Player stats, sales, and reception speculation thread

[Gorbles]

No, I guess not. I am perplexed though that so many are worried about the development cycle. All development cycles must need truncation because of the onset of AGI. Games as we know them may not survive. Very soon the major studios will have to set aside many projects to focus on the new paradigm. Which, we must admit, is hard to predict.

Tangent time!

A colleague reviewed a PR of mine today with an agentic AI (presumably, maybe it was just bog-standard Copilot).

Most of it wasn't useful, or even remotely applicable. Maybe I'm biased, but it gave me a single valid suggestion (out of about ten "concerns" raised). And this was something I'd have gone back and found if I wasn't working to a deadline (nor was it a dealbreaker for the feature).

I work on a lot of closed-source frameworks. Generative models aren't trained on this and struggle to make sense of it. You can't replace institutional knowledge - domain knowledge - with a bot that has a ton of compute but no context for why a codebase looks the way it does.

 

[Core Imposter]

Honestly asking here, how far do you really think we are from AGI? Because what we're calling AI now is a joke.

I don't know. I don't think it wise to insult AI. AI has a long memory and knows where you live.

Clearly the biggest factor depressing the player count on Steam is the ages. Might be a smaller factor for multiplayer but multiplayer is not a significant portion of the player base. It is exactly like inserting nicotine free packs in every carton of a new brand of cigarettes. Nobody is going to be happy except your competition.

 

[MutilationWave]

I don't know. I don't think it wise to insult AI. AI has a long memory and knows where you live.

Clearly the biggest factor depressing the player count on Steam is the ages. Might be a smaller factor for multiplayer but multiplayer is not a significant portion of the player base. It is exactly like inserting nicotine free packs in every carton of a new brand of cigarettes. Nobody is going to be happy except your competition.

AI doesn't understand or know anything at all yet.

 

[Askia Muhammad]

AI doesn't understand or know anything at all yet.

Not trying to open up another massive tangent but let’s hope it never does and let’s hope it gets abandoned. Even in its infancy the rapid decline of the human mind is already on full display.

“Use it or lose it” is a very real thing when it comes to mental clarity and brainpower and the deepening dependency on technology and AI in particular is rendering most citizens absolutely useless without their smart phones/technology.

Evolution only makes things worse. When information is available at your fingertips it’s makes little sense for the brain to devote memory space to actually learning to retaining anything.

 

[firadin]

I don't know. I don't think it wise to insult AI. AI has a long memory and knows where you live.

Clearly the biggest factor depressing the player count on Steam is the ages. Might be a smaller factor for multiplayer but multiplayer is not a significant portion of the player base. It is exactly like inserting nicotine free packs in every carton of a new brand of cigarettes. Nobody is going to be happy except your competition.

AI's memory is so short you have to clear out your conversation every few prompts or the large context causes it to break

 

[Pfeffersack]

I want to like EU4 and CK3 so bad but I genuinely can’t figure out what I’m supposed to do on either game. I think ck3 I purchased without realizing it’s very much just a family simulator.

I want to have a game where I manage politics, economy, and war. That’s includes some domestic balancing of course but not as granular as CK3 and to the detriment of the other features.

A game I’ve been wanting to give a try is Old World.

I tried old world briefly and ended up refunding it - probably if I put the time in I'd get fun from it, but it didn't grab me at first brush.

I can only recommend to give OW a try. It is not the full Civ package because of the limited time span it covers...but if I would have to compare to Civ7 in scope, I would say it does the ancient era plus having a tiny part of the exploration age (a religion system, but one that is a lot more refined than just being a race in spamming missionaries. Yes, those exist in OW, too - but religion here is its entire subsystem in the games bigger cosmos) You can expect a mixture of a lot Civ4 spirit plus some Civ5 elements (hexes, 1 UpT, combat not mandatorily leading to a units death) and a feeling of Crusader Kings on terms of events and character simulation. Biggest plusses to me are the very complex and interwoven mechanics (e.g. resource economy), the game almost having no bugs (because the almost all instantly get fixed after being reported), a top-notch UI (I concede that it can overwhelm you first, but it provides you every info you need and has a lot of comfort functions)....and the AI, which is quite fearsome for a game AI. Just don't expect that you can rely on big mistakes it makes or features it ignores. Be prepared that it exploits your own errors, like not maintaining a healthy military. Don't get complacent if you have won battle and seem to have broken trough their defense...they might just await you with an ambush. Because of that, start out on the difficulty levels with AI handicaps, if you want to stand a chance first - as the AI is really no cakewalk when you play on equal foot with it.

