How about CIV stop being RACIST!!!

[Belcarius]

4. They put the civs that are most diverse in terms of traits, unqiue units and gameplay styles, i.e. what they have now.

That's exactly the same as option two but in slightly different wording.

"Ethically sound"? Dude, get over yourself. It's a game. It's a game, not genocide.

Sorry, my brain wasn't working hard enough when I wrote this (because I was drunk ). It's not like I think it's a crime to not put in certain cultures (you don't have to tell me it's just a game.. i do it all the time), but what I'm getting at is 'a state where the game does not appear to favour one part over another'. Kind of like what they have done with religion. You see where I'm going?

 

[Kyriakos]

Algerians aren't arabs. And Carthiginians were Phoenician. Their culture was astoundingly similar to the the greeks and romans, compared to others in the area, and differences in culture doesn't spell out conflict. I mean, look at WWI. How different were germany and france?

according to various sites the large majority of algerians are arabs, although there is a debate to whether or not they are in reality of berberic origin. I can not say, since i am not familiar with the issue. It seems that there is a berber minority though (people who want autonomy) so i trust that the majority doesnt view itself as berberic, but as arabic.

as for culture, i dont think that carthage had much similarities with greece or rome; you could claim that rome adopted just about everything greek, but that wasnt at all the case with carthage, clearly it was an entirely different culture.

 

[apatheist]

Ya greeks are european.

Mediterranean Europeans look pretty different from Northern Europeans. I'm sure it was more pronounced 2500 years ago before the influx of blonde, blue-eyed barbarians.

Phoenicia was founded in Lebeanon and Syria and spread to North Africa but that didn't turn the people white.

That's because they weren't white to begin with.

Carthgians are of phoencian descent in the same manner that israelis are of roman descent

So are you saying that Carthaginians aren't Phoenican? Or that Israelis are Roman? Neither one of those statements is true.

I know that arabs are black, but i am pointing the fact that most people mean subsaharan "black" when they speak of "black people". If you use that to refer to arabs it can be confusing. Moreover some arabs arent as black as others, or as subsaharans, remember how arafat looked for example; compare him with m. luther king and you will easily understand what i mean.

Only if you defined "black" as "not white." Arabs are Semitic people from the Middle East, like the original Israelites. They're no more black than Persians, Indians, or Chinese people.

-not that much is known about the phoenecians afaik, so again it is dangerous to theorise about their attitude. What is known however is that Carthage was a very different culture to both Greece and Rome, which is why conflict between them was inevitable.

You don't need cultural issues to conflict. You assert that Greek and Roman culture was very similar, yet Rome conquered Greece by force. Also, Roman culture wasn't nearly so similar to Greek culture originally; it evolved over centuries due to the influence of the Greeks who became part of the empire, and then effectively took it back at Byzantium.

Rome and Carthage clashed more over control of the Western Mediterranean than culture, though I'm sure the latter didn't help.

-i maintain that northern african civs are different than subsaharan; infact they share very little, and that is due to the influece they gave and recieved from the northern mediterrenian civs, and the levant.

Definitely. The Sahara's a pretty serious natural barrier. You're not going to see a lot of crossing back and forth of large numbers of people. It's inevitable that North Africa would evolve in a completely different way from sub-Saharan Africa.

In all probability there wasnt anything of importance.

Not if you have a bias against non-settled peoples.

Egyptians acutally were african to begin with

Eh, we can end the whole thing right here. Everybody was African to begin with, so every civ and every people are African civs.

 

[Atrebates]

OMG this is laughable, (okay I'll state here that I am strongly against calling civs pathetic because they don't currently exert an influence, as I've argued before). But the the main protagonists here have been racist from the first post,

If the creators of the game want to label the Celts (who have been called by traditional historians as "uncultured savages")

What kind of traditional historian is this, Pliny? The celts had more advanced woodwork that the Romans, and there metallurgy wasn't bad either... And the 'barbarian hordes' of Scandinavia that earn such derision reached America, the same act that earns African civs a place apparently.
Yes, Sub-Saharan African civs are not insignificant by any means, but being largely insular they do not match up to European civs that had huge impacts on the modern world (there is probably some well earned critism on this point).
I could go on but there are some very eloquent and perfectly argued posts by LouLong and CrazyEskimo on page2.

