Uninstalling Civ IV: Not buying BtS.

[Europhile]

Who would have thought that a guy who likes Civ 3 better than Civ 4 would be called an idiot or a troll...? Such arrogance is alarming (or maybe revealing). Are there inadequacies in the home, MagicalSushi and Pimpy McPimp?

It is clear that Civ 4 can only be modded by those who have extensive knowledge in computer programming or configuration. For those of us who like to cut and paste to make new units or technologies, or who like to actually create a map from scratch, Civ 4 is nowhere near the level of accessibility as Civ 3. (Just try navigating through the Main Menu of Civ 4 when you want to load a custom scenario - you better know what you are doing!)

Obviously strong passion surrounds the Civilization titles. But it looks like there are two groups: those who like to play the game and those who like to modify the game. With Civ 3, most of us were members of both groups. With Civ 4, most of us are only in the former group because the modding interface is way too difficult. We tried to add the Federalism technology (civilization advance), but we were directed to download expensive graphical or other software to do that (which would also require us to learn so much more).

Why can't we just go to the Civ 4 directory, double-click the Map Editor icon, and do what we want to the game? There are only a couple game concepts that we want to modify, anyway (less than ten: units, buildings, technologies, resources, the map, Civilopedia, governments, civilizations, and general settings).

Why do we have to learn computer programming to modify our video games? I don't have the time, money, or desire to become a computer scientist AND THEN figure out how to mod Civ 4. (But I do have the time, money, and desire for Civ 3: Complete - I've already logged about 4,500 hours since late 2002, I figure.)

Instead of the maleficent lambasting of Amazon reviewers, perhaps instead - if you have the skills - make us a Map Editor so that everyone can easily modify Civ 4. That way we can be friends and nobody gets called names! But the fact remains, Civ 4 is a worthless title for almost all people who want to modify it.

 

[Smidlee]

Comparing modding Civ3 to Civ4 is like comparing a bicycle to a car. You don't have to change the oil nor fill up with gas nor need driver license with a bicycle (civ3 mod) yet a car (civ4 mod) has a lot more power. Most of us here have already play and mod civ3 to death (and still play at times). I'm surely glad civ4 mods have more power to have mods like FFH2. So I for one am glad civ4 isn't civ3.

 

[snipafist]

Comparing modding Civ3 to Civ4 is like comparing a bicycle to a car. You don't have to change the oil nor fill up with gas nor need driver license with a bicycle (civ3 mod) yet a car (civ4 mod) has a lot more power. Most of us here have already play and mod civ3 to death (and still play at times). I'm surely glad civ4 mods have more power to have mods like FFH2. So I for one am glad civ4 isn't civ3.

Quoted for truth. Civ 3 pales in comparison to Civ 4, with almost across-the-board game improvements in all fields. If you don't like Civ 4 then I respect your right to disagree, but I must honestly wonder what you're smoking. This is coming from someone who has played since Civ 2, for whatever it matters.

 

[T.A JONES]

Smiddy I kinda feel like thats a fair anology. But go on, finish it man! Lets take it to the track.

Once there you got a car you can ride a selection of bumpy lagged up dirt roads to victory all the while struggling with sluggish controls till the end of 700 somethin turns of marathon, on an real size maps that is (even worse reports comin in with BtS, looks like a step back..but Smiddy I know your rig plays Civ4 perfect always has!)

With the peddler your riding smooth, excelerating on concreate and slipping past AI build up on any size map, any amount of civs without a hitch, and still enjoy better rendered 'sceanary' that rolls past flicker free....true strat perfomance

 

[doronron]

It is clear that Civ 4 can only be modded by those who have extensive knowledge in computer programming or configuration. For those of us who like to cut and paste to make new units or technologies, or who like to actually create a map from scratch, Civ 4 is nowhere near the level of accessibility as Civ 3. (Just try navigating through the Main Menu of Civ 4 when you want to load a custom scenario - you better know what you are doing!)

