Like Star Trek movies...until the most recent ones.
Why are people comparing Civ V vanilla to Civ IV BTS?
- Thread starter Revoran
- Start date
Like Star Trek movies...until the most recent ones.
This, i like how people act as if BTS never existed and state that because it was an expansion pack, for some reason they can't make Civ 5 up to that standard.
jprc
My dog is smarter than me
There are 2 different pathes:
1- you consider that Civ 5 is the evolution of Civ 4. In this case, you need to consider the latest produce of the evolution and comparing Civ 4 BTS with Civ 5 is part of the evolution.
2- you think Civ 5 has opened a new branch in the evolution. In this case, why not considering civ1 vs Civ 5, or Civ2 vs C5, etc...? comparing only Civ 4 vanilla to Civ 5 is not complete: you need to compare Civ 5 vs ALL other Civs...
Conclusion: compare with whatever ou wish, just clarify your references so then it is possible to reply to you using the same reference.
1- you consider that Civ 5 is the evolution of Civ 4. In this case, you need to consider the latest produce of the evolution and comparing Civ 4 BTS with Civ 5 is part of the evolution.
2- you think Civ 5 has opened a new branch in the evolution. In this case, why not considering civ1 vs Civ 5, or Civ2 vs C5, etc...? comparing only Civ 4 vanilla to Civ 5 is not complete: you need to compare Civ 5 vs ALL other Civs...
Conclusion: compare with whatever ou wish, just clarify your references so then it is possible to reply to you using the same reference.
Guys your missing the obvious here.
They released Civ 3 we liked it
They released Civ 4 we loved it
They released some expansions for Civ 4 it was perfect!
So all of a sudden the accumulated knowledge of 5 years gets VAPORIZED in favor of this franken game we have now that shambles around trying to appeal to a much broader audience, and the die hards, but eventually will disappoint both.
The worst part is its HARD to hate Civ 5, or the developers that gave you such a sterling line up. Its just utterly perplexing to me why they couldn't have kept some of the best parts of the previous Civs, that were tried, true, and successful. They wanted something new, they tried it, and in my opinion it sorta works... but man they could have easily done so much more with this from the get go.
They released Civ 3 we liked it
They released Civ 4 we loved it
They released some expansions for Civ 4 it was perfect!
So all of a sudden the accumulated knowledge of 5 years gets VAPORIZED in favor of this franken game we have now that shambles around trying to appeal to a much broader audience, and the die hards, but eventually will disappoint both.
The worst part is its HARD to hate Civ 5, or the developers that gave you such a sterling line up. Its just utterly perplexing to me why they couldn't have kept some of the best parts of the previous Civs, that were tried, true, and successful. They wanted something new, they tried it, and in my opinion it sorta works... but man they could have easily done so much more with this from the get go.
Hello,
My friends and I don't mind (this much) buying bugged games on release date because we feel like supporting developers who still care to produce old style games. Especially in TBS genre. Damn, I also don't mind messing with the difficulty settings, it's really just semantics and I can move up the ladder (hope I don't hit the ceiling). But for the first time in history something feels very wrong with this vanilla civ. And I've been messing with civs since Amiga 500.
To be honest there are some bright sides. Hex grid is the sh*t, I must admit that. I also really like the no-stacking rules (lots of fixes needed here, but I can see this working pretty well). But with those brilliant additions we also got the complete reset of the complexity and almost all previous concepts. Feels like we're starting from the scratch (civ1 maybe? New civics ladder is just like castle building but with bonuses). Most of us expected it to be "a bit more then previous one". And we get a revolution instead
.
Like someone have decided that most of the work from previous civs is worthless. I smell the new management here... Did someone just say "shareholders demand new target definition"?
So, I will definitely vote with my wallet. Buying priorities went from "must have now" to "might want, but check out first". I'm just afraid too much was taken out to simply return as an expansion. I'm even getting slight flashbacks from Fallout:Tactics.
I have the message for new firaxis managers:
"Dear New Managers,
TBS genre is not in mainstream. If you want to reach Blizzard level of sales you need to quit TBS genre altogether. You may find an empty niche in consoles market, but PC niche is already set and your company bears the crown. Usual PC TBS consumer can afford a console if he also likes console games. In most cases he is quite nerdy and is even capable of emulating some consoles on his PC. He usually knows other games from the genre and probably played civ IV. Usual PC TBS consumer likes his strategies slow, challenging and immersive. Making TBS games simple takes out the challenge. Taking out game concepts depicting various aspects of reality makes the game less immersive. I'm afraid increased slowness won't be enough to compensate.
