IGN: Civilization's Past and Future, As Told By Its Lead Designers

[aieeegrunt]

Civilizarion Revolution games had a different “thematic” bonus for each Civ for each era. I liked that system

 

[Zaarin]

Any reason why? I think the Religion system, particularly in Civ 5, was very well done. Civ 6 improved it (although made the whole system bit too gamey for my taste, even if I enjoyed the aspect of Religious Victory).

As a game mechanic it can be fun (though Religious Victory ruined what was a serviceable if not terribly interesting Religion system in Civ5 by nerfing passive spread and implementing the tedious theological combat). However, it's utterly lacking in any kind of historical flavor. I want to see less player control of religion, more conflict between state and religion, and the formation of religious diplomatic blocs; none of these things happens in Civ6 (the latter could happen occasionally in Civ5...if enough religions got eliminated). I want to see religion develop as something that emerges as something outside of a particular civ; civs can then choose to embrace it as state religion, tolerate it, or persecute it. Being a coreligionist should give a substantial diplomatic modifier. Having a state religion that is different from the majority of your citizens should have stability penalties (however that is handled in Civ7). This would be much more interesting, much more flavorful, and look a lot more like religion. tl;dr: Religion as it is currently implemented doesn't really look like religion.

 

[Leucarum]

As a game mechanic it can be fun (though Religious Victory ruined what was a serviceable if not terribly interesting Religion system in Civ5 by nerfing passive spread and implementing the tedious theological combat). However, it's utterly lacking in any kind of historical flavor. I want to see less player control of religion, more conflict between state and religion, and the formation of religious diplomatic blocs; none of these things happens in Civ6 (the latter could happen occasionally in Civ5...if enough religions got eliminated). I want to see religion develop as something that emerges as something outside of a particular civ; civs can then choose to embrace it as state religion, tolerate it, or persecute it. Being a coreligionist should give a substantial diplomatic modifier. Having a state religion that is different from the majority of your citizens should have stability penalties (however that is handled in Civ7). This would be much more interesting, much more flavorful, and look a lot more like religion. tl;dr: Religion as it is currently implemented doesn't really look like religion.

Ignoring the flavour or the historical accuracy, religious play in civ6 is just so much micromanagement... That kills it for me.

 

[Zaarin]

Ignoring the flavour or the historical accuracy accuracy, religious play in civ6 is just so much micromanagement... That kills it for me.

That's also a big problem. TBH I'd like to see religious units eliminated entirely or almost entirely.

 

[aieeegrunt]

Ignoring the flavour or the historical accuracy accuracy, religious play in civ6 is just so much micromanagement... That kills it for me.

That's also a big problem. TBH I'd like to see religious units eliminated entirely or almost entirely.

Seconded
Thirded
All the dededdeded

I find it kinda broken and very, very tedious. The Apostle Lightning Bolts is amusing though

 

[Linklite]

I actually disagree with this, from a game-design pov. there's a very strong reason why you have to design it like that: You need a "reward" for the player who focuses a lot on a certain aspect of the game. So for instance with religion, you pay an opportunity cost at building holy sites first instead of, say, campuses, but the reward is you might get to pick some of those juicy and extra strong beliefs. Imo. that's a good design principle, and one I have a hard time seeing them abandon. If anything, I think such a system should have applied to more parts of the game, for instance the era dedications, which would have made the era system a lot more interesting, i.e. only the first player to unlock a golden age gets to choose freely which dedication he will have. This is one thing I think Humankind did quite well.

When that's said, Civ6 fails on this design on multiple occasions because the AI will often have a locked order of selection and the options that are most interesting for the player will often sit unpicked by the AI even if you are last to the party. A notorious example of this is the work ethic belief, which is circumstantially overpowered (bordering on game-breaking) yet never picked by AI (at least not in a standard 8-civ game).

I understand where you're coming from, but I think it also makes parts of the game...walled off?

