I'm sorry, but just because you found a few people who just had one or two sentences to say about the game and you told them to explain more, doesn't mean everyone who's criticising the game are the same or need your help. Most of us have written walls of text about exactly why we think it's "dumbed down" (which is really just a more critical way to say "simplified", which is just a less deceptive way to say "streamlined"). There are plenty of explanations why the mechanics that were removed mattered for a history simulator and how the mechanics that have been simplified have removed strategic depth and realism.
This game is no history simulator and it never was. Srategic depth is important - I agree. Civrev's lack of strategic depth was the main reason I hated that game. Realism is a tough one, but generally I treat it as a secondary concern.
There may be 'plenty' of explanations why civ5 has less strategic depth, but keep in mind this game is still relatively new to most people and it's relatively unpatched and still potentially less balanced than it will eventually be. Both of those things could mean it's too early to decide once and for all it has less strategic depth.
But none of these walls get read by those who think Civ V is fine as it is.
I can sympathise. But is it really the people who are happy with civ5 who you are trying to convince? If they're happy with the game, why change that?
While those of us who don't like it write at length about why we don't, they simply respond with "Go play Civ 4 instead" or "Actually I find Civ 5 deeper than Civ 4".
The "go play civ4 instead" comments are bordering on trolling at times, but otherwise the people commenting that civ5 is deeper than civ4 is fair enough. I and you might not agree with them but it's a matter of opinion and you can't change that. It's possible that those people who think civ5 has the greater strategic depth have played games where that was exactly what they observed and felt. Maybe you haven't had the pleasure of getting the right settings or so on to enjoy that same experience?
The latter ones are even more annoying, because none of them ever explain what makes it deeper, they just think it is. My condescending opinion is that they just got too lost in Civ 4 to figure out the strategy and thought there wasn't any, but Civ 5 is simpler to figure out so they finally see what depth is.
I understand and agree that people tend to get away a bit easier with not offering any reasons when they express their love of the game. But sometimes it's more difficult to explain one's like for something than one's dislike. That's pretty normal.
As not using Civ 4 when suggesting how Civ 5 can be improved, I don't think that's fair. It's called Civ 5... the 5 means it should be better than 4.
Whoa nelly. That is a big call. It can't be better than civ4
to all people. That is important for you and others to remember. There are definitely people who think civ5 is better than civ4.
And 'better' is a matter of judgement/opinion. Like I've explained before, people who immensely enjoyed civ4 are statistically the most likely group of people to find civ5 less enjoyable. You can't escape that fact. It would still be fact if 70% of the people who own and play civ5 consider it to be better than civ4.
Games shouldn't change in philosophy between versions. If they wanted to make a new, more accessible game they should have done a spin off. Otherwise they're just milking the brand name and it will hurt future sales.
Well, that's a somewhat controversial opinion. As sad as it may be to admit, in general making a game more accessible to a wider audience is more likely to improve future sales. Again, you and I may not like it that way, but I think it's a bit of a stretch to argue that making a game more accessible hurts sales in the long run. Yes, you will lose the enthusiasm of some of the fans, but not the broader majority and the people with too much money for their own good.
Anyway, what you just wrote, and what I just wrote are opinions that are hard to back up with much evidence. Pretty much have to agree to disagree I suppose.
Civ isn't a fantasy game, it's based on human civilization.
And obviously it still is.
We have reality as a guide to help us know what should be in it and what shouldn't. The game doesn't need to, in a a manner of speaking, reinvent the wheel with every new version. If Civ 6 comes out with hex maps gone will people go on about how hex was a Civ 5 mechanic, get over it?
For sure some people would say that.
When it comes to whether a sequel to a very successful game should 'reinvent the wheel' or 'start from scratch' is again a matter of much debate. I'm happy to sit somewhere in the middle on this one. There is no doubt that if civ5 didn't remove much of what was problematic or uninteresting in civ4 and only tried to cram more things in, there would be lots of the "hard core" fans expressing their disappointment that civ5 didn't do enough to innovate and cut the chaff or take risks with a new design. You simply cannot please everyone.
There's no basis for that. So many of us have explained at length why we don't like it and you can understand the complaints are valid. Most of us are much more vocal than “Me too!”. I wasn't much of a poster on these forums before, but having played this game I felt the need to vent my frustration.
And that's good, I welcome people with valid complaints to vent their frustrations and explain their thoughts. On the moderator side I have been advocating for people who want to express their disappointments, especially a few months ago when the steam news was the big topic that was drawing a lot of 'hate' threads.