It is cut+paste, and in some cases, drag+drop. Civ3's editiing program allowed to change the units' stats, graphics, a tech tree. Civ 4, it requires notepad. Editing XML takes a minimal amount of effort to understand, since the major tags are named similarly to the functions they serve in the game.

Why do we have to learn computer programming to modify our video games? I don't have the time, money, or desire to become a computer scientist AND THEN figure out how to mod Civ 4. (But I do have the time, money, and desire for Civ 3: Complete - I've already logged about 4,500 hours since late 2002, I figure.)

...

But the fact remains, Civ 4 is a worthless title for almost all people who want to modify it.

This is a little silly. Take a look into the mod creation forums for Civ 4. Most of those guys are not rich nor not computer scientists. Many of the components you can find there add completely new functionality to the existing game. I do not recall any Civ 3 mods that added components as vast as the Revolution & Rebellion mod, nor Combined Arms Stack Attack, nor M.A.D. Nukes. These were made by people with heavy workloads and families and such. Look at the significant number of units made -- with free programs such as Blender and Gimp, by the way. To say the time and effort needed is insurmountable is laughable -- it simply shows your threshold for the amount of effort you want to put into something outside of work.

Do you complain no one will change the TV channel for you if the remote's just out of reach?

 

[meatwad4289]

Civ4 is a great game. Its an incomplete and imperfect game, however it is a very good game, and is very Addictive.

Here's a few reasons why Civ4 is getting on my nerves..?
-Religion is no longer fun, i loved spreading my religion and Gaining the ability to see all my enemies cities, its the only reason i wouldn't except free religion. now you spread your religion you lose power, there is no longer a see a city option for religion. All religion is good for now is bringing a small bit of culture, and destroying people with the AP. If you turn off diplo victory then Religion is just dumb.
-Colonies are only half thought out. Colonies and Vassals shouldn't be treated the same, Colonies should be more customizable. they were barely thought out and all they do is instead of having an inferior capitulated vassal, we have an equal friend colony, with tech that could allow them to pull ahead.
-Espionage is crappy, I rarely use it. I'd prefer the preBtS espionage.
-Thru out all the civs we still don't get States?!?! I want to form states which i can say I want these cities in this state, i want this state to produce nothing but workers and this state to produce nothing but military.
-The allowed units to go threw eachother unless enemies.
-Disabled being allowed to travel thru others lands without open borders.
-Civ3 looks better, and has a nicer interface.
-no units can use mountains?!?!?!
-Global Warming (turned it off )
-Colonial maintenace(COME ON! IM RUNNING AN EMPIRE, STATE PROPERTY SHOULD ELIMINATE ANY MAINTENACE FROM DISTANCE AND COLONY IT DOESNT! WTF!!!!)
-------------
Things i love about Civ4
-Units
-Civics
-Warlords style of Religion
-Vassal System(i honestly like it because it's how it should be. Colonies shoudl be different)
-Warlords espionage.

--------------------
There are a few other things i love and hate for civ4, most of what i hate is from BtS. I hate Gilgamesh, I hate espionage, i hate colonies.
It wasn't a finished Expansion.

To be fair, Civ4 wasn't a finished game, and Warlords finished it. The jump from Civ4 to warlords was phenomenal, the jump to BtS was..kinda disappointing. Don't get me wrong BtS is good, but it needs fixing. Lots of Fixing. It's not bugs, its the gameplay itself. I've modded out the Colonial maintenace, and the Global Warming, because Global Warming is pathetic as is colonies. Now i gotta get back to my game, i just finished off Alexander, now its Hitlers turn, then Stalins.. Then i think ill be bored and give up.

I run 1 gig ram, 2.8 Ghz Pentium 4. i run civ4 fine until the modern times... then i get the 20secodns to 2 mintue lag sessions. Ofcourse, it doesn't bother me as i played Civ3 al lthe time on a 600Mhz AMD Athlon XP with 256mb. First game of Civ4(demo version) was on that computer(by that time i upgraded to .. barely ran. 768(?) ram) but yeah... I'm half tempted to return to Civ3 because Civ4 i can play for hours and hours an hours.. then im bored with it, civ3 i played for months before id get bored. civ4 only takes me a week on Marathon, while Civ3 would take me a week on normal. So.. yeah. I love civ4, and will continue to play, however, ifi ever find my cds im gonna be loadin up civ3 and see if its still enjoyable.

