Playing as a Continuous Civ- A HUGE Mistake

[stealth_nsk]

The “minority” that somehow made the majority of the reviews negative and the sales dismal and also somehow convinced the Fireaxis devs to possibly cater to them?

I disagree with calling either side a minority, but I disagree with this statement as well. If we look at reviews, half of them are positive and among those nearly 100% are content with civilization switching. If we look at negative reviews, though, a lot of them are either content with civilization switching or not mention it too. So, when we speak about reviews, negative opinion about civ switching is a fraction of that half which gave negative reviews.

However, if we extend our evaluation beyond whose who buy the game, we'll face some pretty large audiences, which include old fans who didn't buy the game because of civ switching (together with large audience of fans who didn't buy the game for other reasons, and audience of potential new players who are mostly ok with civ switching, because they look at it with fresh eye). And since there's no way to estimate sizes of those audiences, speaking about "minority" is clearly wrong.

 

[McSpank01]

Maybe the term minority is not 100% accurate, but I would suggest their volume level is outmatching their numbers quite considerably. The people who don’t like civ switching are very vocal about the fact and I think that creates a false impression of public opinion. Plus I just don’t believe many have actually given the game a chance at all, with some not even appearing to have played it.

It now means that Firaxis are looking to fix a problem that almost certainly won’t improve the game, for ‘players’ who almost certainly will never come back to the game anyway. Wasted effort.

 

[Smegger213]

I disagree with calling either side a minority, but I disagree with this statement as well. If we look at reviews, half of them are positive and among those nearly 100% are content with civilization switching. If we look at negative reviews, though, a lot of them are either content with civilization switching or not mention it too. So, when we speak about reviews, negative opinion about civ switching is a fraction of that half which gave negative reviews.

However, if we extend our evaluation beyond whose who buy the game, we'll face some pretty large audiences, which include old fans who didn't buy the game because of civ switching (together with large audience of fans who didn't buy the game for other reasons, and audience of potential new players who are mostly ok with civ switching, because they look at it with fresh eye). And since there's no way to estimate sizes of those audiences, speaking about "minority" is clearly wrong.

Except half of the reviews are NOT positive. Only 47.2% are positive. I had a scroll through some of the recent negative reviews. It didn't take me long to find mention of Civ switching.

 

[Smegger213]

Maybe the term minority is not 100% accurate, but I would suggest their volume level is outmatching their numbers quite considerably. The people who don’t like civ switching are very vocal about the fact and I think that creates a false impression of public opinion. Plus I just don’t believe many have actually given the game a chance at all, with some not even appearing to have played it.

It now means that Firaxis are looking to fix a problem that almost certainly won’t improve the game, for ‘players’ who almost certainly will never come back to the game anyway. Wasted effort.

Well, I am sure that they will aim to please both camps. Let those that want to stay with one Civ do so. But also let those that want to switch do the switch too. Its not a wasted effort.

 

[Siptah]

Well, I am sure that they will aim to please both camps. Let those that want to stay with one Civ do so. But also let those that want to switch do the switch too. Its not a wasted effort.

We have to wait and see. If the patch that introduces continuous play with a single civ leads to half a million sales or so within a week, it‘s certainly not a wasted effort (and I think this is also not unlikely to happen). If it‘s just 10-20k more than other patches/sales, it would show that either demand for this among potential customers isn‘t all that high, or that people that want mandatory switching gone are actually not buying because of other aspects as well, e.g., ages or the general social media opinion of the game.

I would expect an increase in player numbers for that patch anyway, as many owners will want to try the new mode/setting, regardless of their stance on mandatory switching - me included.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Except half of the reviews are NOT positive. Only 47.2% are positive. I had a scroll through some of the recent negative reviews. It didn't take me long to find mention of Civ switching.

Does this matter? You have 52.8% of negative reviews and among them, for example, around 30% of them mention civ switching, that's 16% of total audience.

But as I said, it's not a big deal, because the core part of discussion is about people who didn't buy the game yet.

 

[Smegger213]

Does this matter? You have 52.8% of negative reviews and among them, for example, around 30% of them mention civ switching, that's 16% of total audience.