To those people though, I only want to encourage them to avoid turning discussions into what are essentially political debates, polarised over whether the game is dumbed down or whether it is not. The outcomes of such arguments are never really productive so I think it's a good idea for people to try and avoid over using such simplistic phrases. Especially those people who are willing to put in the extra time to elaborate and explain their thoughts, I think it would be wise. Every time such a person refers to the game as being dumbed down, someone who's enjoying the game gets offended and then feels the need to defend themselves, often attacking the person who wrote such complaints. As I said in one of my above posts, the 'dumb down' complaints have one implication as that those who enjoy the game are less educated. It's like saying 'this is a game that only kids can enjoy' or 'this is a game that only those who have no knowledge of history can enjoy'. The 'dumb down' complaints insinuate things unfairly about those people playing the game, and it's exactly because the phrase itself is ambiguous and frequently taken in a more offensive way than what was intended.
Again, this is not a new game, it's version 5 of an established franchise. You wouldn't expect that, when Microsoft release the next version of Office, they would leave out PowerPoint, because they want to get the functionality of the rest of the package done right before adding more stuff, perhaps an alternative presentation app that may be better, 6 months later.
I know that Windows Media player 12 felt like a definite downgrade from media player 11, and that annoyed me. In this case I felt they streamlined it too much and took away some of the useful functions I frequently used in 11. It's easy to cherry pick examples that suit your argument, and I don't think it's entirely fair to compare productivity software with video game (entertainment) software.
In the case of productivity software, if a newer version is worse at its task than the previous version, people will simply not buy it. In the case of entertainment software, it's more necessary to provide a different experience. There is no written nor unwritten rule that sequels to anything always have to be better. They can always try, and I'm sure they always do, but it's never a given. People who think that sequels always have to outdo their prequels are simply setting themselves up for disappointment, because it's an impossible expectation to always deliver on. The problem is even more apparent when the prequel is extremely popular, because a larger proportion of people will find the sequel disappointing. Basically you're in the unlucky group who find the game disappointing.
Many mechanics have already been tried and tested progressively in the last 4 iterations of this game. The aim should have been to improve them and add more that gave the game an increased epic feel and made it more realistic, just like each previous version had done. I thought that was what gave Civ such a lasting appeal: the epic feel of actually feeling like you're going through history, not an abstract strategy game that's simple enough for non 4X gamers. What was the sense in throwing away so many mechanics, that took years to work out and starting from scratch?
Honestly I don't think there was anything that made civ4 inherently more realistic than civ3 nor any of the previous versions, but I agree that civ4 was more enjoyable to play. At least to me, I played civ4 exactly like it was an abstract strategy game. It's practically to the point where the phrase 'whipping' to me is synonymous with 'a good early game production method'. It doesn't make any sense at all, but I'm still perfectly happy with it as a gameplay mechanic. Just like the whole combat game in civ is
extremely abstracted to the point where as soon as someone even
begins discussing why combat isn't realistic (e.g. archers having range greater than rifles), getting into the argument becomes completely pointless. If realism is what people want, they should play simulators. I happen to enjoy flight sims and racing sims for example, and I can see why those sorts of games usually don't have mass appeal. Like you said, in a TBS or 4X game, realism can only serve as a general guide but it is never the only guide.
At least to me, civ5 is still barely managing to keep the feel of like I'm playing a civilization going through history. I must admit they've done more in this game to make it feel more like I'm playing a boardgame against other 'competitors' but I don't necessarily have a big problem with that, because it's how I play the game anyway. For example, one of the notifications says 'an unmet
player has reached the Medieval era'. For the Better AI mod for bts, I always liked it when they made the AI try harder to win the game, as it meant there was more challenge for me when playing the game. Trying to figure out a way to win the game was how I enjoyed playing it, and it's for similar reasons that I really enjoy the mp side of civ4. I never really (or at least didn't for long) played civ4 for the purpose of simulating history.
, but come the
compared with SMAC : less victories, less diplo options , less terrain types, less worker actions, less units, no climate , less strategy options for a win, completely boardish map ( while SMAC ,even being on 2-D , had that sense of geography due to the existance of real height + the dynamic rivers ) ... it is true that civ III brought some good stuff, like culture, but in the end I always felt that civ III was a inferior product than SMAC : too little added to make up for what was taken ( better said, never putted there at all )).
), the diplomatic options are little , badly thought in terms of game balance ( research pacts are clearly there ) and quite opaque in their effects ( meaning that a casual player will never get what they do ) and your foreign advisor is so underwhelming that will not even tell you what is the status between 2 civs you know ( i would fire that clear example of nepotism in action if I could 
). The worst is that , without a decent diplomacy, all the sense of playing against active and cunning oponents goes by the window ( by either unexplainable decisions by the part of the AI or by the opaqueness of the diplo situation in general ) and this gets the looks of a turn-based Age of Empires ( P.S I mean those versions of AoE that had some diplomacy , not the last one . Anyway, the diplo of the AI in AoE was always quite underwhelming , to say the least ) ...
