Humankind Game by Amplitude

[Trav'ling Canuck]

I am a bit worried about the "Fame" victory condition. That just sounds like playing civ for a Score win with all the other Victory conditions turned off. That actually sounds a bit boring to me, not new and innovative.

From what's been revealed to date, Fame in HK is different than score in Civ. There's a limited amount of Fame available, evenly spread across the 6 eras. You don't snowball into more and more score as the game goes on.

There's also integration between gaining Fame and moving into the next era. It hasn't been fully explained yet, but it seems like you will have some options to stay in your current era and capture more of that era's available Fame, or push forward to the new era, gaining a new civ, set of bonuses and, as Eagle Pursuit pointed out, different Fame objectives depending on the nature of your now dominant civ.

Edit: the more analogous Civ mechanic is probably era score. It sounds like what HK is shooting for is to award victory to the civ with the best time line, in Civ-speak, regardless of whether their notable achievements arose primarily in the Classical era, or the Industrial era, or whatever.

 

[God of Kings]

I have the feeling that Humankind could potentially be the Civ killer, especially given that Sega provides much funding for such a forward-thinking developer like Amplitude Studios (and Amplitude made great 4X games and have transparent communication between devs and fans).

Humankind would lead to Civ VII becoming the greatest Civ game ever thanks to competition. Firaxis cannot rest on its laurels forever.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

From a dev regarding political systems:

Hello,


Thank you for your post and your interest in the game!

It's still too early to talk more about what we have in stock for politics but there will indeed be a system in the game to take stances on societal issues. It will be more abstracted than the system you propose, but for example the more stable your empire is, the faster you'll be able to make choices.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

I have the feeling that Humankind could potentially be the Civ killer, especially given that Sega provides much funding for such a forward-thinking developer like Amplitude Studios (and Amplitude made great 4X games and have transparent communication between devs and fans).

Humankind would lead to Civ VII becoming the greatest Civ game ever thanks to competition. Firaxis cannot rest on its laurels forever.

I'm more in the camp that HK will appeal to a different group of civilization lovers than the current Civ-series does. We've lost a lot of Civfanatics over the years, and many of those are likely more eager than current Civ 6 players to seek out an alternative. There's enough diversity of opinion even on this board about what a Civ game should be like to support at least 3 or 4 different approaches to modelling a game on the evolution of human history.

This may just be the optimist in me, as I'd like to think the market is big enough to support multiple historical 4x games. And it's also a personal bias, as I don't want HK and Civ to be mirrors of each other or borrow too much from each other. I'd rather have diversity in approach.

 

[Xefjord]

There is one thing I have absolute confidence in Civ beating Humankind over, and that is the soundtrack. Honestly. I almost paid full price for the game just for the soundtrack alone because I love hearing all the unique civilization tracks through the ages. Just with the way Civ is designed compared to HK, it is going to be really hard for HK to win in this department. The idea of the soundtrack of a civilization developing over time is only uniquely possible in Civ as opposed to HK.

 

[God of Kings]

There is one thing I have absolute confidence in Civ beating Humankind over, and that is the soundtrack. Honestly. I almost paid full price for the game just for the soundtrack alone because I love hearing all the unique civilization tracks through the ages. Just with the way Civ is designed compared to HK, it is going to be really hard for HK to win in this department. The idea of the soundtrack of a civilization developing over time is only uniquely possible in Civ as opposed to HK.

To be fair, much of the Endless games have rather forgettable soundtracks. Only Skylark from Endless Legend is memorable to me:

However, I am hoping that Amplitude would find musicians to play various ethnic instruments for Humankind. I trust Amplitude, given that they use a live orchestra for the soundtracks of its games. I am not expecting the composers to be even on the same level as Christopher Tin, Geoff Knorr, or Michael Curran, though.

Oh, and Humankind should not use any current national anthem in its soundtrack.

 

[Zaarin]

So for the first time in ages I'm playing Endless Legend. It's improved since the last time I played it. Three things stand out to me: 1) the map is gorgeous (waterfalls!!!), 2) you are a slave to RNG (this is to a lesser extent true in ES2, but your starting location can make or break your EL game), and 3) EL games are much longer than ES2 games. I play ES2 on Endless speed, but Long on EL seems much longer than ES2 on Endless.

I have the feeling that Humankind could potentially be the Civ killer, especially given that Sega provides much funding for such a forward-thinking developer like Amplitude Studios (and Amplitude made great 4X games and have transparent communication between devs and fans).

Humankind would lead to Civ VII becoming the greatest Civ game ever thanks to competition. Firaxis cannot rest on its laurels forever.

I think "Civ killer" is too extreme, but I think this is an excellent point: even if HK falls short it could still give Firaxis a nice kick in their complacent pants. Competition is always a good thing.

There is one thing I have absolute confidence in Civ beating Humankind over, and that is the soundtrack.

Geoff Knorr is extremely talented, but so is Flyby No. If he's doing the music (which has been confirmed), I have no doubt that Humankind's soundtrack will be exquisite. The Endless soundtracks are the backbone of my writing playlist (alongside the scores for the Mass Effect trilogy, Battlestar Galactica, and anything by Jessica Curry or Austin Wintory).