 

[King Flevance]

It is cut+paste, and in some cases, drag+drop. Civ3's editiing program allowed to change the units' stats, graphics, a tech tree. Civ 4, it requires notepad. Editing XML takes a minimal amount of effort to understand, since the major tags are named similarly to the functions they serve in the game.

Sure XML doesn't take that much effort to learn. Now, lets talk about Python and C++. Saying XML is easy is the same thing (using the car/bike analogy) as saying car maintenace is easy. (tune-ups, tire rotation, etc.) But Adding in new units that the community hasn't supplied you with already requires some real effort and extensive knowledge, especially if all you want to throw in is 1 unit. Suddenly, adding in a new unit enitrely is the difference between a putting in a rebuilt transmission (community supplied unit) or rebuilding one yourself.

This is a little silly. Take a look into the mod creation forums for Civ 4. Most of those guys are not rich nor not computer scientists.

But there are a decent amount of programmers in there. Or people aspiring for programmer careers. And those that do not own 3dsmax do tend to rely on those that do for some stuff.

Many of the components you can find there add completely new functionality to the existing game.

Which is nice, so long as what you want has been created.

Look at the significant number of units made -- with free programs such as Blender and Gimp, by the way. To say the time and effort needed is insurmountable is laughable -- it simply shows your threshold for the amount of effort you want to put into something outside of work.

So how many units have you made yourself? Have you tried using gimp? Or worse yet, blender? These programs have tutorials on this site, but it can still get confusing for me. And I have used imaging software before. I have 4 years experience in both Bryce (sp?) and Photoshop. But these are all new controls and features to me, I can imagine what it looks like to someone who has never used imaging software beyond mspaint before.

 

[T.A JONES]

Ya good post both ya'll
My doodle of Civ3's status in the strat world! Also gives a idea Just how many 'looks' you can have compared to Civ4'3 Bluemarble and plain A overlooked Civ3 mod advantage at the moment IMO.

Spoiler :

....The shot is taken from a mod that properly addressed the need for a balance of corrupiton clean-up and maint cost control to effectivly provide realistic barriers to rapid expansion. ( thats right corruption that goes away!- with maintaining Xpensive infrustructure, justily so,)

...while accomplishing this new luxery to the civving system, the artists created authentic and ingenious vassel system that Firaxis designers couldn't manage to laydown, even as a touted xpak feature you pay 30 doller for lol!.


Now who was saying its not possable for Civ3 to have 'breakthrough' mod improvements? The guy sounds Civ3 'mod naïve' to me. He should come n get some a dis: (or teleport to Balancer Reloaded 'TBXR' -pic link shows "Omaga Project mod", and more ex: of terrain variety )

Civ3's Vassel system (brought to you by embyodead n MEM)

CliffNotes: you can build ForbiddenPalace-like wonders only in conquered capitals. You can have several of those, but your vassals are determined by the form of government you're in. And if you can't claim a title of a king/caliph, you can at least claim a title of duke/emir, which has much smaller effect.

This way, a conquered capital won't be just another city, but a real capital. A common misunderstanding is that it doesn't matter where the FP is built, that it just reduces overall corruption. While, it doesn't work like in Vanilla/PTW, it still reduces corruption first and foremost in neighboring cities (except for communal governments). It's also cumulative. I have to thank Alexman for his research. It's an old thread, but I've missed it earlier, since it wasn't in C&C forum

I tried different settings and played with lowered Optimal City Number in order to make it balanced (FP increases OCN by 37.5%, or 100% for communism), to eventually limit the specific vassal states to specific governments, and I think it makes sense. On a standard map you'll usually be able to build 1-3 FPs in the conquered capitals (it works on random maps as well, the phony wonders have some hidden flags to encourage the AI to build them).

 

[Vroeser]

I'd like to see a mod that can have bill & ted as units, only after you discover campus (which is right behind university).

