This is what happens when asking about multiplayer or modding ...

[homan1983]

Looking at civ6 for more than 5 minutes, it's pretty obvious it's the same engine base. It's new in the sense that windows 10 is a new platform compared to windows.

One of the things that looks to be much improved is the terrain no longer being blurry and loading on screen scroll. I haven't noticed it at all in any of the streams or let's plays.

 

[redwings1340]

Ok, admittedly, Civ isn't starcraft, I get that. Still, Warcraft 2, a game released in 1995, had halfway decent modding and mapmaking tools with it. I still think a basic map editor would be pretty good. In my experience better modding tools creates more mods in general of good and bad quality, which is generally good.

I could be being harsh on Civ V because my main experience with it is on a mac though, and modding on the mac version was really annoying and/or impossible.

 

[Lyoncet]

Looking at civ6 for more than 5 minutes, it's pretty obvious it's the same engine base. It's new in the sense that windows 10 is a new platform compared to windows.

What are you basing this on? This makes it sound like you're looking at just the outward appearance, but it's impossible to assess whether two games share the same engine just by looking at visual cues.

 

[Danzo_87]

the dev said they build a new engine for 6 though

 

[UncivilizedGuy]

I believe they said it's one big gas guzzling engine. Needs special wrenches to make modifications

 

[Sonereal]

Making modding easy leads to truckloads of random trash. If it is hard, at least harder at start, the people doing it are willing to invest time and effort, not just 'hey Ma I made a mod' and the overall results will be of better quality. Yes, it is an elitist way of thinking about it, but it is very annoying to trudge through the self-advertising junk when looking for something new.

It isn't just elitist, but also sorta wrong.

XCOM 2 has, since released, accumulated 2000+ mods. Are a lot of them garbage? Of course! However, 5% of 2000 versus 5% of 100 and I'm going to pick the former over the latter every single time.

 

[malekithau]

I facepalmed after reading the bottom comment - Why is Cleo non African looking? Because she was a Caucasian. Not every civilization to inhabit the continent of Africa was black regardless of how much certain groups wish so.

On topic - this close to release they should be giving at the very least a taster of modding tools. That said the amount of players who will mod is insignificant compared to those who play vanilla or will use any mods made. Perhaps they are more concerned about keeping the hype train puffing at this point.

 

[ww2commander]

Not having modding tools/wizards/what have you is really really lame at this point. You should not have to be a programmer to make a new civ for example. Just look at blizzard and their world Editors for warcraft 3 or starcraft 2, regular people can make big changes to the Maps and game play.
I have respect for those who know it of course but XML, API, LUA etc no regular person knows what that is! Why keep modding for the "elites" only? Maybe im spoiled by blizzard but we should not need a degree in programming to add a new unit or civ.
So i guess, no news means no news...

Hate saying it, but most games going forward will likely be more 'programmer' focused with regards to modding. The counter-argument most modders give is that the unshackled approach of not using proprietary editor allows greater creativity/flexibility. With a game that has so many 'moving parts' like Civ, its easier for Firaxis to just open up the DB, APIs and DLLs and let us figure it out....like we did in Civ V

However, I do agree that most companies can be more helpful in the graphics department. Now making units or any kind of graphic for Civ V was classed as 'elite' status. I tried and failed countless times following various forum tutorials

 

[ww2commander]

I facepalmed after reading the bottom comment - Why is Cleo non African looking? Because she was a Caucasian.

Greek heritage to be exact.

That technically means there are now 3 'Greek' leaders in the game

 

[stealth_nsk]

Greek heritage to be exact.

Macedonian

 

[ww2commander]

Macedonian

That's what I said...Greek

After all, calling Russians Vyatichi or Novgorodian is a bit unnecessary.

 

[mnf]

I disagree with the thinking that a higher barrier means better quality. No. It just means less absolute number of mods available. You get the illusion that there are more quality mods, but you are also not seeing beginner modders making mods that have a great idea who will go on to improve their mods to become great mods.

The internet if full of garbage, why aren't you calling for government regulation of the internet. Only PhD holders may post content on the internet, because they're more likely to create better content, making it easier to find. Those great artists who make excellent artistic works but only had high school education? They are not qualified to make content. That is basically what you are saying. Don't forget that knowing the tools doesn't make you a good creator. Just because you know programming, XML, LUA, knows how to run a proper development workflow, doesn't make your work better.

If you don't want to sort through the garbage, then wait for others to do so and filter the ratings. Those systems exist for a reason.

The publishing industry in Japan publishes tons of garbage every year, but they still have tons of good content, content that are creating millions or even billions in industry value. Why are the publishing houses still accepting just anybody and publishing works based on the merits of the work itself? Because they realize qualifications mean zilch when creativity is what you're after.

