Improvements needed in game mechanics

Druid

Chieftain
Joined
Jan 28, 2002
Messages
8
This is not intended to be a discussion of what needs improvement in the game.

Instead I'm hoping for some improvements in HOW the game interacts with the player..

So, no discussion of corruption, what attack/defense values should be, tech trading logic & etc.

Here are some game mechanics improvements I'd like to see -- please add your own:


1. Game speed. I'm playing on a 500mhz P3 with 256Ram. On a huge map w/ 8 civs, it takes me nearly 10 min after I click for end of turn. Unacceptable.

I (almost) dont care what you have to do to improve this, turn off graphics, sound. I note that the cursor flashes between the arrow and the busy pointer ... stuff like that is wasted cycles.

This long delay makes it nearly unplayable.

2. Moving units by stack. This has already been addressed. Thank you Firixis. Now make it work without unfortifying units and without trashing the Armies.

3. Always respond immediately to a keyboard/mouse in a dialog box. For example: I click on 'good bye' after a negotiation... it waits several seconds. *I think* it waits until it has the next thing to do. or Sometimes after I 'OK' a build order for a city (on the "just built a ____" dialog), it does nothing until for quite a while. [Not always, tho, so this is confusing to me.] OR There's a long, long delay with frozen screen between "you just captured......" and "There are ___ resisters".

Just put the screen clean up right after the click is accepted, instead of at the beginning of the next thing-to-do logic.

4. Unit selection sequence. Give me SOME sort of control, instead of bouncing the focus of the 'active unit' all over the map in whatever-sequence-it-is-now .. (is it build sequence within unit type? I dunno. Dont much care.. it LOOKS semi-random)

Possibilities:
a) Let me click a stack and cycle thru all the units in that stack.
b) Let me specify a region of the map as a "Region 1" and do all the units in that region.

5. Hot spots. Let me specify a place with a hotkey sequence, so I can order units to go there easily. Like: (goto) CTRL+1 to send a unit(stack) to hotspot #1.

6. Pollution. Give me a hotkey to pop the screen to the next pollution square, so I dont have to scroll around and find 'em by eye.
 
1. Game speed. I'm playing on a 500mhz P3 with 256Ram. On a huge map w/ 8 civs, it takes me nearly 10 min after I click for end of turn. Unacceptable.

I (almost) dont care what you have to do to improve this, turn off graphics, sound. I note that the cursor flashes between the arrow and the busy pointer ... stuff like that is wasted cycles.

This long delay makes it nearly unplayable.


well if you look in the preference you can turn off animation i have a pentium 500 p3 i guess with 312 ram (something like that)
and i can play on a huge map with 8 to 12 civ without waiting more then 3 min per turn. My turn are long but that because i have a lot of thing to do.:)
 
I saw an excellent idea on a different thread. A trade screen similar to the F1 screen for trades would be helpful - it can list what trades are active, what are posible, etc, instead of forcing the tedious method required now. With the new patch, it is important to constantly monitor trade status and it's too difficult - I find myself blowing off trades because of the hassle.
 
Please,

Don't dumb down the AI to increase the game speed. The AI although improved over other Civ type games is still relatively easy to beat at reasonable levels.

To each his own, but I would prefer the game to be slower, if the AI was improved even further.

By the way, I like the pollution hot key idea. Although it should cycle only to show the pollution in one's own territory.
 
Controlling specialists. Let me specify specialist priorities in the city governor. Especially, an option to make them maximize happiness before doing any tax/science. (The most tedious thing in the game to me is reviewing cities and fixing the constantly changing allocation of specialists.)
 
"1. Game speed. I'm playing on a 500mhz P3 with 256Ram. On a huge map w/ 8 civs, it takes me nearly 10 min after I click for end of turn. Unacceptable."

I don't know why you should be having a problem with this, i play civ3 on a celeron 166 mHz acer with a crappy soundcard, and a 8 year old monitor. A lot of things are slow for me, but the AI turn is definately NOT one of them. They go by so fast, usually quicker than my slow computer is able to load up the 3d leader faces for diplomacy ;)

Are you playing on a huge map with 16 civs? If the time is too long and you are playing with anything above 8 civ normal map, then its not really firaxis's fault, because they did not design civ3 for 16 civs. They put it in at the last minute because some people consider the fun of 16 civs worth a long wait. If you dont like the wait, then 8 civs or less is the way you should probably play civ3. I have never played with more than 8 civs, and never had a problem with AI turn time, which, considering my computer speed, that is really amazing.
 
I HATE APOLOGISTS!

When playing huge map with 16 civs AI turn shall not take more than 10 seconds!!! The fact that it does take ridiculos amount of time is indicative of nothing more or less than..

poor programming!

Period. End of discussion. No other viewpoint is valid.
 
Originally posted by jimmytrick
I HATE APOLOGISTS!

When playing huge map with 16 civs AI turn shall not take more than 10 seconds!!! The fact that it does take ridiculos amount of time is indicative of nothing more or less than..

poor programming!

Period. End of discussion. No other viewpoint is valid.

I am not apologising for firaxis!

I am merely stating that civ3 was NOT designed for 16 civs, so having a few problems is not unreasonable. Maybe next time, they shouldnt give us the option at all, they should just keep the 8 civs and not even give us the OPTION to play with more civs. :rolleyes: I would rather at least get the choice, and i chose better performance for less civs. If you dont like the wait then why dont you just do the same.

And I dont apologise for Firaxis, I think they messed up on alot of game concepts (some which cant be edited) but turn wait time is not one of them. If i can play the recommended # of civs on my POS computer, then it shouldnt be a problem for 8 civs with most other people. I dont think firaxis should have kept the maximum civs at 8 just to stop some people from crying about the wait. They stated that it wasnt designed for 16 civs, said they couldnt guarantee performance with 16 civs, and hoped the players of civ3 would be capable of making their own decisions, and if they didnt like the results to make a different decision. You are complaining about a "freebie" a feature they could have just as easily been left out. Its like buying a bag of candy, and when the clerk gives you a free extra piece, saying you dont like that kind of candy. Its a free bonus, who cares?? Anyway I would prefer firaxis spent their time on the MP that was promised rather than reprogramming the entire game to accommodate those who cant bear to lower the settings a bit.
 
TOP thread druid!! and on the turn statis ... i also have a p3 500 with 256mb ram and i have to wait 1 min max ... perhaps u have lots of stuff running in the background? odd how similar computers have vastly different wait times (and i usually play with 12 civs on a large map) ..... perhaps point 3 is due to the same cause? (possably u have a virus?? :( that is fragging your computer??) that would bite hard
4. it would seem that this is totally random, having nothing to do with unit type or unit position

5. hotspots ..... love it!! ... would be excellent on the larger maps!!

6. another good idea .... guess that is a reason they made it so dog ugly?

and to the trade screen .... ive seen it sugessted so many times before .... i REALLY hope firaxis put that in as keeping track of trades is soooo tedius!!
i would like to see a diplomacy screen without the faces so it can fit all 16 civs in (perhaps with more than 8 civs u lose the faces in the diplomacy screen?? i would be happy with that)
 
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