We already see a lot of comments about how certain Wonders are always taken by AIs, and those Wonders effectively don't exist for the player. If you make each aspect only winnable by one player, then those that haven't mastered that mechanic don't get a look in and are stuck with the leftovers. That doesn't really encourage player engagement. Unless I'm going for an RV or playing as basil II, I don't bother with a religion at all, in part because my investment has to go elsewhere first and so I don't get the bonuses that are benficial. That's not great game design.

You do get other benefits from an early religion like easier spread and unopposed conversions. I'm not sure why we need the beliefs to be unique to reward increased efforts to get religion. You could have lump sum of faith instead, or an increase in hammers or something.

 

[Leucarum]

I understand where you're coming from, but I think it also makes parts of the game...walled off?

We already see a lot of comments about how certain Wonders are always taken by AIs, and those Wonders effectively don't exist for the player. If you make each aspect only winnable by one player, then those that haven't mastered that mechanic don't get a look in and are stuck with the leftovers. That doesn't really encourage player engagement. Unless I'm going for an RV or playing as basil II, I don't bother with a religion at all, in part because my investment has to go elsewhere first and so I don't get the bonuses that are benficial. That's not great game design.

You do get other benefits from an early religion like easier spread and unopposed conversions. I'm not sure why we need the beliefs to be unique to reward increased efforts to get religion. You could have lump sum of faith instead, or an increase in hammers or something.

Or just have a first-mover bonus - so that the player who pushes for a religion first can get a boost. Doesn't have to be completely obvious, for example being able to score good great scientists like Hypatia is a reward for pushing science early...

I guess there is also a question about whether the balance of the game is aimed at deity. At lower difficulty levels I am not sure if much is walled off and that is probably Civ's primary market for a difficulty level

 

[SammyKhalifa]

As a game mechanic it can be fun (though Religious Victory ruined what was a serviceable if not terribly interesting Religion system in Civ5 by nerfing passive spread and implementing the tedious theological combat). However, it's utterly lacking in any kind of historical flavor. I want to see less player control of religion, more conflict between state and religion, and the formation of religious diplomatic blocs; none of these things happens in Civ6 (the latter could happen occasionally in Civ5...if enough religions got eliminated). I want to see religion develop as something that emerges as something outside of a particular civ; civs can then choose to embrace it as state religion, tolerate it, or persecute it. Being a coreligionist should give a substantial diplomatic modifier. Having a state religion that is different from the majority of your citizens should have stability penalties (however that is handled in Civ7). This would be much more interesting, much more flavorful, and look a lot more like religion. tl;dr: Religion as it is currently implemented doesn't really look like religion.

I enjoy the religion-building game . . . the spreading part with the dueling priests, not so much. Your idea of taking much of the religion out of the player's hands sounds interesting, but there has been pushback to that from some of the fans in the past. I guess people who play God games like to have the control.

I don't mind the religious "powers" being so distinct from each other--not historical, no, but it's a concession I'll make for the sake of it being a game. If all players can choose the same or similar abilities there isn't as much incentive to push hard for the one you want at the expense of other aspects of your civ. I understand the ideas about just giving the peson who gets there first some kind of boost, but I think that edges towards making them less distinct (but more balanced).

For civ abilities, for a while I've thought about a system where the abilities naturally come from what you do or where you go in the game--settle near water, get a maritime boost. Build markets become a trader, etc. So you're not really manually chosing anything, it's all a product of what your people are doing in the game. The civic/ tech boosts came later, and made me think the developers were thinking in that direction too. Now I realize that there would be just moving the problem from one mechanic to another, because inevitably there will be one path that works best and become a default build order. I still kick the idea around in my head though.

 

[HorseshoeHermit]

So... you could make a game from ancient to Medieval, maybe Printing Press or some landmark.

... what would the game that is "From Medieval to present day" be like? Would you change a lot about the formula, given that lands are all settled?

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

When you start breaking up and focusing on specific time periods, it starts to either sound like a scenario or a Paradox game.

 

[Civinator]

For me the most important sentence in that interview was: "The right answer is to step back and try to do things in a simpler way, and focus on the [player] decisions that matter the most."

