They sold an unfinished game. :(

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Well, you could make the same argument that Civ3 complete wasn't finished as it has something unfixed and unbalanced.
 
Smidlee said:
Well, you could make the same argument that Civ3 complete wasn't finished as it has something unfixed and unbalanced.
Right, but we are talking about Civ4 here, aren't we?

I miss the point, when somebody tells us: "Yes, but game xyz wasn't finished either!".
If the a/c in my car doesn't work properly, it doesn't help me a bit to point out that a different model may have unsufficient brakes.

Therefore the question is quite simple: Can we assume a game to be finished with so many problems in game balance, as we find in Civ4?
 
Commander Bello said:
I am a little bit surprised that we don't hear anything anymore from the defenders, as soon as some facts from the game are put on the table.

I understand that it may be easier to counter a general statement "the game wasn't finished" with a similarily general statement "oh yes, it was!".

I'd guess that Urederra, King Flevance, some others and myself have put quite some valid arguments on the table. If we actually were wrong, I would have assumed the supporters of game and company to happily jump onto our errors. Since they obviously don't, I have to assume that our argumentation is valid.

This is about as intellectually dishonest as you can get. We're under an NDA not to talk about anything that went on during testing, and you have to know that. Of course any statements Dale or myself might make are going to be general. How could they be otherwise?

I've told you guys the extent of what I can, that pretty much everything you don't like about Civ4 is a design decision and not the result of an unfinished game. Yes, it was tested, and yes, I'm quite pleased with the game that we ended up with. At this point, all I can say is that if you genuinely don't like it, then please play Civ3 or some other game, and I don't mean that in an impolite way.

Bello's strawman argument at the end of that last post is just classic. :)

Anyway, I'm not going to waste any more time on this issue. There's no point in debating with people who have convinced themselves that Civ4 must be unfinished because feature ____ is not in the game. I'm sure in the bizarro world of Civ4 conspiracies that this will be seen as an admission of guilt, but I trust that most readers will be able to look at this more objectively. :king:
 
Heheh, that was what I was going to post, that I suspected the NDA had something to do with it. I wasn't sure if this only covered the actual time during beta test, but also after it, but apparently it does.

Another reason that might prevent people who know more about the details from posting more detailed responses might also be a legal issue. IANAL but I've read that in the US, companies won't acknowledge ideas put to them by individuals. If e.g. you send an idea to Apple stating 'wouldn't it be a good idea to have feature X on the iPod' their legal department will send back to you a formal letter that they won't acknowledge any ideas (if they're sending a reply at all). The same idea might be valid here. If Take2/Firaxis would openly acknowledge some of the ideas that come up in forums like this and put it into the next patch/expansion/release of the game, they could run a risk being sued by someone who had posted something similar and him/her saying 'you stole my idea so I want to be compensated'. Or worse: 'I want you to stop selling the game because it contains some of my ideas'.

I don't think being aggressive or demanding about any issue with the game will get you anywhere. Imo the 'royal' way would be to state in the forums in a reasonable way the things you think are missing in the game or could be improved upon. Flames don't get serious attention by the developers I'm sure, no matter if they contain valid points, but if you're reasonable in your criticism and come up with constructive ideas, the developers might pick it up (I know some do read the forums) even if they don't acknowledge anyone for it. And who knows, you might even be invited as a beta tester for the next product.
 
shinah said:
Heheh, that was what I was going to post, that I suspected the NDA had something to do with it. I wasn't sure if this only covered the actual time during beta test, but also after it, but apparently it does.

The NDAs I have signed in the past have all been binding forever.
 
What Sullla said. I don't want to jeapordise any possible future dealings with Firaxis by talking about what happened and why.

I got plans ya know! :)

Dale
 
Commander Bello said:
I'd guess that Urederra, King Flevance, some others and myself have put quite some valid arguments on the table. If we actually were wrong, I would have assumed the supporters of game and company to happily jump onto our errors. Since they obviously don't, I have to assume that our argumentation is valid.

That or they got bored arguing about something that can never be proven.