I'm glad Firaxis also realizes this and declares their goal of modding accessibility. I just hope their words will be accompanied by action soon.

 

[Haggbart]

Looking at civ6 for more than 5 minutes, it's pretty obvious it's the same engine base. It's new in the sense that windows 10 is a new platform compared to windows.

What? "Engine base"? Are you suggesting that you can say anything meaningful about the game engine based on similarities in look? There are quite a few games that look similar but have very different game engines. And cVI has a new 64 bit engine that support multi threading.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Well, in my book non-garbage mods include:
- Community patches. Those require huge programming skills anyway.
- New high-quality random map scripts (not static maps). Those require significant programming skills too.
- ... that's all.
Most of the other mods to me look like "Let's add some cool civilization no one ever heard of. The ability to kill all enemy units through diplomatic interface is historically accurate for them".

I'm not against people having fun with making mods, but the accessibility of mod making is not what makes game great. Although the power of mod making could.

 

[Gorbles]

Ok, admittedly, Civ isn't starcraft, I get that. Still, Warcraft 2, a game released in 1995, had halfway decent modding and mapmaking tools with it. I still think a basic map editor would be pretty good. In my experience better modding tools creates more mods in general of good and bad quality, which is generally good.

I could be being harsh on Civ V because my main experience with it is on a mac though, and modding on the mac version was really annoying and/or impossible.

Warcraft 2 was a game released in 1995. Files were stored on-disc outside of a (protected) archive and file formats in general were much more simplistic. Why are we making these comparisons?!

I'm a modder, I am absolutely for mod tools, and good modding tools. But folks need to temper their expectations - it isn't easy to make these things. You can't just point at another developer and say "look!".

 

[Gedemon]

Hate saying it, but most games going forward will likely be more 'programmer' focused with regards to modding. The counter-argument most modders give is that the unshackled approach of not using proprietary editor allows greater creativity/flexibility. With a game that has so many 'moving parts' like Civ, its easier for Firaxis to just open up the DB, APIs and DLLs and let us figure it out....like we did in Civ V

However, I do agree that most companies can be more helpful in the graphics department. Now making units or any kind of graphic for Civ V was classed as 'elite' status. I tried and failed countless times following various forum tutorials

Civ5 modding capability + working tools for the graphic assets, that would give us a solid base. I'm almost certain that we'll have to wait again some time before having access to the DLL, but I do hope that this time the graphic tools will be working on release without needing to be fixed by the community.

Now, having more simple tools for simple tasks would surely help to bring more people into modding, but if we have to choose, having only simple tools wouldn't allow anything else that new units and new civilizations based on what is already in game, we couldn't have any new gameplay features or add any new capacities to those new units/civilizations, they would simply be some copy of existing units/civilizations with mixed abilities from the existing pool and new arts... There were some great mods for civ5 based on just that, but that's not what I want to do.

 

[LDiCesare]

I hope there is no easy modding support on release. People need to play the game before they can have any hope of being able to add to it in a meaningful way, that's just a fact.

That's not a fact.
Civ IV went out with a very bad scores screen. A modder made a better one, and it got integrated in one of the first patches.
So your "fact" is actually a demonstrably false opinion.
That many people write bad mods is irrelevant. You don't have to use them. The truth is some mods make the game better as they get integrated in the game itself and that this happened very early in the game lifecycle.
As for me, I had at least as much fun writign map scripts for civ as I had playing the game. And again, my map script was written before there was even a section on map scripts in the forums here, and got integrated in a patch later. So early modding support provides the game with good mods, that get integrated in patches. Therefore, it's good.

 

[Metecury]

How hard can it be for them to have a stable multiplayer? I mean that's really the only thing we need in that department.

 

[gunnergoz]

I don't mod, just adapt some maps now and then, but I do use other people's mods a lot. The good ones really add to the game. The poorly made ones don't bother me much because everyone has to learn and start somewhere, so why not here? I don't have to use them after all. What is important is that the game becomes much more vibrant and interesting, especially after the honeymoon period is over and you look for fresh ways to play. Developers take note of mods and the good ones often seem to end up in the game in some way. So I'm for opening up modding to as many people as would like to try their hands at it.

 

[Gorbles]

How hard can it be for them to have a stable multiplayer? I mean that's really the only thing we need in that department.

This isn't an unreasonable expectation at all, but it is a difficult thing to achieve. It certainly qualifies as "hard", which is why studios like Firaxis will hire multiple people that specialise in advanced network programming just for the sake of that component.

However, if you're asking "will the game have it", I have no idea.