 

[Architect]

Many (All?) of the Amplitude games are on sale this weekend on Steam and Endless Space 2 is available to play for free so I'm going to try it out.

Look like I can get a 22 game/dlc bundle for $54. It has Endless Space 2, Endless Legend, Endless Space and Dungeon of the Endless. I think it has every DLC for all those games as well.

 

[rlw33]

Many (All?) of the Amplitude games are on sale this weekend on Steam and Endless Space 2 is available to play for free so I'm going to try it out.

Look like I can get a 22 game/dlc bundle for $54. It has Endless Space 2, Endless Legend, Endless Space and Dungeon of the Endless. I think it has every DLC for all those games as well.

Thanks for letting us know about this. It wouldn't have occured to me to check.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

A dev post regarding warmongering:

Hello,


We have some surprises in our bag to offer a challenge to warmonger


Going for war needs to be valid and enjoyable, but it also need to be a challenge. There will be tools for others to protect themselves and reinforce this challenge for warmongers before the war hit them.


Cheers,

 

[Lord Shadow]

There is one thing I have absolute confidence in Civ beating Humankind over, and that is the soundtrack. Honestly. I almost paid full price for the game just for the soundtrack alone because I love hearing all the unique civilization tracks through the ages. Just with the way Civ is designed compared to HK, it is going to be really hard for HK to win in this department. The idea of the soundtrack of a civilization developing over time is only uniquely possible in Civ as opposed to HK.

Civ6 is probably the best in this regard, led by Christopher Tin's Sogno di Volare and only made better by the evolving themes of each civ. Civ5's soundtrack was entirely forgettable. Civ4 had the awesome Baba Yetu, but beyond that it was just alright (except the cacophonic/depressing modern era music, which sucked). CivBE was surprisingly robust as far as music's concerned: it's a shame the game ended up as a largely abandoned experiment. It could've been great.

I also have fond memories of Civ3's less ample soundtrack, particularly the industrial and modern themes.

 

[Jkchart]

you are a slave to RNG (this is to a lesser extent true in ES2, but your starting location can make or break your EL game),

YES. My first attempt to do faction questing was ruined by the fact that the region in question was across the water. In era 1, you can't cross the water, and it took forever just to complete the very first quest because of that.

 

[Krajzen]

Civ5's soundtrack was entirely forgettable.

...what! Half of civ's themes in this game is burned in my brain forever, and few general themes too! From my memory - Shoshone, Brazil, Zulu, Arabia, Ottomans, Mongolia, Huns, Spain, England, France, Poland, Russia, Byzantium had great themes!

 

[qadams]

Unfortunately I don't think anything will ever match Baba Yetu.

 

[Sherlock]

I will just say there are widely varying opinions of game music on display here.

 

[Jkchart]

...what! Half of civ's themes in this game is burned in my brain forever, and few general themes too! From my memory - Shoshone, Brazil, Zulu, Arabia, Ottomans, Mongolia, Huns, Spain, England, France, Poland, Russia, Byzantium had great themes!

I don't remember a single music theme from Civ V either. Idk, was not a fan of the music in V.

 

[CivLuvah]

Civ4 had the awesome Baba Yetu, but beyond that it was just alright (except the cacophonic/depressing modern era music, which sucked)

I loved the modern music in Civ4. I never found it depressing - I found it very reflective of modernity. It made me into a fan of John Adams's music.

 

[Zaarin]

Civ6 is probably the best in this regard, led by Christopher Tin's Sogno di Volare

Frankly, after three years I've come to find "Sogno di Volare" tiresome. The melody is nice (I still like the low-key piano version from the trailer); the chorals are annoying. I take my headphones off while the game is loading these days. I by no means dislike choral music--my favorite soundtrack in existence, Jessica Curry's Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, is heavily choral--but something about the mounting chorals in "Sogno di Volare" just grates.

I loved the modern music in Civ4. I never found it depressing - I found it very reflective of modernity. It made me into a fan of John Adams's music.

I blame Civ4 for my abject hatred of easy listening--the entire awful genre. Its cousin "smooth jazz," too, which may be smooth but is definitely not jazz.

 

[Lord Shadow]

...what! Half of civ's themes in this game is burned in my brain forever, and few general themes too! From my memory - Shoshone, Brazil, Zulu, Arabia, Ottomans, Mongolia, Huns, Spain, England, France, Poland, Russia, Byzantium had great themes!

I suppose it depends on how much you played Civ5.

I've played Civ6 less and yet the impact of its music on me has been much greater.

I loved the modern music in Civ4. I never found it depressing - I found it very reflective of modernity. It made me into a fan of John Adams's music.

I remember a mess of SimCity-like strings and horns and generally invasive background noise, unfortunately. Just heard a few bits again on YouTube and my memory isn't failing me: there's nothing really distinctive nor memorable. There's a single choral theme at the end, and it's neither pleasant nor engaging. Just all-around not something I wanted playing on a loop during those final stages of the game.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

I will just say there are widely varying opinions of game music on display here.

I play with the sound off, and could not care less what the music is like in any game. I therefore find it fascinating that (a) people have an opinion on it, and (b) that it actually influences their buying decisions. Just another way that customer preferences differ.