If the expansion had been called Civ 4: Diplomats, some people would be complaining that the diplomacy system was not complete. If it had been called Civ 4: Astronauts and added new space items or mechanincs, they would have said the modern era was not completed. Civ 4: Religion, they released an incomplete religion system! There is no pleasing some and most sucessful companies understand that you can't spend too much time listening to your reliable fanboys or constant critics. The market lies somewhere in between.
 
@ Sullla & Dale:
I understand that you are under a NDA. Actually, it was not my intention to "make" you break it in any way.
But you somehow answered my not very well (as I admit) articulated question:
So, what I find faulty in air and naval combat was an intentionally taken design decision.

We may finish this discussion by stating that what some people here regard to be a weak design and / or to leave certain things missing was intended to work this way.
This seems to be a clear statement, and now that we know about it, everybody can make his own judgement about this. I am pretty sure, some people will dislike it, and some will like it. That is o.k, with me, but finally at least we know about it.
File closed, as far as I am regarded.
 
Commander Bello said:
I am a little bit surprised that we don't hear anything anymore from the defenders, as soon as some facts from the game are put on the table.

I understand that it may be easier to counter a general statement "the game wasn't finished" with a similarily general statement "oh yes, it was!".

I'd guess that Urederra, King Flevance, some others and myself have put quite some valid arguments on the table. If we actually were wrong, I would have assumed the supporters of game and company to happily jump onto our errors. Since they obviously don't, I have to assume that our argumentation is valid.

I'll reinforce what Sulla said with the additional comment that many of us have lives to live outside of bickering on Forums. Thus, like him this will be the last time I'll be posting on this thread as well since I get enough of beating my head against concrete walls at home with my two year old and five month old (and at least they're cuter than Flevance and Bello ;) ). It will also be pretty general, not because I'm some beta tester with an NDA, just someone who can actually look at THE WHOLE GAME and say, "They did a pretty good job on this."

I love how the malcontent contingent ignores the value of the Promotion System. So what if it allows you to make your own 'TOW Infantry' with Ambush, or 'Scout Cars' with Sentry, or 'MASH Units' with Explorers and Medic, or 'Royal Marines' with Redcoats and Amphibious or... Even with the vanilla promotions, the possibilities for some suprisingly effective combinations are so great, I can't imagine having enough time to complain that The Great Wall isn't in (even though there's another Wonder that performs the equivalent funtion). As if that weren't enough, you now have Civics which uncouple government choices that were previously joined. Thus, if you want a massive conquering army (or armies) and a vast Empire, you can do it with the income of Free Speech, the Unit Production boost of Police State, and the distance maintenence reduction of State Property or you could run a highly trained force with Vassalage and Theocracy while funding them with Free Market and large numbers of Merchants from Caste System or... The point is that there are several new, broad, signifigant concepts added in CIV that seem to be ignored in light of grouseing over some narrow ones that are not in the game or have a reduced role. This suggests to me a change in design philosophy from previous iterrations of Civ, not something rushed out a door or witheld by evil capitalists in collusion to force us to buy and expansion.


Which brings us to an interesting problem: just how does someone convice the malcontents when the basis of the post is a conspiracy theory in the first place? The only people with real information to share are those in Firaxis and the beta testers. However, the initial theory automatically discounts any information they might give as false or misleading. Trying to work back from other aspects, like concepts included or not included is also doomed to failure since what one considers to be a 'finished implementation' varies from poster to poster. There are several reasons that a concept can be left off a project and it can happen at several different stages from the early conception to the beta test phase. The suggestion that Firaxis should have just kept working until all these concepts were working is spurrious since some may have been discarded years ago, not just recently. It seems even more petty when you consider that most of the complaints center around air and later naval combat: both encompassing only 60 years in actual history (~1% of recorded human history). As a programmer, I'm often asked to make changes and improvements to projects. However, if this improvement is only beneficial to a few users but is either detrimental to the majority of others or might keep the project delayed too long, it is set aside for future consideration. This isn't conspiracy, nor does it make the final project 'unfinished'; it's simply the reality of limited resources and limited time for any business.