(PS. will people stop saying the Mongol empire was the biggest ever, the British empire wins there)

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

(PS. will people stop saying the Mongol empire was the biggest ever, the British empire wins there)

They could be refering to the fact that it was the largest continuous empire in history, compared to the British, which was divided into many parts.

 

[Ghafhi]

-hm, first of all i dont have any reason to lie, and neither do i find doing anything of the kind interesting nor important.
I know that arabs are black, but i am pointing the fact that most people mean subsaharan "black" when they speak of "black people". If you use that to refer to arabs it can be confusing. Moreover some arabs arent as black as others, or as subsaharans, remember how arafat looked for example; compare him with m. luther king and you will easily understand what i mean.
-As some other poster said we have no way of determining what Hannibal looked like, and there is absolutely no scientific backing for any claim that he looked black. Imagine that south africa had been populated by only white protestants, today the population would all look white, would that mean that it was like that since the beginning of the presence of man there?
-not that much is known about the phoenecians afaik, so again it is dangerous to theorise about their attitude. What is known however is that Carthage was a very different culture to both Greece and Rome, which is why conflict between them was inevitable.
-i maintain that northern african civs are different than subsaharan; infact they share very little, and that is due to the influece they gave and recieved from the northern mediterrenian civs, and the levant.
-you wrote that: "Carthgians are of phoencian descent in the same manner that israelis are of roman descent", by which i gather that you meant that carthaginians arent at all of phoenecian descent. But again you seem to view carthage as algeria, when it wasnt that at all. Algerians are arabs, which is entirely different ethnically from the ancient carthaginians. Also it wouldnt be really serious if you claimed that "carthaginians" existed before the formation of Carthage; what does it matter what was in the region before its first real civilization was developed? In all probability there wasnt anything of importance.

-Well to me when you break up people into degrees of black I get confused. How about if I were to break up people into degrees of white? Eg. Romans were white but not like the Russians. Then what other kind of white is there?
-Your claims of Carthgians being white or not black is like me claiming that the Greeks were black or non-white. Because you said we don't know the people who lived there always lived there.
-Saharan civs only differ from sub-saharan civs at some points in history, but I would agree that I historically northern africa and egypt has been involved alot with europe.
-Not all Algerians are Arabs only about 80% of Algerians follow Arabic culture and language. What about the Amazigs who don't speak Arabic. How can they be of Arabic culture when they don't speak the language. Or how about me I'm not even Muslim so I have no reason to speak arabic.
-Arabs and Carthgians are only different in a cultural sense. Eg. I could Arabic culture came to Algeria after the Carthgians so to suggest that I could be Arabic and not of carthgian descendent is ridiculous.

Algerians aren't arabs. And Carthiginians were Phoenician. Their culture was astoundingly similar to the the greeks and romans, compared to others in the area, and differences in culture doesn't spell out conflict. I mean, look at WWI. How different were germany and france?

Carthgians were very different culturally from the two. Carthage existed before Rome(I think but not 100% sure) so I doubt they had much in common

according to various sites the large majority of algerians are arabs, although there is a debate to whether or not they are in reality of berberic origin. I can not say, since i am not familiar with the issue. It seems that there is a berber minority though (people who want autonomy) so i trust that the majority doesnt view itself as berberic, but as arabic.

as for culture, i dont think that carthage had much similarities with greece or rome; you could claim that rome adopted just about everything greek, but that wasnt at all the case with carthage, clearly it was an entirely different culture.

ya there is alot of truth of what you are saying. The problem is that amazigs refuse to give up their culture and language where as the arabic cultured amazigs who just consider themselves to be arabs reject this. All muslims are supposed to speak Arabic. Of course I get to speak French in Algeria because I'm not muslim. and that sums up the issue between ethnic amazigs and arabzied amazigs

Moderator Action: Please stop posting multiple posts after one another. Just express all your ideas in a single post. The two posts that were after this one have been merged.

