Three (1/2) months later... The facts about Civ 5's problems

builer680

eats too much Taco Bell
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I've seen a number of posts that dismiss the problems many of us have with Civ 5 as "matters of opinion" or "taste." So I sat down and wrote up the problems I could think of that are not opinions.

The fact that nearly every single one of these problems existed upon release, and has not been fixed in the 3 1/2 months since, directly challenges the arguments of those who state that the game will "get better in time" and has "potential." Moderator Action: Trolling
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

It may very well have potential, and it remains to be seen if it will get better in time. My only question is... How MUCH time?

While many of the things I list are also in another thread, the primary purpose of this post is to directly ask...
If you're reading this Firaxis, why aren't these things fixed by now?

Spoiler :
SETUP AND SYSTEM

Initial load times (game startup) can take over a minute.

Turn times can take several minutes even on Small maps, especially late game with lots of AI units (Deity unit spam). This is not limited to lower end machines, it includes machines that are above the recommended specs listed on the box.

Setup preferences are not saved. If you launch from the basic setup menu, the options you made there are saved. If you launch from Advanced Setup, where there are many more options, any changes you make must be made every single time you setup a game.

The game crashes regularly on systems that exceed "Recommended." It frequently crashes on game reloads, game "re-setups," and randomly upon issuing commands or menu option selection.

Generating a new map with the same options requires exiting to the main menu and setting up the game options all over again. Then waiting for about a minute for the new map to generate. Then typically a crash to desktop, restarting Civ, and reloading the Autosave, which can take 2-4 minutes each time (game startup + Intro video + game save reload).

UI

Unit cycling is not intelligent. Instead of cycling through all units in current view on screen, the game will cycle from a unit on one side of the map, to a unit on the other side, back to the other side, etc...

Units auto garrison when moved to a City.

You cannot see friendly defensive combat bonuses such as Fortification and Flanking, as you must be mousing over another Civ's unit to see combat bonuses. This only shows their defensive bonuses and your attack bonuses.


You cannot see friendly combat bonuses when mousing over your unit. You must mouse over an enemy unit with your unit selected. This means you already be at war to see them. (Apparently this is wrong, you can do it by holding down Alt. I'm leaving it here so others can see it.)

You cannot see neutral unit combat bonuses. You must be at war to see them. (Apparently this is wrong, you can do it by holding down Alt. I'm leaving it here so others can see it.)

Multiple unit promotions are represented by the same icon (Triangle).

It is hard to see all Enemy unit promotions, because you must mouse over them with a Friendly unit selected. When you move your mouse to see what the promotions are (since many are just Triangles), by definition your mouse is no longer over the Enemy unit, and thus the info box disappears and you can't read the promotion.

Parts of the UI sit on top of others in certain situations. An example is a Unit gaining a promotion. If your screen is set in a way that the promotion selection box is over an enemy unit, your promotion options disappear under the combat box that comes up. You must "move" your screen to promote it. This can result in a unit being destroyed in the simultaneous turns of Multiplayer.

Citizen management requires extra click to activate, and is more cluttered than previous versions. It's harder than before to tell at a glance who is working what, the green citizen circles, gray empty citizen circles, shared tile circles, yield icon circles, and terrain features blend together.

Production queues require multiple clicks to setup. Can be, and has been, done with fewer necessary user inputs before.

Invisible rivers still exist.

"Phantom" units still exist. You can see an icon but there is no unit there. Vice versa as well, there is a unit there but you can't see the icon.

Buildings and Wonders still frequently appear in the middle of the ocean, or a lake. If you can tell a Wonder to sit on the texture of a mountain inside a terrain tile, you can make buildings sit in the proper places in a terrain tile, coastal or otherwise. Alternatively, you could simply adjust the texture rendering of the terrain tiles in question upon construction of said Wonders or buildings.

Only Happiness buildings, Wonders, and some Naval buildings show up on the game map. This is a step backwards.

DOCUMENTATION

The Civilopedia is sometimes wrong.

The Civilopedia is sometimes missing information.

The Civilopedia no longer utilizes Hyperlinks in text.

You no longer get a manual and tech chart with the game. Instead you must use the manual on the Internet. To be fair, this isn't something they can change now, even if they wanted to, which they don't.