I know, in the end, we'll have to agree to disagree. I just have a hard time with people whose tunnel vision on particular items (like naval bombardment, cutting trade versus going to war, or limited air combat) keep them from either acknowledging or enjoying that there are perfectly rational explinations for such (farms/mines too decentralized versus city, tells you on the screen why AI will/won't do something, land-based units have a more logical intercept algorithm) or enjoying the far richer game we have even for warmongers with Promotions, Civics, Cultural defenses, etc. If you can't accept this, then you're likely to find that your gaming options are getting as narrow as your vision. :(
 
I began to see this thread as a stalemate of as Bello put it "It's incomplete" vs "No it wasn't". I was decided to simply just read what other posted and I dont even want to bring up now, with responses. I will say that I thought that many good arguements were made against the so called finished product from posters.

I see this thread as coming to an end on agreeing to disagree. I do hope Firaxis completes the game for others like me and myself included. Only time will see. Look at it this way though. Since so many people that hated 3 seem to love 4, maybe those of us that have a distaste for 4 will recieve a nice 5. Or better yet, maybe on 5 we will all be content.

With that I am out of here with maybe a check back here or there before I kill this from my subscription. It was a good topic of discussion to have with other posters that see the game with the same respect I do. At least we aren't the only ones.
 
Catcher said:
I'll reinforce what Sulla said with the additional comment that many of us have lives to live outside of bickering on Forums. Thus, like him this will be the last time I'll be posting on this thread as well since I get enough of beating my head against concrete walls at home with my two year old and five month old (and at least they're cuter than Flevance and Bello ;) ). It will also be pretty general, not because I'm some beta tester with an NDA, just someone who can actually look at THE WHOLE GAME and say, "They did a pretty good job on this."
Nice attempt to drop something and then run away in despair ;)
Catcher said:
I love how the malcontent contingent ignores the value of the Promotion System. So what if it allows you to make your own 'TOW Infantry' with Ambush, or 'Scout Cars' with Sentry, or 'MASH Units' with Explorers and Medic, or 'Royal Marines' with Redcoats and Amphibious or... Even with the vanilla promotions, the possibilities for some suprisingly effective combinations are so great, I can't imagine having enough time to complain that The Great Wall isn't in (even though there's another Wonder that performs the equivalent funtion).
Except that there are no promotions for air units.
Catcher said:
[... excluded the part about the civics and the conspiration theory, as this doesn't regard to my statements] The suggestion that Firaxis should have just kept working until all these concepts were working is spurrious since some may have been discarded years ago, not just recently. It seems even more petty when you consider that most of the complaints center around air and later naval combat: both encompassing only 60 years in actual history (~1% of recorded human history). As a programmer, I'm often asked to make changes and improvements to projects. However, if this improvement is only beneficial to a few users but is either detrimental to the majority of others or might keep the project delayed too long, it is set aside for future consideration. This isn't conspiracy, nor does it make the final project 'unfinished'; it's simply the reality of limited resources and limited time for any business.
Ok.. so you are looking at the whole game, as you stated, and you just miss that air and naval warfare may only cover "60 years in human history" (around 100 years, when I count it for air warfare and much more for naval warfare) but some good 150 - 200 turns in the game?

Please, would you be so kind as to tell us, for which company you are programming? I would like to avoid any product you may have contributed to.
Catcher said:
I know, in the end, we'll have to agree to disagree. I just have a hard time with people whose tunnel vision on particular items (like naval bombardment, cutting trade versus going to war, or limited air combat) keep them from either acknowledging or enjoying that there are perfectly rational explinations for such (farms/mines too decentralized versus city, tells you on the screen why AI will/won't do something, land-based units have a more logical intercept algorithm) or enjoying the far richer game we have even for warmongers with Promotions, Civics, Cultural defenses, etc. If you can't accept this, then you're likely to find that your gaming options are getting as narrow as your vision. :(
The compliment about the tunnel vision may very well hit yourself. A mine of an oil well in the concept of the game is that powerful to provide a whole empire for its whole history with certain ressources. And you are nitpicking about the size of a mine in the real world?
Once again, I would like to avoid any product of your company.

Obviously, you like the game in its current state. This is fine with me.
Obviously as well, you haven't got the concept at all.
So, please go on headbanging with your children, they seem to be a more appropriate partner for you than others here. :lol:
 
Commander Bello said:
Obviously, you like the game in its current state. This is fine with me.
Obviously as well, you haven't got the concept at all.
So, please go on headbanging with your children, they seem to be a more appropriate partner for you than others here. :lol:

I don't have an opinion on this issue one way or the other, but it seems to me that the flaming, baiting and belittling of anyone who has an opinion different from your own adds little to the overall productive nature of the discourse so far.
 
