"More patches are on their way"

[Anthropoid]

Why would a lead developer stop working for his employer immediately after a successful game that is the latest installment in one of the most famous series ever?

In contrast, why would lead developer stop working for his employer immediately after a failed game that is the latest installment in one of the most famous series ever?

When you lack cold hard facts, reasonable inference is the best you got.

In this instance, the most reasonable inference I can make is that Shafer "left" because Civ5 has been recognized as being either a failure or imperiled. I'm open to any facts anyone has that would support or dispute that hypothesis. But with this set of observations in hand, I see little point in quibbling about much more ambiguous and complex matters such as sales numbers. The reviews by the big sites are meaningless to me.

 

[CivFanaticMan]

First of all, thats just wrong. You clearly didn't do ANY research. Civ5 has had great reviews on major gaming sites before and after release. Below are the reviews of the first 5 websites that show up from a simple Google search of "Civ5 review".
Joystiq Review: The game got 5 stars out of 5
IGN Review: The game was ranked as outstanding with a 9 out of 10
PC Gamer Review: The game got a 93 percent score
Gamespot Review: The game was ranked 9 out of 10 by critics and 8.2 out of 10 for users.
G4TV Review: The game was ranked 5 out 5 stars. Users gave it 4.3 out of 5 stars

My problem with reviews is that Civ5 looks great when you scratch the surface, but as you dig deeper you see its major flaws. Most reviewers review the game from their first play through, which for me was the funnest. After that the games re-playability diminishes at an alarming rate.

The reviewers also are able to recognize Civ5's major flaws, but they are under the impression that it will all be fixed. Civ5, for a game as widely marketed as it was, was a disaster at its release. No MP, huge balance issues. I would have rated the game a 6.5 not a 9.

 

[timtofly]

According to Gamespot there have been over nine million units sold.

 

[SuperJay]

According to Gamespot there have been over nine million units sold.

[Citation needed]

COD: Black Ops has sold what, 7 million total? Civ 5 has not outsold COD:BO by more than two million units. Either you mistakenly added a zero or your source is wildly mistaken.

 

[Carl5872]

Please Add Hotseat!!!!!

 

[Gamemaster77]

@gamemaster77 - i think you use facts as figures just as poorly as duuks lack of them.
its equally wrong to totally ignore the fact that there is a very vocal and supported group of people who simply cant stand the game and feel betrayed by civ5. sure some people just cant adapt to the new style and others are on a bandwagon but it still remains that a significant portion of the fan base is dissatisfied with CIV5 whether you personally like it or not.

I am not ignoring the fact I simply did not go into it in my post but I shall delve into it now. There is a large amount of people who do not like Civ5 however this is because they are still more geared towards Civ4. A large amount of people including me did not like Civ4 because they like Civ3 much better. This can be shown be simply going into Gamespy and looking at the amount of people still playing Civ3 even after all these years. Civ5 I was geared towards a different audience. I believe this audience is more of the Civ3 audience since I liked Civ3 and Civ5 while not liking Civ4 as did some of my friends.

dispite your opinions on the thread heading i think it is a safe bet that a larger percentage of the people on the civ5 boards are expressing negative or less than positive views on the game than those in the civ4 boards

I believe you are right but this is not because of Civ4 being better than Civ5. It is because of time. In time the people who hate Civ5 will leave because their non-constructive criticism is simply not productive and they will naturally stop as people did with the Civ4 forum.

also note stability bugs, on an otherwise well liked game is much easier to patch than fixing a simply poorly thought out product. Civ4 patches fixed bugs. civ4 expansions added to a game that people already felt was great. what many people in the civ5 community are saying is that they concede that civ5 is sub-par and they just hope that future patch/expansions will make it enjoyable. but civ5 is not poor in comparison to civ4 it is simply a singularly lacking game.

I really don't understand your point here. You are basically saying that the Civ5 release situation is the same as Civ4 except that Civ5 is not as good as Civ4. However, this is not true, this is only an opinion, not a fact. Many people including me enjoy playing Civ5 so you cannot just clearly state that Civ5 is a lacking game.[/QUOTE]

Well done indeed. To think how much faeces we'd avoid in this world if everyone were as scrupulous as you...

