Negative review from write at Uni Of Chicago

I only have one disk...:confused:
but that's really a lame 'review'
 
Uh, the writer's male, right? It says 'by Brian White' at the top, but maybe I'm missing something...?

I didn't like the way he presented his argument overall. It seemed too much like he let his technical problems with the game rule out any fun he may have been having, and while I know firsthand just how much technical problems can suck the fun out of any otherwise great gaming experience, his description of the gameplay being "just like civ3's" was pretty obviously biased. If you don't like the game because of lots of technical problems, that's cool (they obviously do exist for many people), but don't trash the gameplay because of it.
 
This guy (or gal) seems more like a back alley critic by the nature of the righting. (For instance "Spilling Fun-yuns")

I can see what they are talking about on some issues. But civics/GP are a great addition. Sounds to me this person just doesnt know how to utilize these to maximum potential. I have found it isnt too hard to not only make, but utilize GP. I have even been getting better at ways to make sure my next one is a artist/merchant/prophet, etc.
I am happy to see some negative views out there as well. As I am a person suffering from the technical issues also. However, it should be held seperate from what the game has to offer. Even through my colorblind terrain, invisible resources, and slow ass speed I can see the game is a great improvement.
I agree anyone that doesn't own a Civ game would be better off getting C3 gold than 4. (Based off odds of the ability to play on day 1) Especially, if they dont have a hog of a machine. Though, this review was bias to the frustrations of the reviewer. It seems they typed up that review right after going through all their problems, thus at the peak of their frustrations.
 
The first half was true to me. The second half of his review trailed from my preception of the game. Atleast he didn't get his tech chart in french.
 
:lol: I love the way religion is slighted......If used "correctly" religion in -game is a MAJOR asset..... I have had AI civs fighting religious wars for me many times.

point dismissed (inadequate imagination)

As regards the slight improvement over civ III....Ummmm its a sequel. Of course its going to be similar. I bought it expecting CIV not simearth..didn't he?

The technical difficulties...a given the game does have its troubles...

With regards to saving $20 and buy civ 3 instead..well I hope no one does,because they would be worse off for it.

Nicely written drivel overall though;)
 
Only negative people will look for negative reviews.
 
I'm not sure what's worse, being called a moron for giving an honest opinion of a game or a guy calling him a moron because he dared to disagree with the general consesus. Is it really that threatning to the fan boys to have someone think the game is bad?

I see a lot of reviews similiar to this one if you can call it that and in a lot of ways I find them to be far more honest if not less intuitive then most of the "official reviews". This guy didn't give you a review so much as he gave you his experiance and personal opinion of a game. It's obvious to me he's a purist that would happily play Civilization I because for him it's about the experiance and not the glitch or hype. I bet he never read any other reviews of the game, just tried playing it and formed an opinion. I challenge anyone to point out a single review from an official magazine that keeps it that simple.

I read it three times to make sure, but as far as I could tell, everything that he said in his review was 100% accurate. The disk were mislabeled, he obviously had technical problems (very common for Civ 4) and he didn't care for the many changes that have been so glorified by other reviews, all of which were described accuratly. You might not agree with him, but he gave his opinion and he didn't BS you. More importantly however it's worth noting that he didn't have any advertisment banners for PC games of any kind on his website. Name any of the high end reviews that can say that.

Is an honest opinion a problem for anyone?
 
Dairuka said:
Only negative people will look for negative reviews.
Click to expand...

Actually only people looking to buy the game would. And realistic people that know there is no game out there unflawed. Negative reviews are a fact of life. No game can please everyone.
 
You people don't know poop about real technical problems within the first month of a games release.

You should have been around for Battlefield 2's release; or Shadowbane's release; or Anarchy Online's release; or World of Warcraft's release. Oh god... Or that horrible Daikatana... *Shudder*

John Romero; why have you forsaken us! WHYYYYY!!!!

A little tweaking, and a slight inconvenience followed with some mild crashing is nothing in comparison to paying $20 a month for World of Warcraft, and not being able to log into the same server your friends are playing on, because it's full; Then if you do happen to get on through a fluke, you'd happen to fall through the ground, getting stuck for two weeks, only listening to pithy quotes from Blizzard Representatives stating, "Try rebooting your computer. We'll move you out when you get back."

You think Firaxis is bad? You haven't seen nothing yet. Try borrowing your friend's copy of Port Royal 2.
 
I agree with xguild.. About the 'moron' review, really its just a matter of opinion. What he desliked, i actually liked (except religion; i expected it to be much different, not so irrelevant.. it dosent matter if you go for buddism or islamic religion, in game terms they are the same thing... and i wanted to play with the nordic religion!).
 
To add on to what Daikura said, you could always try to install the unpatched version of Pool of Radiance 2 :shudder:
 
OK, first off those are online games. Which needs constant patching anyways. As a whole 3D world is implemented. You compare the technical issues of TBS CIV4 to WoW or AO?
I was around on the release of AOE2. That was the worst release I had seen until now. I was lucky to have mine work on the first day. Didn't even know other people had problems until about day 3.

