Player stats, sales, and reception speculation thread

[queenpea]

Curious to what extent Steam reviews play a role in everyone's game-buying decisions? If it's a game/series I love, I find I look for at least Mostly Positive to take the plunge and make a purchase. Also, I realize the mostly negative is just for recent reviews - but what with the trend of going down around 1% a month, in a few years, it could very well be mostly negative overall.

I mean, it certainly won’t help things. How could it? I am willing to try out new games if I’ve read a good review or two/or the game has been suggested by a friend, etc. However, if the Steam reviews are negative I am much less likely to buy the game (at full price anyway).

 

[Leucarum]

It makes me hesitant, but I've enjoyed a lot of games that got mixed or negative reviews - e.g. Civ7, Veilguard, Victoria 3 - so maybe I'm an outlier? Or a harbinger of a game's eventual failure?

 

[itix]

Curious to what extent Steam reviews play a role in everyone's game-buying decisions? If it's a game/series I love, I find I look for at least Mostly Positive to take the plunge and make a purchase. Also, I realize the mostly negative is just for recent reviews - but what with the trend of going down around 1% a month, in a few years, it could very well be mostly negative overall.

I'd like to try Cities: Skylines 2, but with a 53% user rating, I am hesitant. It does not look bad when reading negative reviews, but I have other games to play. Maybe later, and I have been pushing it away for nearly a year now.

 

[MutilationWave]

I'd like to try Cities: Skylines 2, but with a 53% user rating, I am hesitant. It does not look bad when reading negative reviews, but I have other games to play. Maybe later, and I have been pushing it away for nearly a year now.

I was a big Simcity fan from the first one on DOS up until that disaster they last released. I tried to give Cities a go but I couldn't get into it. I've heard terrible things about the sequel.

 

[canadamufc]

Reading on Reddit and such, it seems like the most common criticism of Civ 7 has changed. It used to be the UI, but now it seems like the vast majority of the hate is directed towards the age transition.

This is where I stand too.

The devs underestimated how much people don't like losing their progress and being forced to railroad into a certain way. The age transitions simply feel, bluntly, garbage.

I believe it's a major design flaw in the game and reviews will continue to trend downwards unless it gets fixed.

 

[Leucarum]

Reading on Reddit and such, it seems like the most common criticism of Civ 7 has changed. It used to be the UI, but now it seems like the vast majority of the hate is directed towards the age transition.

This is where I stand too.

The devs underestimated how much people don't like losing their progress and being forced to railroad into a certain way. The age transitions simply feel, bluntly, garbage.

I believe it's a major design flaw in the game and reviews will continue to trend downwards unless it gets fixed.

It might be difficult to disentangle the age system from other criticisms. The design for 7 is very interconnected and ages are at the intersection of everything from legacy paths to bottlenecking to civ switching... Not that that improves things for firaxis in any way...

 

[bitula]

Also, I realize the mostly negative is just for recent reviews - but what with the trend of going down around 1% a month, in a few years, it could very well be mostly negative overall.

Well yes, that's the point ("Ill Omen/R.I.P."). Were it the other way around: all negative and recent mixed it would at least hint on recovery (like patches making the game better).

 

[Civinator]

It might be difficult to disentangle the age system from other criticisms. The design for 7 is very interconnected and ages are at the intersection of everything from legacy paths to bottlenecking to civ switching... Not that that improves things for firaxis in any way...

Yes, the age transition is needed to connect the single, otherwise not fitting, parts of the Civ 3 Conquests campaign (otherwise stand-alone scenarios with completely different civs and rulers created by Ed Beach decades ago), to be a game - but my mod CCM 3 shows, that this can be done in a much better way without such a connection part, despite the changing of the names of civs with a focus on the same territory and changing names and titles of the rulers during the 4 eras of Civ 3.

The other function of the age transition, to provide the gamer a much more interesting game during the later eras of the game by a kind of "resetting" the game seems to be not working well, when reading the reports of civers who have played Civ 7 (this is only my impression of those reports, I don´t have Civ 7 yet myself). May be here Firaxis would be well advised to use the same wisdom as it was used in C3C by Soren Johnson when they found that the planned dark age in C3C is an "unfun element" and they decided to replace the "unfun" element of a dark age by the "fun element" of a golden age (German Civ IV manual, page 161). Firaxis should not weaken the player but making the opponents much stronger during an age transition. Weakening the player by taking away parts that he has won during the game in my eyes is no good idea.