 

[Shylock]

"This game is totally bogus". Are you planning to watch Bill & Ted again, quetzaln?

His opinion is totally heinous.

 

[GreenMonkey]

The OP's main gripe seems to be that the game isn't as easy to mod as Civ3.

Well, hell. You could create your own game genie codes to mod NES games. OMG Civ3 is so much more complicated than that!

Video games are getting more and more complicated with time. Development costs for PCs and consoles are escalating as graphics and other programming takes more and more people and time.

That's how it works. You're not going to have a game released that is as easy to mod as Civ3 any more. Period. If nothing else the jump to 3D creates half the difficulty as you have to make 3D models instead of using MS paint.

2D games are practically dead (Nintendo DS exempted). TBS games like Civ, Heroes of Might and Magic, etc had to go 3D eventually. They held out a lot longer than other games.

 

[Adam7Eight]

I do have to agree with one thing said in all of this - This expansion pack trend is getting way out of hand. It's not just Firaxis either. Even sports game developers are doing this for there sports titles now (EA's FIFA Manager comes to mind).

It just ain't right... Another $30 here, $40 there, it's getting old, especially when you know a lot of this "expansive content" could have and probably should have been implemented in the original game to begin with. For that, I do call shenanigans on this age of the expansion pack.

 

[Europhile]

I won't stoop to the level of some people on this website, but I must say that Civ fans who appreciate quality titles should stay away from Civ 4 completely. Compared to Civ 3, it is a waste of money.

Also, Civ fans aren't really this sarcastic and pig-headed in general are they? When the sacred cow is attacked, they all circle wagons and put out hate speech? I would hate to learn that this was the culture of the CivFanatics website. I would hope that Civ fans are more like King Flevance, and that the flamers are just a minority.

Surely Civ 4 is not for the casual gamer in terms of modification. If there is an edifying counter to that argument, I would sure appreciate the insight. Otherwise, I would hope the hate mongers would move to another site or the Moderators would punish them.

 

[UERD]

Otherwise, I would hope the hate mongers would move to another site or the Moderators would punish them.

So, we should kick the people who like Civ 4 out of the Civ 4 forum because they like Civ 4....what?

 

[Europhile]

UERD, how could you quote my post, have it right in front of you, and then misquote it?

 

[Stolen Rutters]

All I really wanted is a feature where u can turn off "Show Units over Cities" (like in Civ3).
That coupled with Dale's Combat mod and I'll probably re-install Civ IV.
I've been drawn back into the magnetic field of Civ. Again I dream of colonizing distant lands, amassing huge armies, and forging a utopian existence for all within my empire.
Forgive my transgressions, for I am a civ-fanatic at heart and I'll probably always be playing off & on even if the game has a few flaws.

Yeah, this game is definitely a very different game than Civ3. When I first put Civ4 into the computer I couldn't figure out how to play the game (REx in Vanilla and Warlords was seriously nerfed... get that 5th city before researching Writing, and you are almost guaranteed to kill your research for sure!) After a couple months, the 1.63 (or was it 1.62?) patch fixed enough other gameplay problems that I reinstalled the game.

As a non-modder (don't ask me to fiddle with code... I won't do it.), I found this game to be real fun because of the variety and balance. Settler spawn isn't a required tactic any more (building settlers and always settlers isn't that fun after awhile). You balance your various demands in a game of control. It's very engrossing.

The Warlords expansion really completed the game for me. Yes, by most accounts, the relatively weak Civ4 modern age was greatly improved in BtS, but I haven't finished with Warlords yet... I rarely play into the modern age as it is.

I heard that BtS lightened up on nerfing Rapid EXpansion, though. I kinda got used to controlling growth to shoot through the tech tree until Banking and economics remove the last real barriers to financing the monster empire. I do plan on getting it eventually (maybe Christmas break)... I stopped wasting money on cable TV, so I figure I can afford a video game every year or two.

 

[alamo]

Perhaps the original poster is caught in the love-hate trap. I've been stuck between regent and prince for awhile, and get frustrated with those tech-trading @#$ civs and their boot-licking vassals.