CONTROLS

Input is not always consistent. Right clicking an enemy unit with a ranged unit sometimes bombards the enemy, sometimes moves the friendly unit instead. An example involves a naval unit. Right clicking an enemy ship and right clicking an enemy embarked unit have different results.

Cannot move units as a group.

Many hotkeys are no longer used.

Many hotkeys are not intuitive. (B)ombardment with land and naval units is (B). The exact same thing with air units is called Air (S)trike, and uses (S).

Cannot see a unit's destination by clicking on it.

Units forget their destinations if they run into an obstacle, even a friendly one, such as your own Worker.

GAMEPLAY and INTERFACE OPTIONS

Cannot change many options, including most (all?) Video Options midgame. It requires a reload, which can take 2-4 minutes each time (game startup + Intro video + game save reload).

Cannot change combat and moves animation (quick moves/combat) options midgame. It's selected at the start of the game and can never be changed for that game.

Can no longer differentiate between Showing/Not showing Friendly moves.

Can no longer differentiate between Showing/Not showing Friendly combat.

There are no longer any videos other than the intro video.

You cannot view a game replay without digging through game files.

AI

Governors will sometimes starve population with different settings.

Neutral or Friendly units block passage of tiles. Frequently in the early game, multiple scouts from multiple 'neutral' Civs on other sides of the continent, purportedly exploring, will Fortify themselves right on top of tiles I would be using to attack a nearby enemy Civ.

Similarly, supposedly neutral Scouts from the other side of the landmass often Fortify in choke points linking your cities so Workers cannot get through. Once you move your Worker, the Scout will often then move away.

The AI frequently suicides units with no military followup to take advantage of any weakness they may have created by suiciding the units.

The AI fortifies units in City bombardment range until they are dead.

The AI embarks units on water tiles in City bombardment range until they are dead.

The AI will frequently, repeatedly, and with multiple units walk right through "kill zones" with both military and non-military units while at war, when there are other options to get to a destination.

The AI occasionally brings to bear a preponderance of force to a City's gates, only to frequently either move back and forth until bombarded to death, or Fortify until bombarded to death.

City State mission requesting a road does not recognize the Road once it's built, if you can manage to build it while dodging the City State's units shuffling tiles every turn. (This is a new issue that came up after the 1.0.1.135 patch.)

MULTIPLAYER

There are no options for combat animations. Only "off."

You cannot use Hotseat, PBEM, or Pitboss. Your only option is Simultaneous turns.

You are limited to one timer, you can not alter the amount of time per turn for different games.

There is no option to hide the player score screen.

You cannot use DLC Civs.

There is no staging area / chat lobby. You must use 3rd party chat rooms such as the room set up by www.civplayers.com to talk with other players, except for the chatbox that is only open to those who have joined your game.

If a player disconnects from a game and you aren't in Steam chat with them, it is very difficult if not impossible for them to reconnect and continue the game.

I am sure there are more. If I think of or see any from other posters, I'll add them.
 
Congratulations you don't like ciV. This thread is simply to start an argument. It has been fairly well defined now who says they refuse to play until, that they don't believe will ever come, are made. It has also been fairly well defined who is simply trying to enjoy the game as much as they can. I just don't see the need to comment on a game you refuse to play and clutter the forum with negative messages.
 
Congratulations you don't like ciV. This thread is simply to start an argument. It has been fairly well defined now who says they refuse to play until, that they don't believe will ever come, are made. It has also been fairly well defined who is simply trying to enjoy the game as much as they can. I just don't see the need to comment on a game you refuse to play and clutter the forum with negative messages.

I don't see the need for you to be in this thread if you don't like it and contribute nothing to it. This post is both a direct question to Firaxis with the faint hope of seeing some action, and a direct challenge to those who play the "potential" card and the "wait and see" card.

It's a forum for discussions (and sometimes arguments) of all types after all. It's not up to you to decide what I post. Whether or not YOU "see the need" for something is not very important.
 
Good list, I will add one point:

you can't choose which version of Civ5 you want to play, you are forced to play the latest patch. I spent 1 month to make myself a mod that would change the game so that I liked it, the mod worked with version 1.0.0.62. Then the December patch came and I was forced to update, my mod doesn't work anymore and I can't go back to 1.0.0.62 anymore. Gah !

