Lazygamer Zoe Hawkins reflects on "Hybrid Affinities" livestream

[Westwall]

I sincerely doubt adding a handful of building and unit models for hybrid carriers, air units, and cities would have broken the bank.

It's just half-baked.

Yeah I'm not buying any of this "short on resources/time" talk.

This is a Triple-A game developer we're talking about here.

 

[Galgus]

Yeah I'm not buying any of this "short on resources/time" talk.

This is a Triple-A game developer we're talking about here.

Yeah, and that excuse sounds like one is saying the game isn't complete, but that we shouldn't blame them or set AAA standards for them.

 

[Galgus]

Have you noticed that even the expansion gives importance to water cities and water combat, none of the new hybrid units is designed for water gameplay?

It would be nice to see a set of navy affinity units.

Of course LEV Tanks and LEV Destroyers work fine, but the lesser affinities need some love too.

Water Xeno Swarm would be great for Harmony, though no other ideas immediately spring to mind.

 

[Natura]

Yeah I'm not buying any of this "short on resources/time" talk.

This is a Triple-A game developer we're talking about here.

Triple-A game devs are notorious for delivering products missing features and rushed out the door. Virtually every MMO since WoW would fall into this category. We have no idea how large the budget is that the BE devs have been allocated. X-Com 2 and presumably Civ VI would be sucking up funds. Furthermore BE, going by Steam stats at any rate, probably hasn't been as successful as Firaxis would have wanted, so the idea of allocating significant resources to an already failed project (throwing good money after the bad) might not appeal.

Whether or not any of this is true is pure conjecture. What can be said is that them simply being part of a Triple-A studio is no guarantee that their resources are large, or that their lords and masters don't want a product out by a certain date. It can't be a co-incidence that BE is getting out the door well in time for the Christmas season.

 

[Westwall]

Yeah, and that excuse sounds like one is saying the game isn't complete, but that we shouldn't blame them or set AAA standards for them.

Which in turn makes them look worse, not better.

 

[Westwall]

Furthermore BE, going by Steam stats at any rate, probably hasn't been as successful as Firaxis would have wanted, so the idea of allocating significant resources to an already failed project (throwing good money after the bad) might not appeal.

Except that's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Steam stats prove that BE sold well initially, after which players tapered off when they realized the gameplay was buggy and boring without really adding much more than they were already getting from Civ 5, and in many cases a lot less.

So that explanation doesn't really hold water.

 

[Halbbruder]

Triple-A game devs are notorious for delivering products missing features and rushed out the door. Virtually every MMO since WoW would fall into this category. We have no idea how large the budget is that the BE devs have been allocated. X-Com 2 and presumably Civ VI would be sucking up funds. Furthermore BE, going by Steam stats at any rate, probably hasn't been as successful as Firaxis would have wanted, so the idea of allocating significant resources to an already failed project (throwing good money after the bad) might not appeal.

Whether or not any of this is true is pure conjecture. What can be said is that them simply being part of a Triple-A studio is no guarantee that their resources are large, or that their lords and masters don't want a product out by a certain date. It can't be a co-incidence that BE is getting out the door well in time for the Christmas season.

Perhaps the issue for Firaxis is stating that you're about to release a game at a certain time 6 months before you do so. 2 months after news release, you get rushing into the work, with the livestreams and all. You probably get a rough plan and such, but in focusing on certain shortfalls, you either forget about the others, notably AI, or you create new ones along the way.

And I really doubt that they'd do another expansion after this. If this fails to revive the franchise, then they'll start working on civ 6, while using CivBERT and civ 5 as a precursor to civ 6. If they want to add changes after CivBERT, they all have to be in the form of patches.

For civ 6, Fingers crossed they'll implement a capped MUPT at 3 units (melee, ranged, civilian) as a hopefully satisfactory appeasement to civ 4 fans.

 

[Westwall]

Pretty sure they've been working on Civ 6 for some time now.

 

[Natura]

Except that's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Steam stats prove that BE sold well initially, after which players tapered off when they realized the gameplay was buggy and boring without really adding much more than they were already getting from Civ 5, and in many cases a lot less.

So that explanation doesn't really hold water.

Except it's that very lack of interest that might be making Firaxis invest less in a BE expansion. Yes, it sold well initially, and I suspect (though of course cannot prove) that a great deal of those sales were because the game had Civ in the title and (despite what the devs kept saying) people were hoping for SMAC 2. But the game then dies, people are disappointed (going off of Steam reviews and Metacritic) and Firaxis would be fools not to have noticed that. They can't count on people automatically buying the expansion the same way they bought the base game (at least not to the same extent).

So maybe they don't allocate funds to the development of an expansion as extravagantly as would for a base game that was still doing well. I don't know. I still think it's a possible explanation.

 

[Halbbruder]

Pretty sure they've been working on Civ 6 for some time now.

Source? I mean it's possible, but if true, then Firaxis needs to refine its multi-tasking policy to minimalize distractions and maximize results and progress.

 

[Westwall]

So maybe they don't allocate funds to the development of an expansion as extravagantly as would for a base game that was still doing well. I don't know. I still think it's a possible explanation.

Again, let's not speculate too much over the financial and budgetary situation over at Firaxis, I doubt most of us are shareholders here.

What we do know is that BE was highly anticipated for a number of reasons, not least of which having to do with the fact that it was Firaxis' first sci-fi/off-world themed 4x since SMAC. I don't think most of us were expecting SMAC 2, but we were anticipating a quality installment from the company that brought us SMAC.

