What do you want to see in Civilization 5?

[GuitarHero]

Sounds like a nice idea, Zenon PT.

 

[Sebastian Piotr]

I always thought this is little idiotic when you build a transplanetary spaceship and you do not have any colonies or base on other planets (Moon) in your solar system. I want to build colony on Moon, Mars, Europa, Pluto (extra option: during colonization is possible find some resources let to build new kinds of engines for spaceships)
Why I can not build as a wolrd wonder a Hubble Telescope? Plus Extra invention/world wonder "Aleksander Wolszczan new planetary systems". Developing this technology let as to discover planets in Alpha Centauri. After settle colony in Alpha Centauri next step will be create a gates to transplanetary voyages.

Generaly I want more future technologies and longer time to play. A few ideas from "Next war" should be as a standard technologies in civ.

 

[silvio82]

i WANT OTHER EXPANSIONS FOR CIV4. I WANT SEE A CIV LIKE ALPHA CENTAURI WITH COLONIZATION OF OTHER PLANETS, SPACE BATTLES, ALIENS, AND FUTURE UNITS AND RESOURCES.

 

[GuitarHero]

Aliens would be cool though.

 

[GuitarHero]

Calm down Silvo. Just like how your teacher told you, USE YOUR FREAKIN' INSIDE VOICE!

 

[Skallagrimson]

I couldn't find it. Who am I looking for?

I don't remember his name, and I guess it's not that important. The resulting game gives the idea of what they had in mind when they designed it.

Seems like an odd and unnecessary mechanic. But I guess I'd have to see it to understand it. Do they have realistic lifespans?

The lifespans are realistic and it gives you a new thing to plan for--to make use of a general (or a prince or a king, etc.) during their lifespans rather than just park them somewhere for hundreds of years.

I agree that the current model blows from a realism standpoint. But I'm also more concerned about how both Civ 3 and Civ 4 models blow from a game balance standpoint. What you're suggesting sounds too close to Civ 3 -- a unit that is guaranteed to take no damage on the attack. You essentially create an uber-powerful unit that can deal damage without taking damage.

The realism of artillery is that if you hung back and let an artillery battery barrage you, then yet, you will take damage and they'll receive no damage in return--while that's going on. And the way said artillery got taken out was to attack it: either with your own artillery barrage, or a cavalry charge, or the much more quixotic and wasteful tactic of an infantry charge. SURE some artillery pieces would break and what-not during a barrage, but Civ4's approach of totally destroying an artillery unit while THEY are the ones attacking, nothing "blows" more than that, from a realism perspective. But they don't care about realism. At all. IMO there's not even any "verisimilitude" in wildly unrealistic things, but try telling them that.

I'm all for some kind of change. But making one element of the game more realistic is sometimes a disaster. Not only can it hurt game balance -- it can even hurt the realism of the game indirectly (e.g.: catapults never die, so they become the bulk of everyone's army -- highly unrealistic).

Again, in case you missed it yet again: I wouldn't make catapults "never die". I would simply make their death have to come from an attack ON them, as opposed to having them spontaneously die on their own while they are the ones attacking from a safe range.

RTSes manage to make it work for realism AND gameplay. In an RTS, catapults are incredibly slow for their power. Someone can scatter their troops to avoid taking maximum collateral damage. Mounted or tactical units are fast enough that they can sometimes dodge. And, if you dare to challenge the front line, someone might be able to break through and hit the catapults at the back.

Total War goes even farther in that catapults and trebuchets can't *turn*, so it's a simple matter of getting out of the target zone if you want to avoid the barrage. Which is why, in Total War, I usually only bring siege engines if it's a true *siege*, not for field combat.

However, the game Civilization occurs at such a global scale that these RTS ideas can't really transfer. So, alas, we're still left with the stupid Civ 4 vs Civ 3 debate, both of which really suck when it comes to siege units.

IMO, if the game is going to bother to "zoom in" and let you "watch a battle" (between six iconic representations of warriors, who in turn symbolize thousands on a real battlefield), then said game might as well go fully into it and do it right: with a Total Warresque switch into real-time mode, with a real battlefield, and real units, and real tactical decisions to be made about deployment, terrain, force balance, etc. And in TW there's the "auto-resolve" option if you don't want to bother with the details of combat, and let the game engine decide based on raw military power factors, who would win.