Sincerely,
- Loyal TBS genre consumer."
My friends and I don't mind (this much) buying bugged games on release date because we feel like supporting developers who still care to produce old style games. Especially in TBS genre. Damn, I also don't mind messing with the difficulty settings, it's really just semantics and I can move up the ladder (hope I don't hit the ceiling). But for the first time in history something feels very wrong with this vanilla civ. And I've been messing with civs since Amiga 500.
To be honest there are some bright sides. Hex grid is the sh*t, I must admit that. I also really like the no-stacking rules (lots of fixes needed here, but I can see this working pretty well). But with those brilliant additions we also got the complete reset of the complexity and almost all previous concepts. Feels like we're starting from the scratch (civ1 maybe? New civics ladder is just like castle building but with bonuses). Most of us expected it to be "a bit more then previous one". And we get a revolution instead
. Like someone have decided that most of the work from previous civs is worthless. I smell the new management here... Did someone just say "shareholders demand new target definition"?
So, I will definitely vote with my wallet. Buying priorities went from "must have now" to "might want, but check out first". I'm just afraid too much was taken out to simply return as an expansion. I'm even getting slight flashbacks from Fallout:Tactics.
I have the message for new firaxis managers:
"Dear New Managers,
TBS genre is not in mainstream. If you want to reach Blizzard level of sales you need to quit TBS genre altogether. You may find an empty niche in consoles market, but PC niche is already set and your company bears the crown. Usual PC TBS consumer can afford a console if he also likes console games. In most cases he is quite nerdy and is even capable of emulating some consoles on his PC. He usually knows other games from the genre and probably played civ IV. Usual PC TBS consumer likes his strategies slow, challenging and immersive. Making TBS games simple takes out the challenge. Taking out game concepts depicting various aspects of reality makes the game less immersive. I'm afraid increased slowness won't be enough to compensate.
Sincerely,
- Loyal TBS genre consumer."
I've never been for strictly comparing civ5 to civ4 BtS.
On its own, vanilla civ4 was still a far better game than civ5. The only major problems were technical flaws, but in gameplay vanilla civ4 excelled in pretty much every way. If anything, what was new conceptually in BtS and Warlords (things like vassal states, espionage, and just adding more civs) I've always pointed out as the least important things. Some things got minorly better over time but, say, diplomacy in civ4 vanilla was the way it was at the start - civ5 couldn't approach that without extreme overhauls which are not comparable.
Along those lines it's more like comparing civ5 to other games (there are plenty of strategy games out there) not in the civ series and this release was still kinda sad. For instance, I'd take the Total War Series or an actual turn-based wargame over civ5 for the war aspect - so all the praise about civ5 as a wargame is kinda off in that perspective; I'd rather civ5 be better at things other than just the wargame part.
On its own, vanilla civ4 was still a far better game than civ5. The only major problems were technical flaws, but in gameplay vanilla civ4 excelled in pretty much every way. If anything, what was new conceptually in BtS and Warlords (things like vassal states, espionage, and just adding more civs) I've always pointed out as the least important things. Some things got minorly better over time but, say, diplomacy in civ4 vanilla was the way it was at the start - civ5 couldn't approach that without extreme overhauls which are not comparable.
Along those lines it's more like comparing civ5 to other games (there are plenty of strategy games out there) not in the civ series and this release was still kinda sad. For instance, I'd take the Total War Series or an actual turn-based wargame over civ5 for the war aspect - so all the praise about civ5 as a wargame is kinda off in that perspective; I'd rather civ5 be better at things other than just the wargame part.
falconne
meep
Btw for those who missed it/have bad memories
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=141327
There were plenty more of the same ilk. Civ 4 was a horrible game on release, it really was bad.
People who use the argument that Civ 4 had the same criticism on release, like the above post, are forgetting that the problems with Civ 4 were technical issues. The gameplay was great - sure you'll always find people who preferred Civ 3, but in general most people complained they wished the game wouldn't crash so much because they were enjoying it.