The flood of, in my eyes, unnecessairy additional micromanagement, that was introduced to the franchise in Civ 4 -6 with all these not needed secondary techtrees must be cut out. Sid Meier worked hard to eliminate such secondary techtrees in the past and I think he knew why he did it.

Spoiler :

The rule of thumb for creating a new game of the Civ series "one third new, one third stays and one third should be improved" now must be drastically changed, due to the great amount of those unnecessairy additions that are providing not enough fun for the amount of additional micromanagement in a civ game. Firaxis should have a focus to assemble the best parts of the complete Civ series in their next version, always having an eye on reducing the micromanagement that is caused by those features and to avoid completely unrealistic features (like an immortal leader living more than 6.000 years, thoughts about creating a new city "some tiles to the north" as this would be a better place for a space district in some thousand years or to see the epic game with its scale of thousands of years as a base for tons of RPG elements).

In the interview about future aspects I am missing the following parts:

- No thoughts about a working merchant navy
- No thoughts about abolishing the immortal leader
- Why should a player identify with an in most cases bloody mass murderer and not with a civ?
- No ideas to change the wrong concept of connecting additional new settlers to the direct production of a city

 

[The_J]

Just about every Civ has had the Late Game Tedium issue where the outcome is more or less decided but it’s now Next Turn Simulator for 4 hours.

I usually just call it so I can start a new game

Yes, every civ game has failed to solve the late game tedium issues which is why Shafer's solution is not to even try and just chuck the last half of the game. If players are going to quit anyway, might as well, end the game for real.

Nice interview. Seems like they all on the same page about what the issues are with Civ as most players are. I wonder if those three would be up for answering questions submitted by this forum?

Iv'e had a similar idea as Shafer - don't include late game on release. If the life of a version of civ is going to be 8 year there's plenty of time to put out a expansion instead.

If it doesn't go through the late ages it's a different game.

So... you could make a game from ancient to Medieval, maybe Printing Press or some landmark.

... what would the game that is "From Medieval to present day" be like? Would you change a lot about the formula, given that lands are all settled?

When you start breaking up and focusing on specific time periods, it starts to either sound like a scenario or a Paradox game.

Maybe people should get a pointer to the game "Old World", which basically only focuses on the ancient mediterranean .
Since Soren was the lead on that, he also implemented a few things which he discussed in the interview, mainly the event-driven diplomancy. The tech tree itself also got some nice features.


The big issue with the late stages can be 2 cases a) what aieeegrunt points out: you have basically won already, and it'd be tedious to finish it b) the empires are so big that maximizing them to win would be too tedious.
Having different scenarios/setups for later games might indeed be something to consider, but would probably make the whole thing also a lot more complicated for the players, might break the flow, and would be hard to balance.
I'm thinking of the Civ5 scenario generator though, which tries to implement something like this.

 

[AsH2]

Spoiler reply on :

I think the US is the exception to the rule rather than the rule, though. The benefit of planned building. Most, at least from what I've seen, are not completely arbitrary, but defined how historic realms were defined, usually by things like rivers, mountains and other geographic features that made it easier to defend, or at least recognise where the line was. Since the person designing the Earth evidently didn't have access to ruler, thsoe rarely conveniently fall in nice geometric shapes. I'm not sure the UK even knows what a straight-line even is.

Oh, the UK knows what a straight line is. Just look at Africa. Yes, natural features often define borders, but just as often they don't. Borders come and go with the empires that make them; having them present from the start of the game feels like an exercise in absurdity to me.

No, borders do not come just with empires - borders are often defined long before any empire rising.
Also, you don't see a connection between those straight lines and colonies?

 

[Civinator]

The big issue with the late stages can be 2 cases a) what aieeegrunt points out: you have basically won already, and it'd be tedious to finish it b) the empires are so big that maximizing them to win would be too tedious.

In my eyes these are all issues caused at least in big parts by the wrong concept connecting settler production to city production.