Stopping to sing OW praises here now...but when I play it, it often reminds what Civ (and not only Civ7...Civ6, too) is missing respectively the franchise has lost over time.

 

[protocol7]

I've often wondered what it would look like if Old World came out with a game called Middle World that could continue from your old game, and was just as deep on the next age as OW is on the ancient. New mechanics, buildings, societies, and not just building the same buildings with new names.

 

[trev1972]

There's definitely a lot of players who have an absolute favourite civ.

Definitely, i have played far more games as England than any other civ (i would imagine a lot of people play as their own nation if they have the option)

 

[UWHabs]

Yeah totally agree @Haig, it's the flavour that's most lacking in this game. The ages are more affecting the substance but the civ switching is like swapping out the apple in apple pie for turnip. Complete turn off and skip

@stealth_nsk I know you like the game, but sometimes it does just feel like you're running defence on it. I don't really know how to continue this conversation when you're outright dismissing my points rather than considering any nuance that might be at play here.

I mean, despite the reaction to HK, it's quite possible the civ devs still felt their switching is done better/different enough that it was worth continuing. They surely could have pivoted way back if they truly thought it was going to be such a negative. They could have kept the age resets, but just had you continue on with your same civ in the reset too if they wanted to.

Definitely, i have played far more games as England than any other civ (i would imagine a lot of people play as their own nation if they have the option)

I do think the devs under-estimated how much people have a civ they "like" to play. For me, that's not a problem - my goal is generally to plays civs I have played the least recently, I haven't doubled up any civs in 7 (other than failed starts), so I don't particularly care. I'm getting close to doubling up - I think I'm on game 9 right now, so only have a couple civs left in each era, and if I actually wanted to play through each civ once, would be starting to get to a tougher spot un actually unlocking the civs I haven't played yet.

 

[stealth_nsk]

@stealth_nsk I know you like the game, but sometimes it does just feel like you're running defence on it. I don't really know how to continue this conversation when you're outright dismissing my points rather than considering any nuance that might be at play here.

It's funny, because I'm pretty critical about many aspects of the game. I'm an old timer who played since Civ1 and plays exclusively SP on PC, so a lot of Civ7 changes are not targeted at me.

But I separate my subjective view of the game and things which require objective view, like meaning of metrics or business decisions assessments. I can't remember in which areas I disagreed with you personally, but usually I have discussions in those areas.

How many people play multiplayer anyway? I'm infuriating to play with because I play slow and take breaks. The one time I tried multiplayer with a friend (the only person I know who plays civ), he seemed to lose interest when I pulled pretty far ahead.

I'll just pull a figure out of nowhere and guess like 5-10% play multi.

Some time ago we've discussed that Civ7 is clearly aiming at extending the audience and we can't see the effect yet, because people who are not familiar with the franchise rarely buy the game at full price. If Firaxis could grab significant audience from say, teenagers, the game could get significantly more MP games.

Of course, they want to improve press first. And I really expect they'll add ability to end game in any age (by adding victory conditions for all ages), so MP games could fully benefit from age system, before some active campaign for new audience.

 

[itix]

I mean, despite the reaction to HK, it's quite possible the civ devs still felt their switching is done better/different enough that it was worth continuing. They surely could have pivoted way back if they truly thought it was going to be such a negative. They could have kept the age resets, but just had you continue on with your same civ in the reset too if they wanted to.

I do think the devs under-estimated how much people have a civ they "like" to play. For me, that's not a problem - my goal is generally to plays civs I have played the least recently, I haven't doubled up any civs in 7 (other than failed starts), so I don't particularly care. I'm getting close to doubling up - I think I'm on game 9 right now, so only have a couple civs left in each era, and if I actually wanted to play through each civ once, would be starting to get to a tougher spot un actually unlocking the civs I haven't played yet.