But as I said, it's not a big deal, because the core part of discussion is about people who didn't buy the game yet.

Core of discussion about people that didn't buy the game? I thought the thread was about playing with one continuous Civ?
I suspect that the majority of the players posting in the Civ 7 forums, actually own the game. Not seen all that many people say things like "that's why I ain't buying the game".

But even your thought of 30% mentioning Civ switching. That's still a big chunk of the over 25,000 negative reviews.

But anyway, I think the major decent among players, is the era transitions. Which also includes changing your Civ and or leader.
Not only do a lot of players hate being forced to change Civs. They also hate the transitions themselves.
EG you spend all that influence to be friendly with as many City States as possible. But at transition, all that effort is lost. You have to start befriending them all over again. Which wouldn't be too bad, if it wasn't for the fact that the influence cost doubles.
I prefer the Civ 5 way of dealing with City States. Every so often, give them some gold to keep them sweet etc.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Core of discussion about people that didn't buy the game? I thought the thread was about playing with one continuous Civ?

It was about that part of discussion where either side looks at the other as "minority", not the whole thread.

I suspect that the majority of the players posting in the Civ 7 forums, actually own the game. Not seen all that many people say things like "that's why I ain't buying the game".

But even your thought of 30% mentioning Civ switching. That's still a big chunk of the over 25,000 negative reviews.

But anyway, I think the major decent among players, is the era transitions. Which also includes changing your Civ and or leader.
Not only do a lot of players hate being forced to change Civs. They also hate the transitions themselves.

Yes, that's an issue which is unlikely to go away. But it raises another question - how much do they hate it (or civ switching)? Is it "never ever buy the game", or "dislike, but play"?

 

[OmegaDestroyer]

They should work on improving what they have, before adding a mechanic which is going to be a rebalancing nightmare to deal with.

 

[Crashdummy]

So maybe Firaxis are just going through a PR exercise here, making small effort to appease this crowd whilst never actually implementing a full version with no civ switching. The wording of their statement made me suspect that they know the game just doesn’t work with continuity civs and would require an enormous overhaul to do it any justice at all, and so they are just ‘testing ideas’. They have probably been thinking about how it would work for years, and come to the conclusion that it just doesn’t.

It worked for decades. What is not working is the civ switching option

This isnt a "minority" or "mayority" issuie. The current players are not enough to sustain a game like Civilization 7. Firaxis tried to bring new players by improving the current design for months, it didnt work

Firaxis NEED new players to sustain Civ VII, and all their efforts so far failed. This is a new approach to that

 

[Crashdummy]

We have to wait and see. If the patch that introduces continuous play with a single civ leads to half a million sales or so within a week, it‘s certainly not a wasted effort (and I think this is also not unlikely to happen). If it‘s just 10-20k more than other patches/sales, it would show that either demand for this among potential customers isn‘t all that high, or that people that want mandatory switching gone are actually not buying because of other aspects as well, e.g., ages or the general social media opinion of the game.

I would expect an increase in player numbers for that patch anyway, as many owners will want to try the new mode/setting, regardless of their stance on mandatory switching - me included.

Its not just sales. There are cases like mine, which in my case i have the Founders Edition, played several games to see if the game clicked, it didnt and uninstalled the game over 8 months ago. They wouldnt get a new sale if i return, because since i have the Founders i even have all the DLCs so far, but if i come back i would be a new player, which is something they desperately need

I think there are many players in my situation

 

[Leucarum]

Maybe the term minority is not 100% accurate, but I would suggest their volume level is outmatching their numbers quite considerably. The people who don’t like civ switching are very vocal about the fact and I think that creates a false impression of public opinion. Plus I just don’t believe many have actually given the game a chance at all, with some not even appearing to have played it.

It now means that Firaxis are looking to fix a problem that almost certainly won’t improve the game, for ‘players’ who almost certainly will never come back to the game anyway. Wasted effort.

We attempted a poll here before, and it was around 50-50 between those who like and don't like Civ switching. Most of the dislikers said it stopped them from playing the game. So I'd guess the minority part is wrong, but the "not giving it a fair shot" has some basis in fact. Not that we are an unbiased audience but that's the best I've got.

