Since the ideas thread has ballooned to ridiculous size, I am sure my ideas will be drowned in the sea of random thoughts. So here's my input on Civ 4.
The thing that has been lacking in Civilization games until now is a sense of creativity on part of the creators. They study their history but the whole thing about this game is that you are re-writing history. All the units and city structures are based on the assumption that everything will go as it did in history. Lame.
Examples:
The Americans build the best fighter jet in the end, but remember that for a time it was the Germans who had dominance of fighter combat with the Me-262 jet. If you are the Germans and you're the most advanced, why should the Americans suddenly pull ahead with their ass-kicking fighter if they are significantly behind you (and you're just blowing cash on silly Future Techs because all the real technologies are gone)?
In other words, they need to account for these kinds of things. There should be no civilization who has a unique unit contemporary to the final era. If there were a Stealth FIGHTER unit (as in the F-22, not the pseudo-fighter F-117) then that could be the final air combat unit.
Next, while on the subject of air units, there is not a whole lot of realism. The first bomber is a B-17 and they skip over the B-52 jet bomber era and go straight to the Stealth Bomber. Now last time I checked the first bombers were in World War 1 and were clunky pieces of crap and we did not come out of World War 2 and invent a high tech flying wing. So what I'm saying is, first off, make the first era of planes include the biplane bomber and fighter, the second include a P-51 and a B-17, then make the Jet Age with the jet fighter and a new jet bomber based on the B-52.
Additionally, because the cold war ended prematurely, we never really utilized technologies that would have been suited to fighting it but in your civ game, you may damn well fight a war in the modern era versus a huge civilization, which means you should have the option to build B-1 supersonic bombers (capable of carrying nukes), SR-71 Blackbirds, and high-supersonic bombers like the XB-70 Valkyrie.
In the modern age, anyone who knows about modern warfare knows that treads are becoming passe. Wheels allow faster vehicles, they're cheaper to maintain, and don't break down as much. Thus, the final armor unit should be a tank based on this technology and given 4 instead of 3 movement points. Additionally future artillery should get at least 2 points so it does not putt along as though pulled by horses.
Now away from the subject of armies, there is also the issue of buildings. Why do the Germans build a forbidden palace that looks like it's Chinese? Why in the modern age are the cities' temples a bunch of Stonehenges? There needs to be more building variation based on time and place. If the Europeans make pyramids they should be made of grey stones, if the Aztecs build them they should be of the step design that they are in real life. Modern buildings show very little difference from each other but imagine if it were not the Europeans who first advanced into the modern age. Maybe skyscrapers would look totally different if it were the Aztecs who built them. That should be taken into account. Any building, whether it be a colosseum or a temple or a library or a barracks should be styled along those guidelines.
I don't have time to keep going on about this but I'll wrap up with another brief thought. Why do amateur spearmen do even one point of damage to an elite Modern Armor? Why does it take about ten reloads before a stealth bomber conducts a successful precision strike? The people who designed the combat system need to be fired and replaced because it's ridiculously unrealistic. Smart bombs are accurate about 95% of the time these days assuming the target is stationary. Therefore in the game 95% of your precision strikes should be successful, but in fact it's more like 10%.
Lame lame lame!
The thing that has been lacking in Civilization games until now is a sense of creativity on part of the creators. They study their history but the whole thing about this game is that you are re-writing history. All the units and city structures are based on the assumption that everything will go as it did in history. Lame.
Examples:
The Americans build the best fighter jet in the end, but remember that for a time it was the Germans who had dominance of fighter combat with the Me-262 jet. If you are the Germans and you're the most advanced, why should the Americans suddenly pull ahead with their ass-kicking fighter if they are significantly behind you (and you're just blowing cash on silly Future Techs because all the real technologies are gone)?
In other words, they need to account for these kinds of things. There should be no civilization who has a unique unit contemporary to the final era. If there were a Stealth FIGHTER unit (as in the F-22, not the pseudo-fighter F-117) then that could be the final air combat unit.
Next, while on the subject of air units, there is not a whole lot of realism. The first bomber is a B-17 and they skip over the B-52 jet bomber era and go straight to the Stealth Bomber. Now last time I checked the first bombers were in World War 1 and were clunky pieces of crap and we did not come out of World War 2 and invent a high tech flying wing. So what I'm saying is, first off, make the first era of planes include the biplane bomber and fighter, the second include a P-51 and a B-17, then make the Jet Age with the jet fighter and a new jet bomber based on the B-52.
Additionally, because the cold war ended prematurely, we never really utilized technologies that would have been suited to fighting it but in your civ game, you may damn well fight a war in the modern era versus a huge civilization, which means you should have the option to build B-1 supersonic bombers (capable of carrying nukes), SR-71 Blackbirds, and high-supersonic bombers like the XB-70 Valkyrie.
In the modern age, anyone who knows about modern warfare knows that treads are becoming passe. Wheels allow faster vehicles, they're cheaper to maintain, and don't break down as much. Thus, the final armor unit should be a tank based on this technology and given 4 instead of 3 movement points. Additionally future artillery should get at least 2 points so it does not putt along as though pulled by horses.
Now away from the subject of armies, there is also the issue of buildings. Why do the Germans build a forbidden palace that looks like it's Chinese? Why in the modern age are the cities' temples a bunch of Stonehenges? There needs to be more building variation based on time and place. If the Europeans make pyramids they should be made of grey stones, if the Aztecs build them they should be of the step design that they are in real life. Modern buildings show very little difference from each other but imagine if it were not the Europeans who first advanced into the modern age. Maybe skyscrapers would look totally different if it were the Aztecs who built them. That should be taken into account. Any building, whether it be a colosseum or a temple or a library or a barracks should be styled along those guidelines.
I don't have time to keep going on about this but I'll wrap up with another brief thought. Why do amateur spearmen do even one point of damage to an elite Modern Armor? Why does it take about ten reloads before a stealth bomber conducts a successful precision strike? The people who designed the combat system need to be fired and replaced because it's ridiculously unrealistic. Smart bombs are accurate about 95% of the time these days assuming the target is stationary. Therefore in the game 95% of your precision strikes should be successful, but in fact it's more like 10%.
Lame lame lame!
