open letter to firaxis: come back to alpha centauri approach

[Tavenier]

Please bring back puppet-nations. Totally unrealistic for a country to still say things like: Accept this peace or my armies will crush your pathetic civilization! While you have conquered 8 of their 10 cities and have a stack of doom in front of their last two!

 

[TLHeart]

Terrafroming is going on world wide this very day...Huge pits are dug, mountains are leveled, islands have been leveled, see has been filled in it Japan and Hong kong to build cities and airports....

Terra forming is NOT a SciFi concept, but a concept being implemented every day around you. New Orleans would not exist expect for terra forming.

China is building the worlds largest dam to terra form 3 gorges into a huge lake. The Z axis added depth to the game that would be so cool with the 3D engine now being used.

To say that the personalities of the leaders were easier to fit into SMAC than Civ IV is pure bull. There are more personalities in CIV, and many more options, but they in no way follow history once the game begins. This is a great platform to develope the differing personalities of the leaders.

 

[InFlux5]

[The] personalities in CIV [...] in no way follow history once the game begins.

I couldn't disagree more. The "personalities" in Civ IV are the best of any Civ. If I had a complaint it would be that they are too predictable. In previous versions they were much more random and definitely did not follow history.

 

[Tavenier]

Terrafroming is going on world wide this very day...Huge pits are dug, mountains are leveled, islands have been leveled, see has been filled in it Japan and Hong kong to build cities and airports....

Terra forming is NOT a SciFi concept, but a concept being implemented every day around you. New Orleans would not exist expect for terra forming.

China is building the worlds largest dam to terra form 3 gorges into a huge lake. The Z axis added depth to the game that would be so cool with the 3D engine now being used.

To say that the personalities of the leaders were easier to fit into SMAC than Civ IV is pure bull. There are more personalities in CIV, and many more options, but they in no way follow history once the game begins. This is a great platform to develope the differing personalities of the leaders.

Well, in every Civ leaders were leaders of a country or people. In SMAC they are leaders of a ideology or way of life. And in SMAC developers could make up personality while in Civ they need to follow history. Because lack of good sources about leaders like Genghis or Cyrus they made up stereotype conquerers. It is easier to add personality to a religious freak like Marian or to an iron lady of the Spartan faction.

 

[EscapedGoat]

Sid Meyers Alpha Centauri(SMAC) is simply the best CIV-based game yet.

Terraforming: You are playing WITH the map, not ON it. Different rainfall on different sides of hills etc. Alterable height of land. Great stuff. A wealth of terraforming options, and the possibilty of stacking improvements on the same tile. This is the most fun with the game for me, the immersion into the map.

Social Engineering: The Civics system in CIV 4 is a dumbed down version of the Social Engineering from SMAC.

Real 3D: Civ 4 could just as well be a 2D game, there is nothing to justify 3 dimensions. SMAC actually uses 3 dimensions.

Unit workshop: Some hate it, I like it! If you want a hard hitter, you can make it. If you want a hard hitter and a good defender in one, you can, but you will have to pay for it.

Great intelligent story and atmosphere: This is the best part of the game. The story of SMAC is simply great. Everything from the personalities of the leaders to the innovative techs is great. Wonder movies are great. There is a great and intelligent use of quotes, some Nietzsche quotes comes to mind. The music is also great, a good sci-fi feel. Even some of the things the leaders say are actually quotable as somewhat philosophical insights, Yang for example.

Okay, I am going to go play SMAC now. See ya!

 

[MrCynical]

Terrafroming is going on world wide this very day...Huge pits are dug, mountains are leveled, islands have been leveled, see has been filled in it Japan and Hong kong to build cities and airports....

Terra forming is NOT a SciFi concept, but a concept being implemented every day around you. New Orleans would not exist expect for terra forming

But nothing on the scale of what was possible in SMAC. It was trivially easy in SMAC to sink entire continents beneath the sea and raise new ones elsewhere. Are you seriously claiming this isn't sci-fi? In Civ terms the land reclamation and dams you refer to might have altered one or two tiles across the entire map over the course of centuries. In SMAC a hundred times this could be done in a single turn. It was ridiculously unbalanced and made the actual map of limited relevance.

To say that the personalities of the leaders were easier to fit into SMAC than Civ IV is pure bull. There are more personalities in CIV, and many more options, but they in no way follow history once the game begins. This is a great platform to develope the differing personalities of the leaders.

The personalities of SMAC are all highly biased towards one particular aspect of the game. Very few historical figures have been that one sided, and while Civ may not stick to history accurately it would look very strange to suddenly find that Montezuma was an Ecologist or Washington had tuned into a one sided financial character like Morgan was in SMAC. In any case many of the leaders in Civ 4 do have good personalities, and I have just as much of a dislike for Isabella and Montezuma as I did for Sister whoeveritwas of the Believers. The Civ 4 personalities just aren't as clearly biased towards a single approach (cash, ecology, diplomacy etc.)

 

[TLHeart]

So your Saying that Julius is not biased towards war? Or the Japanese leader and Chairman yang, being isolationists and build a huge military?

Yes the Leaders of CIV start with personality traits that the AI uses, and with 18 leaders present, instead of 8, there is more subtlty with the leaders, but in no way do the leaders follow history once the game begins.

Also with the change from picking your country first, to picking your leader and their traits first, Civ is moving away from the country idea, and towards the SMAC idea of factions aligned along ideological lines.