Thanks, I appreciate that as well as the language. I learned a new word today (the latter).

Professional (i.e., paid) reviewers for any company / group / magazine / website will almost automatically give a great review for any major company's new release. If they don't, then advertising money won't flow their way and they won't be reviewing any more releases from said major company.

This has been said before but this is not necessarily true. The reviews are at least okay not always great.

It has been proven (statistical analysis) that such reviews will always trend to the high end of the reviewer's point / star / percentage range. It takes extreme, immediate failure right out of the box for reviewers to give lower values. Civ5 doesn't suffer from such failure; the problems it has are more subtle and start becoming evident after hours of play which reviewers generally don't have the time to give. Further, in a 10-point scale, one would expect that 5 is average. Doesn't happen that way, though. If the game is average, it gets 8 or a bit better. Again, you can go looking and you'll find the studies that demonstrate this.

First of all where is this statistical analysis? You pretend to back up your claims but charge us to find the evidence. If you are making the claim then it is your job to back it up. Also, you don't point out any problems, you just say there are. That just leads people to believe these "problems" are just gameplay that you don't like and are really just opinions.

Are you sure you want him to, I dunno, put his sources down somewhere? Are you sure you don't want him to cite them?

What are you even saying? Of course I would want him to cite sources!

You look at these numbers and see 340 games played. I look at these numbers (40, 46, 48) and see 3 people who've played 40 games against each other. If 5 people get together and play each other 10 times, is that 10 games or 50 by their website? I know which way I'd bet. I will admit, 40 multiplayer games successfully completed is impressive (for low values of "impressed"), but does the website keep track of games completed, or games started? Statistical information such as this is next to useless; it's incomplete. It's as useless as the information cited in the other poster's missive.

That is true that they may have played together, however many games are 1 on 1 and rarely a lot of players. I know this from experience as I used to play on that website. This website also only keeps track of finished games so there are certainly unfinished games that go on reported. So to say it is incomplete is wrong, you just assumed that it is incomplete even though it really was.

 

[SuperJay]

There is a large amount of people who do not like Civ5 however this is because they are still more geared towards Civ4.

While I realize this is a convenient generalization for you to make, it's also incorrect. Maybe show a little more respect for your fellow Civ fans (who are actually thinking beings just like you) next time around.

 

[Gamemaster77]

While I realize this is a convenient generalization for you to make, it's also incorrect. Maybe show a little more respect for your fellow Civ fans (who are actually thinking beings just like you) next time around.

Im sorry let me correct my typo:

"There is a large amount of people who do not like Civ5; however many of these people don't like it because they are still more geared towards Civ4."

 

[SuperJay]

Im sorry let me correct my typo:

"There is a large amount of people who do not like Civ5; however many of these people don't like it because they are still more geared towards Civ4."

Sure, you can do that. We can also do this:

"There is a large amount of people who do like Civ 5; however many of these people like it because they are more geared towards The Sims."

See? Now, I don't actually believe that statement, but it's about as accurate as yours is.

I'm really, really tired of you folks refusing to believe that those Civ fans who are disappointed in the flaws in Civ 5 are disappointed because of Civ 5. I get that it's easier for you to portray your fellow fans as simply stuck in the past and completely resistant to change than to accept that Civ 5 is severely flawed, but you aren't convincing anyone with that kind of rhetoric.

 

[Celevin]

Sure, you can do that. We can also do this:

"There is a large amount of people who do like Civ 5; however many of these people like it because they are more geared towards The Sims."

See? Now, I don't actually believe that statement, but it's about as accurate as yours is.

I'm really, really tired of you folks refusing to believe that those Civ fans who are disappointed in the flaws in Civ 5 are disappointed because of Civ 5. I get that it's easier for you to portray your fellow fans as simply stuck in the past and completely resistant to change than to accept that Civ 5 is severely flawed, but you aren't convincing anyone with that kind of rhetoric.

