[poll] How excited are you currently about Civ7? [vol 1 - September/October 24]

[Verified_Confection_Being]

Good question. Why don't you do your job for free as a show of goodwill to your boss or as a reward to your company for hiring you?

I don't think this kind of snarky response is at all welcoming or constructive towards creating healthy discussion.

There is a reasonable criticism here about withholding launch day content behind additional cost barriers. At its worst, it's a shady practice that segments a game down to it's barest bones to leech the maximum out of your biggest customers, and get a little from as many disatisfied and univested ones as you can.

A more flowery criticism I would level at it is that it draws us further away from the artistry in the creation of games and the full vision of the people designing them, and it leads to more bugs for all the people who don't keep up with the full content release schedule.

That is nothing like working for free for your boss and I know you know that's a silly comparison because you aren't a silly person.

I remember this forum as being a lot more critically minded in the past, but I fear it's starting to feel like a love in that doesn't want a diversity of opinions any more. I've never seen the kind of derision and dismissal towards a group of forum goers that those with concerns about 7 are getting, at least in releases around the expansions of 5, and then 6 and BE.

Yes absolutely let's get excited and have a space for that, but this of all threads should be a space to hear the other side of feeling towards the game too in a respectful manner

 

[Zaarin]

I don't think this kind of snarky response is at all welcoming or constructive towards creating healthy discussion.

I think it's a perfectly reasonable response to, "Why won't people work for me for free?" It's entitlement at its finest. I like free things as much as the next person, but I think people have a right to be paid for their work--especially in a culture that increasingly devalues the work of artists and of online work in general (speaking personally as someone who works for frankly too little money online).

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

There is a reasonable criticism here about withholding launch day content behind additional cost barriers.

Yes, there is. The problem is that this comment is regularly followed by something like this:

At its worst, it's a shady practice that segments a game down to it's barest bones to leech the maximum out of your biggest customers, and get a little from as many disatisfied and univested ones as you can.

And we're so very far from this kind of problem that it naturally creates some pushback.

 

[ColtSeavers]

Well, in that case I just have to disagree with him. Civ 7 is clearly a civ game. Humankind is so different in so many aspects from what‘ve seen with civ 7. They share one superficial and prominently mentioned mechanic, mostly, that lead to overreactions as the one post above. And as you might know many people claimed that civ 7 would be HK2 when it was announced, without knowing much about civ 7 (or HK for that matter). With all the info we‘ve received since then, the fear that civ 7 would lean into being HK isn‘t very rationale. I personally would even say that if there is a game that‘s closer to civ 7 than civ 6, it would be Millennia by a long shot over HK.

Well let's call it a Civ 6/ HK Hybrid then!

 

[Siptah]

Well let's call it a Civ 6/ HK Hybrid then!

A Civ 3/Civ 6/HK/Millennia hybrid if anything The main new features are different ages and bonuses you can choose for each age, just as in Millennia. Or in civ 3 Conquests

 

[Naokaukodem]

I don't see how segmenting customers is a problem, it's just a way to maximize sold amount by charging more (130) from people who are ready to pay (i.e. hardcore fans), while charging less (70) from more casual players. Having single price (i.e. 100) would mean receiving less money from hard core fans and having much less sales from casual players. And having less profit means higher chances of the game's financial fail.

Segmenting the audience is a known problem, at least for online games. And as Civ7 will definitely have an online part, it will be a problem there too : you will meet less games to play with (in the case of expansions), or not be able to pick this super-civ/leader that the others may pick ; or else, it will be banned by pretty much everyone and the guys who bought it will feel robbed or unsatisfied. I'm not saying that it cannot happen with base game civs/leaders, like it did with Gilgamesh and Tomyris in Civ6, but at least you have not been charged more for them, as it's more likely to happen in Civ7.

EDIT : there should be a way to past quotes when we edit. Double post.

 

[Naokaukodem]

I remember this forum as being a lot more critically minded in the past, but I fear it's starting to feel like a love in that doesn't want a diversity of opinions any more. I've never seen the kind of derision and dismissal towards a group of forum goers that those with concerns about 7 are getting, at least in releases around the expansions of 5, and then 6 and BE.