What's the final verdict on BtS? And what's this about Revolutions? Is it a remake for the dreadful Matrix finale?

 

[Titus001]

Don't waste another minute of your precious time playing civ IV: go write some philosophies, music, or do something good for somebody... This game is totally bogus... Ripoff to the extreme. They didn't spend the time to make it right and I'm dissatisfied to the max.

I almost agree. I don't understand why this expansion or warlords did not allow us to play with more than 18 civs on any map. For BTS to not even add a new earth map with different civs is also lame in my opinion. Firaxis next time please don't waste time on scenarios and allow me to play with more than 18 civs on any map including earth. Hell, just give me an empty earth map that allows me to play with 24 civs or more and I will pick which civ I want in and put them in the correct spot. Oh and thanks for changing the DLL. Now if I do want to play warlords and play rhys 24 earth map I get a crash when I try to build my first city.

 

[Commander Bello]

Although the OP made a big mistake with being aggressive and too short in his initial posting, many of the replies do not meet any standard either.

Happily playing BtS (came back to Civ4 due to a mod pack for WL), I have to admit that I miss the configurator as of Civ3 a lot. Worldbuilder is so disgusting that I didn't touch it very often.
In this area Firaxis made a major mistake, as far as I see it.

About easyness of modding in general: As long as you just want to change one statistics, it is pretty simple, as you only have to change a certain value in the appropriate xml file. Wait, if you do know, which xml file to adress...
But you find them rather easily, so this is not that much a problem.

What I am really made about is that most of the files are completely undocumented, and therefore it is quite hard to identify the real meaning behind some of the settings.

<PrereqNatureYields>
	<iYield>1</iYield>
	<iYield>0</iYield>
	<iYield>0</iYield>
</PrereqNatureYields>

Just for the fun of it: how many people here will know by heart, which value is which?

<MemoryAttitudePercent>
					<MemoryType>MEMORY_MADE_DEMAND</MemoryType>
					<iMemoryAttitudePercent>-100</iMemoryAttitudePercent>
				</MemoryAttitudePercent>
				<MemoryAttitudePercent>
					<MemoryType>MEMORY_TRADED_TECH_TO_US</MemoryType>
					<iMemoryAttitudePercent>10</iMemoryAttitudePercent>
				</MemoryAttitudePercent>
				<MemoryAttitudePercent>
					<MemoryType>MEMORY_VOTED_AGAINST_US</MemoryType>
					<iMemoryAttitudePercent>-200</iMemoryAttitudePercent>
				</MemoryAttitudePercent>

Once again: on which basis are these settings based upon? For sure, you will find the answers.... somewhere. Most probably in a posting in the customization subforum or in one of the many wikis, of which most have been come to a complete standstill, as people (and the ones who did contribute to them for sure for quite eager) became tired with finding out the different values.

At the end of the day: You can do very many things for customization of Civ4. Yet, you have to put in a high effort to gain, what could have been achieved much more easily by the configurator of Civ3 (although in Civ3 of course you could do only less than in Civ4).

Now, everybody who likes Civ4 has the right to do so. It is the only game that I am constantly playing. Yet, being a fan of it should not make us forget or worse, neglect that there are many things which might - and already should have been! - be improved.

Therefore, to a certain degree I understand the OP's standpoint and even more the quoted review.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

Well, the quoted review was ignorant and seemingly uninformed in many areas. It almost seemed like the reviewer watched his buddy play for 30 minutes and tried to mess with worldbuilder and went straight to the Amazon.com review boards.

There is much to be said about an amateur reviewer vs. the industry professionals that give out awards. Most of us who play aren't video game industry professionals and many are probably closer to the amateur that the reviewer clearly is. However, the reviewer made a distinct error in making such strong claims as to uninstall the game and boycott cIV. Many have already posted that this would cause a major delay or perhaps the total prevention of further installments being released.

Words can be strong and clearly 66 out of 68 people found the review more than helpful. Most of these people most likely saw the GAME OF THE YEAR awards and had never played cIV or similar games until buying cIV. They are excused