Gameplay or Realism? Which do you prefer (and why?)

[Joecoolyo]

Immersion. I want Palace View, City View and more realistic scaling!

This^

 

[Hsinchu]

When I play a game... I want game-play?

I think its pretty obvious where my loyalties lie. I prefer racing in Burnout 3 to Gran Turismo. It just feels better because it is arcade style.

However, I think a game needs to have enough realism to give reason to the rhyme. If Civilization was simply a fun game with make believe civilizations, that would be great, too. But the fact that it is based on history makes me want to buy it and sets it apart from other games. While gamers will buy games that are more fun to play, there are ALOT of fun games to play that are out there and something that has a distinct flavor is what whets our pallets and makes the connoisseur salivate.

 

[Argetnyx]

I like the way in which the others have put the problem. You need to consider how playable a game is, how manageable and how cost-effective. The guys at Civ. won't make a game for a few fanatics alone. It has to reach the tens of thousands (maybe more) of players out there. Hence, I think the way of the future is more custom-flexibility. So far, Civ 4 allows for customization, but I have no idea of programming, so I can't add anything. Civ 5 should allow for simple customization of the game, including and removing features--the more the better. I and others will like a long, very long game on large maps with realistic depictions and realism throughout, economically, socially and culturally--I love reality and I could contemplate for hours a beautiful city, with picturesque surroundings, diverse buildings and unique layouts. Others want to jump into battle quickly and don't want to deal with pollution, revolts, architecture, the micromanagement stuff. I would say the evolution of the game so far has been toward more realism--what role would cultural borders, great people, religions, etc. have if not to imitate reality? But some want to move faster toward total realism, others more slowly and never at the price of immediate gratification. So we need more customization possibilities.

I like this Make the game however you like, but make it so that it can actually have something to do with reality.

 

[rysmiel]

I like the way in which the others have put the problem. You need to consider how playable a game is, how manageable and how cost-effective. The guys at Civ. won't make a game for a few fanatics alone. It has to reach the tens of thousands (maybe more) of players out there. Hence, I think the way of the future is more custom-flexibility. So far, Civ 4 allows for customization, but I have no idea of programming, so I can't add anything.

I don;t think learning programming is actually that much of an imposition to make on the players, myself.

Civ 5 should allow for simple customization of the game, including and removing features--the more the better.

The problem with this is, every time you add another optional gameplay fature, you're causing an exponential increase in the number of playable combinations that have to be texted for bugs and balance.

I love reality and I could contemplate for hours a beautiful city, with picturesque surroundings, diverse buildings and unique layouts.

I'm a strategy game player and I have no time for eye candy - the visuals exist to give me information to play the game, and that's it. I don't at all mind optional different visual layers and styles and so forth for those as like them - I'd rather like a "looks like Civ 1" option, myself, to avoid all the annoying quasi-3D stuff. There's a big difference between making look-and-feel optional and making gameplay elements otpional, though.

 

[rysmiel]

However, I think a game needs to have enough realism to give reason to the rhyme. If Civilization was simply a fun game with make believe civilizations, that would be great, too. But the fact that it is based on history makes me want to buy it and sets it apart from other games.

To each their own; getting rid of the historical leaders, and the traits and UUS and so forth that seem to be justified in terms of making individual civilisations unique, would make me very happy indeed.

 

[rysmiel]

Immersion. I want Palace View, City View and more realistic scaling!

I don't mind palace view or city view, though I pretty much never use them; they're not relevant to playing the game. "Realistic" scaling I actively do not want, I want the visual interface to tell me what I need to know. If a unit is there, make what type of unit it is, whose unit it is, health and so forth clearly visible. Beyond that it does not matter what it looks like.

The "immersion" I want is immersion in playing a good game, not "let's pretend this game world is real."

 

[Camikaze]

I'm a strategy game player and I have no time for eye candy - the visuals exist to give me information to play the game, and that's it. I don't at all mind optional different visual layers and styles and so forth for those as like them - I'd rather like a "looks like Civ 1" option, myself, to avoid all the annoying quasi-3D stuff. There's a big difference between making look-and-feel optional and making gameplay elements otpional, though.

To each their own; getting rid of the historical leaders, and the traits and UUS and so forth that seem to be justified in terms of making individual civilisations unique, would make me very happy indeed.

To each their own indeed. I think most players, however, would want a gaming experience that does have a degree of immersion. You could play strategy games with lines of codes as a display, I guess, but that wouldn't really be very attractive to most players. Aesthetics are important for enjoyability, which is really what gameplay is all about.

 

[Nitram15]

Immersion. I want Palace View, City View and more realistic scaling!

I want the graphic to more realistic!
Like realistic leaderheads, terrain graphic and City wiew too.

