play FFH2.
- I'm pretty sure Sid knows what he's talking about with how to appeal to the default user. That's good. Appealing to the default user makes the default user happy, which sells more copies, which means that Firaxis makes more money. It is good for us when Civ is profitable. I'm sure, however, that Civ5 is going to be at *least* as moddable as Civ4 - and I can guarantee that even if they don't package the game with a "The world is a dark pit of sadness and suffering" anti-carebear mod, *someone* will produce it. It probably won't even be terribly hard. Actually, it might be amusing to have a mod where losing battles meant that the Hand of Fate was turning against you, making it more likely that you would lose more battles in the future.

Really, as long as deity difficulty consistently flattens you at least half the time, does it *matter* how many carebear effects it hands you along the way?
 
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