I believe you meant to say "because of Civ4", correct me if I'm wrong. Secondly there is, at the very least, a vocal group of people on these forums who dislike Civ5 because it went in a direction away from Civ4. They've said it clear as day. If it's a large group or a small but vocal group or one person with 15 accounts smurfing, who knows, but it's a group. You're just not in it so you take offense to it.

This reminds me of a joke. Three men are traveling on a train in Scotland: An engineer, a physicist, and a mathematician. They see a black sheep outside the window.
The engineer exclaims "Wow, all the sheep in Scotland are black!"
The physicist corrects him saying "No, all we can say is some of the sheep in Scotland are black."
The mathematician shakes his head, saying "You're also wrong. All we can say is there exists at least one sheep in Scotland, which is at least half black".


(I'll still hold that if Civ5 was just Civ4 with new stuff, we'd have a *different* vocal group complaining that the game wasn't innovative or something else, and they would be loud enough to be seen as a very large group).

 

[Guardian_PL]

I believe you meant to say "because of Civ4", correct me if I'm wrong. Secondly there is, at the very least, a vocal group of people on these forums who dislike Civ5 because it went in a direction away from being a good game towards a shabby half-arsed release, made for a quick buck and DLC milking. They've said it clear as day. If it's a large group or a small but vocal group or one person with 15 accounts smurfing, who knows, but it's a group. You're just not in it so you take offense to it.

This reminds me of a joke. Three men are traveling on a train in Scotland: An engineer, a physicist, and a mathematician. They see a black sheep outside the window.
The engineer exclaims "Wow, all the sheep in Scotland are black!"
The physicist corrects him saying "No, all we can say is some of the sheep in Scotland are black."
The mathematician shakes his head, saying "You're also wrong. All we can say is there exists at least one sheep in Scotland, which is at least half black".


(I'll still hold that if Civ5 was just Civ4 with new stuff, we'd have a *different* vocal group complaining that the game wasn't innovative or something else, and they would be loud enough to be seen as a very large group).

Maybe now you'll get the point. Stop that "oooh it's not a Civ4 haters will hate it" mantra, it's silly.

Civ5 is bad. That's why I don't like it. That's all there is to it. SuperJay meant exactly what he posted.

 

[aziantuntija]

..than to accept that Civ 5 is severely flawed,..

So can you tell me your civ5 flaws?

In the meantime i will tell you my civ4 flaws:

I took this list from another thread where i writed this.

Brainless stack combat smashing, insane unit spam, square tiles combined with lack of ZoC so that enemy has lots of change to slip trough your good defence positions ----> go wait in the city for some unit smashing party, religion wich almost solely determined the diplomatic relations, the suicide siege weapons wich engaged in melee combat against other units, almost meaningless navy (at least much more meaningless than what civ5 has), road spam, missionary spam and executive spam (latter only in BTS), cartoony unit graphics and endless strategic resources.


Neither of us isnt of course right because they are just our own opinions, but still i would like to see what do you answer.

EDIT: Oh i forgot the useless espionage gimmick in Bts, well it wasnt really a flaw because you could just ignore it, so it didnt really bother me too much

 

[SuperJay]

I believe you meant to say "because of Civ4", correct me if I'm wrong.

You're wrong. I said "because of Civ 5" intentionally.

Secondly there is, at the very least, a vocal group of people on these forums who dislike Civ5 because it went in a direction away from Civ4. They've said it clear as day. If it's a large group or a small but vocal group or one person with 15 accounts smurfing, who knows, but it's a group.

Okay, if it's so vocal and large, where is it? Who's in it? Where are all these posts?

I'm not here to convert anyone who loves Civ 5 and ruin their fun. I'm just tired of these same pathetic attempts, over and over, that attempt to dismiss criticism of Civ 5 into "you just wanted Civ 4 version 2." I know I shouldn't be surprised - this is CFC after all, where belittling your fellow fans has become the norm.

 

[Gamemaster77]

Sure, you can do that. We can also do this:

"There is a large amount of people who do like Civ 5; however many of these people like it because they are more geared towards The Sims."

See? Now, I don't actually believe that statement, but it's about as accurate as yours is.

My statement is based on things that are true. Many people clearly don't like the 1UPT even though it works with gameplay. They don't like the features that are distinctly different from Civ4. Provide some comparisons to civ5 and the Sims and then your statements could be as accurate as mine.