 

[rysmiel]

To each their own indeed. I think most players, however, would want a gaming experience that does have a degree of immersion. You could play strategy games with lines of codes as a display, I guess, but that wouldn't really be very attractive to most players. .

I would point at the durability of Nethack/Moria here, I think.

 

[Camikaze]

But similar games would undoubtedly have a lower audience reception. Games made in the era of worse graphics could get an audience that wasn't used to aesthetics and hook them on the game. Much of civ's appeal comes from visuals, so an audience wouldn't be attracted to it by a lack of good graphics, and the current audience (mostly) would be turned away due to a change from what they were attracted to.

 

[Hsinchu]

Agreed with Camikaze.

Marketing is so much more important to the almighty dollar in this area. If you want to sell a game at all, 99% of all players need a hook; a beautiful game with a distinct flavor as Civ 4 is provides just that kind of hook. However, for a franchise to be successful and spread through word of mouth and have sales after initial release to players that aren't hardcore gamers, we can see from this platform that it is rolling around at 75% preferring a great game to a great history simulator. I think this is inflated because its not a big enough pool of players polling and underdog votes typically poll more often relative to their actual population.

 

[Hail]

[...] Aesthetics are important for enjoyability, which is really what gameplay is all about.

aesthetics are important for sales. gameplay is all about killing time.

But similar games would undoubtedly have a lower audience reception.

of course it would. however the shine of eye-candy fades with time and people look for something to enhance their playing experience or go out and buy one more game. they are a lot of mods out there, but very few civ clones, which is strange.

[...] Much of civ's appeal comes from visuals, [...]

this is why i turned off much of the animation. say a game is like a magazine. the eye-candy would be the cover. but there must be something juicy under the cover too. strategy games should not be like fps games, where you play several days until you win, and then, there is [mostly] nothing left to do.

[...] 99% of all players need a hook; a beautiful game with a distinct flavor as Civ 4 is provides just that kind of hook.

the name is a hook by itself. alike everyone went to see "Terminator 4". most gamers will praise whatever the devs put into the game. had they left attack/defense in civ4, most would say that the 2 attribute thing is cool, and could not imagine civ units with only one characteristic.

[...] However, for a franchise to be successful and spread through word of mouth and have sales after initial release to players that aren't hardcore gamers, [...]

so i think that the initial release buyers are mostly hardcore gamers? real interesting. hardcore gamers are spoiled people(gamers) and rip through the eye-candy really fast. they value some ethereal substance called gameplay. good for the devs that hardcore gamers are minority and do not make sales.

 

[Camikaze]

You say that a magazine needs some value inside, and that is true, and is absolutely the case for civ, being a strategy game. But by the same token, a magazine needs a cover to protect it, promote it, and hold it together.

 

[Thoughtful Thug]

Well I bought Civilization Revolution for the PS3, and trust me, if you are a hard core PC gamer who loves the Civilization Series, then I suggest you pick more Realism vs Gameplay.

 

[rysmiel]

a beautiful game with a distinct flavor as Civ 4 is provides just that kind of hook.

Thank goodness I was not drinking anything when you said that.

Civ 2 is a game that looks like a computer game within the limits of the tech of the time. Civ 3 is a game that looks like a computer game, and a very pretty one. Civ 4, in pulling away from looking like a game to all this stuff defended in the name of "realism", becomes basically hideous, visually, because all the camera-zooming and so forth, the more "realistic" terrain, drives home how far it is short of actual realism, whole pulling it away from looking like a nice clear computer game designed to be clearly a game. It fails both ways, and unless you want Civ to integrate Google Earth levels of details and to zoom in to units on the same scale as the actual map, it will always fall short on pure realism grounds; I am strongly opposed to failing both ways when it's clearly possible to succeed as a game by looking like a game.

I would count chess as a game that succeeds by looking like a game. I would count Civ 1 as a game that succeeds by looking like a game. Eye-candy doesn't hook serious players, and serious players are the market that stick with a franchise and keep on buying.

 

[rysmiel]

Well I bought Civilization Revolution for the PS3, and trust me, if you are a hard core PC gamer who loves the Civilization Series, then I suggest you pick more Realism vs Gameplay.

Well, we can always hope for a PC port of the CivRev to satisfy all the people who like things going in that direction, and a Civ 5 that then can freely go further in the other direction.

 

[exhile]

Realism, let game-play suffer for the while as long as universal rules among historians agree.

 

[Naokaukodem]

Civ to integrate Google Earth levels of details

If Civ5 would be like Google Earth, that would be really cool.

(except for the level of zoom - a less powerfull zoom would do the stuff)

 

[Camikaze]

If Civ5 were to be like Google Earth, my computer would break.

 

[rysmiel]

Realism, let game-play suffer for the while as long as universal rules among historians agree.

"Universal rules among historians" is a pretty small set, dude.