Lord Olleus said:
Combat has been dumbed down? Are you a complete idiot?

Why do some people constantly cry foul every time a discusion dosn't go there way or their opinion, in this case. I saw two or three members push through a wall of one sided opinions taunts and layers of sarcasm in just these few pages. They used supported opinions to make people believe their side, not the " we'll make believe" using the company line. :mischief: The OPs point was proven now we see defensive maneuverings all of a sudden. it was followed by this last quote "Hey thats not nice",

Whats that? the quote your looking at or Bello defending his words. You said you not subjestive, I quess you only tuned in on the last post. Ill tell you what happened. No mod came to talk to this real 'flamer' but Commader Bello and King Flev replied to these kind of posts. They punished out right ignorance with proof. If there going to dish out it be ready to roll with the punches. That goes for both sides no? (lets say this is a fairest way to deal with disputes) ;)

I come to the end of a mostly good read after seeing one side has "hit a wall" :wallbash: One side leaves politly after proving and defending the OP's every word with the quote "We agree to disagree", Well the other side starts with the " lets say that we have better things to argue about were to cool to be disscussing this now, and by the way My kids are cuter then you :(

Joe Come'on man listen, let the mods handle this stuff you can't be judging who's in the wrong if your one-sided or not gettin the the whole story,
 
Armorydave said:
That or they got bored arguing about something that can never be proven.

As I stated in my last post, if I were 100 % sure I wouldn't even have cared to open this thread. But, same as with the modern times graphics, only time will tell. If the expansion focus on warfare too much, my suspicions would be proven true.

If the expansion had been called Civ 4: Diplomats, some people would be complaining that the diplomacy system was not complete. If it had been called Civ 4: Astronauts and added new space items or mechanincs, they would have said the modern era was not completed. Civ 4: Religion, they released an incomplete religion system!

If the expansion had been called Civ 4: Missionaries, and they bombard you with the previews saying that there is gonna be a new great person, the great prophet (not included in the vanilla version, which has great artists, great engineers, great scientists and great military leaders), new world wonders, like the spiral minaret, and you are going to be able to send missionaries to convert other cities, wouldn't you be suspicious? Wouldn't it look like as if they were going to finish the religion system in the expansion? Same as with warlords. It is even more clear with warlords, since the great military leader was already in Civ III.

Is the great military leader bad implemented in civ III? Maybe. but why did they wait to implement and balance it in the expansion? It is a new idea? No, it is not.

In my previous post I explained what 'expansion' means to me, and what 'completion' means to me. If you have a house without bathrooms and you add a bathroom, that is not an expansion, is finishing the house.
 
I do not know whether the game was sold unfinished (I do think it was rushed and not tested in all aspects as the initial hiccups suggest). Maybe the elements were intended to work the way they do.

But then I ask again (I did many times before). Why is there no civic combination that allows for a proper warfare game. It annoys me to no end to start ridiculous HM (that's happy management iso MM). If the constant issue is WW and how to overcome that, something is broken here.

Have you tried and play a team AW game with the AI? The WW IS broken, full stop. It hasn't been tested, that's what I claim. If it had been intended to work that way, then I think fun gets a new definition.

All the promotions are beautiful. However, with the erratic RnG, those precious units die as well at one point (unless you do not use them). In the end, it does not really matter much and the concept of more = merrier is true anyway. SOD is well and alive and the only way to win big battles, was that really intended when we heard the opposite for a long time.

Units are too simplified, especially air and sea. Yes, older Civ versions suffered the same. But if promotions are the way to enhance this and diversify, the issue is that we have to get them to higher exp point first anyway (well, I do not think bombers get exp points anyway ;) )

So, maybe it was all intended to work the way it does, the simplifications, weird artillery, heavy nerfing to weaken the human, etc etc. But it did one thing for me, the fun I had with all other Civ versions before was lost on the way...which is sad to say the least :(
 
Oh... were you the one who opened a thread about total war and WW? sorry, I thought it was Tr1cky.