I would be a TW fan uniquely, and not a Civ fan at all, if TW didn't have even worse issues in the new campaign maps, and problems with the interface and graphics that make it, for me, just a place to go and do battles.

 

[dh_epic]

Skallagrimson,

On the topic of catapults, what you're suggesting is very close to Civ 3. But they really were fundamentally unbalanced. "Invincible on attack" may sound realistic in principle, but when introduced into a highly abstract combat system it actually results in less realism. In practice, people take advantage of huge catapult stacks, and to see a catapult get taken out is extremely rare.

Civilization is a game of abstraction. I don't think they were openly hostile to realism. Just that the first game was built in 1990. A certain amount of simplicity was a must for technical reasons. That's without even getting into marketing reasons. The abstract combat system doesn't deal well with front lines and back lines. Nobody has really offered a way to make catapults more realistic that doesn't either (a) make them overpowered, thus indirectly making them unrealistic, or (b) make combat much more detailed, like your total war tactical real time battlefield.

I don't think Firaxis is ever going to do either, and you know why, even if you disagree with it.

I don't suppose they'll have realistic life spans either, considering the game spans 2000 years in the first 50 turns. Death every two turns is not fun, no matter how unrealistic eternal life is. Again, it's not that they're hostile to realism. But they probably look at their development resources and decide whether it's worth it to add more realism here or there. The end result is a game that is realistic in only a superficial way.

Spoiler :

Some kind of automatic stack combat system could be interesting, though. Say, you can assemble 5 unit armies. Some units would be back-line, some units would be front-line. And somehow, in forming these 5 unit armies, you form a strategy that will ultimately affect the probability of winning the battle. This would probably put them more on their way to better realism AND strategy.

The one-unit combat system is just fundamentally unrealistic. Any realistic tweaks around that system can only create more weird results elsewhere. The interaction of algorithm and human-player will tear your realistic intentions apart.

 

[Skallagrimson]

what you're suggesting is very close to Civ 3. But they really were fundamentally unbalanced. "Invincible on attack" may sound realistic in principle, but when introduced into a highly abstract combat system it actually results in less realism. In practice, people take advantage of huge catapult stacks, and to see a catapult get taken out is extremely rare.

I never actually played Civ3 because I loved Civ2, hated the changes to the graphics for Civ3, and just kept playing the old version. When Civ4 came along, I decided to give it a chance, and sometimes I regret that.

So I don't know what siege engines did in Civ3. I do know that in BtS they're part of the way there because now siege engines *NEVER* fully destroy a unit they attack, and to re-balance it back a bit they just need to have a 100% chance of withdrawal. This will not, by any means, make them an "invincible" unit. It merely means their attack, the damage they give, and the damage they incur on attacking, are partial, never a full wipeout or full self-destroy. And that *is* realistic, as artillery was used to reduce enemy numbers or defenses, not obliterate them to the last man.

Civilization is a game of abstraction. I don't think they were openly hostile to realism. Just that the first game was built in 1990. A certain amount of simplicity was a must for technical reasons.

Philosophical reasons as well as technical. To them, excessive realisim would be "too imbalanced" with too much emphasis on luck, in spite of the fact that the game already is unbalanced and already does weigh heavily toward luck (tell me that someone starting with iron, ivory, two food, and six luxury resources in the first city's fat-cross isn't at an unbalanced ADVANTAGE, go ahead, make a fool of yourself!)

They need to fish or cut bait. If they want all balance all the time, then give everyone everywhere all the time, access to the same resources and quality of start position. Down to the last ivory and gold. If they want to gun for a realistic expression of imbalance, then DO it, and do it the right way instead of some cartoony preposterous abstraction thereof.

That's without even getting into marketing reasons. The abstract combat system doesn't deal well with front lines and back lines. Nobody has really offered a way to make catapults more realistic that doesn't either (a) make them overpowered, thus indirectly making them unrealistic, or (b) make combat much more detailed, like your total war tactical real time battlefield.

I don't think Firaxis is ever going to do either, and you know why, even if you disagree with it.

