(Poll) How important is the Multiplayer in Civ.4 too you?

[SonicX]

It will be VERY important to me although I've only played 2 MM games in the past. The reason for that is that 3 of my friends at college also are going to buy the game, love epic games and we're planning on playing eachother over the internet quite often
So the "save MM game" option is real good thing ...

I just hope they ain't failing when some ports are blocked and firewalls enabled, as we can't get to those setting because it's a university internet line we'll be using

 

[Sub]

I voted that I don't plan on playing it. Civ is a great single player game... I just can't see it being a good multiplayer one.

 

[vbraun]

Anonymous internet multiplayer sucks, as anyone who is losing just quits.

Go join the ladder, they don't quit.

 

[SonicX]

Or play friends and laugh at them when you see em in real life again

 

[joethreeblah]

I don't understand why someone wouldn't try it or would say that it is a single player game. If they made it good enough, wouldn't your standard single player game be better if the only difference was that the AI was an actual human making (un)intelligent / unpredictable decisions?

 

[apatheist]

Anonymous internet multiplayer sucks, as anyone who is losing just quits.

That's why I suggested a reliability rating system in another thread akin to what is used by Play-By-Email (PBEM) Diplomacy. Basically, you get a point for every turn you are in a game that you submit your moves "on time" (according to the agreed-upon game settings), and you lose a lot of points for quitting a game. You get bonus points for taking over someone else's abandoned position. There would be a database of players, each with a reliability rating. When starting a multiplayer game, the initiator could say that only players with a reliability of 400 or higher were allowed in. That doesn't address a player taking over an abandoned position and then throwing the game to another player, but it's still a 90% solution.

I'd rather that they spent all that time on AI.

Ah, but how do they know how the AI should play against a human player without seeing two human players going at it? How do they know the game is balanced and the AI is flawed, or vice versa without being able to test the game without any AI?

 

[Commander Bello]

As my time is quite restricted, I don't have much multiplayer experience. And the bit I have, was not promising, as the games were suddenly ended by either lost connections or due to players leaving the game.
All of this seems to be adressed, yet I am much more interested in a good SP game (aka strong AI) or maybe even some good PBEM options. That's it for me.

 

[Sullla]

Most people will probably play Civ4 as a Single-Player only game. However, if the game is as stable as Firaxis claims it will be, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of formerly Single-Player only folks find their way into a Multi-Player game eventually. There's supposed to be team play in Civ4, which I think will hold a lot of promise; imagine a team of 5 humans banding together on one team to fight a team of 5 Deity AIs! As long as it works as advertised, that's something I'd like to try.

 

[Avayaman]

important but not quite... if i had the oppurtunity, it would be fun to play with friends. but majority of my time will be spent playing civ... during the wee hours of the mornings, and it will mostly likely be quite an erratic schedule. which means a good civ AI would still be priority first... after all, it would be hard to finish a game with more than 3 players... the empty slot would still have to be filled by AI.

 

[Desert Fox]

It really depends on how the game acts online. The lag was bad with civ3 for me and rarely could I ever get the game to work online. Firewall or not, however I do like to play online with a friend cooperatively.

 

[Phoenix_56721]

Interesting results so far, seem like the Nay's have it for now. I would like to run this same Poll after Civ.4 has been out for 6 months or so, too see if any has changed their mind and started playing multiplayer.

 

[vbraun]

My brother and I will play Civ4 MP all the time. Its going to be awesome!!

 

[spongeman2007]

If they improve the mp in civ4 i would play it a lot more. I just can't take waiting for an hour just to get into a game that works! When you finally do get in a game on civ3 you still might not play because of all the bugs. I'm sure people would play more mp games if it wasn't such a hassle. A good thing for the mp would be that you could see who's online and maybe some people could create there own games, like on warcraft3.

 

[mastertyguy]

It is not important at all

 

[Gr3yL3gion]

Not likely to play multiplayer game at all.

 

[Crimso]

Man! I am so surprised at the number of people who just plain don't think Civ 4 has any potential as a multiplayer game. Playing against other people opens up so many more opprotunities gameplay wise. If you find something that is effective against the AI (i.e. artillery in Civ III), you'll keep using it again and again. The AI doesn't wise up, but humans do. This forces you to employ everything you've got, and change your tactics from game to game. The AI is scripted, and I'm getting sick of making up my own counter-script.

Anyway, one thing that will surely make multiplayer much more fun is the removal of ages and so many prerequisite technologies. It means Civs can become much more specialized and efficient in achieving their target victory condition. It also opens up many more paths through the tech tree, something which was really lost between Civ II and III.

My only concern is the advantage of a great starting location. Unfortunately, many multiplayer games I've played have been decided on that die roll alone. You're much more pressured to keep your start because sometimes it's hard to get a game together in the first place.

 

[nicae]

very interesting results - many people dont plan to use MP at all!
that points out how the game really depends on stuff like AI, etc.

i myself dont plan on playing MP. i like civ for fiddling around with the people under the game rules, most of the time using cheats - something that we all know does not belong in MP!

 

[HourlyDaily]

MP does make for a different experience and gameplay - but often people don't have the same maps and modifications and setting up a game between friends over a LAN can take a fair amount of effort. Then there is the issue with players dropping out. I wouldn't blame the developers for any of those issues at all, I'd credit them for trying to make it user-friendly.

If the SP is challenging and fun enough then that will satisfy me more than the occasional MP game.

 

[Pacifist]

I'm a careful player and play like a turtle. No one would ever want to play with me using a turn-based option because they would get too impatient waiting for me to finish my turns

For simultaneous turns, I would get beaten to a pulp every game because I'd be playing like it was turn-based. All my opponents would be way, way ahead of me. I would be greatly disadvantaged. The way Civilization plays, the longer you play, the more there is to manage, the longer I take to make sure I've done everything possible before I continue on. I'd be too focused trying to finish everything as quickly as possible instead of focusing on my strategy

If I can find others who enjoy taking their time just as much as I do, I suppose multiplayer would be a much richer experience for me.

Multiplayer seems to be geared more towards fast gameplay though, since the majority don't want very long games that takes forever to finish.

For me, I don't think Civilization is the type of game suitable for multiplayer. I'd rather stick with RPG and RTS type of games when it comes to multiplayer gaming

-Pacifist-
"Its good to play together" --Xbox Live

 

[kryszcztov]

@ Pacifist : We seem to have the same way of handling a game like Civ. Maybe I can suggest you paid us a visit at a certain site listed in my sig ? PBEM is also in the "multiplayer" league, but this time it's about taking all the time you want during your turns. Or you could wait and see what this PitBoss server is about ?