It's just that remember, it's civFANATICS and it holds its name very well. As you can see not everybody is super-enthusiastic for the game but generally those voices are lost in fan noise because there's nothing to say anymore when you just said "I will not buy the game" for example. Trust me, it's a natural phenomenon that in this forum, the last word will go to the fans. Just because it's the forum reason to be you know... it's physics. Know the gameplay and crack the game ! Oops, the moderators will shut you up if you insist. Anyway, Zaarin's words ARE BACKED WITH MODERATOR WEAPONS.

As to this segmentation, I don't even know what it's about because the 2-3 civs/leaders/personas you get from paying 30/60 $ more seems far underwhelmed for that cost. I think I saw someone say that you may have further civs/leaders/personas in the future, but you don't know what exactly. This is all too vague... I don't know if you can already purchase those, because I feel it's way too early to even talk about it... or it's designed for the core rich audience that will happilly throw, as I said previously in this thread, 1000 bucks on it. In that case, I think the offers are still too shy, there should be the 70$ game, and the 250-500 $ content, including expansions and super-premium exclusive content. Mind you, it's already the case (maybe not for the expasions ? I DON'T KNOW ) but this content may not be appealing enough even for rich people. I guess it's a business that has to be learned, and probably 2K should check how the super-pricy stuff is effectively sold in other games. (like unique ships in this space game if it's still a thing)

Or 2K/Firaxis said themselves that they had to respect their audience by not going overboard, which is the most believable reason I see here, hence you have my support.

 

[Zaarin]

Anyway, Zaarin's words ARE BACKED WITH MODERATOR WEAPONS.

Unless what I post is in mod text, my words are my own and do not necessarily represent the views of CivFanatics, Firaxis, 2K, Take Two, Sid Meier, or the Illuminati-Lizard People-Pepsi-KFC-Texas Instruments-NASA Conglomerate. In other words, most of the time I'm just an ordinary poster, and I don't actively moderate threads I participate in as a matter of decorum.

 

[Siptah]

because the 2-3 civs/leaders/personas you get from paying 30/60 $ more seems far underwhelmed for that cost.

If you pay $30 more, you get 2 personas, 2 leaders and 4 civs + some cosmetics + early access
If you pay $60 more, you get 4 personas, 4 leaders and 8 civs + some cosmetics + early access

You might think that's not much, but I would assume it's cheaper than buying the civ packs by themselves.

 

[notNamed]

If you pay $30 more, you get 2 personas, 2 leaders and 4 civs + some cosmetics + early access
If you pay $60 more, you get 4 personas, 4 leaders and 8 civs + some cosmetics + early access

You might think that's not much, but I would assume it's cheaper than buying the civ packs by themselves.

Well yeah, it's an exemplary game as a service.

$70€ for 30 civs, 10+ leaders, all mechanics and graphics, 1 extra persona and possibly more
Which then transfers into a platform to produce yearly:
$60€ for 4 personas, 4 leaders and 8 civs + some cosmetics

The model is popular and works because of this. Fans are endless content addicts, in turn it is more economically viable for the developer to be their dealer who provides shots at regular intervals even with jacked up prices.
If, instead, the DLCs were as good value as the game itself, you'd be back at the old model of making games and regular sequels. Since, at the end of the day, a new title sells more than an upgrade of the old one. So why inflate a single title for 2, 5, 8 years with ever-mounting tech debt, drop in developer enthusiasm and other downfalls of long lasting projects... if you could just make a new one?

 

[Naokaukodem]

Unless what I post is in mod text, my words are my own and do not necessarily represent the views of CivFanatics, Firaxis, 2K, Take Two, Sid Meier, or the Illuminati-Lizard People-Pepsi-KFC-Texas Instruments-NASA Conglomerate. In other words, most of the time I'm just an ordinary poster, and I don't actively moderate threads I participate in as a matter of decorum.

In fact I wasn't quite referring to your moderator power more than your "aura" ; when writing this I instead thought that you could have 1 or 2 likes because you are a moderator (which is probably wrong); I pay attention to the "likes wars" and felt sorry your "antagonist" had none and you... byeah. But as I said, that must just be Civfanatics for you. I also noticed that in forums, usually one single person is against everyone else, and that's true in real life too, call it the black sheep or something. I experienced myself this phenomenon in the french army, I've even heard some people were meant to be black sheeps. This is believable as the guys there seemed to have a lot of fun (mixed with fear) designating "who's the most stupid/useless"... such a pity. Human kind. I'm so sorry to be a part of it, and we must be the descendants of the most stupid(the people)-and-clever(the "elites", preferably hidden in the shadows) and aggressive race of monkeys.