Because Firaxis thinks everyone is too stupid to manage the tactics of a real ancient battle. And, because Firaxis is so absolutely deathly afraid of "immitating Total War" that even the things TW does *right*, they'll avoid like the plague. And there's really only one thing TW does right.

When I'm in a high-level campaigning mood, I play Civ. When I want battle, I play TW. One of these days a game will provide both. One of these days.

The one-unit combat system is just fundamentally unrealistic. Any realistic tweaks around that system can only create more weird results elsewhere. The interaction of algorithm and human-player will tear your realistic intentions apart.

You just haven't played the game (TW) that manages to do this right, which would explain your response here. You think it can't be done, but it has been done.

 

[Dribble18]

@Skallagrimson

A misunderstanding here I think. dh_epic is saying a one unit system can never be realistic which I agree with. TW is about as far away from a one unit system as it gets (I think in the current Medieval 2 release it is possible to have some 20,000 units).

 

[Skallagrimson]

@Skallagrimson

A misunderstanding here I think. dh_epic is saying a one unit system can never be realistic which I agree with. TW is about as far away from a one unit system as it gets (I think in the current Medieval 2 release it is possible to have some 20,000 units).

20,000 MEN, but the max number units OF men, on the field, is still limited, and the overflow is in the "reserve force" waiting to deploy to the battlefield (if other units get wiped out or flee, etc.)

The great thing about TW battles is that even if you have an enormous numerical disadvantage, you still may be able to employ Thermopylae-like tactics to prevail, especially if there are tactical chokepoints like a bridge or a narrow valley, to use terrain to your advantage (much moreso than just "forest on a hill"). And the flipside, just because you have overwhelming numbers, doesn't mean the AI in TW will fall over dead, as they might find a nice tactical chokepoint to use against *you*, so you have to not only bring it, but bring it the right way. I like it when the outcome of a battle is not a "given" based solely on what shows up the morning thereof.

Anyway, even in Civ it's not a "one unit system" if you build a stack and balance it. A unit on the campaign map can be x number of men in a real-time battle mode, and a stack can be a group of units. This isn't brain surgery here, but it runs philosophically against the grain of "let's just play checkers and pretend they have swords" types of gaming.

 

[CivFan87]

The #1 biggest change I want to see in Civ5 from Civ4 is the combat system.

Supply routes, Flanking attacks/Encirclements, morale, fuel limitations, gueirlla warfare, anything.

Basically I would love it if it were possible to defeat a larger force by using strategy and tactics.

 

[pcgamerdude]

I enjoy the medevil era but it just oges by too fast. I epecialy hate it when i'm in the middle of a war and discover gunpowder. I need it to win but i'll lose if I stop makeing pre gun powder units.

well at lest I took out that political A-hole Isabella in the early game!

 

[pcgamerdude]

in civ 4 they should make trebuches as worker improvements to give you a bonus when attacking from the tile with a trebuche in it

but just to make it fair you would need construction and a stone resource

 

[pcgamerdude]

sorry for all the messages but I keep makeing them before i got ideas from the other posts

they should make more people in the units like more archers in a unit to make combat more exiting

 

[dh_epic]

So I don't know what siege engines did in Civ3. I do know that in BtS they're part of the way there because now siege engines *NEVER* fully destroy a unit they attack, and to re-balance it back a bit they just need to have a 100% chance of withdrawal. This will not, by any means, make them an "invincible" unit. It merely means their attack, the damage they give, and the damage they incur on attacking, are partial, never a full wipeout or full self-destroy. And that *is* realistic, as artillery was used to reduce enemy numbers or defenses, not obliterate them to the last man.

I still find collateral damage unbalanced. Its realism is pretty lousy too. But are you saying that BTS has made strides in both departments? I think it's maybe a bit more balanced, but I can't say 100% withdrawal is realistic since they still take an unrealistic amount of damage before withdrawing.

Philosophical reasons as well as technical. To them, excessive realisim would be "too imbalanced" with too much emphasis on luck, in spite of the fact that the game already is unbalanced and already does weigh heavily toward luck (tell me that someone starting with iron, ivory, two food, and six luxury resources in the first city's fat-cross isn't at an unbalanced ADVANTAGE, go ahead, make a fool of yourself!)