I suspect what Firaxis know, but we don't is how often we play past an age transition. That's probably the least biased measure of whether there's a problem. I doubt they'd be putting resources into this if it wasn't an actual issue. I usually end my games after antiquity, when the civ switch puts me off continuing.

Psrsonally, though I have >500 hours and dislike civ switching. So I think I can say I have given the mechanic a fair shot. Most of my dislike is on an emotional level, I identify with my Civ, it sets the tone for the game and I dislike losing it. I also want to be able to use my civ's mechanics over as broad a swathe of the game as possible. And I mainly connect to antiquity civs and love the alt history of keeping them going. Mechanically it's not great to lock civs to a less interesting late-game. And logistically civ switching negatively affects my percieved value of XPACs. Civ switching opponents aren't all shouting zealots. I think I have legitimate gripes with a mechanic in a game I otherwise love.

Will I enjoy what Firaxis puts out? Who knows... If it's a cosmetic or half-baked idea then probably not. But I do think I personally need optional civ switching to be an interesting choice for me to continue playing civ long term.

 

[Crashdummy]

They should work on improving what they have, before adding a mechanic which is going to be a rebalancing nightmare to deal with.

They have been doing that for 9 months already. It didnt work, numbers stabilized in a lower number than they need and didnt grow

 

[stealth_nsk]

They have been doing that for 9 months already. It didnt work, numbers stabilized in a lower number than they need and didnt grow

There are 2 big assumptions in this sentence:

1. Numbers show significant problems with the game. Actually stable number show stable stream of new sales and recent increase in numbers show increase in sales rate. Without more numbers known to Firaxis only, it's impossible to tell how big the problem is.
2. The reason for those problems are age transition and/or civilization switching. A lot of things point out that half-baked state of Civ7 on launch had much more impact on negativity.

But we've discussed all this already multiple times in relevant thread. Let's just say that your statement isn't based on actual data and many people disagree with it.

 

[Civinator]

But somehow, mysteriously, the people boycotting the game *now* seem to think that only THEIR opinions will ever impact sales, and that it's therefore okay to piss off the people who like the game right now, because they obviously have no standards and will continue buying the game and expansion anyway.

Yes, this is completely right. Besides the way to attract more people to the game, there is another option to improve the sales, that astoningishly is never appearing in all these (in my eyes) nonsense-discussions: Double or tripple the price for the game and its expansions and DLCs, so less customers (who currently like the way Civ 7 is set) can provide the same profit.

If the profit is sufficient with the current fans, who like the current settings of Civ 7, that´s fine. The current Civ 7 fans are pleased, Firaxis and 2K are pleased and I am pleased, too, because I have not thrown out money for a game that is not convincing me.

If the profit by the current fans of Civ 7 is not enough for 2K and Firaxis, they still can double or tripple the prices of future expansions and DLCs to receive the profit they are intending. In that case Firaxis and 2K are pleased, the current fans of Civ 7 have to pay the price that is the logical consequence of all their posts, that all in Civ 7 should stay as it is, to receive the expansions and DLCs they are wanting and therefore should be pleased, too (I hope you see the problem here ) and I am pleased too, as I save much more money in not buying that game and its expansions and DLCs.

So every civer, who is posting, that in Civ 7 all should stay as it is, should at least be willing to pay a much higher price for expansions and DLCs as he now is expecting, if Civ 7 should continue without attracting additional players and the profit should not be sufficient.

Of course Firaxis and 2K in such a case could also decide not to continue Civ 7. In such a case the fans of the current Civ 7 are not pleased, Firaxis and 2K are not pleased as they received not the profit they have calculated and I am not pleased too, as it would be the first game of the Civ series that has failed and I am a big fan of the Civ series.

So in my eyes the best way would still be to attract more civers by Civ 7 and this can only be partly achieved by lowering the prices massively, but will not happen with the current prices without listening to their demands.

