Is anyone else disappointed by the quotes for Techs/Wonders?

[Jaybe]

Isn't it fascinating how everyone seems to have such different tastes ...
and seemingly different levels of tolerance.

Having a variety of quotes for the accomplishments is good.

 

[bookman_]

The game really doesn't need to have a serious tone, I mean, it is a game, I don't know about you but I do in fact play games for fun.

That's sad, games can be much more than just that, fun is just one feeling among many others that one can experience in video games. There is for sure absolutely no fun in the feeling of fear, but still a lot of people enjoy horor.
I play Civ for living the fantasy of being the leadear of a civilization, advancing through the ages of History and for the fun of seeing History doing fun things like Gandhi dropping the nuke.

 

[Lyoncet]

Having a variety of quotes for the accomplishments is good.

I'd agree with this if I thought it had a good variety of quotes. As it is, it seems slanted towards modern comedian telling jokes that, to me at least, fall completely flat. Machines coming with just the right number of parts, Roman AC, no Wi-Fi, etc. If the media build shipped without Sean Bean, I would honestly still be working under the assumption that they're mostly placeholders someone cobbled together from Goodreads one afternoon. Even some of the more sober quotes seem like they're scraped from the bottom of the barrel.

Plus, going heavily with humor in a game that's getting a worldwide release is a baffling position to begin with, since humor is so linked to culture, history, and language. I can't imagine how they'll manage to pull it off in Chinese or Portuguese without a) completely alienating the listener or b) doing a complete rework of the quotes. At least honest-to-goodness insights or passages from classic literature has an easier time jumping borders.

Although credit where credit is due, there are still some great new ones. “Set your course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship.”

 

[BrokenBokken]

I'd agree with this if I thought it had a good variety of quotes.

....

Although credit where credit is due, there are still some great new ones. “Set your course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship.”

Just leaving in the relevant parts.

 

[Stilgar08]

I didn't read all the quotes, but have absolutely no problem with the Mix. To me a good quote can either come from Plato, Einstein or Groucho Marx!
If you take it all too seriously, it might not be fun

 

[AntoineS]

Sean Bean is great for the narration... the problem with some quotes talking about the love of pigs or the absence of wifi is that it kills (a little) the mystic of the game. Not all of them are bad but it does leave something to be desired, especially as they will be repeated over and over again over the course of thousands of hours of gameplay

 

[Stellastruck]

The Romans did have air conditioning (of a sort). Learned that back in college.

 

[Stilgar08]

Sean Bean is great for the narration... the problem with some quotes talking about the love of pigs or the absence of wifi is that it kills (a little) the mystic of the game. Not all of them are bad but it does leave something to be desired, especially as they will be repeated over and over again over the course of thousands of hours of gameplay

Beep Beep Beep Beep -
How happy are those whose walls already Rise - got just as old as beep beep beep...

I just don't understand the overly pronounced need for seriousness. It's kind of the same discussion like we had on "childish graphics".
But every to his own... 'Over and Out' (James T. Kirk)

 

[AntoineS]

Giving quotes a certain mystic and them being serious are two different things.

I am ok with most of the uotes anywy, I would change like 5 of them in the whole game it´s not like if it were a big deal

 

[ExemplarVoss]

Few too many from modern American comedians for my taste. Devoid of their original context, they just sound amazingly like 'ignorant Americans not knowing history.'

"For example the air conditioning one with Rome or the Monty Python one."

I don't understand or "get" the air conditioning quote. Maybe someone can enlighten me. That's the only quote I truly hate, but maybe if I get the joke I might like it. The others are okay, some better than others.

I'm not sure I can really explain it. Garrison Keillor was around for about 42 years doing the same radio show (though new material in every show) in a very dry monologue, and the audience reactions to funny (in the sense of strange) statements (like the air conditioning) are largely a matter of snapping out of the hypnotic drone with a sort of 'Wait? What?' reaction.

Odds are pretty good that if you aren't a rural(ish) American of the Baby Boomer generation, you won't find most of his material particularly amusing. Just a lot of double takes and raised eyebrows.

 

[King William I]

As long as the quote actually fits the tech/wonder, it could be from the Flintstones or all I care. CiV was seriously lacking in that department

 

[Dearmad]

So after playing the game a few hours... YES to the OP, I think they all basically suck! They are all from too modern, too western a slant. And not funny.

 

[CaiusDrewart]

That Kilimanjaro quote is an atrocity.

 

[CaiusDrewart]

I researched the tech scorched earth and what the heck is a quote by Roger Ailes doing in the game? The guy is a monster. And that quote isn't even good. Why?

 

[Dearmad]

Roger Ailes, really!? That is f'ing disgusting! This isn't inspiring or even illustrative of any meaningful history. Petty, pissant people get quotes in the game now? And it's not like they were afraid to repeat previous quotes they used- the "for there you have been and there you will long to be
" quote by DaVinci was reused.

Really horrible quote decisions all around- oh well makes it easy to click the box and move on I guess.

 

[Usama84]

@OP yes I am, it will never be like civ 4

 

[Stalker0]

Mixed bag for me. Some of the quotes are good, some are pretty bad.

But....if you makes you feel better, no Civ quotes ever stood a chance against the old Alpha Centauri quotes!!

"Air Power rests at the apex of the first triad of victory, for it combines mobility, flexibility, and initiative!"

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded."

"Resources exist to be consumed. And consumed they will be, if not by this generation then by some future. By what right does this forgotten future seek to deny us our birthright? None I say! Let us take what is ours, chew and eat our fill."

"I loved my chosen. How then to face the day when she left me? So I took from her body a single cell, perhaps to love her again."

"The righteous need not cower before the drumbeat of human progress. Though the song of yesterday fades into the challenge of tomorrow, God still watches and judges us. Evil lurks in the datalinks as it lurked in the streets of yesteryear. But it was never the streets that were evil."

 

[Dearmad]

wow.. those ARE good. Geez!

 

[PhilBowles]

I've found most better-chosen than I'd have expected, though there are some fairly bad ones to be sure (while Civs IV and V hit the mark to a greater or lesser degree with nearly every one - some were less evocative than choices they could have used, but very few felt as though they didn't fit at all).

And the pig quote was from Winston Churchill, so it seems fair game.

 

[PhilBowles]

"Resources exist to be consumed. And consumed they will be, if not by this generation then by some future. By what right does this forgotten future seek to deny us our birthright? None I say! Let us take what is ours, chew and eat our fill."

Ugh, that always struck me as by far the worst of the AC quotes, and that game had more than its share of pretentious efforts to inject missing depth into its character narrations. Not only is this one pretentiously-written, its actual message is scenery-chewing megalomania from a caricature of capitalist excess.