They need to fish or cut bait. If they want all balance all the time, then give everyone everywhere all the time, access to the same resources and quality of start position. Down to the last ivory and gold. If they want to gun for a realistic expression of imbalance, then DO it, and do it the right way instead of some cartoony preposterous abstraction thereof.

They've actually done a pretty damn good job of map balance, compared to Civ 3. Everyone is going to get a horse, iron, copper, *or* ivory resource. That some people still get all four, or even three of those sucks. It pisses me off, especially in multiplayer, to lose because I got shafted on my starting location. But there's been lots of modders putting together pretty good map scripts for all kinds of different tastes. Some people want more natural looking maps. Other people will sacrifice a lot of that for fair play.

Even though it's nearly impossible to get dice rolls out of a game like Civ, I feel like Civ 4 got rid of some of the biggest dice rolls (spies, great leaders, the senate, and ESPECIALLY map conditions). This might not be all that realistic: according to Jared Diamond, Europe won the "game" ENTIRELY because of their starting location. But I think the argument between two extremes -- that they need to cut out probabilities or have the game turn on probability like real life -- presents a false dichotomy. There IS an optimal balance somewhere in the middle. Of course, we'd have to argue about where that balance is, and it might not be the same for every audience.

Because Firaxis thinks everyone is too stupid to manage the tactics of a real ancient battle. And, because Firaxis is so absolutely deathly afraid of "immitating Total War" that even the things TW does *right*, they'll avoid like the plague. And there's really only one thing TW does right.

I've played a few turn based games with a real time battle mode. I can't remember, Master of Magic in the 90s some time. It was fun. But I think one of the reasons they got away with it in that game is because the economy of the game was barely half as complex as that of Civilization.

When I read Soren Johnson's design blog and some of his design presentations at the GDC, that's the common thread I seem to find. His concern isn't so much that people can't understand X, Y, or Z... but that when you put X, Y, and Z in the game at the same time, you risk alienating all but the most hardcore gamers. The game takes a lot longer, hurting the multiplayer scene. The game is harder to learn for anyone who isn't a veteran of the genre or franchise. I think this is a legitimate concern for a game that sells millions.

I hope they DO consider replacing unit-to-unit combat with some kind of tactical-stacked combat in Civ 5. But in order to get them to consider that, you'd need to convince them that it's smart to cut something out. (I'd easily vote for cutting the mindless micromanagement that goes into optimizing your workers, if it meant more intricate combat.)

When I'm in a high-level campaigning mood, I play Civ. When I want battle, I play TW. One of these days a game will provide both. One of these days.

I don't think Firaxis is afraid of realism. But I do think they've been steadily trying to improve the game balance. I also think they've been deathly afraid of making the game any more complex than it already is. I think that's why realism ends up getting the back seat.

(I'd love to try Total War, from what it sounds like.)

 

[Skallagrimson]

I still find collateral damage unbalanced. Its realism is pretty lousy too. But are you saying that BTS has made strides in both departments? I think it's maybe a bit more balanced, but I can't say 100% withdrawal is realistic since they still take an unrealistic amount of damage before withdrawing.

The true realism would be for siege engines to have no defensive strength as the balancing factor to a 100% withdrawal chance--and I really don't think they should move into a square if they destroy an enemy. They are, after all, STATIONARY weapons. And their own damage on attack should represent those engines that broke upon usage, perhaps a max of 20% damage per turn (for really unlucky siege engine batteries!) And then the only way to keep the siege engines alive when defending in a siege is with other units. And of course the "flanking attack" damage from cavalry units, I think is reasonably realistic enough. A final tweak may be to allow siege engines to include other siege engines in collateral damage--they are, after all, just as vulnerable to big flying rocks as anything else.

Much as they hate realism, Firaxis did make a *few* strides in the right direction with BtS (two steps forward, 1 and a half steps back lol).

They've actually done a pretty damn good job of map balance, compared to Civ 3. Everyone is going to get a horse, iron, copper, *or* ivory resource.

Sometimes ONLY one of these. In my current BtS game, I shared a continent start with Alexander, and while I had copper, iron, and horses, he had ONLY horses, and tried to get to my iron with a horse archer rush, which really really really went badly for him. A few spearmen, macemen, and my own horse archers, just went through his horse archer and catapult stacks like a hot knife through butter. Conquering all of his cities became ridiculously easy after his initial stacks got blown away. It really was a case of the AI got totally SCREWED in that one.