 

[bitula]

Here is an excerpt from a positive review:
- Age Transitions: These are too manufactured/forced, they're not seamless, they're disruptive to the game flow, and they don't allow major in-game activities to conclude organically. Big miss here.
- Intermixing Civs/Leaders: The intent to majorly evolve each Civ over the Ages is good and very welcome, but that does not necessitate re-Civ'ing every Age. Firaxis used a sledgehammer on this one and it's jarring.
Oh, see usage of the word "forced " from someone who likes the game.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I mean, it certainly won’t help things. How could it? I am willing to try out new games if I’ve read a good review or two/or the game has been suggested by a friend, etc. However, if the Steam reviews are negative I am much less likely to buy the game (at full price anyway).

Well, my opinion goes against the majority of players often enough, plus it, of course, depends on expectations. So I pay very little attention to player review score and focus more on actual gameplay videos and more objective opinions like the amount of bugs.

 

[Doratov]

The age mechanic would be a great gameplay element, if it wouldn't be, as the quote says, a sledgehammer, but a well thought out idea. I like the game, have almost 300 hours sank in, and I still shake my head thinking about it. So by now, I can easily win the ages with 1-2 points at least in every legacy path and, 2-4 golden ages. If I'm doing so well, why is there a crisis incoming? The achievements in the legacy paths should negate a portion of the negative effects, so much so, that if you get 4 golden ages by the end, they negate it completely. I started 2 games at the very start of the early access, and when both times my empire started to disintegrate from the excessive conquering, I just disabled the whole crisis system, and refused to enable it. And of course, if my civ is in triple/quadruple golden age, the player should have the option to carry on the civ, maybe have new buildings that replace older ones with current age specials, maybe form new quarters from them, same improvements with better yields and graphics, new units in the same unit type, etc. May have been a greater undertaking, but getting an antiquity age civ in a single DLC would warrant a greater perceived value, hence less dissatisfaction. (And dropping the civ change would also be bad, if you are in at least two dark ages, the player lock-out from civ carry on would be warranted.)

Also, the narrative events ignore the playstyle quite heavily - if I'm all about war and plundering, surely that should warrant new and unique social policies, that can negate the negatives (getting happiness in core cities and/or towns, getting more settlement limit, snatching up the unique social policies of the conquered nation, etc.). In the same vein, maintaining a small nation with science focus could lead to better units with greater strengths, special isolationist policies; or greater/special trade bonuses if that small nation is all about trade and good relationships. My mind starts racing when I think about all of the missed opportunities. Narrative events shouldn't be just the same random stuff that pops up every game, but things that fit into the players unique narrative, enhances it, and maybe tells a meta story that continues through the ages. Something that was in Alpha Centaury.

The whole game is like Cyberpunk 2077 or Anthem, very undercooked on release (probably because last minute course corrections - I don't think that with this much time the team had since VI on their hand, they couldn't make a significantly better product), and need an extra 3 year of development to arrive to a good state. Not sure the devs have the time and goodwill CD Project had and may go down on the Bioware road...

 

[kaspergm]

I'd like to try Cities: Skylines 2, but with a 53% user rating, I am hesitant. It does not look bad when reading negative reviews, but I have other games to play. Maybe later, and I have been pushing it away for nearly a year now.

I played a good deal of CS1 and was extremely excited when CS2 was announced, and it seemed to have a lot of features I really wanted in CS1, so I pre-ordered the deluxe edition, but the game just didn't grab me on release. It was hard to put a finger on what it was, but there were some bugs and game aspects that really did not work on release. I haven't played since, although I do think they've been working to fix a lot of the bugs. I reckon I'll pick it up at some point when I have time, but this was also one of the reasons I was holding off on pre-ordering Civ7 when they revealed those game design decisions.

 

[UWHabs]

Yes, the age transition is needed to connect the single, otherwise not fitting, parts of the Civ 3 Conquests campaign (otherwise stand-alone scenarios with completely different civs and rulers created by Ed Beach decades ago), to be a game - but my mod CCM 3 shows, that this can be done in a much better way without such a connection part, despite the changing of the names of civs with a focus on the same territory and changing names and titles of the rulers during the 4 eras of Civ 3.