Now we can debate why exactly the numbers started dropping off far more quickly than Civ 5 did prior to GoK, but I think it's a stretch to suggest that it led to the BE team having their budget/resources cut just short enough that they could put in as much as they did, but couldn't manage adding a few more unit models.

As Galgus pointed out, it's seriously unlikely that would break the bank. And as GenEngineer pointed out, it's not so much that they were left out, but rather that no explanation was even attempted.

Seriously, watch the hybrid affinity units video. McDonough actually says, "I don't think we have hybrid upgrades for air units."

Not even sure what to make of that.

It's somewhat disconcerting when lead designers seem unsure about their own game.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Seriously, watch the hybrid affinity units video. McDonough actually says, "I don't think we have hybrid upgrades for air units."

Maybe he mispoke? Wouldn't that be funny after all the drama over why hybrid air units were left out, if they actually will be in the game?

 

[Westwall]

Well yes.

Oh my god, YES. Of course it would be funny. I'd even go so far as to say it would be hysterical.

But until that's the case, you better believe I'm going to ask questions.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Here is the exact quote, in more context, from McDonough which I carefully transcribed from watching the live stream at the 7 minute mark:

Dave McDonough:
In terms of their generic units, which is what we call the core classes that are not unique, the hybrids only appear at level 3, and they are not for all the classes, like I don't believe aircraft have hybrid upgrades but all the, I guess you would say the really fundamental parts of an army, can get hybridized at their highest level.

I understand this quote as basically saying that the devs made a design choice that not all classes of units would get hybrid upgrades and that they would only give hybrid options to classes of units that they deemed most important to gameplay.

But also note that Dave does not appear to be 100% certain if aircrafts don't get hybrids. It is remotely possible that they do and it is a different class of unit that does not get one. If aircrafts indeed don't get hybrids, it will be because the devs decided that they were not fundamental enough to the player's military to deserve an hybrid. But in any case, it appears obvious to me that the devs made a design choice to only give certain generic units hybrids plus add unique hybrids. Now, we can disagree with that but it is the design choice that they obviously made.

 

[Westwall]

It seems like they covered nearly every unit class under the sun (and then some), so I'm not sure what qualifies air units as not being generic enough or being particularly special compared to everything else.

Unique hybrid units certainly aren't fundamental classes.

This isn't me being unsatisfied with the answer, but the answer itself doesn't really add up. And since it seemed more like an off-hand comment, I'll continue to wait and see if they say more on this.

Is it a deal-breaker for me? No. But I'd still like to hear their reasoning for why air units and submarines aren't generic enough.

There's certainly nothing generic to me about the stealth Geliopod.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

It seems like they covered nearly every unit class under the sun (and then some), so I'm not sure what qualifies air units as not being generic enough or being particularly special compared to everything else.

Unique hybrid units certainly aren't fundamental classes.

This isn't me being unsatisfied with the answer, but the answer itself doesn't really add up. And since it seemed more like an off-hand comment, I'll continue to wait and see if they say more on this.

Is it a deal-breaker for me? No. But I'd still like to hear their reasoning for why air units and submarines aren't generic enough.

I think you misunderstood the quote. McDonough is saying that all the units that are not unique units (CNDR, Battlesuit ...), so for example, soldier, ranger, cavalry, patrol boat, aircrafts, submarines are considered generic classes. So, aircrafts and submarines are considered generic classes. And he is saying that they made a deliberate choice to only give some classes of units, their own hybrid upgrades instead of giving all of them a hybrid option. So the real question is, why did the devs think that aircrafts were not important enough to get hybrids? Who knows? But the fact is that they chose to leave some generic hybrids out on purpose.

There's certainly nothing generic to me about the stealth Geliopod.

The Geliopod is a unique unit, hence a separate class. McDonough is only talking about the generic classes.

 

[Natura]

It's somewhat worrying that the devs don't consider aircraft to be a "fundamental part of your army". Possibly this is because the AI is atrocious at using them, but advancing without friendly air-cover can be a difficult task. And trying to have lower tier air units fighting advanced ones goes about as well as you might expect.

 

[Westwall]

So the real question is, why did the devs think that aircrafts were not important enough to get hybrids?

I agree.

Who knows?

Well I'd like to know. Because it's not a matter of "Well we only wanted to offer hybrid infantry and cavalry options for now," it's more like, "Well we only wanted to offer hybrid options for literally every class except air units, carriers and submarines."

Now do I need to know why that is? No, but I'd like to know just because their classification of "generic" or "unimportant" seems rather arbitrary.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Keep in mind that the only unit type that we have actual screenshot proof does not have a hybrid option, is the submarine. McDonough only said that he thinks the aircraft is one unit type that does not get a hybrid but he did not seem 100% sure. So, all we know we know is that some unit types don't get a hybrid by design, we know that the submarine is one of them, and the dev thinks the aircraft is another one that does not a hybrid.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

it's more like, "Well we only wanted to offer hybrid options for literally every class except air units, carriers and submarines."

Not exactly what the devs are saying. They did not randomly decide to make hybrids for everything except aircrafts, carriers and subs because they wanted a hybrid affinity system that was just shy of complete. They are saying that they chose to only make hybrid upgrades for the most important unit types and that is why some units like the sub don't get a hybrid.