SO: is Firaxis all about "balance"... or not? Are they going to fish the balance fish, or cut bait? That's what they need to decide. If they're going to allow for random imbalances for a player's strategy to overcome, fine, then WHAT'S THE PROBLEM with allowing for the other imbalances that you run into when stepping up the realism factors? Hmmmm?

I'm beginning to suspect that what's really at the root of it is: lazy programming!

That some people still get all four, or even three of those sucks. It pisses me off, especially in multiplayer, to lose because I got shafted on my starting location. But there's been lots of modders putting together pretty good map scripts for all kinds of different tastes. Some people want more natural looking maps. Other people will sacrifice a lot of that for fair play.

When I get shafted on a start, it depends on how hard the shafting was. If I still get at least *copper* and horses, I'm good. I can fight my way to the iron. Or if I get copper and ivory, same same. If I can't build ANY melee units at ALL, screw it, restart. I'm not going into battle with nothing counter a horse archer stack, are you kidding me? I'd be just as screwed as the Alexander AI I just wiped out last night! Well, okay, maybe with elephants... if the OTHER guy doesn't have 'em, hehe...

(Luckily Alexander didn't have ivory last night either... he had horses, and ONLY horses! I learned quickly that if I get that level of screwing, RE to the START!)

Even though it's nearly impossible to get dice rolls out of a game like Civ, I feel like Civ 4 got rid of some of the biggest dice rolls (spies, great leaders, the senate, and ESPECIALLY map conditions). This might not be all that realistic: according to Jared Diamond, Europe won the "game" ENTIRELY because of their starting location. But I think the argument between two extremes -- that they need to cut out probabilities or have the game turn on probability like real life -- presents a false dichotomy. There IS an optimal balance somewhere in the middle. Of course, we'd have to argue about where that balance is, and it might not be the same for every audience.

I disagree 100%. If you say you worship at the altar of balance, the f'ing DO it already and stop your piddly whinging for gawd's sake. And abandon all hope of realism altogether. Or if you think you want to present "verisimilitude", the $10 word for quasi-realism, do THAT, and quit using "balance" as an excuse not to. Squeeze the cheeks or get off the pot. Fish or cut bait. Take any metaphor you like, but JUST DO IT.

I've played a few turn based games with a real time battle mode. I can't remember, Master of Magic in the 90s some time. It was fun. But I think one of the reasons they got away with it in that game is because the economy of the game was barely half as complex as that of Civilization.

Similarly so with Total War. The economic choices just amount to taxation levels and the building/units queues, and that's it. Your "tech level" just depends on what buildings you've built, which in turn regulates which units you can build. Not a whole lot in the way of economy strategy to play out other than perhaps some city specialization (rather, province specialization in the old TW). For resources... mmmm... some provinces have iron which gives a weapons and armor boost, and some don't. Yeah, it's simplistic, and I don't really get much out of the campaigning in TW, but for BATTLES... TW is unmatched. It's as close to role-playing William Wallace as you ever might wish to, hehe.

But then, why IS it impossible to incorporate the campaigning complexities of Civ with the battle complexities of TW? Just because? Because they said so? I never accept that as an answer, personally.

When I read Soren Johnson's design blog and some of his design presentations at the GDC, that's the common thread I seem to find. His concern isn't so much that people can't understand X, Y, or Z... but that when you put X, Y, and Z in the game at the same time, you risk alienating all but the most hardcore gamers. The game takes a lot longer, hurting the multiplayer scene. The game is harder to learn for anyone who isn't a veteran of the genre or franchise. I think this is a legitimate concern for a game that sells millions.

Here again they need to learn to fish or cut bait. Do they want simplistic, or do they want micro-manageable? If anything, BtS has taken the game into a far more MM-intensive direction. In Warlords or Vanilla, you're just using the economy as a support structure for military stacks, but in BtS, you CANNOT just rely on military might to get things done. If you think otherwise, two words: APOSTOLIC PALACE!

So if they've boosted the complexity on their own, what are they saying? Quite the opposite of what you read into Soren's blog, apparently.