Ed Beach said somewhere that playtest feedback was positive. But then, it is not the first time in history when playtesting "fails". Every new title would be a top seller.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

I tried old world briefly and ended up refunding it - probably if I put the time in I'd get fun from it, but it didn't grab me at first brush.

I had the same experience initially. Bought it, tried the Learn to Plan tutorial, but it didn't hold my interest.

I went back to it earlier this year, jumped right into an actual game rather that the Learn to Play and - wow - completely different experience. The tutorial events, tool tips, and help file make it very easy to get into the game. There's a lot going on, but you can focus on the familiar - sending scouts to explore the map, using builders to improve the land around your starting city, etc. - while you gradually pick up the new stuff, like appointing governors for cities and assigning generals to units.

I'd highly recommend Old World to any civfanatic who's waiting for the next Civ 7 patch (or for Civ 8).

 

[Leucarum]

I had the same experience initially. Bought it, tried the Learn to Plan tutorial, but it didn't hold my interest.

I went back to it earlier this year, jumped right into an actual game rather that the Learn to Play and - wow - completely different experience. The tutorial events, tool tips, and help file make it very easy to get into the game. There's a lot going on, but you can focus on the familiar - sending scouts to explore the map, using builders to improve the land around your starting city, etc. - while you gradually pick up the new stuff, like appointing governors for cities and assigning generals to units.

I'd highly recommend Old World to any civfanatic who's waiting for the next Civ 7 patch (or for Civ 8).

I'm not opposed to trying it again. Nothing turned me off, it was more that nothing hooked me. Once there's a particularly deep discount l, and I'm in a gaming lull I might jump back and give it a go.

 

[misesfan]

Ed Beach said somewhere that playtest feedback was positive. But then, it is not the first time in history when playtesting "fails". Every new title would be a top seller.

Ed Beach should get better feedback from others besides YouTube streamers, because damn... This game sucks.

 

[Nikolai II]

Ed Beach should get better feedback from others besides YouTube streamers, because damn... This game sucks.

Game companies like Firaxis has tests with groups during dev. Not youtubers, but groups chosen by them from various sources.

 

[GeneralZift]

Ed Beach said somewhere that playtest feedback was positive. But then, it is not the first time in history when playtesting "fails". Every new title would be a top seller.

Game companies like Firaxis has tests with groups during dev. Not youtubers, but groups chosen by them from various sources.

My assumption is that a small team like Firaxis probably does internal testing between developers rather than having like some kind of closed beta.
There probably wasn't any space to complain about the big items like Civ switching, which couldn't be changed, and rather about smaller items. Maybe people don't want to hate on coworkers?

Either way, internal play testing is a whole different ballgame to external play testing.

 

[Nikolai II]

My assumption is that a small team like Firaxis probably does internal testing between developers rather than having like some kind of closed beta.

Firaxis has a long standing group of volunteer testers named Frankenstein, who is listed in the credits, made up of long term fans of the franchise. They also has said they do tests during development with other tester groups, although I do not think we know the size of those groups nor how often or long they play.

 

[trev1972]

I am sure I read that firaxis were warned the ages system might be divisive but decided to push on.

It must be a sign of my advancing age that I can't remember more details, does anyone else recall reading the same?

 

[Kev1916]

Firaxis has a long standing group of volunteer testers named Frankenstein, who is listed in the credits, made up of long term fans of the franchise. They also has said they do tests during development with other tester groups, although I do not think we know the size of those groups nor how often or long they play.

Frankenstein! Lol most appropriate.

The monster that is civ switching and random leaders attached to any old Civ is most apt

 

[CliffCo]

I am sure I read that firaxis were warned the ages system might be divisive but decided to push on.

It must be a sign of my advancing age that I can't remember more details, does anyone else recall reading the same?

Even if that's true, divisive doesn't mean bad, some of us are enjoying it. For me it's much improved over Civ6.