Why do so few people play Civ IV? or grand strategy games in general?

[Fippy]

Strategy was very popular before mobile and social media, i doubt that shooters etc. have an impact on this.
Most of us played all good games when PC gaming was on top, from Civ or Homm to RPG like Might & Magic or Wizardry,
then maybe some Doom or Quake, or adventures like Indy Jones and Sierra games..

But those were times when peoples liked to relax and sit down in one place.
We were not thinking about who liked something we wrote or pics of us, we played for ourselves and not for hypes,
and almost everybody i knew liked many different genres as mentioned above. Maybe cos all those games had much heart in them.

 

[Quintillus]

Back when I was in high school/college, and Civ4 was the current version of Civ, I did in fact randomly encounter people who played Civ4. Despite gaming as a whole being much less mainstream than it is now. I remember discussing Age of Empires III vs Civ 4 back in the fall of 2005 (AoE III played much better on my computer, so it was the winner for me), playing Civ3 LAN one New Years' Eve in the mid-late 2000's (not everyone had picked up Civ IV yet), and both playing Civ4 with friends at college and hearing people I didn't know as well talk about playing it. But, to be fair, most of my friends are also fairly nerdy, I went to a pretty academically-focused high school and college, and history became one of my favorite topics in high school. So, I was more likely to know people who played Civ than the average person.

I also don't recall knowing anyone playing Civ II (which would have been the equivalent Civ game in terms of age) at that time, although IIRC one of my college roommates had played it before I knew him (and had definitely played Sid Meier's Gettysburg). Realistically, the number of people playing a game that came out when they were three years old is not likely to be very high. Off the top of my head, the only games that came out at that point relative to my age, and which I played a semi-decent amount, were Sim Ant and Sim City (the original), and I'm not sure I know anyone else my age IRL who has played those.

 

[Hamilton321]

Yeah, I do play many more old games than most other people I know, I got into strategy games early on, then I played mostly new releases, but in the last three years or so I have really gotten into old strategy games. I think that there are good things about both new and old strategy games. For me Civilization IV will always be my favorite, mostly because I like the unique and interesting mechanics in civilization IV, my father played it and I really find one upt tedious. There is something to be said about new strategy games and I play new and old games about half and half. I think that old strategy games have a certain level of refinement that newer releases lack. Franchises increasingly try to appeal to new players, but not to skilled players and publishers push their development teams to churn out new content at a faster and faster rate, meaning less polishing, less variety, less new features.

There is a certain charm to playing a game time and time again, finding easter eggs, developing new strategies, and mastering them. Most new releases lack this charm, although I do occasionally find new releases that are fun to replay and master. There are quite a few new releases that I enjoy.

 

[rah]

I UPT isn't necessarily the issue. More roads help you solve the movement issue, but some moron figured that the map looked ugly with too many roads so they decided to add maintenance for them to discourage you building them. And the AI has no Idea how to fight using 1UPT. At least in IV SODs don't have to be that tactical. They can just come in and maul you, so you actually fear them. Carpet of doom is just laughable,.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

^ Doomstacking is SP only tactics in Civ 4 after extreme early game. Not even worth considering in PvP unless you attack with a large tech lead or before catapults.

 

[rah]

I don't know about that. Doom stacking using stack attack is ultra fast in pvp games.
Speed while attacking determines more results than anything short of really large tech advantage.
I've lost many battles because I just wasn't fast enough. He who gets to use his collateral damage units first wins.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I don't know about that. Doom stacking using stack attack is ultra fast in pvp games.
Speed while attacking determines more results than anything short of really large tech advantage.
I've lost many battles because I just wasn't fast enough. He who gets to use his collateral damage units first wins.

With roads in own territory, collateral initiative goes to defender unless defender is out of position or just doesn't have enough tech to damage the attacker's units. Doomstacking works for high level AI ONLY because they have the production + maintenance bonuses to shove 30+ units around in the BC era while still garrisoning every city with 2-4 units on top of that. Enough to sponge collateral.

MP doesn't carry that kind of production disparity. Yes, with simultaneous turns input speed + connection are both factors on culture-contested borders. Double moving (at end of turn, with connection advantage at turn start) is a real possibility and it sucks to be on the wrong end of it. I guess my RTS background is showing a little though.

Still, in PvP it's not clear how you're getting past the issue of "friendly terrain + roads = 2 movements minimum, while the attacker only gets 1 with non-mounted". As time goes on this rapidly becomes 3.

There are alternatives like using terrain-move promotions and/or sticking to defensive terrain so that defender is forced to take bad trades to dislodge attacker. Better if units take multiple turns to get between cities and/or could be intercepted.

Another huge exception is if the attacker is on boats. For civs with lots of coastal cities this is a massive problem because the attacker *can* doomstack and amphibiously attack/burn any of several coastal cities in 1 turn of movement. Also possible to surprise-raze on DoW if defender doesn't have vision in water to see it coming, even with just galleons. AI doesn't do stuff like this but it's a very serious threat against players.

 

[rah]

Yes. The two move was such an issue that we had a gentleman's rule that on the turn you DOWed you couldn't wait till you thought everyone was done with their turn, DOW, move, then hit enter. The turn you DOWed you had to pause to let the defending civ move that turn. This didn't eliminate the issue in later turns, but in an active war, people would be paying more attention.