 

[Crashdummy]

There are 2 big assumptions in this sentence:

1. Numbers show significant problems with the game. Actually stable number show stable stream of new sales and recent increase in numbers show increase in sales rate. Without more numbers known to Firaxis only, it's impossible to tell how big the problem is.
2. The reason for those problems are age transition and/or civilization switching. A lot of things point out that half-baked state of Civ7 on launch had much more impact on negativity.

But we've discussed all this already multiple times in relevant thread. Let's just say that your statement isn't based on actual data and many people disagree with it.

Numbers are lower than needed, thats a fact

Now, neither we, not Firaxis know exactly why Civ VII numbers are lower than needed. We can try to guess or infer based on incomplete data, but thats it

That being said, they have attempted to fix other things, unrelated to civ switching for 9 months. And they did improve a lot of things. None of that worked. 9 months ignoring the civ swithing problem.

The increase came after the announcement, so the announcement might have something to do with it

 

[Siptah]

So every civer, who is posting, that in Civ 7 all should stay as it is, should at least be willing to pay a much higher price for expansions and DLCs as he now is expecting, if Civ 7 should continue without attracting additional players and the profit should not be sufficient.

I don't think anyone is posting that it should stay *as is*, and if it were, that person wouldn't need to buy anything at all, nor require future patches.

If FXS can't increase long-term sales, they might of course increase the price (once more). But they might also do this when the game is very popular (see the atrocious price for Gathering Storm).

Personally, I don't see the benefit of dividing people in two strictly separated groups according to a simplified like button, or seeing success/happiness as only black and white categories. Especially for the situation that FXS/civ7/CivFanatics are currently in, different shades of grey is where you can operate, not black and white. Attempting to draw the discussions into black and white territory is, in my opinion, exactly what makes some discussions nonsense.

 

[disjointaccount]

Numbers are lower than needed, thats a fact

Is it? We know Civ 7 has a lower concurrent player count on Steam than previous entries, and that's about it. Concurrent player count as it relates directly to the game's health isn't a particularly important metric for Civ 7 as a primarily single-player game (versus something like a battle royale where an active playerbase is a necessity for the game to function).

It's an indication that fewer people are currently playing the game than in previous entries, but offers very little insight into sales, especially if it is indeed true that Civ 7 is so disappointing that lots of long-time fans bought and tried the game but it's been sitting untouched in their library ever since. To the developers, and especially the publishers, a customer who buys the game and never touches it differs very little from one who's logging on every day. Furthermore, this is just Steam. We have no insight at all into how it's doing on any other platform. And lastly, we have no idea what the "required" number of sales even is. We have no idea what the game's budget was, and we have no idea how much the unit of "one concurrent player on Steam" counts towards that, given Steam sales, different regional pricing, key resellers, etc.

I'm not saying Civ 7 had the launch every developer dreams of. It's pretty clear that the reception across the wider could be described as "mixed" at best. But wading into the specifics of the game's finances seems pointless when we have exactly zero of the necessary information to build a picture of how the game's doing on that front.

As for civ-switching specifically, I think it's absolutely fair to attribute a lot of the negativity surrounding the game towards that. There are absolutely players on here and elsewhere who are just put off by not getting to stick with one empire. However, I think there's another proportion of the negativity that comes from players who were always going to be vocally negative about Civ 7 regardless, just because it's new and different (as has happened with pretty much every previous Civ). These players might latch onto civ-switching as a focal point for their negativity, but it's not necessarily an actual dealbreaker for them. They just don't like Civ 7 because it isn't Civ 6 (which they didn't like at its launch because it wasn't Civ 5). These players are unlikely to be swayed by a single-civ mode and instead were always going to come around to Civ 7 as the best Civ ever whenever reddit decides it's had enough patches and there's a decent bundle on sale.

Again, I'm not saying that's everyone complaining about Civ switching. I absolutely acknowledge that there are lots of people whose perfectly legitimate preference is to not have switching. I'm just pointing out that for the sake of discussing majorities vs. minorities, there's some portion (of a functionally unknowable size) of the anti-Civ-switching noise that we can reasonably assume is just, well, noise.

 

[Crashdummy]

Is it? We know Civ 7 has a lower concurrent player count on Steam than previous entries, and that's about it. Concurrent player count as it relates directly to the game's health isn't a particularly important metric for Civ 7 as a primarily single-player game (versus something like a battle royale where an active playerbase is a necessity for the game to function).