I hope they DO consider replacing unit-to-unit combat with some kind of tactical-stacked combat in Civ 5. But in order to get them to consider that, you'd need to convince them that it's smart to cut something out. (I'd easily vote for cutting the mindless micromanagement that goes into optimizing your workers, if it meant more intricate combat.)

Some "automatability" is always warranted to re-balance back when engaging in complexity. True statement. I think a few tweaks on city management would go a long way in that direction: for example, just "emphasize production" as a button doesn't really cut it if automated workers are happily blasting out cottages and windmills. You should be able to "specialize" a city automatically in both the citizen automation and the worker automation, such that if you click "production city", the workers build for production, the citizens automate for production tiles, and why not: building queues should automate for production too! (Forge, levee, health-buildings to allow growth, etc.) This way if you want to rise above the minutiae of city specialization, and "just do it", and focus on higher-level strategy, you should be able to without worrying about how badly automated workers and such are going to screw it up for you. I personally would MM anyway, but, that's just me.

I don't think Firaxis is afraid of realism.

You haven't read the designers' own comments on it. They abhor it. They think it takes away from "balance", which is entirely hypocritical because there IS NO balance in the game as it is today.

But I do think they've been steadily trying to improve the game balance. I also think they've been deathly afraid of making the game any more complex than it already is. I think that's why realism ends up getting the back seat.

(I'd love to try Total War, from what it sounds like.)

I like the *original* Total War, but not so much Rome or Medieval 2 TW. The newer campaign maps are confusing, and although they improved the messaging interface (scrolls that drop to the side of the screen), the inability to figure out where the hell cities are or how long it'll take units to move there, is too high a price to pay. Original TW is more like "Risk", which, okay, maybe it's simplistic, but a province was a province, and you move one per turn, whatever's contiguous, and you don't have to try to interpret what the little squiggly white lines mean or get a rude awakening (too late) that your legions won't be at a city on time to defend it from barbarian attack. In a way the newer TW adds *difficulty* to campaigning in an *unrealistic* way, worst of both worlds. But they still have the original battle interface that "put it on the map", so sometimes I'll go into M2TW and just... fight a battle!

 

[dh_epic]

I'm just not buying your "fish or cut bait" argument. The analogy doesn't work. It's foolish to abandon realism as much as it's foolish to abandon game balance. There is actually lots to be gained by abandoning neither. The choice isn't between perfectly symmetrical astro-turf and Jared Diamond's Civilization. The choice isn't between checkers and virtual reality. There's an optimum in the middle somewhere, and that's where the debate should start.

Finding the optimum maximizes profit. When you say the programmers are just lazy, it suggests to me that you don't understand the basics of the business. It doesn't make economic sense to spend twice as long to make a game when you're selling it for the same amount of money. It makes even less sense when you realize that twice as much complexity might lead to half the potential game-buying audience. Somewhere in the middle, the game is simple enough to draw in a lot of consumers, but complex enough to hold their attention.

It's bigger than what you or I want.

Complexity is the issue. I haven't been able to find the developer quote on realism you're talking about (although I do hope that you find it for me). I'm still convinced that Firaxis is concerned about keeping complexity down. Too much complexity drives up development costs. Too much complexity makes it hard to attract new customers. And too much complexity essentially kills their hopes of making a multiplayer product.

Optional automation is never a viable alternative to optional micromanagement. Micromanagement will always yield better results than the AI. (Without necessarily proving that a human being is smarter. Just more patient.) Especially in multiplayer games, excessive micromanagement degenerates the game into who can click the fastest. A fast clicker will beat an automator. I'd rather people win on strategy, but that's just my taste.

The only exception to the complexity rule is expansion packs. Why? Because selling an XP beyond the original justifies the extra development cost, as opposed to just selling single bloated version of the original game. Also, you don't have to worry about scaring away new users -- the XP is sold pretty much EXCLUSIVELY to people who are already experienced with the original version. Civ 4 had fewer units than Civ 3 Conquests. I wouldn't expect Civ 5 to be more complex than Civ 4 BTS.

My hypothesis: the day you see Total War style battles in Civ is the same day that they full out remove workers, or tile yields, or special resources... or greatly simplify some other aspect of the game.