 

[Urlance Woolsbane]

As SupremacyKing2 pointed out, EL and HK have hexes, yes, but settlement is divided into regions--you can't just settle anywhere. To me it is very strange that the map is divided up into regions before there is anyone to decide why that should be the case. Granted, HK's anemic system of expansion also leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

Yeah, I think that you couldn't do it quite the way Paradox does it, for a game on Civ's timescale. You might, however, start with a bunch of geographically-defined regions, such as steppes or valleys or whatnot

 

[Gedemon]

Maybe people should get a pointer to the game "Old World", which basically only focuses on the ancient mediterranean .
Since Soren was the lead on that, he also implemented a few things which he discussed in the interview, mainly the event-driven diplomancy. The tech tree itself also got some nice features.


The big issue with the late stages can be 2 cases a) what aieeegrunt points out: you have basically won already, and it'd be tedious to finish it b) the empires are so big that maximizing them to win would be too tedious.
Having different scenarios/setups for later games might indeed be something to consider, but would probably make the whole thing also a lot more complicated for the players, might break the flow, and would be hard to balance.
I'm thinking of the Civ5 scenario generator though, which tries to implement something like this.

Old World is a great game, IMO better than both civ6 and HK on the design/gameplay, but it's not what I want to play, I want the full "building a Civilization to stand the test of time" experience, knowing I'm going to stop at what would be the civ mid-game doesn't even motivate me to start.

Problem is that while Old World design is perfect for a game that span one era, I don't really see how to export it to a full length civ-like game.

As SupremacyKing2 pointed out, EL and HK have hexes, yes, but settlement is divided into regions--you can't just settle anywhere. To me it is very strange that the map is divided up into regions before there is anyone to decide why that should be the case. Granted, HK's anemic system of expansion also leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

I'd love more dynamic regions, a middle ground between the "why those predetermined and fixed borders" and "hey, this place is nice, strange that it had no history at all until we decided to build a city there at turn 150."

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Maybe people should get a pointer to the game "Old World", which basically only focuses on the ancient mediterranean .
Since Soren was the lead on that, he also implemented a few things which he discussed in the interview, mainly the event-driven diplomancy. The tech tree itself also got some nice features.


The big issue with the late stages can be 2 cases a) what aieeegrunt points out: you have basically won already, and it'd be tedious to finish it b) the empires are so big that maximizing them to win would be too tedious.
Having different scenarios/setups for later games might indeed be something to consider, but would probably make the whole thing also a lot more complicated for the players, might break the flow, and would be hard to balance.
I'm thinking of the Civ5 scenario generator though, which tries to implement something like this.

I haven't been following Old World very much, but it struck me as a Paradox style game with a few Civ features

 

[SupremacyKing2]

I haven't been following Old World very much, but it struck me as a Paradox style game with a few Civ features

Old World is not a Paradox style game IMO. The only thing it "borrows" from Paradox is the fact that you are a leader with a genealogy and have to marry and get an heir to continue your dynasty. But the game itself is very much like civ. The map is hexes, you built cities, build buildings in your cities, improve terrain, build units etc.. It plays very much like civ.

 

[civac]

@Civinator You are a Civ3 player? What is micromanagement in Civ4 specifically that you dislike?

Late game Civ is less fun for most people since you often have to manage 30+ cities and with much increased unit production due to industrialization. However, the problem with games where you have already won and are just going through the motions can be reasonably avoided/lessened by making domination victories much easier than they are.

In the early game settling and city planning is the part I like most. Preset regions can go die in a fire.

 

[Leucarum]

When it comes to game length, I really like Jon Shafer's comment about wanting to just chop off the 2nd half of the game. We all rail about late game civ being less fun, and I think he just nails it on the head. It's less interesting, but would it still be Civ without that 2nd half of the game? 4x games have so much snowballing that once players understand the systems in place, games are effectively over in the first few eras... I don't know that any games have really solved these problems.

Regions probably have a good implementation, though I am certain they also have several bad implementations too *cough*Humankind*cough*... I don't know that regions are incompatible with city planning. You can still potentially place buildings inside regions, it's just a question of getting the level of complexity right....