 

[aziantuntija]

(I'll still hold that if Civ5 was just Civ4 with new stuff, we'd have a *different* vocal group complaining that the game wasn't innovative or something else, and they would be loud enough to be seen as a very large group).

No, they would not be a very large group. They would be SUPER HYPER INSANELY MOTHER F***ING HUGE GROUP !

 

[Celevin]

Maybe now you'll get the point. Stop that "oooh it's not a Civ4 haters will hate it" mantra, it's silly.

Civ5 is bad. That's why I don't like it. That's all there is to it. SuperJay meant exactly what he posted.

Okay, if it's so vocal and large, where is it? Who's in it? Where are all these posts?

I'm not here to convert anyone who loves Civ 5 and ruin their fun. I'm just tired of these same pathetic attempts, over and over, that attempt to dismiss criticism of Civ 5 into "you just wanted Civ 4 version 2." I know I shouldn't be surprised - this is CFC after all, where belittling your fellow fans has become the norm

Guys, there have been threads titled "I wanted Civ 4.5!" with a lot of people agreeing in them. I'm not going to link every single one. There is a lot of people who wanted Civ5 to be like Civ4. You're purposely being ignorant about this. If you're not part of the group, don't get offended, but you have to acknowledge the group exists.

Secondly, Guardian, "FTFY" posts are the lamest way to get your point across. You don't like Civ5 because you don't like Civ5, I got it and that's fine. It's a better reason than most have given. I disagree with you thinking it's just corporate devils trying to make a quick buck, but that's a different discussion.


This is getting way off topic, and I'm part of the cause. What about them future patches?

 

[timtofly]

According to Gamespot there have been over nine million units sold.

Black Ops:cited

Civ 5: cited It is misleading though. That is the total for the franchise.

 

[Standup]

I'd just like a patch that allows me to play on large maps and beyond and then I could decide if I like it or not.

 

[Jourin]

Somebody asked for facts on the sales figures, so I tried to find some. First some info on Civ IV sales. Some recent advertisements for Civ V are claimng over 9 nine million in sales, but when you read the fine print this is for the entrie Civ series 1-IV. A press release on May 29,2009 indicated that the entire Civ seris I-IV (not including V) now exceeds 9 million in sales. Additionally, the press release from OCT 25, 2005 indicates that upon the release of Civ IV, 6 million copies of I-III where sold. This indicates that about 3 million copies of Civ IV where sold by May 2009. Another press release on Mar 17, 2010 indicates that as MAR 17, 2010 over 9 million copies in the Civ seris (I-IV) where sold - so probably over 3 million copes of Civ IV where sold by then. As of today, Amazon is claiming that over 6 million copes of Civ IV alone have been sold. Over 6 million for Civ IV by it self seems high, but that is what Amazon in claiming

Now Civ V sales: From the 2K WEB site on the source that tracks all sales of Civ V

Civilization V comparative sales including stream
You can observe comparative sales for all media (XBox 360, PS3, PC, etc.) here:

http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly.php?r...onsole=&maker=

Civ V sales
As of SEP 25th: 192,874 in the first week
As of OCT 2nd: 260,486 were sold worldwide (67,612 in 2nd week)
As of OCT 9th no longer in top 30 worldwide but still in top 3O in US
As of OCT 9th: 191,731 (25,919) in US only (#30 worldwide was 40,411)
As of OCT 16th: 210, 818 (19,087)in US only (#30 worldwide was 34,636)
As of OCT 23rd: 235, 171 (24,353)in US only (#30 worldwide was 42,670)

As of OCT 30th - Civ V no longer made the top 30 game sellers in US or WW
OCT 30th #30 - 35,919 (#30 worldwide was 64,794)
NOV 5th #30 - 33,368 (#30 worldwide was 64,386)
NOV 13th #30 - 30,474 (#30 worldwide was 64,784)
NOV 20th #30 - 40,959 (#30 worldwide was 70,116)
NOV 27th #30 - 81,203 (#30 worldwide was 128,484)
DEC 4th #30 - 65,065 (#30 worldwide was 133,807)
DEC 11th #30 - 99,264 (#30 worldwide was 167,859)
DEC 18th #30 - 131,913 (#30 worldwide was 218,726)

