Playing as a Continuous Civ- A HUGE Mistake

[ColtSeavers]

You were mocking Ed Beach's decision to make a change* that I personally enjoy because I get value out of it. If you were in charge, and not Ed Beach, this presumably wouldn't have been in the game at all.

Nothing about your post that I responded to was talking about an option. You were criticising the original inclusion of the thing.

*which is fair - no complaints on the mockery or general criticism!

The original inclusion was a mistake in my opinion (and if you look at various polls, a lot of people agree with me on that). You are deliberately misinterpreting my post. I never said, that you shouldn’t be able to play your beloved Civ Switching any longer and I’ve repeated that many times already.

 

[Gorbles]

The original inclusion was a mistake in my opinion (and if you look at various polls, a lot of people agree with me on that). You are deliberately misinterpreting my post. I never said, that you shouldn’t be able to play your beloved Civ Switching any longer and I’ve repeated that many times already.

The original inclusion was a mistake in your opinion. This is literally what I said! As it turns out, I disagree. I'm not misinterpreting anything. If you disagree with me, just say so.

There really is no need for attempting to attack my motive instead of the point made.

 

[peter79]

Recently, Ed Beach discussed the fact that Firaxis will be playtesting civs to see if there can be continuous civs all through the game, ie you would no longer have to change civs. While changing civs will still likely be an option, I believe even allowing players the choice to play as a single civ all throughout the game is a massive, huge mistake. For starters, think of all the time and resources that could and should go toward improving the already existing (and subpar) religion, crisis and government mechanics. Also, this will mess with the core identity of the game. Civ 7 was sold to us as "history as built in layers". I think that is a great founding principle and one that sets Civ 7 apart from previous entries. I really appreciate the attempt here to make the ages, and thereby the game, more historical in its feel.
I fear that Firaxis is also caving and following what the crowd wants more than sticking to their original vision of the game. I believe Civ 7 has greatness in its bones but it needs devs with vision and the will to make it that way. Keeping the same civ, even the option to, is taking the game off its unique path and moving it into crowd pleasing territory. Hint: you can't please everybody, stick with what you know to be true and sharpen it.

I agree 100%. They should focus on improving what they have instead of trying to force a square into a circle hole. I'm not a game dev but the game is built around the core of civ switching I cant see them delivering a one civ only option that will satisfy the "I hate civ switching" group.

 

[Krikkit1]

I agree 100%. They should focus on improving what they have instead of trying to force a square into a circle hole. I'm not a game dev but the game is built around the core of civ switching I cant see them delivering a one civ only option that will satisfy the "I hate civ switching" group.

They won't deliver an option that will satisfy the Whole "I hate civ switching" group, but they will deliver an option that will satisfy some of the group. And the option hopefully will provide more fun alternatives for those who like civ switching or don't mind it.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I don't think Firaxis even considers "I hate civ switching" as a group. From marketing perspective it doesn't make sense to select a segment based on hating or loving particular feature.

If you watch Ed's video, he tells that playing as one civ is the most requested feature by players. And that's true, a lot of reviews from people who actually bought the game mention this.

So, from company perspective, they just continue improving the game, while also listening to feedback. Which results in constant flow of game purchases and slow improvement of review scores. From commercial point of view, there are just current and potential owners (segmented by things like geographic, social or invome) and not haters or supporters.

 

[GeneralZift]

I fear that Firaxis is also caving and following what the crowd wants more than sticking to their original vision of the game. I believe Civ 7 has greatness in its bones but it needs devs with vision and the will to make it that way. Keeping the same civ, even the option to, is taking the game off its unique path and moving it into crowd pleasing territory. Hint: you can't please everybody, stick with what you know to be true and sharpen it.

This statement is what I find fundamentally wrong.

I have a theory if you will hear me out.
If the developers thought that the game was going to be perfect as-is... then why did each and every update try so hard to patch up their own design?
For example: adding game options to address the Era Change, giving you the ability to completely turn off Crises, and now going ahead and letting you turn off the Civilisation Switch?

