Why have the Mughals never been in the game?

Did you ever play Civ 3? The name Abu Bakr could have played a trick on your memory.

No, never played it
I have played it, but he wasn't who came to mind.
Well, going by the name, she's still a Gandhi. :p
THOSE Gandhi's are not related by blood or marriage to the Mahatma, though I think they passively on ignorance.
Knew you were from Vancouver BC before even looking at your profile after that comment :mischief: what’s up fellow PNWer
There's quite a few Sikhs where I live in Edmonton. I'vr heard they also have notable numbers in Wisconsin and Minnesota.
 
I've been thinking about this question, and I think the reason the series always portrayed the Mauryans and modern India is because (in their view) the Mauryan Empire encompassed the same area as the modern Indian Republic. So we have Mauryan India, it breaks into multiple countries, and is then finally reunited as modern India. Adding Mughal and Chola leaders and components would, in their view, not be representative of the entire "Indian" civ but only a part, which would be against their philosophy of a united India.

And yes, I know the Mayans and Greeks and other civs that weren't always or ever politically unified have had different components from different times, and Firaxis' treatment of India seems unique, but to me the theory seems completely plausible.
 
I've been thinking about this question, and I think the reason the series always portrayed the Mauryans and modern India is because (in their view) the Mauryan Empire encompassed the same area as the modern Indian Republic. So we have Mauryan India, it breaks into multiple countries, and is then finally reunited as modern India. Adding Mughal and Chola leaders and components would, in their view, not be representative of the entire "Indian" civ but only a part, which would be against their philosophy of a united India.

And yes, I know the Mayans and Greeks and other civs that weren't always or ever politically unified have had different components from different times, and Firaxis' treatment of India seems unique, but to me the theory seems completely plausible.
I'm not sure that's the best explanation considering the Mughals controlled more area than the Mauryan Empire, especially more of southern India. Also, Civ 5 India unique building was a Mughal Fort after all, and Civ 4's mausoleum building resembled, or made reference to, the Taj Mahal.

In this instance, I would say that the biggest contribution that the Mughals did give India was in their architecture, which at least has been put into the design of the civ on multiple occasions. :)

Regarding leaders, I wouldn't be surprised if it had more to do with the Mughals were originally foreign conquerors that practiced Islam. As a result, they probably thought it for the best to have leaders that originated from the Indian subcontinent that practiced religions which originated there (Hinduism, Buddhism etc.).
 
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I'm not sure that's the best explanation considering the Mughals controlled more area than the Mauryan Empire, especially more of southern India.
I know that, but earlier versions of Civ weren't very well-researched, and there's this pervasive Indian nationalist myth that the Mauryans controlled all of modern India (and Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and a few other countries as well). I can see the developers falling down that pothole.
 
I know that, but earlier versions of Civ weren't very well-researched, and there's this pervasive Indian nationalist myth that the Mauryans controlled all of modern India (and Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and a few other countries as well). I can see the developers falling down that pothole.
Sure, but that's where India's Anglophone colonial period helps.
You can easily portray it with sources made by Europeans, thus completely dodging nationalist narratives and nonsense.
Compare that with someplace like Korea, which had next to no contact with England or US and as such they get to fully dictate the narrative. That is, South Korean national myths which wouldn't even see eye to eye with a purely hypothetical 90s Russian Civ clone focusing on historical events and views that North Korea focuses on, simply due to research through Soviet era books and acamedia.
 
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Sure, but that's where India's Anglophone colonial period helps.
You can easily portray it with sources made by Europeans, thus completely dodging nationalist narratives and nonsense.
Compare that with someplace like Korea, which had next to no contact with England or US and as such they get to fully dictate the narrative. That is, South Korean national myths which wouldn't even see eye to eye with a purely hypothetical 90s Russian Civ clone focusing on historical events and views that North Korea focuses on, simply due to research through Soviet era books and acamedia.
In my experience, colonial historiography is rarely better than national myths in terms of accuracy or historical value. As a prime example, Frederick Jackson Turner, whose Frontier Thesis dominated American historiography for over half a century, would have you believe that the Native Americans never existed. He simply doesn't mention them except vaguely as part of the landscape that obligingly retreats as white settlers advance. The only Native American he mentions by name is Tecumseh, and only as an exemplar of the futility of resisting Manifest Destiny. While scholarship started calling Turner's hypothesis into question by the 1930s, it wasn't until the 1950s that Native American historians started being able to say, "No, actually, we're still here" in mainstream scholarship. All sources should be approached critically, whether written by outsiders or insiders.
 
Now that you mention it Nur Jahan would have at least been a more inspiring choice than Indira Gandhi for the female leader of Civ 2, if they had to keep the other one.
I wanted Nur Jahan as a third India leader in Civ VI.

I still think that game had one solid 8 civ expac/pass left in it, and only a handful of missing leaders: Nur Jahan, Charlemagne, Margaret of Denmark, and maybe Harun Al-Rashid. Would have rounded out the "idea" of VI, I think.
 