 

[apatheist]

(PS. will people stop saying the Mongol empire was the biggest ever, the British empire wins there)

Asking sincerely and seriously, do you have a source for this? With actual numbers? When I think British Empire, the only large landmasses that come to mind are India, South Africa, and Canada. Besides that, it was a collection of many smaller territories in Africa, Asia, and S. America. The Mongols, on the other hand, had most of modern Russia, the modern -stans, China, Persia and smaller, nearby territories. China and Canada are approximately the same area (within 5%), while Russia is enormous. What am I missing?

 

[Ghafhi]

Mediterranean Europeans look pretty different from Northern Europeans. I'm sure it was more pronounced 2500 years ago before the influx of blonde, blue-eyed barbarians.


That's because they weren't white to begin with.



So are you saying that Carthaginians aren't Phoenican? Or that Israelis are Roman? Neither one of those statements is true.


Only if you defined "black" as "not white." Arabs are Semitic people from the Middle East, like the original Israelites. They're no more black than Persians, Indians, or Chinese people.



You don't need cultural issues to conflict. You assert that Greek and Roman culture was very similar, yet Rome conquered Greece by force. Also, Roman culture wasn't nearly so similar to Greek culture originally; it evolved over centuries due to the influence of the Greeks who became part of the empire, and then effectively took it back at Byzantium.

Rome and Carthage clashed more over control of the Western Mediterranean than culture, though I'm sure the latter didn't help.


Definitely. The Sahara's a pretty serious natural barrier. You're not going to see a lot of crossing back and forth of large numbers of people. It's inevitable that North Africa would evolve in a completely different way from sub-Saharan Africa.


Not if you have a bias against non-settled peoples.


Eh, we can end the whole thing right here. Everybody was African to begin with, so every civ and every people are African civs.

Wrong. Arabs are any people who practice the arabic culture and language. If arabic is race then so is spanish. and american. Arabic is a culture and anyone who has been to jordan, saudi arabia and yemen knows that there is no such thing as an arabic race. If you go to Jorfdan you will see white-skinned arabs who resemble europeans with green and blue eyes. If you go to Yemen which was a part of ethiopia until the 5th century you will see brown-skinned arabs who look no different than other africans from ethiopia and somalia. If you go to Saudi Arabia you will see both white and black and a couple indonesian arabs. Now you tell me which color arab is the correct arab.

 

[patternofnerves]

The fact of the matter is that "civilization" as we know it generally started in the middle east (as well as China and India) and moved northwest from there. The absence of African and Southeast Asian civilizations is mostly due to the fact that the great civilizations simply didn't originate there. There are some notable exceptions, many of which have been previously named here, but for the most part, the lack of their representation in Civ can be attributed to the same reasons we're writing in English and not a Bantu dialect- lack of resources in subsaharan Africa coupled with a glut of resources in Europe.

Certainly, however, I think we can acknowledge that there is little need for the copycat Euro tribes running around in Civ3. I, for one, almost never play Earth-based maps, and part of my interest is seeing tribes that might have been, perhaps on an alternate world with a better starting location. There's quite a bit of tension in this thread, but I think most people agree that Civ needs to include tribes like the Malinese. I don't really understand what the squabling is about, other than over some historical details.

If it makes you feel any better, the Egyptians can be considered both an African and Mediterraean tribe, their in-game representation as the Ptolmaeic version of themselves is poorly founded. They're golden era was long before the reign of Cleo, and I expect to see an earlier figure as their second leader.

 

[Atrebates]

Asking sincerely and seriously, do you have a source for this? With actual numbers? When I think British Empire, the only large landmasses that come to mind are India, South Africa, and Canada. Besides that, it was a collection of many smaller territories in Africa, Asia, and S. America. The Mongols, on the other hand, had most of modern Russia, the modern -stans, China, Persia and smaller, nearby territories. China and Canada are approximately the same area (within 5%), while Russia is enormous. What am I missing?

