News: civ4 features

[Camber]

I'm pretty excited too about the religious aspects of cIV. The Age of Discovery religious aspects were very tantalizing, and I really enjoy playing mods where "Holy Site" resources are required to build religious improvements and units. I'd like to hear more about the "civics" ideas he mentioned. I haven't heard as much about what the possibilities could be there. But more complexity, more realism, is always good.

 

[Chieftess]

Originally posted by kryszcztov
Let's hope some good news later, though, as I said, I'm not in a hurry ; I want some C3C stuff now. And I hope the game will be widely tested for months ; Firaxis should consider extending the beta testing phase, to a point never seen before.

I'll remind myself (and others) to bring 2 gallons of tea/coffee to work everyday.


and to the other post above, C3C was tested by people around the world (mostly Europe).

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

If it were longer than the OLD testament- then I'd be worried

All I can say: hope they learn from SMAC's Civics, (hey they seem to want to)diplomacy, and events (after all a Firaxis game ), and especially its modular upgrade system, TOT's interlinking of maps, CTP1&2s multilayered maps (for real submarine and sea bottom envrironment and skies) and experience levels (i.e. also army alertness levels) - these alltogether are the best features of all other top games in this genre

... just my 2 cents for the Book of Books thanks 4 the info

 

[LzPrst]

events should be part of the game, like in Civ 1. I liked the newspaper clips "New Delhi suffers earthquake, citizens killed".
ah, the good ole days...

 

[Rhye]

CTP sucks. I hope they DON'T learn from their submarine cities . what a stupid thing

 

[Herr_Doktor]

What is that sort of reluctance everyone has when it comes to religion? Let's face it, it has played a huge role in many continents and in almost every country's history. I mean, it's like cause n°1 for 3/4 of European wars in the middle ages up to the XIXth century... forgeting religions would be denying the essence of civ, which is to develop a civ your way, INCLUDING regimes, foreign affairs, cities development...

One nice thing they could do is a displomatic way to convince a civ to wage war to another WITHOUT having your own civ involved... Just for the fun of being the "puppet master" of the world. It could also help to make nice Cold War/colonial wars scenarios...

 

[D. Minky]

Originally posted by LzPrst
events should be part of the game, like in Civ 1. I liked the newspaper clips "New Delhi suffers earthquake, citizens killed".
ah, the good ole days...

YES!!!!! That is one feature I miss so much! Civ3 *sort of* has it... but its just a pop up window. Bleaugh. Those newspapers, city view, palace building, and we love the king parades were silly little things that made the game so much fun, and I think they've suffered the way they've been shunted off to the side in Civ3.

Also, I'd like to see more Civ-specific music, like in Civ1. Civ3 just has a generic track for every Civ. Maybe at least they could have specific music for different ages and cultural groups.

Also, let's hope they take a page from CTP's book with the turn announcements. There's nothing worse in Civ3 than having click OK 100 times just to cycle the turn. A popup list with all the turn events that appears when the turn finishes cycling would be perfect.

 

[Louis XXIV]

I'm not sure I get the "Wack a Mole analogy"

Anyway, the ideas sound interesting. I like how they got rid of some needless complications in Civ3 (Marching fatigue, city support, settler food support, ZoC). But I'm not sure if I like (or even understand) getting rid of corruption and disorder.

 

[kryszcztov]

Originally posted by Chieftess


I'll remind myself (and others) to bring 2 gallons of tea/coffee to work everyday.


and to the other post above, C3C was tested by people around the world (mostly Europe).

Mmmh, looks like we disagree... BTW philosophers don't drink coffee. I know C3C was beta-tested for months, I also read Sullla's review (before it was half-deleted). I think some people made an excellent job in the testing, I also think some other folks didn't do much (some said they didn't), a few months later, and the game is unplayable. I won't hide my thinking : the beta-testing failed. It sure helped to debug stuff, to help the team to make clever choices, but as for making a decent product for sale, it didn't do what it should have done. The blame on whoever had control on the beta-testing... So me thinks a better beta-testing is needed, after a playable version is out, not while it is being finished (and sorry, Sullla's review proved that everything was mad and fast in the testing, I see why those 2 bugs weren't detected).

This post isn't for bashing, I had enough dealing with Civ3's faults. This is to tell Firaxis to do things well, not fast.