In some ways, it looks to me like they were capitulating right from the start. You can go ahead and turn off pretty much all the 'crazy new innovations' they had for the game and stick to the tame new stuff most of us actually wanted.
Now is this in reply to great criticism? Or more likely: They didn't really have a concrete plan in mind to begin with.

I'll tell you what Firaxis' production plan actually looks like.
If their unfinished gameplay is anything to go by, and their history of unfinished games on launch, then maybe the plan from the start was to play it by ear and adjust their game accordingly to player demands and expectations so as to keep people happy.
There was no 'original vision' in the way that you imagine it. Not like some secret bible of great game design that they never finished implementing, from which they are now going astray.
Instead, it's an original blueprint which they experiment with and build layers upon.

Long story short, they get the funding early by releasing early; they have 'something new' to market with; they release the game unfinished; they finish it with the aid of their beautiful loyal player base who tell them overwhelmingly what's wrong with the game; and after 2 expansions, 30 DLCs and 1 aggressive monetizing strategy later, BAM you have a 'good game'.

So when people say, is Firaxis moving into 'Crowd Pleasing Territory'?
I like to think 'When did Firaxis ever leave Crowd Pleasing Territory?'
It's their favourite territory! It comes right after 'Releasing the Game Early' territory for maximum efficiency

 

[kaspergm]

(...) In some ways, it looks to me like they were capitulating right from the start. You can go ahead and turn off pretty much all the 'crazy new innovations' they had for the game and stick to the tame new stuff most of us actually wanted.
Now is this in reply to great criticism? Or more likely: They didn't really have a concrete plan in mind to begin with.

I'll tell you what Firaxis' production plan actually looks like.
If their unfinished gameplay is anything to go by, and their history of unfinished games on launch, then maybe the plan from the start was to play it by ear and adjust their game accordingly to player demands and expectations so as to keep people happy.
There was no 'original vision' in the way that you imagine it. Not like some secret bible of great game design that they never finished implementing, from which they are now going astray.
Instead, it's an original blueprint which they experiment with and build layers upon.
(...)

It may be pointless to discuss this, since we can't proof who's right (if there even is a right and wrong), but I don't think your interpretation is correct (or fair?). I do think they had a vision of the game. I think in their minds, civ switching was going to be amazing and make every game and civ feel fresh and relevant, and they imagined that crisis was going to add excitement and prevent games from being endless peaceful marathons. And I guess on paper there was some merit to at least some of those thoughts.

Of course, I personally think it was a misjudgement of epic proportions not to understand the impact many players felt this had on immersion, and from what I read, implementation of many of the ideas like the crisis is pretty abysmal, which of course does not help - but I don't really see any justification to say they didn't have a vision. I just think they started immediately backpedaling when it became clear how horrible the game was received among the fans - either by their own decision, or by force from someone higher in the companies.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I'd go even further and said Firaxis has a vision, sticks to it and there's no "capitulating" or "backpedaling" at all.

I mean, "continuity" mode? They test "collapse" mode as well. Also, the whole development process (as described by Firaxis) was to start from completely independent ages and when adding things to keep. So, this actually follows the development direction.

Or this potential optional mode to play as a single civ? If people call it a pivot, I wonder how they'll describe Civ6 development process, which led to "pivoting" into adding optional modes with vampires and zombie apocalypse?

 

[stealth_nsk]

Another important thing is that people often confuse "vision" with "development plan", while they are completely opposite.

Vision is the highest level direction of the product, almost always in one sentence. Civ7 vision is probably "History is built in layers" (it's marketing slogan, but it's likely to be based on the actual vision). So, it's pretty easy to check whether Firaxis sticks to Civ7 vision. If the game doesn't remove ages or overbuilding, it sticks to the vision.

Development plan is totally different thing, first of all it doesn't exist in terms expected by people who are not in software development. There's a backlog of ideas, which gathers everything, when there are different iterations of implementation, playtesting, more complex implementation, more playtesting, etc. until idea is either scrapped or turned into released feature.

 

[kaspergm]

Or this potential optional mode to play as a single civ? If people call it a pivot, I wonder how they'll describe Civ6 development process, which led to "pivoting" into adding optional modes with vampires and zombie apocalypse?