 

[Rikkisix]

Hey as some one who has lurked here for mods and to view, figure i'd finally make an account myself. How i get myself into Civ 4 was mostly word of mouth, from a buddy quite a few years ago. The problem is compared to most newer games it's very hard to get into for a few reasons, looks difficulty etc. But one big problem is a lot of people just don't want too (Maybe can't) enjoy sitting down and playing games for a long time. I personally stopped playing this when i started because i thought i was a horrible player because i couldn't beat Monarch on my first try. A few month's later i booted it back up and improved etc. It's a tough game to learn, but once you get the feel for it. Well it's a pretty great feeling, even losing or winning people could just dogpile you and it's game,

I myself love that, most do not in the normal game market. As some one who's in there early / Mid 20's I was surprised at how many people just don't make time for games anymore. The only other game i play is WoW classic / Vanilla etc back in the day when i was much younger mostly because i don't enjoy games with endings. An example is, i just played Divinity 2 Great dnd Strategy type game. But once i beat it well ain't much point in replaying it, besides for more story options etc. I've had the same problem with FPS Before multiplayer came out besides a select few games.

Civ 4 isn't really a game about winning as much, sure you can rush rifling / Military tradition and just rapidly conquer everyone. But that gets boring fast, and why would you want to win that way over and over again? Does it fit the narrative of your civilization? Can you do that? Are other people to far etc etc. Even in maybe you're best games you can look back and find ways to improve in a way it's sorta a timeless game once you find yourself in a spot you enjoy. Personally once you get to about 1800's era tech for me, the game just feels like a slog, and it's tough to lose or come back at this point. But no doubt others enjoy the end game and dislike the start.

It's also very tough to find games like Civ 4, I've tried, never was big on Grand strategy's myself. I think the only real strategy games i got into was, Warcraft 3 and Fire Emblem. (If you'd call em that.) and Chess.

I think history is also a big factor as a fan of it, it most certainly opened up for me personally more people to learn about and such. Not being the smartest guy in the world it always shocked me that most people who do get a higher education then myself, seem indifferently uncaring or lack any knowledge of a good chunk of it. Heck i remember talking to some people at my local college who didn't even know who De Gauile was. Or Hannibal. There's a much better i don't know. Want to get into a game as a character you'd want to play for sure.

But i also think people just enjoy more colorful games, to me the graphic's don't look bad at all but most people run pretty beefy PC's now and days, although to be fair games like minecraft are huge and they don't look like a game straight out of a moive. I think people are more use to a hands on approach as well, for example being told what to do. Why / how / when etc. To some that's more welcoming then, here's a settler i hope Barb axemen don't spawn next to me as i learn why building roads to the sea doesn't let me make ships!

I think age is also a huge part without a Re-master people just won't seek it out, unless they know about it already or word of mouth. People just naturally don't look to the past for better games, and that's a shame because there are aton of amazing games from early 2k, 90's etc. One i always like to name is planescape torment, and the multiplayer is slow. Very slow, but i'm also an oddball in a sense i only enjoy marathon games. But plaything that on Multiplayer is rough everything takes so long ending turns. NPC RNG etc.

But that's just my two cents i only really dump a ton of hours into this game and O.G WoW so who know's. I just guess it's a mentality difference. After 8 hours of work, not everyone wants that super challenging world conquest game, but at the same time they won't put it on settler to just steam roll the world. They'll play another game etc.

 

[gavenkoa]

Grand strategy's

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_grand_strategy_video_games

Civ4 is not in a list. Someone needs to correct that...

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_grand_strategy_video_games

Civ4 is not in a list. Someone needs to correct that...

Civ4 isn't Grand Strategy though, something like Europa Universalis is.

 

[Hamilton321]

Civ4 isn't Grand Strategy though, something like Europa Universalis is.

I don't know, it depends on how broadly one defines grand strategy, my definition of a strategy game is a game where the player leads a group of entities to work towards a set of specific goals which can be achieved through making a series of decisions throughout the game that gradually move this group of entities towards those objectives. By this definition Civ4 is definitely a strategy game. The term grand strategy is a little more ambiguous and there are arguments about what it actually means.

When I looked up the definition of grand strategy, I found this one quote by political science professor, Peter Feaver, "Grand strategy is a term of art from academia, and refers to the collection of plans and policies that comprise the state’s deliberate effort to harness political, military, diplomatic, and economic tools together to advance that state’s national interest."

I think that the difference between strategy games and grand strategy games is that in grand strategy games there is more complexity, there are more variables, decisions in one area tend to have more wide-ranging implications than in a simple strategy game, for instance if you make a diplomatic decision it effects your economy and politics, or if you make a political decision it effects your military and economy. Civilization does have a certain amount of this overlap, although it has less of it than crusader Kings II for instance. Civilization is on the border of grand strategy and strategy and is usually defined simply as a strategy game, but could be defined as a grand strategy game as well. I am sick of writing now, so I conclude here.

 

[Kaiman]

As someone who plays a lot of this style of board games, time-consuming turn-based historically-grounded games have always been a niche market, even when they were at their peak in the 70s (before RPGs got popular and before computers were a thing). Playing that style of game on PC helps vs using a real board, but it's still gonna be too long and complicated for some people (whether their tastes are just different or whether their mental strengths lie elsewhere).