 

[rychan]

Originally posted by Aussie_Lurker
Heres hoping that they also introduce the idea of banned resources

rofl, great idea. A drug trade!

 

[warpstorm]

Originally posted by kryszcztov

I think some people made an excellent job in the testing, I also think some other folks didn't do much (some said they didn't), a few months later, and the game is unplayable. I won't hide my thinking : the beta-testing failed.

I wouldn't call the game "unplayable" as I play it nearly every day.

Beta-testing no matter how good does not ensure that bugs will be found or fixed. In particular fixing is totally up to the programmers.

The beta testers were there to see if the game was fun and balanced and occasionally find bugs.

Sullla probably wasn't aware of this, but in addition to the beta testers, there were QA test teams from Firaxis, Breakaway, AQ, and Atari looking at it (these are professional testers whose job it was to find bugs, not players recruited).

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

Originally posted by Rhye
CTP sucks. I hope they DON'T learn from their submarine cities . what a stupid thing

You are right about the underwater cities (or the space ones ) but they should put some resources at the bottom of the sea (oil for instance ) and the layered maps were really cool, allowing to really go two floors down with your subs (but you could only use your missiles in the middle layer) whaere the chance of getting discovered was much greater than at the bottom (CTP one was- well- unfortunate, to say the least, but it featured some brilliant ideas that reemerged in CTP2)

 

[mazzz]

I would like to see civ4 with faster turns on huge maps, more diplo agrrements, and please fix the if you conquer i civ you signed an allince aganist you get a rep hit bug!
the rep hits should be changed. it should be able to be forgiven and rejoin the rest of the world in trading after sometime. If your trading with someone one who attacks your MPP partner it should not be a rep hit for you if you automaticly declare war

 

[Turner]

Originally posted by Louis XXIV
I'm not sure I get the "Wack a Mole analogy"

Anyway, the ideas sound interesting. I like how they got rid of some needless complications in Civ3 (Marching fatigue, city support, settler food support, ZoC). But I'm not sure if I like (or even understand) getting rid of corruption and disorder.

Whack-A-Mole is an arcade game, usually a redemption game (where you get tickets for prizes based on score) that has a 3x2 grid, and a hole in each section. A motorized mole pops out, and you need to whack it with your mallet to score points.

Pollution pops up, and like a mallet decending on the popped-up mole, workers converge on it as soon as possible to clear it. Although you don't get points for clearing pollution, but you do fix the cities so production/commerce/food doesn't go down.

I'd also like to see some kind of message log, where you can view the pop-up messages that scroll by to quick. First SGL I got, I didn't know where it came from because I was looking away when it popped up.

 

[mazzz]

pollution should not take up tiles, but should have an antihappyness affect, maybe a gold/shield per turn cost

 

[Metacomet]

Hi,

Firaxis people please think in the Events and we really need real diplomatic options (locked peace, locked war in alliance and alone, and a milion more things......)

 

[Louis XXIV]

Originally posted by Turner_727


Pollution pops up, and like a mallet decending on the popped-up mole, workers converge on it as soon as possible to clear it. Although you don't get points for clearing pollution, but you do fix the cities so production/commerce/food doesn't go down.

Ah, I see now.

I never really thought about it before, I guess I took it for granted about pollution (although I can't think of one instance in real life where pollution worked like that ).

 

[Turner]

Oil spills?

 

[das]

Excuse my ignorance but what is civics in this case? Any ideas?

Oh, and speaking of culture flips, I think that there should be special revolter units for that, that will "attack" the troops inside the city from inside, nullifying the effect of walls. I mean, a modern armor division COULD have a chance of fighting off a bunch of resistors. And good to see there will be a religion. I think it will be alittle like governments. It will also probably mean that BC/AD thing will have a certain point... or that it will lose whatever point it had if religion will depend on scientific research.

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

Civics should be (as far as I understand it) teaching schools of governemnt; in SMAC there was a possibility of customizing ones Government form (and your allies would take even their diplomatic stance towards your empire according to your choices- religious civs would warn you repeatedly if you are atheist- and even break alliances or declare war if you ignore their pleads for too long (according to your relative power).

I.e.
A1) Industrious A2) Leisurelike A3) Environmentalist
B1) Religious B2) Tolerant B3) Atheist