The problem with Civ 5 is the gameplay. Those of us who don't like it feel it's boring and dumbed down. I've never felt bored in any version of Civ before, no matter how many times I played. This isn't a "Oh it's new and I don't like change" reaction... we've had plenty of Civs before, it's not like this is the first sequel to a 20 year old game. Civ 5 really isn't a "new" game... the only significantly new things that have been added are tactical combat and tile by tile growth. City states and social policies are ok, but mostly "meh". Everything else is just Civ 4 with many of its features removed. The gameplay has boiled down to "Hit End Turn until victory, you'll get to make the odd decision now and then".
Quoted for truth .
Whoever thinks we should compare Civ V with Civ IV vanilla needs to wake up and open his eyes . That's not how it works at all .
Mîtiu Ioan
Deity
Absolutely true from my point of view.
Civ 4 introduced - from Vanilla version - alot of new improved features and managed them quite well from beginning :
1. AlphaCentaury-style Civics instead of "monolithic" government from previous version. For me this was THE CHANGE.
I absolutely loved it and the great flexibility which it induce to game ! Practically I'm in expectation to buy this version ( and play Civ 4 BTS or SC2 instead for the next month ) mainly due to this aspect
. May sound silly but that's my personal feeling ... 2. New combat style - OK ... still SOD, but without stupid Attack/Defense split but with promotion instead. And - more important IMHO - without über-powerfull artilery from Civ3 ( the fact that Civ3 lacks sort of "counter-battery fire" as defense was one of my biggest disgust ... ).
3. Logical and less-random Great Personalities behavior and capabilities ( little unbalanced by Great Spies addition but anyway ... ).
4. Removal of corruption-based way to counter/limit over-expansions ... which was an absolutely horror in my opinion ( and the attempt to minimize the impact using "new special specialist" was even worse in Civ 3 Conquest
).5. Impossible to switch from one Wonder to another - personally I like this as long as it lead to situations when AI not longer build a large number of Wonders ( if it missed one skipped to next available ones for that age and so on ).
6. Better game-balance with more available strategic choices ( at least until discover of Communism/Biology when - IMHO - State Planned Economy is too powerful and almost "a must to adopt Civics"
).Regarding technical flaws I assume that most of them came due to ( underlying ) dificulties imposed by transition to a ( decent ) 3D graphics ... but was mainly fixed.
Just some of my toughts ...
Bill Bisco
Callous Calling
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2007
- Messages
- 590
Thank you sir! Finally someone said it!
Because people really just want Civ IV: BTS part 2.
A new Civ game only comes out so often. I WANT them to start fresh, start with the basics. Then build upon that with expansion packs. Civ IV: BTS was nowhere near basic, and personally, I didn't care about espionage and corporations. The expansions are there to add things, and should be considered optional extras. So, start with the basics, make them work right, then add new features and complicate things through the expansion packs. If thing's start out already overly complicated, two things could happen:
People who like the more simple approach will be elimenated from the sales. There are vast amounts of people that hated how complicated Civ IV became. I know people love Civ V but couldn't really get into Civ IV because of it's complexity.
people could be thrown off, because it would take ages to learn the game. Even with Civ IV, it's easier to start out with Vanilla, learn the basics, then move on to more advanced stuff in BTS. With a basic Civ, especially one that is as drastically different from all others like this (5), we get some time to learn the game properly, then when it's been patched up, tweaked and stuff like that, a proper expansion pack that adds new elements and features will be easier to enjoy.
Also, if Civ V was Civ IV but with 1UPT and hexes, people could call it a rip-off and wonder why the hell not just play Civ IV.
Which is what I ask of you people who are so desperately clinging to Civ IV:BTS - why don't you just play that if that's all you want? What exactly did you want from a new Civ game?
A new Civ game only comes out so often. I WANT them to start fresh, start with the basics. Then build upon that with expansion packs. Civ IV: BTS was nowhere near basic, and personally, I didn't care about espionage and corporations. The expansions are there to add things, and should be considered optional extras. So, start with the basics, make them work right, then add new features and complicate things through the expansion packs. If thing's start out already overly complicated, two things could happen:
People who like the more simple approach will be elimenated from the sales. There are vast amounts of people that hated how complicated Civ IV became. I know people love Civ V but couldn't really get into Civ IV because of it's complexity.
people could be thrown off, because it would take ages to learn the game. Even with Civ IV, it's easier to start out with Vanilla, learn the basics, then move on to more advanced stuff in BTS. With a basic Civ, especially one that is as drastically different from all others like this (5), we get some time to learn the game properly, then when it's been patched up, tweaked and stuff like that, a proper expansion pack that adds new elements and features will be easier to enjoy.