It's an indication that fewer people are currently playing the game than in previous entries, but offers very little insight into sales, especially if it is indeed true that Civ 7 is so disappointing that lots of long-time fans bought and tried the game but it's been sitting untouched in their library ever since. To the developers, and especially the publishers, a customer who buys the game and never touches it differs very little from one who's logging on every day. Furthermore, this is just Steam. We have no insight at all into how it's doing on any other platform. And lastly, we have no idea what the "required" number of sales even is. We have no idea what the game's budget was, and we have no idea how much the unit of "one concurrent player on Steam" counts towards that, given Steam sales, different regional pricing, key resellers, etc.

I'm not saying Civ 7 had the launch every developer dreams of. It's pretty clear that the reception across the wider could be described as "mixed" at best. But wading into the specifics of the game's finances seems pointless when we have exactly zero of the necessary information to build a picture of how the game's doing on that front.

As for civ-switching specifically, I think it's absolutely fair to attribute a lot of the negativity surrounding the game towards that. There are absolutely players on here and elsewhere who are just put off by not getting to stick with one empire. However, I think there's another proportion of the negativity that comes from players who were always going to be vocally negative about Civ 7 regardless, just because it's new and different (as has happened with pretty much every previous Civ). These players might latch onto civ-switching as a focal point for their negativity, but it's not necessarily an actual dealbreaker for them. They just don't like Civ 7 because it isn't Civ 6 (which they didn't like at its launch because it wasn't Civ 5). These players are unlikely to be swayed by a single-civ mode and instead were always going to come around to Civ 7 as the best Civ ever whenever reddit decides it's had enough patches and there's a decent bundle on sale.

Again, I'm not saying that's everyone complaining about Civ switching. I absolutely acknowledge that there are lots of people whose perfectly legitimate preference is to not have switching. I'm just pointing out that for the sake of discussing majorities vs. minorities, there's some portion (of a functionally unknowable size) of the anti-Civ-switching noise that we can reasonably assume is just, well, noise.

Civilization model is based on selling DLCs, and to that you need an active playerbase. You dont sustain 8-10 years of Development of the next Civilization with base game sales

Again, i always had the impression that Ages and Civ switching had a lot to do, but of course i could never be certain of that. 9 months after with so many attempts Firaxis did (Civ 7 have received the largest amount of patches in the first 9 months than any other Civilization game) and numbers not improving, and Firaxis making this announcement is another clue that these changes did have an impact

 

[Siptah]

Civilizatioin model is based on selling DLCs, and to that you need an active playerbase. You dont sustain 8-10 years of Development of the next Civilization with base game sales

And from a customer perspective, it shouldn't take 8-10 years from one game to the next. Honestly, I like to play things that I already know every now and then. But the thrill of trying something new that feels nonetheless familiar beats that, and I enjoy learning and trying out new things anyway – and being surprised (in a positive way). As much as I like civ 7, I'd be happy to 2-3 expansions, a few civ packs, and civ 8 before 2030. Having games sustained on DLCs for that many years seems to benefit the publisher, the seller/platform, and the studio much more than the players who get fed overpriced content in small doses. And it also gives the studios and publishers an excuse to deliver unfinished products, because development hasn't finished anyway. This probably makes me sound like an old timer or someone blinded by nostalgia. But I do agree that getting content for a beloved game after some years is great, and it often gives us games that are extensive and great (see e.g., Anno 1800 after all seasons as a positive example).

Yet, I do wonder how some companies still manage to live without many-year-encompassing DLC plans and deliver finished and balanced games at release (see Mario Odyssey or Breath of the Wild for example, two huge almost bug-free 10/10 titles on launch day), while others publish bug-ridden unfinished good ideas with very rough edges on all sides, and expect to be able to fix most things and put bandaids on the rest for the next 5-10 years, e.g., civ 5-7 or all PDX titles of the past 10+ years. Makes me feel as if the latter is always a bet I have to make that the game will actually be sell well enough to be finished eventually – or given up because it simply became to old to be kept updated.