If CIV V was consistently just 1 unit below the #30 this puts the max sales at 1.29 million. Using the same logic for US sales indicates a max level of 753,328. Applying the average derived constant of 1.5 as as factor for WW sales indicates a max level of 1.12 million WW

Most likely, CIV V was not a consitent one unit below #30. If we say that US sales is half the #30 WW based on weeks OCT 9-16 (which would still be very good sales) and then apply the 1.5 factor, this just breaks the 1 million sales level WW. If the best case is just breaking 1 million in sales, then in all probability, the magic 1 million mark in sales for Civ V has not yet been reached. Based on the available data, a more likely estimate would be between 750,00-950,000 factoring in a Christmas increase in purchases.

 

[Bill_in_PDX]

Somebody asked for facts on the sales figures, so I tried to find some. First some info on Civ IV sales. Some recent advertisements for Civ V are claimng over 9 nine million in sales, but when you read the fine print this is for the entrie Civ series 1-IV. A press release on May 29,2009 indicated that the entire Civ seris I-IV (not including V) now exceeds 9 million in sales. Additionally, the press release from OCT 25, 2005 indicates that upon the release of Civ IV, 6 million copies of I-III where sold. This indicates that about 3 million copies of Civ IV where sold by May 2009. Another press release on Mar 17, 2010 indicates that as MAR 17, 2010 over 9 million copies in the Civ seris (I-IV) where sold - so probably over 3 million copes of Civ IV where sold by then. As of today, Amazon is claiming that over 6 million copes of Civ IV alone have been sold. Over 6 million for Civ IV by it self seems high, but that is what Amazon in claiming

Now Civ V sales: From the 2K WEB site on the source that tracks all sales of Civ V

Civilization V comparative sales including stream
You can observe comparative sales for all media (XBox 360, PS3, PC, etc.) here:

http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly.php?r...onsole=&maker=

Civ V sales
As of SEP 25th: 192,874 in the first week
As of OCT 2nd: 260,486 were sold worldwide (67,612 in 2nd week)
As of OCT 9th no longer in top 30 worldwide but still in top 3O in US
As of OCT 9th: 191,731 (25,919) in US only (#30 worldwide was 40,411)
As of OCT 16th: 210, 818 (19,087)in US only (#30 worldwide was 34,636)
As of OCT 23rd: 235, 171 (24,353)in US only (#30 worldwide was 42,670)

As of OCT 30th - Civ V no longer made the top 30 game sellers in US or WW
OCT 30th #30 - 35,919 (#30 worldwide was 64,794)
NOV 5th #30 - 33,368 (#30 worldwide was 64,386)
NOV 13th #30 - 30,474 (#30 worldwide was 64,784)
NOV 20th #30 - 40,959 (#30 worldwide was 70,116)
NOV 27th #30 - 81,203 (#30 worldwide was 128,484)
DEC 4th #30 - 65,065 (#30 worldwide was 133,807)
DEC 11th #30 - 99,264 (#30 worldwide was 167,859)
DEC 18th #30 - 131,913 (#30 worldwide was 218,726)

If CIV V was consistently just 1 unit below the #30 this puts the max sales at 1.29 million. Using the same logic for US sales indicates a max level of 753,328. Applying the average derived constant of 1.5 as as factor for WW sales indicates a max level of 1.12 million WW

Most likely, CIV V was not a consitent one unit below #30. If we say that US sales is half the #30 WW based on weeks OCT 9-16 (which would still be very good sales) and then apply the 1.5 factor, this just breaks the 1 million sales level WW. If the best case is just breaking 1 million in sales, then in all probability, the magic 1 million mark in sales for Civ V has not yet been reached. Based on the available data, a more likely estimate would be between 750,00-950,000 factoring in a Christmas increase in purchases.

No matter how you slice it, that is a successful launch in terms of sales. I leave it to others to continue to debate the merit of those sales, but the checks cash for the developers and hopefully that leads to continued support.