Besides, just because other games have a piss poor release doesn't mean anything less just falls into an acceptable margin set by the crappy game. To me the game with good releases sets a margin of quality we gamers should accept from future games.
I think it is obvious this release is poor. When I see my "Install Disc" I think of people with dollar signs in their eyes frantically slapping stickers on CDs packing CIV 4 boxes in a mad blur. Not taking time to notice the shipment going to France has English manuals and vice versa. And this doesn't even include anything about bugs. This is simple packaging.

20% of all buyers suffering technical issues and getting no information from the company 3 weeks after the release is a poor release. Maybe I am a crazy guy with high standards though. I should really get on track and go buy a Take 2 T-shirt tonight. Hopefully the next game can come out 2 times as fast and 40% will be screwed for their cash.

EDIT: Before anyone disects my post, the main point stressed here is "Just because there has been a worse release than this one for some people, doesnt mean this release is acceptable. Take 2 doesnt get to get off the hook because EA did a crappier job on 'such-and-such' game"
 
Moderator Action: People are entitled to their opinions - kindly don't make ad hominem attacks on him - focus on his review

That said, I'd suggest that a lot of his problem is that he simply hasn't played enough. 3 religions in one city? Suggests to me it was a game a very easy level. Concentrating on religions and getting caned by a civ with pikes? This suggests that the military was completely neglected - a sign that the play was out-of-balance - but that's the fault of the player rather than the game - its a startegy game, remember.
 
Heh, I had no problems with WoW when it went live, except maybe the log-in server crashing. I played in beta though, so guess I was use to some of the bugs and I avoided the evening rush.

Civ4 is a different story though, I spent 3 days tweaking and fixxing things with the software to get it to run smoothly. Even BF2 ran ok on my machine when first released. It is hard not to let the technical things take away from the game and bring the overall mood of the review down. It could have been much worse if he had more of the serious technical issue with the game.

Almost comical how someones experience with technical issues can sway their opinion of the gameplay a lot, understandable being frustrated with the game; but it is crazy how it can fog the mind so much on the gameplay. I had less technical problems with BF2, WoW, EQ2, CoD2 and AoE3 combined than I had with Civ4 by itself; even after the problems I think the gameplay in Civ4 is pretty solid. Pretty funny hearing people say it is my hardware when I have been running much more demanding games than civ is supposed to be. Civ4 resources management is a mess and the persons responsible with the engine should have to get lunch for the office the next 5 years.
 
Civilization 4 is technically an online game now as well, it was built from the ground up to be a multiplayered online game; one could compare it to Halo 2 in that aspect. Which is why I compared it mostly to online games.

However, there are other single playered games which were equally as horrible during release. Some never even recovered.

Port Royal 2, D&D Darksun, Superpower 2, Exile - great games that never recovered.

Daggerfall, Baldur's Gate 2, Gothic 1, Gothic 2, All extremely exceptional games which are still horrifically plagued with bugs today; yet... they're classics because people are willing to overlook the bugs, because the meat and potatos are too juicy to pass up.

You want a game without bugs in the first week? Go buy Tropico, which is pretty much a, 'build your own island' simulation, with the same fun factor as a home designing software kit.
 
ainwood said:
That said, I'd suggest that a lot of his problem is that he simply hasn't played enough.
Click to expand...

Yes, but you have to admit that most, of not all, of the official reviewers (i.e., those on the front pages) don't have much clue either. The difference is they just took what Firaxis told them and wrote them in their reviews. Just read those reviews, how similar they are like!
 
Dairuka said:
You want a game without bugs in the first week? Go buy Tropico, which is pretty much a, 'build your own island' simulation, with the same fun factor as a home designing software kit.
Click to expand...

What I mean by the comparison to WoW and AO, is that those games are far more dependant on constant updating than CIV 4 is.

Second, I didn't even know Port Royale had a part 2. I take it 1 was better.

I have had Tropico for a while now. Would be such a great game if you could have the workers level the ground without having to build something on it to do so. I usually build rows of small fountains to level the ground for roads. Other than that, I love that game. Now that game has a great soundtrack.
"Your people, they suffer for lack of medical treatment Presidente.":D

As for the reviews, I havent looked for any myself. I blindly bought into the Civ 4 hype and my own passion for the series. Already owning the game now, there is no point to go see what CGM said about it. Probably said "Sid Does it again" or something like that I figure. My personal review can be summed up to 1 statement.

"I wont be pre-ordering anymore Take 2 games."
 
Only negative people will look for negative reviews.
Click to expand...
great, any industry will love you since for you everything will be rosy. There will be never any 'bad' product, heavenly.

I am looking for realistic reviews and not just some fanboi statements that all those commercial reviews showed us.
 
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