[BTS] Like seeing an old friend again

[salty mud]

I've played Civ IV pretty regularly since its release way back in 2005. Never been particularly good, only now tackling Monarch difficulty, but hey... by the time I retire I may be ready for Deity. This year I've taken a break from Civ IV and decided to expand my Civilization horizons somewhat, and take in some Civ V and VI. People rave about them, so I thought they were worth a try.

I got Civ V initially on release but was that disappointed with it I shelved it for years. Even with BNW I couldn't get into the game as it strayed too far from what, in my opinion, makes Civ IV great. The 1UPT mechanics ruin the AI and destroy any feeling of military progression or industrialisation. Diplomacy is bonkers, and I could never really feel power blocs developing like in Civ IV. This year I decided to try the Vox Populi mod, and it is indeed like a breath of fresh air and does the seemingly impossible; makes Civ V fun. That said, putting very pretty lipstick on a pig doesn't change the pig underneath. 1UPT still ruins the game, the diplomacy is fundamentally broken beyond modders' capabilities and, due to the game's design, city specialisation just doesn't exist.

I also bought the Civ VI Platinum Edition at a heavily reduced rate. On the surface, it's new and fresh. Districts are novel and reintroduce a form of "playing the map" present in IV. Civilisations are nice and varied, though the game does lean too far towards pushing you down a particular playstyle. Corps and armies seem to address some of the issues that 1UPT introduced in Civ V. After a while though, the cracks start to show, and boy, are they big. Diplomacy is even worse than V. Agendas are STUPID beyond all reasoning. My favourite is land-grabber Trajan's - he loves building a massive empire, and also loves other empires that build massive empires. He views other civs taking his potential land as a good thing. Until you reach the arbitrary, "you're too close and claiming my land" point, anyway. The more I played, districts started to seem more and more abstract and forced. I have to build a separate plot just to build a library? I can't build a theatre in my city centre? I would have preferred a city specialisation type district system; most buildings can be built in the city centre as normal, but the player can then sacrifice land to accentuate some bonuses.

Disappointed and dismayed, I return to Civ IV, and boy how I missed it. I won't sit here and claim Civ IV is perfect. Percentage based combat is iffy at best, and archers/siege units could be better designed. That said, it's Civilization. Every turn gives me something to think about; barbarians from the north, war with neighbour to the east, foreign religion spreading in my cities, should I whip these units I need or keep working these gold mines, which tiles can I sacrifice for my specialists... I'm constantly engaged. And the mods, my word... One can play this game for DECADES with all of the variety available.

I got this game when I was 12; I'm now 27. I can imagine I'll still be playing this in another 15 years when I'm 42. Perhaps with a young one by my side, showing them what good games looked like back in the old days.

 

[Louis the XIV]

I totally understand what you are feeling. I felt the same when I bought Civ 5 and Civ 6 and tried them.
Civ 5 in my opinion is definitely the worst from the top 3 (Civ 4, 5 and 6). I have never played Civ 1, 2, or 3 but I would like to try them out at some point in time.
The actual reason I started playing Civ IV is because when I was a a little kid (7-9 years old) my dad used to play civ 4 and I was very easily impressed by the Assault Mechs and Arcologies!
As far as I know a lot of Civ IV players didn't think too much of Civ 5 and 6 because I personally think that it is very hard to get used to a game like Civ 5/6 after you have played Civ 4 for over more then 5 years. For me it was very hard to get used to the Blue Marble terrain graphics! That's how used I am with Civ 4!
Anyway I owe a LOT to Civ 4! Civ 4 is the reason I started learning Python and many other utilities like xml etc...
I'm very glad that people still play Civ 4 and I hope that in continuation people will still play it. I know as a fact that I will still play Civ 4 from time to time in the far future.

 

[6K Man]

I got into Civ1 in 1994-5, played it a lot but never really got good at it.

A friend told me that there was an update called Civ2 out. I switched to Civ2, loved it, and got really into it about when I discovered there were online forums about the game. That's when I really learned the game - got into succession games, demo games, comparison games, modpacks.

Civ2, I think, was as much fun for me then as Civ4 is for me now, but eventually, once I knew the tricks, I could beat Deity on Civ2 without too much difficulty. That made the game less interesting - you'd have to impose odd rules on yourself as a player in order to make the game a challenge.

Somewhere in my Civ2 days, I tried out Call to Power and CTP2, and Test of Time. ToT was basically a slightly better version of Civ2. None were really worth the $, to me. Another nice benefit of being part of Civ2 forums was getting the reviews for Civ3. Nobody seemed too thrilled with it, so I didn't get it.

Civ4 was a different story. It seemed almost universally acclaimed by people I knew from these forums. So I picked it up, upgraded to BtS, and I've played no other Civ games since about 2007. I've seen too many complaints about 5 and 6 to want to give them a try. I'm also tempermentally opposed to Steam and game licenses, so Civ4 might be the last PC game I play.

 

[noontide]

My sentiment exactly. I'm an Immortal player (perpetually) struggling to make the final jump. I have won a total of one Deity game after, I don't know, nearly a hundred attempt? Logged in over 1000+ hours on steam and this is after I got the steam version.

I post this topic every other year or so but is there any chance we'd ever see a Civ IV remastered? I'd like to see diplomacy tweaked a bit and if only just give us a visual update. This and Morrowind, are the two games I'm dying for a remake. Anything we can do to stir up the interest, a kickstarter maybe?

 

[Louis the XIV]

My sentiment exactly. I'm an Immortal player (perpetually) struggling to make the final jump. I have won a total of one Deity game after, I don't know, nearly a hundred attempt? Logged in over 1000+ hours on steam and this is after I got the steam version.

I post this topic every other year or so but is there any chance we'd ever see a Civ IV remastered? I'd like to see diplomacy tweaked a bit and if only just give us a visual update. This and Morrowind, are the two games I'm dying for a remake. Anything we can do to stir up the interest, a kickstarter maybe?

Advanced Civ tweaks diplomacy a lot. I am pretty sure there will never be any other CIV IV updates, even though it's sad it's the truth.
Firaxis games is working on improving the Civ 6 and they might start working on a Civ 7.

 

[ArchGhost]

Every time I rage at this game I just remind myself that I only feel so passionate because I love it. I care that things don't go my way in games of Civ4, just when I think I understand it enough at my level to have a good time.

Being frustrated by something you don't care for just leads to moving on. Civ 4 has its claws in me though and I come back each time. Once after breaking my desk from slamming my fist on it!

 

[Seraiel]

I'm also staying with Civilization IV. I took a pretty long break from it but it's simply still the best CIV around.