Also, it is true that you don't have an option to hide friendly/enemy moves, but now all AI units move at the same time so it's not a big deal.
 
Very true. I'll leave. Forgive me for being a little frustrated at seeing the 9999999999999999999999 thread of I hate ciV, to paraphrase. Especially with the rant thread specifically for this type of thread now created, so these complaint threads dont clog up this forum with many people posting the same type of thing over and over and over. Also if this is all directed at firaxis, their forums might be the best place for it.
 
Very true. I'll leave. Forgive me for being a little frustrated at seeing the 9999999999999999999999 thread of I hate ciV, to paraphrase. Especially with the rant thread specifically for this type of thread now created, so these complaint threads dont clog up this forum with many people posting the same type of thing over and over and over. Also if this is all directed at firaxis, their forums might be the best place for it.

A more civil reply than I expected.

Just to be clear, this is not a Rant (in the sense I think of "Rant"). It's an introduction, followed by a list, followed by a question. Nothing more. Nowhere am I verbally abusing the game or calling people names. I cite facts with no hyperbole. I also don't hate Civ, I've loved this game for 20 years and I want to see it treated better than this version has been by the people who made it.

It's also well documented that Firaxis reads and takes input from these forums as well as their own, so this forum is as good as any, if not better. I don't really want to bother setting up yet another forum account just to re-post something I've already written in a place that I already HAVE bothered to set up an account. :lol: But you may turn out to be right. If I get little to no attention here, I very well may "bother to" set up an account over there as well.
 
Yeah, some of what you wrote about I agree with. Especially the load times. I have been playing Tropico 3 and that loads in like 5 seconds. I am not even kidding. I am selecting game options after 6 seconds. I press escape to avoid their ads, and I am at game options. It's awesome.

Late game crashes are terrible because the game sucks to start (18 seconds for me), sucks to load (sometimes 2 or 3 minutes, and will probably crash again in short order.

I also am annoyed by not being able to easily see unit promotions. I too have been annoyed by having the UI overlay itself.

V is a dog. For me, that is established fact. For others, it is game of the year. It's a damn shame.
 
But how it's five months? AFAIR, the game was released on late September? October+November+December, it's three months?

Just double checked the release date of 9/21/10. It's now 1/03/11. You are quite correct, it's closer to 3 1/2 months. For some strange reason, I had it stuck in my head that it came out in early August.

A very silly mistake to make, I'm a bit embarrassed to admit. :hammer2:

Thanks for pointing it out! I will edit the title now.
 
I like this list, it's VERY valuable. Good work OP; the more people that bring attention to the nonsense that is unfortunately truth in that spoiler, the more our long odds go up.
 
This thread will be very useful to devs if they bother to read it.
 
A noble effort by the OP, I applaud you.

I hope it helps, but I have serious doubts. Maybe in time.
 
It may very well have potential, and it remains to be seen if it will get better in time. My only question is... How MUCH time?

As long as it takes.
Cuz, if Firaxis still wants to be a "Fair" contributor to the current Gaming Industry they must keep up with plenty of competitors by upgrading their flagship product to modern consumers' standards - right out of the box, progressively or even through proper tracking of suggestions by players such as what you've listed above.

Being under 2K/Steam umbrellas might very well enforce them in a sort-of limited grasp over specific design choices & relatively good pace of updates though. Considering the trends of DLC driven distribution also... you may certainly say that time doesn't really matter anymore as it is (somehow) replaced by pure(st) and solid quality of quantities or lack thereof.

Rushed out release didn't help them either and yet, better then than never.
As usual, the whole risk has inherent marketing_support consequences only -- for everyone industrially involved i should add.
 
The most valuable list of problems so far, those are facts, period.
Facts indeed.
On other side, many of these facts don't bother me at all: e.g. lack of videos, bad multiplayer, long starting/loading times and stupid combat AI. I was never a fan of videos (actually, they harmed my fun a lot in Civ3, since I had computer of about minimal requirements then, and it took ages for them to be shown). I never played MP. And I have grown quite accustomed to two latter points during 20 years of playing Civ.
Other facts do bother me, and I can add some. A CS ask me to build a road to them, meanwhile they block access to my workers by putting their troops at every hex where a road could be built... anf even if I manage to build it, CS won't recognize this because of a bug.
 
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