Tourism

[salty mud]

I think tourism would be a cool idea to implement.

It would work like this: A civ can focus on economy and can build hotels, arenas, underground tunnel systems etc and this would contribute to tourism. Tourists can come from neighbouring civs, or even from a different continent! Tourism will increase gold, and could be a great boost to gold in a particularly econmic civ. Tourism would also increase the use for ports, airports and roads/railways.

It may sound a bit simplistic at the moment, but I think with fine tuning this would be a good idea! What do you guys think?

 

[Lockesdonkey]

Actually, they had a simple tourism model in C3C, whereby certain Wonders could become tourist attractions and rack up the revenue. I think it might be enhanced like so:

In order for a city to attract tourists it must meet one of a few criteria: Either it is a great and vibrant center of the arts and culture, or it has a great piece of old art or architecture (i.e. a World Wonder), or it has a particular natural beauty to it. So, a city with, say, Influential or Legendary Culture, or a World Wonder would become a Tourist Destination and generate small amounts of gold (at first). (For the moment, I will ignore natural beauty tourism, because it is so hard to model). As time goes on, these Tourist Destinations become more and more lucrative as their reputation as such spreads. Advances in transportation technology--at the very least Railroad, Combustion (or Industrialism), and Flight, would further increase the Tourism income in a city. Finally, one could build the Hotel (with Railroad), Grand Hotel (with Industrialism) and Convention Center (with Computers) to further increase tourist income.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

I made a similar suggestion some time ago; perhaps it can fit in here. When you discover Currency, you can build inns; when you discover Nationalism, you can build restaurants; and when you discover Railroad, you can build hotels. Each would generate money, an the effect would be cumulative (and based on the cultural value of your city). This would not only be profitable but also quite correct from a historical point of view.

Öjevind Lång

 

[Mewtarthio]

I think that inns and hotels are the kind of things that spring up naturally as a result of tourism. I've never seen the player as simply the head of the government (otherwise you'd lose control as soon as you switched out of Despotism), but I believe that the player's power should be limited to important, major events that would not simply occur by themselves (that and troop training, but I see that as more a large mobilization to war in that city and therefore important enough for the player to control). All theories aside, Inns, Restaurants, and Hotels are too much in the private sector and too naturally-occurring to be built by the player: They are simulated by your tourist income increasing as more people hear of your greatness (that is, as your culture increases, your citizens naturally build hotels in response). Now, especially large five-star luxury hotels and other incredibly large projects associated with tourism could be built by the player, but none of the minor stuff.

Oh, and to pre-empt the inevitable comment: Tourism has existed ever since people could travel to foreign nations. It's just that sometimes people only called it "pilgrimage."

 

[zapple]

Some of my earlier tourism ideas...

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=166298

 

[zapple]

It might be handy to have a ready equation for tourism value...something like:

City's Cultural Value (including Religious shrines) * Commercial Value/Activity (London, New York, Miami...consider all those passenger-ships) * Ancient Wonders (e.g. Postcards from Giza) * Modern Broadcast Wonders (e.g. "Come See Fabulous Las Vegas!") ...

with weighting in favour of particular aspects (I would weigh an airport more than a harbour; Hanging Gardens and Collossus more than Pyramids; Eiffel Tower, Hollywood, Rock n Roll, Broadway more than Three Gorges Dam)

 

[Clownfish]

Good idea! And if your're at war, you'll probably loose a lot of tourism, at least if the war is going on at your continent. A while after peace is declared, people will start coming again...
That's why tourism can't be allowed to bring in too much cash, cuz then civs wouldn't afford to go to war! And a totally peaceful game of Civilization wouldn't be right!

 

[The Lardossen]

Open borders and peace should be a minimum for generating tourism inbetween nations.

 

[Ball Lightning]

i think the amount of tourism should be dependent on how many cities are conected with you city. Also if your city has a railroad conection then it should get increased tourism profit, and if you have a airport and other cities alos do then you get a trade bonus from your wonders.

Also there should be natural disasters and they could destroy wonders making the tourism bonus oppsolete. But you should be able to rebuild a destroyed wonder but only in the origenal city. If you have open borders deal with somone then you should gain more tourism bonus.

You could also applie this (if it is not already) to the trade bonus a city would gain from it's trade routes.

 

[Mewtarthio]

I think Tourism could be implemented quite simply in the abstract: Just increase the trade route income based on culture and wonders. What is the current trade route formula?

 

[nour3001]

I guess that the affection of tourism by wars should depend on if the war is actually taking place on the lands of the civilzation or not.A country can have a war on another place of the world and still have the same amount of toursim (USA is an example of that).
Also presence of Jungles and forests around the city (at least in the late ages when most players would have chopped them down to clear land) would enhance tourism in that city,yet it's balanced by the uselessness of jungle tiles,so the player can balance what he wants,more toursim in that jungle city (for safari or watever) or more production and agriculture.
And about your opinion Clownfish,maybe that could be balanced by not allowing toursim to yield too much income related to the total income,so the inevitable loss during war wouldn't make too much difference in the economy.
Also there could be resources that enhance toursim in its local city,such as hot springs or ancient monuments (of civilizations that were extinct even before the current civilzation was born) etc etc.

 

[sand]

i thinkn tourism is allready in the game. income form trade route's represents trade and tourism. building a cottage will attract tourism which will give commerce the bigger it gets (to hamlet) the more tourism (commerce) it gets.
i guess cities could increase this per culture, e'g legendary would add 100% commerce.

also religios shrine's would generate pilgims.

 

[Mewtarthio]

also religios shrine's would generate pilgims.

They already do. That's where the +1 Gold per believing city comes from.