Firaxis Devs Q&A - Send me your questions!

[Eagle Pursuit]

The thread title mentions Devs Q&A - and Kate is not a developer. So these are presumably going to be collated, passed to the devs, go through marketing machinery to decide what they can answer in how much detail, and then answers will be posted to those they've decided to answer.

Not an overnight process.

Kate has followed through before on Q&A. It just takes time.

 

[Ga1Friday]

So many great questions!

Alright, I have looked through these and worked with Rob (R8XFT) and some of the other awesome CivFanatics mods and admins here to come up with this list:

01. Could you advise what the starting advantage is of one of the already revealed factions?

02. How far does the unit workshop allow us to customise the units? Do the upgrades work in a similar manner to promotions in Civ 5?

03. Will there be Great People in Beyond Earth?

04. We've heard that the culture system is based on "virtues" - is that much like the policy trees in Civ 5?

05. Apart from earth itself, does Beyond Earth feature one planet each play?

06. How many turns will we have at the start of a game of Beyond Earth before other factions arrive? Will they then all arrive at once? Will the difficulty level affect the length of time?


I will send this along to the devs and see what I get back

Of course the big question is, "When will we see our answers, Kate?!?!"

As soon as I have a date to share with you, I will. I know that everyone will be excited to get these answered, and I do not want to set up any expectations and not meet them. Instead please know that they are getting passed along, that the dev team will answer when they can (Firaxis truly does love working with their communities!), and as soon as I know when the answers will be going live I will return to this thread with that info.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Sounds good, Kate. Thanks!

 

[Cyon]

Good questions!

Skickat från min GT-I9195 via Tapatalk

 

[stealth_nsk]

Is it possible to switch affinity? If yes, how it affects already opened affinity-specific upgrades, units, etc.?

 

[Makavcio]

Ah, damn. I guess it's too late to ask questions now but if by some lucky quirk of fate it isn't, please add the following question:
To what degree our identity will be determined by choices made in turn 1 (or turn 0) and how much will depend on our further development?

 

[Rebel Fighter]

So many great questions!

Alright, I have looked through these and worked with Rob (R8XFT) and some of the other awesome CivFanatics mods and admins here to come up with this list:

01. Could you advise what the starting advantage is of one of the already revealed factions?

02. How far does the unit workshop allow us to customise the units? Do the upgrades work in a similar manner to promotions in Civ 5?

03. Will there be Great People in Beyond Earth?

04. We've heard that the culture system is based on "virtues" - is that much like the policy trees in Civ 5?

05. Apart from earth itself, does Beyond Earth feature one planet each play?

06. How many turns will we have at the start of a game of Beyond Earth before other factions arrive? Will they then all arrive at once? Will the difficulty level affect the length of time?


I will send this along to the devs and see what I get back

Of course the big question is, "When will we see our answers, Kate?!?!"

As soon as I have a date to share with you, I will. I know that everyone will be excited to get these answered, and I do not want to set up any expectations and not meet them. Instead please know that they are getting passed along, that the dev team will answer when they can (Firaxis truly does love working with their communities!), and as soon as I know when the answers will be going live I will return to this thread with that info.

Good questions, but I'm surprised you guys aren't interested enough in the multiplayer to ask about, lol. I guess the majority of Civ players battle against AI instead.

 

[iRule]

1. On the geo-political consequences of the Great Mistake... is Brazil larger than it is today in 2014?

Oh, I missed the window. Those are good questions though! Thanks

 

[Lheim]

So what are the biggest 'takeaways' from each Civ game that the developers feel really influence their work?

 

[Ga1Friday]

Hi everyone. I just want to clarify that this is not the only set of questions that we will be working to get answered as we wait for the game to come out this fall. There will be other opportunities to submit questions both from right here at CivFanatics and through other communities such as the 2K Forums. Keep your eyes peeled both for the answers to the questions selected from this round and future Q&As.

 

[dscarron]

With the engine being adopted from Civ 5, how is the AI going to be improved/adapted from that system and made usable for this one?

With the 1UPT system, how is that being tailors and adopted into this one?

How is the AI going to handle the unique unit crafting system so as to be able to handle humans?

What are the different starting benefits that are being contemplated, in general and/or factionwise?

PS Thanks in advance. I await with baited breath.

 

[DCParry]

Here's a question - How will you answer snotty passive aggressive questions from fans who demand you cater to their every esoteric whim?

Just kidding =)

Anyways, are the paths different enough in effect that each faction basically break downs into three unique player experiences, or is there significant enough overlap that paths only make relatively minor changes to faction game play?

 

[Jman5]

Civilization V changed combat quite a bit from its predecessors. What are some lessons you learned from the game or players that made you want to do things different?

 

[MortQ42]

Will BE maps wrap North/South as well as East/West, or just East/West?

 

[Perfection]

One thing that made SMAC an excellent game was the immersive storytelling via text cuts and technology quotes, often from the leaders themselves. It really put together this mythical atmosphere that one doesn't see often in a game, and made the faction leaders compelling characters. Is this storytelling aspect something the developers are seriously talking about? How do they plan to implement it?

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Will BE maps wrap North/South as well as East/West, or just East/West?

Probably just East/West... these are planets not doughnuts
(although there might be an option for North/South wrapping)

 

[beetle]

Thanks for doing this.

Will the game be available through Apple’s Mac App Store? If so, are you doing anything different this time around to ensure that the version there is closer to the same release schedule as the Steam version? A couple years later, and Civ V is still my one-and-only Steam game. With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had purchased the campaign edition instead. Steam is the only app I have that crashes regularly under OS X.

 

[beetle]

One thing that made SMAC an excellent game was the immersive storytelling via text cuts and technology quotes, often from the leaders themselves. It really put together this mythical atmosphere that one doesn't see often in a game, and made the faction leaders compelling characters.

I would like to up-vote this question. The story aspect was really a remarkable thing.

Is this storytelling aspect something the developers are seriously talking about? How do they plan to implement it?

I would be okay with a few approaches:

1. Just re-tread the Planet story. Sure, it won’t be new to me, but that’s okay. It is a great story, and will be new to lots of people. I will enjoy the nostalgia.
2. A completely new work of science fiction, just as deep as Planet’s. Surprise me!
3. Beyond Earth is really just Civ-in-space. The “narrative arc” is closer to V than SMAC.

I am assuming that 1 is off the table. What I am not okay with is setting expectations for 2, but then delivering 3. The articles I have read so far give due credit to SMAC for being inspirational, but seem to fall short of aspiring to same kind of epic. Which is okay, I would much rather that the developers under promise.

 

[beetle]

Probably just East/West... these are planets not doughnuts (although there might be an option for North/South wrapping)

Well, they are not cylinders either! The interface hides/minimizes this aspect of the game, but if we are not really playing on a sphere anyway, why not have torus as (not the default, but) an option?

 

[manu-fan]

Well, they are not cylinders either! The interface hides/minimizes this aspect of the game, but if we are not really playing on a sphere anyway, why not have torus as (not the default, but) an option?

What's the point of North/South wrapping if the Northern and Southern regions are impassible (which will most likely be the case)?