If you pay $30 more, you get 2 personas, 2 leaders and 4 civs + some cosmetics + early access
If you pay $60 more, you get 4 personas, 4 leaders and 8 civs + some cosmetics + early access

You might think that's not much, but I would assume it's cheaper than buying the civ packs by themselves.

Thx for the reminder Siptah. I still don't get how they think one will be interested in new civs as we don't know how the game will play. (and that should still remain so until we play, so an amount of time AFTER RELEASE) It's putting the cart before the horse, and not only it is disrespectful and nearly insulting, but each rank is usually the cost of a full expansion... so that makes me think that they DID get overboard after all.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Segmenting the audience is a known problem, at least for online games. And as Civ7 will definitely have an online part, it will be a problem there too : you will meet less games to play with (in the case of expansions), or not be able to pick this super-civ/leader that the others may pick ; or else, it will be banned by pretty much everyone and the guys who bought it will feel robbed or unsatisfied. I'm not saying that it cannot happen with base game civs/leaders, like it did with Gilgamesh and Tomyris in Civ6, but at least you have not been charged more for them, as it's more likely to happen in Civ7.

1. In the past it was possible for people with DLC to play against people without it, the latter just didn't have access to particular civs and leaders, I expect it to be the same in Civ7. And while it could be frustrating to not have such access, it's totally playable.
2. Civ7 is still mostly single-player game, especially for more casual players, so for them not having DLC is not a big problem (two days ago my wife finally purchased the last expansion for Civ5, it never was a problem for her).

EDIT : there should be a way to past quotes when we edit. Double post.

Yep, it's the "Quote" button, which collects all the quotes you want and lets you post them in one message.

 

[Siptah]

I still don't get how they think one will be interested in new civs as we don't know how the game will play. (and that should still remain so until we play, so an amount of time AFTER RELEASE)

I think most people are interested in new civs because, looking at the roster, we all miss some civs that we want to have pretty strongly. E.g., antiquity without any Mesopotamian civ? Modern Age without one of Germany/Britain/Russia? A whole age about the exploration and colonization of the new world but no civ from Mesoamerica in that age? It feels like something is missing to me.

Also, it didn't help that, here on this site, we speculated for some time that it will be 45 civs at release and this created a lot of expectations that now aren't fulfilled.

Taken these two together, I think for many people, the first "full" version of the game is the one in September '25 and not the one in February '25. At least that's how I'm reading many posts here about rosters and speculations.

each rank is usually the cost of a full expansion... so that makes me think that they DID get overboard after all.

It's incredibly overpriced compared to what you get. Almost all expansions are. But at least all expansions and packs were completely optional in civ 6, and I hope this stays like this with 7. I'm a bit worried that if civs/leaders are only sold in packs instead of individually, they will combine popular and less popular choices in a pack and "force" me to buy, e.g., Canada when I actually want Burgundy or the Kingdom of France. Yet, maybe because I'm getting older, I like it when new civs are trickling in one by one, but just making one purchase. It allows me and motivates me to play a game each time. I'm also not at all opposed to games as service or long/extensive DLC plans (e.g., EU4, CK2, AoE2, or Anno 1800). It's a good way to keep my interest in a game that I already know how to play going for years. But if I get the feeling that something is missing for no good reason besides to sell it later (as religion in civ 5, world congress in civ 6, and now some "core" civs) I always feel exploited.

What I really hate is the founders edition having exclusive content (2 personas) that are only available until the end of February '25. That's just very consumer-unfriendly. Worse even, the one included persona that has been revealed seems to be a good one I'd like to have.

But of course, one of the worst things I ever saw in video game marketing is the fact that you can buy a collector's edition of a game that doesn't include the game itself. That's just... I don't know an appropriate name in English.