Don't worry too much, if my suspicions are correct, there will a trait or two and another (great or national) wonder to decrease war wariness in the next "expansion"
 
Urederra said:
OK, I have played CIV iV for some time, not as much as many people in these forums though, but I have also read many posts in these forums and my impression is that they sold us a game which is not finished yet.

I am not talking about bugs and the lack of throne chamber or palace view. I am talking about that one key feature of the series was INTENTIONALLY left unfinished. The warmongering.

If you look carefully you'll notice that. Here are some clues, I am sure that warmongers who played more than me can add some points to this list
  • Domination victories are usually more difficult than cultural or space race victories.
  • Many unit types are missing. Particularly siege weapons. You'll keep playing with catapults forever, until you upgrade them to cannons. Trebuchets are obviously missing in the game. But is not only that ones, there is only one type of missiles.
  • Naval and air warfare is dumbed down. There are also very few types of naval wessels.
  • Fewer world wonders to help the warmongering. No Great wall, no Leonardo's workshop (BTW, did it really exist in first place?)
  • As Tr1cky pointed out, (I think It was him) there is a always war option which is umplayable in many circumstances due to the war weariness.
  • EDIT: Added from post #17. GREAT LEADERS. One of the most succesful additions of Civ III, great leaders, is missing in CIV IV. How could they add great prophets, great artists, great scientists and great engineers and leave the original great leaders out?

You can add more points if you like, but I think you'll get the message.

The point is that they INTENTIONALLY left all those things out. Why? to sell the expansion. As Jesse Smith confessed in gamespot:



Bolding is mine. So, in my opinion, they sold an unfinished game. It is true that you can enjoy the game, have some cultural, space race or even domination victories, but, compared to the other iterations of the series, the game is not completed. It will be when they release Warlords.


:cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

So if you don't like the game, don't play it. Return it, and move on. if it's too late to return it, then you aren't smart enough to figure that out in time. The game is one of the best strategy games ever created. IF not, play the one you think is. Or mod the heck out of it so it suits you.

You're whining like the company didn't personally contact you and ask what was most important to you. Grow up. They specifically designed the game so that if you don't like the way they designed it, you could alter the game to be how you want it. Firaxis or Take 2 doesn't owe you anything (even though you think so). The game works, they corrected bugs a couple of times with patches. Other than that they aren't required to do anything (most especially please you). Again, instead of spending all this time and energy complaining that they didnt' create a game specifically for you, develop a mod so that it is. That is what many others have done and have made a great game spectacular. That is what the rest of us are doing....
 
I guess this really depends on your definition of finished!
No software ever ships totally finished there are always outstanding bugs and design issues, always.
And there are always badly needed features that slip into the next release, it is a fact of life in s/w devt.

Was Civ4 better or worse than the average might be a better question...
 
homersheineken said:
[...]
So if you don't like the game, don't play it. Return it, and move on. if it's too late to return it, then you aren't smart enough to figure that out in time.
So, if you don't like threads with critism, don't read them.
If you already typed an answer, this is only proof that you weren't smart enough to identify the subject of the thread in time.
homersheineken said:
The game is one of the best strategy games ever created.
Now, this is really a good one.... :D
homersheineken said:
You're whining like the company didn't personally contact you and ask what was most important to you. Grow up. [bla bla bla deleted]
No, he isn't. He is stating facts which are hard to refute.

Of course, for us who are limited to watch the result of 24 months of development, it is impossible to prove that the game was not finished. We have to rely on the statements of people who obviously took part in the creation process, at which role ever.
Nevertheless, even under the assumption that the game now exactly works as it was intended to work, this doesn't mean that the intention was very well defined.
Personally, I see many flaws in the concept, as I have mentioned in postings above already and therefore will not repeat here.
In fact I think that the "great general" was one of the first concepts which was requested and discussed in the modding area.

That you don't like others to state their critism is your personal right. Yet, it is the personal right of those others, to have their opinion as well. And, based on the arguments in this very thread, those others have backed up their opinion with better arguments than you did, as far as I see it.

So, if this game is that perfect, why do you bother yourself to hang around here and read threads which you obviously don't like, instead of continuing happy gaming? Hm? :mischief:
 
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