 

[Skallagrimson]

Finding the optimum maximizes profit. When you say the programmers are just lazy, it suggests to me that you don't understand the basics of the business. It doesn't make economic sense to spend twice as long to make a game when you're selling it for the same amount of money. It makes even less sense when you realize that twice as much complexity might lead to half the potential game-buying audience. Somewhere in the middle, the game is simple enough to draw in a lot of consumers, but complex enough to hold their attention.

It's bigger than what you or I want.

It may or may not be true, but if it is, it's a horribly sad statement about the people in the marketplace, that they're too stupid to grasp good gaming. That they would only reach for one off the shelf if it's cartoony nonsensical rubbish. That they would be "put off" by too real of an experience. "Onoz, more than one army man on the screen, I can't HANDLE it!"

Or maybe it's just Firaxis who thinks gamers are that stupid? Creative Assembly isn't bankrupt from selling Total War, but shhhhhhh, that can be our little secret, mmmmkay?

Complexity is the issue. I haven't been able to find the developer quote on realism you're talking about (although I do hope that you find it for me).

No real need, as he was talking the same gibberish you're talking right now. Just pretend he was you.

I'm still convinced that Firaxis is concerned about keeping complexity down. Too much complexity drives up development costs. Too much complexity makes it hard to attract new customers. And too much complexity essentially kills their hopes of making a multiplayer product.

Here's the deal: Civ's got complexity in the campaigning, and Firaxis manages to sell today. TW's got complexity on the battlefield, and they manage to sell today. Why is it a game with both would, of necessity, BOMB?

Development costs would in fact be a required investment. And the return on that would be buyer$ who would henceforth and forever leave TW, the old Civ, Age of Empires, and all the others, sitting on the shelf. Market share. But if that market share isn't worth it to Firaxis, then maybe someone, someday, will decide that it is. And I hope that day is soon.

Optional automation is never a viable alternative to optional micromanagement. Micromanagement will always yield better results than the AI. (Without necessarily proving that a human being is smarter. Just more patient.) Especially in multiplayer games, excessive micromanagement degenerates the game into who can click the fastest. A fast clicker will beat an automator. I'd rather people win on strategy, but that's just my taste.

If I were in a multiplayer game and the other guy thinks he's better because he clicked faster, I'd be wiping my screen of whatever I was eating or drinking at the time. Sometimes I've had to wait a bit for the other player to do his MM bit in his cities, and I thought, bonus, more time for me to double-check MINE!

The only exception to the complexity rule is expansion packs. Why? Because selling an XP beyond the original justifies the extra development cost, as opposed to just selling single bloated version of the original game.

You're making no sense at all. Civ expansion packs are a "single game". You install BtS, and you play BtS. That's a game. You install Warlords and you play Warlords. That's a game. It makes not a bit of sense to say one version, in a more complex state, is "bloated", while another, in that same state, wouldn't be.

Also, you don't have to worry about scaring away new users -- the XP is sold pretty much EXCLUSIVELY to people who are already experienced with the original version. Civ 4 had fewer units than Civ 3 Conquests. I wouldn't expect Civ 5 to be more complex than Civ 4 BTS.

Just as soon as a n00b gets the feel of things in vanilla Civ and starts chatting with other users in a forum like this, and finds out everybody's playing Warlords or BtS, he's gonna dive into Warlords or BtS just so he'll be on the same page as the people he's trying to get advice from. That is yet another dimension of marketing strategy for XPs. An XP isn't just an afterthought or a "meaningless extra" to the game, it's a whole new game. And this is one thing I can't accuse Firaxis of not knowing, because they DO price it accordingly!

My hypothesis: the day you see Total War style battles in Civ is the same day that they full out remove workers, or tile yields, or special resources... or greatly simplify some other aspect of the game.

Who knows, maybe the day that will come instead is one where Creative Assembly decides to add tile yields and workers to TW, give it a better campaign interface, and then THEY sweep the market of all share. And Sid can go back to whatever he was doing in life before Civ1.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

The fact is, the more complex a game is, the more time needs to be devoted to be good at it. Some people don't like gaming that much, so they will buy games that are less complex, but still fun at a level that doesn't require such a great time investment. It is completely reasonable to go after this market.

 

[Skallagrimson]

I think checkers has it locked.