Australia and huge swathes of Africa, Russia is not as big as it looks on a flat map and the Mongols did not hold all of it (as you said, e.g. siberia).
For sources there are a few, but Wikipdia seems to be well used on this forum so here goes

Wikipedia
The British Empire was the world's first global power and history's largest empire; by 1921, it held sway over a population of 500–600 million people — roughly a quarter of the world's population — and covered about 15.1 million square miles (nearly 39 million square kilometres), roughly 35% of the world's total land area.

 

[apatheist]

Russia is not as big as it looks on a flat map

I know that, silly ;-).

The Wikipedia article includes Canada in the British Empire in 1921. Apparently, Canada didn't achieve full sovereignty until 1982 (starting in 1867), and one could argue that they still haven't.

Here are some numbers backing you up: http://www.hostkingdom.net/earthrul.html
Canada is just about 10 million square km, which pushes the British Empire to 36 million square km compared to the Mongols' 33 million square km. That's pretty close.

 

[Janos]

I want to respond to any dissent to my original post.
It is no excuse that just because Westerners made the game, that they can justly ignore the rest of the world.

Actually they can - it's their game and they can do what they like with it, as Firaxis is a private company. They are including Mali, and Egypt is in Africa. I don't recall any huge empires outside of Africa ruled by Zulus or the Mali, and this might just be me... but isn't Africa the continent that is on it's knees and needs Western help to keep its population alive in the less well-off countries?

Another reason why more African civs aren't in-game is that not many proper negroe civilizations in history have actually DONE anything of note with themselves. They didn't discover a religion, they didn't have an empire, they didn't invent the wheel. You have an African race in-game, and others which are linked to Africa - i'm sure many others will agree with me when i say there isn't much point in including another African race.

 

[Legionary37]

I've said this before and I'll say it again. Regardless of what we in the modern world like to do, history doesn't exist to boost self esteem, to encourage everyone to believe that all cultures, nations, and beliefs have been as influential and as innovative as any other, or to make people feel better. Some nations and empires have done more than others, and hence, deserve the be here.

We might as well be complaining about how Eastern Europe isn't be respresented. Why no Lithuania? Georgia? Poland?

Simply put, Saharan Africa is basically filled with civilizations whose acheivements are minimal compared with those of Eur-Asia and to a lesser extent, America. I don't see any gameplay or historical reasons why there needs to be more African civs. Aren't the Mali, Egyptians, and Carthaginians enough?

It is no excuse that just because Westerners made the game, that they can justly ignore the rest of the world.

Unfortunately, the "West" has had a much larger influence on the world than Africa. Ditto for Asia. I don't want to see these obscure little tribes who noone has heard of. I want to see great civilizations who's acheivements have had a large impact on history.

 

[Janos]

Thank you Legionary. As a Czech, i don't complain that they aren't in the game. And i don't care when i say that Czech has done absolutely nothing of note really in history, apart from some nice food, and don't deserve to be in Civ IV! Similarly with Africa (except take away the nice food part ).

 

[warpstorm]

Actually they can - it's their game and they can do what they like with it, as Firaxis is a private company.

Ultimately, most of this argument is a waste because of this. Firaxis can make any game they please. They are under no moral obligations at all. You can decide for yourself if you object to their decisions and either buy the game or don't. It's your call.

 

[Urederra]

(PS. will people stop saying the Mongol empire was the biggest ever, the British empire wins there)

The Spanish empire was also bigger than the Mongol one, and the british one, AFAIK.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperio_Español

In times of Phillip the second, when Portugal joined Spain, the Spanish empire was the largest ever.

 

[apatheist]

I don't know Spanish, but the English version of that article states no such thing. The link I supplied above disagrees. Intuitively, it also doesn't sound right. South America just isn't that big.

 

[rhialto]

The English version of the article about the Spanish empire mentions that it was very big, and I am sure it was the biggest at the time, but it does not say Spain's was the biggest ever.

 

[Nyvin]

Spain was the first global power though, not Britain.

 

[Janos]

Spain are in the game though, so what's the damn problem?

http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia/aencmed/targets/maps/mhi/T012876A.gif

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5b/Spain_empire.gif

Enough said really...