Breezin
Warlord
Let me just say I am from Canada but am not some flag waving overzealous patriot.
I attended Firaxicon yesterday and was disheartened by certain comments or lack there of regarding my country.
I want to mention that I fully understand why Canada is not in Civ games as it's already represented via France, England, and United States. I see my country as an amalgam of those three countries in particular so game play and fun-wise adding it in would add little.
There where three times in particular where I was put off.
(1) At a talk about BE, an lot of time was paid to discussing how the nations formed various factions. There was in-depth discussion regarding all but the ARC. Where there was an explanation as to why certain countries were and were not included (left white) in a faction when it came to indicating why Canada and Mexico were not represented the comment was "what are they gonna do". To me this implied, that Canada is nothing without the USA. Yes, Canada depends on the USA but we're not worthless.
(2) The discussion regarding how Civs were chosen to BTW, again a lot of explanation was given to pretty much every other country, included or not, except for Canada and Australia. There was mention of how Civs are chosen. Why not throw a few words about these two countries and how they fared or reasons why they were not chosen? What irritated me more, is at least Australia gets representation in BE.
(3) The final issue sealed the deal so to speak for my opinion. It was during the talk with Sid and it was mentioned that he was born in Canada but moved to the USA when he was three. When there was clapping in recognition of his birth country I could sense from his demeanor and facial expression he was not please with this association. I am pretty good a reading people as it's part of what I do this for a living and it was obvious to me. He mentioned that his family came to Canada since USA wouldn't take them until they had enough money. You think that someone would be grateful that Canada did take his family in but I didn't get that sense. They other speaker actually right after mentioning this made a point to say that Sid has dual citizenship - Swiss and American. I felt this was a bit of a slap in the face.
I suspect that the real reason Canada has never been included is not so much that as a country and culture it's not distinct enough but rather there is a top down bias against it.
Will I stop playing Civ games? No. But I had to get this off my chest rather than do the Canadian thing and just shrug my shoulders.
I know I'll get burned in this thread for my comments but I don't care. I needed to bring this up.
I attended Firaxicon yesterday and was disheartened by certain comments or lack there of regarding my country.
I want to mention that I fully understand why Canada is not in Civ games as it's already represented via France, England, and United States. I see my country as an amalgam of those three countries in particular so game play and fun-wise adding it in would add little.
There where three times in particular where I was put off.
(1) At a talk about BE, an lot of time was paid to discussing how the nations formed various factions. There was in-depth discussion regarding all but the ARC. Where there was an explanation as to why certain countries were and were not included (left white) in a faction when it came to indicating why Canada and Mexico were not represented the comment was "what are they gonna do". To me this implied, that Canada is nothing without the USA. Yes, Canada depends on the USA but we're not worthless.
(2) The discussion regarding how Civs were chosen to BTW, again a lot of explanation was given to pretty much every other country, included or not, except for Canada and Australia. There was mention of how Civs are chosen. Why not throw a few words about these two countries and how they fared or reasons why they were not chosen? What irritated me more, is at least Australia gets representation in BE.
(3) The final issue sealed the deal so to speak for my opinion. It was during the talk with Sid and it was mentioned that he was born in Canada but moved to the USA when he was three. When there was clapping in recognition of his birth country I could sense from his demeanor and facial expression he was not please with this association. I am pretty good a reading people as it's part of what I do this for a living and it was obvious to me. He mentioned that his family came to Canada since USA wouldn't take them until they had enough money. You think that someone would be grateful that Canada did take his family in but I didn't get that sense. They other speaker actually right after mentioning this made a point to say that Sid has dual citizenship - Swiss and American. I felt this was a bit of a slap in the face.
I suspect that the real reason Canada has never been included is not so much that as a country and culture it's not distinct enough but rather there is a top down bias against it.
Will I stop playing Civ games? No. But I had to get this off my chest rather than do the Canadian thing and just shrug my shoulders.
I know I'll get burned in this thread for my comments but I don't care. I needed to bring this up.