I don't think that's comparable - as in, at all. Those game modes added extra stuff, but didn't change the fundamental core of the game. Adding a continuous mode is basically rolling back half of what defines Civ7 imo.

 

[Gorbles]

I don't think that's comparable - as in, at all. Those game modes added extra stuff, but didn't change the fundamental core of the game. Adding a continuous mode is basically rolling back half of what defines Civ7 imo.

Why? If options are things that don't take away from what we already have, how can they simultaneously also be rolling what we already have, back?

 

[ThERat]

By the way, even if they let you play the same civ the entire game, there is still this thing called eras. I didn't enjoy crises at all in previous iterations and the idea of the abrupt end of an era (for all civs at the same time) just puts me off. Won't jump on the civ 7 train even then. Additionally, the graphics make my eyes bleed, maybe I am just too old a boomer, but the last time I really liked the graphics, were Civ 3 and 5

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Additionally, the graphics make my eyes bleed, maybe I am just too old a boomer, but the last time I really liked the graphics, were Civ 3 and 5

Interesting. I feel like no matter what most people's position on the gameplay itself, is that both sides at least agree the game looks good graphically and is visually beautiful.

 

[Leucarum]

Interesting. I feel like no matter what most people's position on the gameplay itself, is that both sides at least agree the game looks good graphically and is visually beautiful.

It is beautiful, but it suffers in terms of readability relative to Civ6. Even after hundreds of hours I can't look at a Civ7 map and tell what's happening at a glance. I prefer it to Civ5... But as much as the graphics are an upgrade, in practice I think what Firaxis did with that upgrade does leave quite a bit to be desired.

 

[ThERat]

Beautiful and useful to play a game are 2 different things for me. The city sprawl I find terrible. I can't even tell what the heck is happening when trying to follow people play Civ7.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Yes, I think most of people agree. The map is really beautiful and I enjoy the diorama style, it seem to fit Civilization game abstraction perfectly. But readability of the map suffers a lot - because of mix-and-match districts, it's impossible to color-code them like in Civ6.

 

[ColtSeavers]

By the way, even if they let you play the same civ the entire game, there is still this thing called eras. I didn't enjoy crises at all in previous iterations and the idea of the abrupt end of an era (for all civs at the same time) just puts me off. Won't jump on the civ 7 train even then. Additionally, the graphics make my eyes bleed, maybe I am just too old a boomer, but the last time I really liked the graphics, were Civ 3 and 5

For me, it is the other way around. I acctually find the Ages system interesting, though there is naturally room for improvement, i.e. concerning the transations and the later ages. Civ Switching though, I find totally absurd, therefore I'm glad, that they are working on some alternatives there!

 

[aieeegrunt]

The most common comment I have seen on Civ7 is “beautiful screenshots, cannot tell what the hell I am actually looking at”. So basically great for marketing hype, awful at actually functioning.

Seems on brand for this decade of just about everything except cars.

People hate on Civ6 and it’s cartoony art style, but by God it has aged the best of all the games, and other than maybe Civ3 it is by far the most functional.

 

[stealth_nsk]

The most common comment I have seen on Civ7 is “beautiful screenshots, cannot tell what the hell I am actually looking at”. So basically great for marketing hype, awful at actually functioning.

Seems on brand for this decade of just about everything except cars.

People hate on Civ6 and it’s cartoony art style, but by God it has aged the best of all the games, and other than maybe Civ3 it is by far the most functional.

As I said, I think it's a pretty logical consequence of two simple things:

1. More complex gameplay elements on map
2. Less "cartoony" style

Both decrease map readability, but I can't say it's actually a bad thing, because of the visual and gameplay value we have. I think it just requires UI decisions, like the recent mechanics for highlighting goody huts (I don't think it's great feature, because it's tied to specific units, but it's much better than before).

 

[Krikkit1]

Yes, I think most of people agree. The map is really beautiful and I enjoy the diorama style, it seem to fit Civilization game abstraction perfectly. But readability of the map suffers a lot - because of mix-and-match districts, it's impossible to color-code them like in Civ6.

You could just have 2 color regions in each district.