Also, if Civ V was Civ IV but with 1UPT and hexes, people could call it a rip-off and wonder why the hell not just play Civ IV.
Which is what I ask of you people who are so desperately clinging to Civ IV:BTS - why don't you just play that if that's all you want? What exactly did you want from a new Civ game?
It's not like they have to forget all the progress of Warlords and BTS. They already implemented those gameplay mechanics and saw how they worked out before developing Civ 5, so I don't see how it would make sense to ignore all that when judging Civ 5. Why not compare it to Civ 1 while we're at it? What I'm interested in is how this game compares to other releases in the same series that I can also choose to play, not how it should be rated on some arbitrary scale of how good a 1.0 release is. That becomes a lot less meaningful when you're on the fifth incarnation of reinventing the same gameplay anyway, if you ask me.
I want to build a civilization/empire standing the test of time. I want to feel as a ruler who manages a virtual empire modeled after real life. I want to care for my people health, I want to spy on and sabotage my enemies and friends, I want to have commercial relations with other nations, I want to care about different strategic and special resources, I want to cripple an enemy just by destroying access to a strategic resource, I want to build my palace, I want to juggle civics depending on the context and I want to plan a war properly not just making units and moving them one by one, where 10 units would stretch from one end to the other of the continent.
P.S: About the auto embarking, think about the D-day WW2, no unit embarked itself in small boats and away they went. The units were in transports protected by navies. That's a crucial aspect of war logistics when you fight on another continent. In civ 5 you just move the units on the water is if it were another type of land terrain. And somehow the war is deeper and more complex?!
Well, I of course think Civ V should mostly feel like an "improved" BTS, although "improved" can mean a lot of things. But I do understand, that some think Civ 5 is supposed to only have only the "best" features of IV and everything else swept away, and new, more polished features would be added with expansion packs, or that Civ V should ignore all previous Civ's and start completely from the point zero. Neither is really right or wrong, but I would have wanted to hear from Firaxis what they are going for. That's really only thing that matters, if this is what they wanted to make, they have succeeded, wether I like it or not.
Actually one is wrong: starting from the point zero . Thats not what you expect from a successor . Thats what you expect from a totally new game line , like Civ CTP for instance , there you expect something totally different . Or is that just me :|
katipunero
Prince
quoted for truth. developers of 5 had the benefit of hundreds of thousands of hours of free beta-testing thanks to Civ's 1-4. why put everything to waste and build stuff utterly from scratch? if that is the case with 5, then fans of the series have a perfectly valid claim that the game is civilization redone 1.0, and therefore should not in any way be considered as the 5th generation of the series.
charon2112
King
Reading these forums up until the release of the game, it's apparent that some people had already made up their mind that V was "dumbed down", when in reality it's every bit as complex as IV, you just need to learn how to play. My experience with boredom has been the exact opposite. With IV, I often experienced late game boredom...at that point I had every building built in every city, and the game boiled down to hitting end turn until I either built the spaceship or won a score victory. With V, I have to think much harder about how I want to win, buildings take longer to build, so I need to plan which ones I want where. I have found with V, the late game boredom is lessened.
I can't state this enough, removing redundant features like health, espionage, corporations isn't "dumbing down"...it's just good design.
For people who have been a fan since day one can you answer me this;
Does Firaxis have a history of listening to the community and making changes? I mean it's clear there are several common dislikes that even people who enjoy Civ 5 say could be improved upon.
Another question;
You people who have been long time fans...Do you have faith in them to make the changes or are you just going to pack it up and stick with 4?
Thanks.
Does Firaxis have a history of listening to the community and making changes? I mean it's clear there are several common dislikes that even people who enjoy Civ 5 say could be improved upon.
Another question;
You people who have been long time fans...Do you have faith in them to make the changes or are you just going to pack it up and stick with 4?
Thanks.
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