 

[Black Gate]

It's incredibly overpriced compared to what you get. Almost all expansions are. But at least all expansions and packs were completely optional in civ 6, and I hope this stays like this with 7. I'm a bit worried that if civs/leaders are only sold in packs instead of individually, they will combine popular and less popular choices in a pack and "force" me to buy, e.g., Canada when I actually want Burgundy or the Kingdom of France. Yet, maybe because I'm getting older, I like it when new civs are trickling in one by one, but just making one purchase. It allows me and motivates me to play a game each time. I'm also not at all opposed to games as service or long/extensive DLC plans (e.g., EU4, CK2, AoE2, or Anno 1800). It's a good way to keep my interest in a game that I already know how to play going for years. But if I get the feeling that something is missing for no good reason besides to sell it later (as religion in civ 5, world congress in civ 6, and now some "core" civs) I always feel exploited.

What I really hate is the founders edition having exclusive content (2 personas) that are only available until the end of February '25. That's just very consumer-unfriendly. Worse even, the one included persona that has been revealed seems to be a good one I'd like to have.

But of course, one of the worst things I ever saw in video game marketing is the fact that you can buy a collector's edition of a game that doesn't include the game itself. That's just... I don't know an appropriate name in English.

As far as we can tell from the Switch eShop, it counts there being seven separate DLCs per pack. That suggests to me that each leader/civ can be purchased separately, and the last option of the seven is the full pack (including the "special cosmetic bonus" perhaps?) and the wonders are included with the civs.

 

[stealth_nsk]

As far as we can tell from the Switch eShop, it counts there being seven separate DLCs per pack. That suggests to me that each leader/civ can be purchased separately, and the last option of the seven is the full pack (including the "special cosmetic bonus" perhaps?) and the wonders are included with the civs.

I suppose it's Switch-only thing, probably enforced by some Nintendo rules.

 

[pokiehl]

That suggests to me that each leader/civ can be purchased separately, and the last option of the seven is the full pack (including the "special cosmetic bonus" perhaps?) and the wonders are included with the civs.

I wasn’t sure that I agreed with this, but to your point, both the Leader Pass and New Frontier Pass were able to be purchased piecemeal, so you might be right.

 

[chaosprophet]

It's just that remember, it's civFANATICS and it holds its name very well. As you can see not everybody is super-enthusiastic for the game but generally those voices are lost in fan noise because there's nothing to say anymore when you just said "I will not buy the game" for example. Trust me, it's a natural phenomenon that in this forum, the last word will go to the fans. Just because it's the forum reason to be you know... it's physics.

And then, it is more like that some negative views lose steam after a while, either because someone who dislikes it a lot will likely soon lose the motivation to keep following close for news or those who like enough to be following can only say so much about the topics they dislike about it.

But we got plenty of diverging and negative comments, at some points they even being the louder ones for a while. And whenever there is some news there is bound to be at least a small surge of those. And I often see plenty of people who likes a lot of the new things but mentions they dislike for something,

I'm so excited for the game that I don't tend to comment on the few things I'm mixed about, but there is things like the likely only smaller maps at release. I'm the type that always play huge, and often with even less civs than the standard amount for that map size cause I like playing in maps with lots of space, lots of things to explore (the eXplore is my favorite of the 4Xs)

What I really hate is the founders edition having exclusive content (2 personas) that are only available until the end of February '25. That's just very consumer-unfriendly. Worse even, the one included persona that has been revealed seems to be a good one I'd like to have.

That is something I'm not a fan of, even though I'm buying that version. I really dislike any gameplay elements being time locked or only available for a version. I hope it means at least that the Founders Content Pack may not be available after that, but the content with gameplay effect, the two personas, will be sold later on.

 

[j51]

But if I get the feeling that something is missing for no good reason besides to sell it later (as religion in civ 5, world congress in civ 6, and now some "core" civs) I always feel exploited.

I pretty much agree with all of your points except this. They should have paid us to to take the world congress.

 

[Siptah]

I pretty much agree with all of your points except this. They should have paid us to to take the world congress.

I fully agree. I didn’t want to imply that the one we got was good, just that I felt it was missing from 6 at release.

 

[Stoic]

I think the most radical change in the series was to eliminate humankid, which is why there are too many similarities. Humankid is truly destroyed with these new game implementations.