Terra forming is a fact, and huge projects are being completed yearly now. No we have not built entire continents on earth yet. By the time we reach actual space travel, changing whole areas of a world will be possible.

Go and look at the changes being made around Dubia. Entire islands are being built out of the sea, in the form of palm trees. OUr hard spent oil dollars at work!

 

[MrCynical]

So your Saying that Julius is not biased towards war? Or the Japanese leader and Chairman yang, being isolationists and build a huge military?

No, Julius is biased towards war and Tokuwaga is isolationist. However there are only so many different styles in the way you play the game, and so the 26 Civ 4 leaders are less distinct and memorable than the 8 SMAC leaders. Nonetheless, as I've said, I already have a dislike for some of them. I don't think they're that far behind SMAC's in terms of personality, I'm just saying it's a lot harder with more leaders. You'll tend to get some with very similar personalities (Genghis and Julius for instance).

As to terraforming, some of these are just starting to be visible from space, but the only one that would be visible on a Civ map is the Netherlands (which has taken centuries). I've read about the work at Dubai, as well as various other land reclamation projects around the world, but do you realise how tiny they are compared to the size of the planet? Speculation on modifying entire continents is still just as much in the realms of sci fi as interstellar travel. We have a few nice theories, but nothing that could be done in any practical length of time. Frankly, given the level of technology presented in SMAC, the vast terraforming possibilities don't make much sense there either. More to the point I felt it was very detrimental to the gameplay, which is why I certainly don't want to see anything like it in Civ.

 

[Tavenier]

I love(d) SMAC, but I hated the terraforming. There are just some things while building your empire that you must be able to rely on. In Civ3 I hated that I didn't had iron, then started a very bloody war with inferior units just to get that iron source. Then capturing it, making peace and 20 turns later the resource was depleted. I am so glad they removed that from Civ4. In SMAC I hated it that a piece of land was suddenly gone just because some terraformer completed an action close to your border. Never liked it.
I also hated water-cities, endless cities with only 2 or 3 pop all around the ocean. I always left the Pirate-faction out.

The rest of SMAC was great and memorable. I also liked the workshop. And for those he did not liked that, you didn't need to use it. It was an option, you could also go with the standard units. I loved it and often made some cheap fast units and some monstrous supertanks. Named them after cities I founded and so forth. Very great game, loved it. I would easily pay more then 100 Euro's for SMAC2!

 

[enchanter100]

Wonder movies, changes in maps, workshop, UN voting, Planetbuster.. Plus there seems to be a lot more techs in that game then in any civ. SMAC is on my computer and I play it often, forever wishing for SMAC 2..

 

[Tavenier]

Wonder movies, changes in maps, workshop, UN voting, Planetbuster.. Plus there seems to be a lot more techs in that game then in any civ. SMAC is on my computer and I play it often, forever wishing for SMAC 2..

I lost my copy of Alien Crossfire. I lend it to someone I never see anymore. It's a pity you can't buy it anywhere anymore....

 

[Sgt Grimes]

I lost my copy of Alien Crossfire. I lend it to someone I never see anymore. It's a pity you can't buy it anywhere anymore....

You can sometimes find it on eBay.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ALPHA-CENTUARI-WITH-ALIEN-CROSSFIRE_W0QQitemZ8255703575QQcategoryZ11053QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

[offworld]

As to terraforming, some of these are just starting to be visible from space, but the only one that would be visible on a Civ map is the Netherlands (which has taken centuries).

Centuries? Not at all. The largest reclamations in the former Zuyder Sea were finished in less than a decade.

 

[MrCynical]

I was referring to the Zuider Zee works in their entirety as well as early dykes, rather than any individual polder, which I think has been going on for nearly a century, but point taken. They are still a far cry from the sinking and raising of continents though, since the Zuider Zee is only around 4 to 5 metres deep on average. The terraforming I objected to in SMAC was the sinking and raising of continents more on the scale of Africa than the Netherlands.

Wonder movies, changes in maps, workshop, UN voting, Planetbuster.. Plus there seems to be a lot more techs in that game then in any civ. SMAC is on my computer and I play it often, forever wishing for SMAC 2..

While I agree with the wonder movies and UN votes, and to a lesser extent plantebusters I really don't want to see the design workshop returned. It was horrible even in SMAC, since every unit became generic. It feels far more impressive to build my first musketman than my first "Shard silksteel fission cruiser" or whatever. It was also an annoying layer of micromanagement that the AI was utterly incompetant at. As for having it as an option, I believe it took a lot of time making all the interchangeable graphics, and I think the time would be better spent on more or less anything else. I don't think there were actually more techs in Alpha Centauri. As I recall there were about 16 in each line, so somewhere between 60 and 70. I think both Civ 3 and 4 have around 80 techs.

As for changing maps I think I've made my opinion clear on this.

 

[Schneids]

Alpha Centauri was and still may be the best of all Civ games. Civ4 totally needs the diplomacy options and U.N. options that A.C. had. The unit design and fabrication abilities of A.C. are solely missed. It would be nice to have workers in Civ4 be able to terraform as in A.C. Being able to join landmasses or cut off another civilization was a great option to have as well as seabases.

 

[The Last Conformist]

Centuries? Not at all. The largest reclamations in the former Zuyder Sea were finished in less than a decade.

In SMAC, a single planetbuster could dig a whole thousands of meters deep and thousands of kilometers wide. You could ruin your neighbours' agriculture by raising a mountain range to trap the rains. People would build plateaux the size of Tibet just to get more power from their solar generators.