The other function of the age transition, to provide the gamer a much more interesting game during the later eras of the game by a kind of "resetting" the game seems to be not working well, when reading the reports of civers who have played Civ 7 (this is only my impression of those reports, I don´t have Civ 7 yet myself). May be here Firaxis would be well advised to use the same wisdom as it was used in C3C by Soren Johnson when they found that the planned dark age in C3C is an "unfun element" and they decided to replace the "unfun" element of a dark age by the "fun element" of a golden age (German Civ IV manual, page 161). Firaxis should not weaken the player but making the opponents much stronger during an age transition. Weakening the player by taking away parts that he has won during the game in my eyes is no good idea.

I think they could have been a little less aggressive on the age transition. Like, if at least all your buildings kept their old adjacencies and yields, but they re-balanced things so that the new era buildings just dominated the totals. Or you kept all your old units, but they stayed as the previous unit types, and you had to either pay to upgrade them to the new units, or the new units were simply so much stronger that they dominate.

It's the old case where people are a lot less upset if someone else gets a bonus, you don't like yourself getting a penalty.

 

[Askia Muhammad]

I think they could have been a little less aggressive on the age transition. Like, if at least all your buildings kept their old adjacencies and yields, but they re-balanced things so that the new era buildings just dominated the totals. Or you kept all your old units, but they stayed as the previous unit types, and you had to either pay to upgrade them to the new units, or the new units were simply so much stronger that they dominate.

It's the old case where people are a lot less upset if someone else gets a bonus, you don't like yourself getting a penalty.

I just generally think resets and removing units and yields go against the very core of what makes a 4X game a 4X game.

I’m not actually against rubber banding or “negative” events happening so long as they are predictable and earned. If I do a terrible job governing and my empire is in disarray as a result of my failures, I welcome the idea of a dark age that is punishing. While I also don’t mind there being a faster way to advance back to normalcy.

In Civ 6, I quite liked dramatic ages but even with that I felt it was as a very underdeveloped feature I wanted to see expanded.

 

[Gorbles]

I’m not actually against rubber banding or “negative” events happening so long as they are predictable and earned. If I do a terrible job governing and my empire is in disarray as a result of my failures, I welcome the idea of a dark age that is punishing.

This seems like poor design. You don't want a feedback loop that punishes players who don't know to play excessively more than players who do. Bad play is its own punishment.

The point of Ages, and indeed the "problem", is that players have been conditioned that they can overcome anything. That narrative game events represent a "failure".

Which I get. It's an emotional connection to how well you think you're doing. But at the same time that means what matters are the narrative hooks and not the mechanics themselves. The empire is going to go through change. As every single one has done, historically. Literally, every single one.

How well you do determines the details.

That's not a conceptual problem. That's not something that requires Ages to be ditched.

 

[firadin]

players have been conditioned that they can overcome anything.

Players haven't been "conditioned", we're just uninterested in getting punished for no reason. Why would I want to play a game where I work hard to achieve X thing only for that thing to get taken away from me for no reason/reasons outside of my control? Blaming players for being upset that they're being punished for playing the game feels silly.

 

[Gorbles]

Players haven't been "conditioned", we're just uninterested in getting punished for no reason.

Good news! You're not

 

[user746383]

Recent reviews are now mostly negative for the first time. it doesn’t seem that people agree that the patches have fixed anything (if anything they seem to somehow be making things worse). The ages and civ switching also doesn’t seem to be something that people are realising they like the more time they have with the game.

Mixed (48% of 31,708) ALL TIME
Mostly Negative (37% of 1,144) RECENT

 

[CliffCo]

Recent reviews are now mostly negative for the first time. it doesn’t seem that people agree that the patches have fixed anything (if anything they seem to somehow be making things worse). The ages and civ switching also doesn’t seem to be something that people are realising they like the more time they have with the game.

Mixed (48% of 31,708) ALL TIME
Mostly Negative (37% of 1,144) RECENT

Sad that so many are jumping on the hate bandwagon, it deserves better reviews.

I’m sure some of the negative reviews are coming from people who haven’t played it or haven’t played it long enough to fully learn the new mechanics, others just wanted a remake of an earlier version and don’t like change.

 

[fantsu]

Curious to what extent Steam reviews play a role in everyone's game-buying decisions? If it's a game/series I love, I find I look for at least Mostly Positive to take the plunge and make a purchase. Also, I realize the mostly negative is just for recent reviews - but what with the trend of going down around 1% a month, in a few years, it could very well be mostly negative overall.

Maybe Steam users can take a look? Don't know as I am not an Steam user.
Those who dont use Steam obviously dont care at all.