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why have we never seen them represented in the franchise before?
My guess is that Sid Meier himself has always insisted that Gandhi should be available as a playable leader, and so has made it difficult to justify implementing more South Asian representation beyond that, as there's really only one polity in the region's entire history that Gandhi could realistically represent, and that's modern, unified India. A probably more important aspect I would say, is that the Mughals were not a nationality, but a dynasty (a foreign one at that, if that matters); it makes about as much sense as having a Hapsburg civ, a Ptolemaic civ or... jfc, an Ottoman civ!? (Quick aside: I've always hated how strategy games refers to the country as "The Ottomans", as the historical Ottomans themselves never called it that; they most often called the country they ruled over Turkey, Rome/Rum or more formally, "The Well-Protected Domains")

What makes this kind of a hard nut to crack, is that unlike Europe, the polities in pre-colonial India were pretty much always named after their respective ruling families, rather than the languages their inhabitants spoke. To make matters even trickier, Indian nationalism in real life has always put a lot of focus on uniting the subcontinent as much as possible, which has resulted in more regional nationalisms being extremely controversial. Like, enough for people frequently getting killed over this topic. Heck, I'm pretty sure people are still getting killed over it.

Put more simply, a unified India under Gandhi has always been the safest choice
 
(Quick aside: I've always hated how strategy games refers to the country as "The Ottomans", as the historical Ottomans themselves never called it that; they most often called the country they ruled over Turkey, Rome/Rum or more formally, "The Well-Protected Domains")
I used to think like this too, but I've come around to it recently. The issue with 'Turkey/Turks' is that they were plenty of Turks who were not within the Ottoman Empire. The other is that unlike the Habsburgs or the Tudors or the Carolingians the Ottomans were not just one of many dynasties ruling over the same state, they were the state; it's amazing how in their 600+ years of history every ruler was a descendant of Osman, and the legitimacy of the ruling dynasty was never seriously threatened. I think that makes a strong case for identifiying the polity with its dynasty.

Also, I am in favour of the Ptolemaics being their own civ
 
(Quick aside: I've always hated how strategy games refers to the country as "The Ottomans", as the historical Ottomans themselves never called it that; they most often called the country they ruled over Turkey, Rome/Rum or more formally, "The Well-Protected Domains")

I used to think like this too, but I've come around to it recently. The issue with 'Turkey/Turks' is that they were plenty of Turks who were not within the Ottoman Empire. The other is that unlike the Habsburgs or the Tudors or the Carolingians the Ottomans were not just one of many dynasties ruling over the same state, they were the state; it's amazing how in their 600+ years of history every ruler was a descendant of Osman, and the legitimacy of the ruling dynasty was never seriously threatened. I think that makes a strong case for identifiying the polity with its dynasty.
I believe they only ever called their heartland, "Turkey," (which was why Ataturk took the name as his new Republic's official one, not just to distinguish it from the fallen and shamed Sublime Porte, but because that heartland was all he had left). Calling the Ottoman Empire, Rome/Rum or more formally, "The Well-Protected Domain,' would be the same, but common, minomer, as I understand it, as calling the Soviet Union, "Russia," or the United Kingdom (or worse, the British Empire), "England."
 
What you say is true. However, I suppose one of the questions I'm asking is why Firaxis have always had Gandhi as India's default leader when there were always much more suitable alternatives.

In the context of limited development time and resources, I of course understand the rationale for defaulting to a single iconic leader such as Qin Shi Huang for China, or Augustus Caesar for Rome. But the decision to have Gandhi of all people as India's default leader for every civ game, both mainline and spin-off, seems bizarre to me.

You've pointed out that Firaxis has always been oriented to a western market. This is undoubtedly true. However, whenever non-Gandhi alternatives have been added to the game, they have always been either the Mauryans or Indira Gandhi. These choices do not strike me as attempts to appeal to a western market. The Mughal leaders are all far more famous in the West than either Chandragupta, Ashoka, or Indira Ghandhi. As I said in my previous post, this seems to be a deliberate design choice by the developers, who do not feel that the Mughals fit into the mould of the Indian identity that they have constructed in the game.
Sid went for Gandhi because he wanted famous people and so relatively recent one. I think it make it a good pick for the 1991 US market

There is at least 1 reference for mughals which is the red fort wonder
 
As a Indian, I find lot of comments made in this topic very hilarious about Indian history and leaders. 😂
However, respecting your views no comment on that.

From game point of view, I am playing this series since Civ5 and am just excited to see maurya, chola and Mughal being represented in Civ7. And yes definitely want new leaders like Chandragupta (Gupta Empire), Akbar, Aurangzeb, Rajendra I, Shivaji and many others to be represented in future.
 
Sid went for Gandhi because he wanted famous people and so relatively recent one. I think it make it a good pick for the 1991 US market

There is at least 1 reference for mughals which is the red fort wonder
This. Civ isn’t a research paper, a text book, a biography, an atlas, or anything of that nature. It is a video game meant to entertain people and by doing so, make money.
 
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