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#36 WHY I HATE RATINGS Andrew Livings doesn't have a taste for ratings: find out why. #37 INTERVIEW GONE ASTRAY DanQ reproduces his respones to a never-before-published interview. COLUMN ARCHIVE

Saturday morning, as I was going to start on writing my column titled "Who Said I Don't Love SMAC?" (yes, that was the real title!), I saw the GameCenter comparison of CTP and SMAC. After reading it, I was back to my first topic I was thinking for this week, a review of CTP's reviews. My first thought a couple days ago was to look at all the all reviews, negative and positive, and show some of their flaws, but I will concentrate on the two GameCenter articles: the CTP review, by Mr. Martin E. Cirulis, and the SMAC-CTP comparison. This is nothing personal with him of course, it's just with what he writes from the position that he is a reviewer of a "big gaming site". And before I start, I will ask you to forgive me for the tone of following text :). I will explain my position at the end.

THE CTP REVIEW
Let's start from the review of CTP...

"This is far too complex a game to remain playable if the player can't tell what an enemy unit is and who it belongs to with a simple mouse point".
Come on, each unit is pretty much distinguishable. I don't get it, which unit looks like another? As for to which Civ the unit belongs, how about looking at the color of it's shield?? You know, like in civ1/2?

"And, in order to defend against enemy stacks, city garrisons have to be larger and kept up-to-date--but the cost of building units is still exactly the way it was back in classic Civ, when a single tank could make a big difference".
On the other hand, some people say that the benefits of a unit fortified in a city are too big. Meanwhile others have complained that early units can win over modern ones, like in the famous "phalanx vs tank" example. Who is wrong and who is right?

"Edison's Lab alone is one of the most unbalanced game effects I have ever seen".
So far, I haven't seen anyone on the forums saying "if you want to win the game for sure, build the Edison Lab". Have you? I guess that's what an "unbalanced game effect" would do...

"It also would have been nice if the AI players didn't decide ahead of time which one of the computer-controlled sides was going to win the game and then not attack that empire for the entire game". Never seen it happening, never noticed, noone mentioned anything about it on forums or newsgroups. I guess that's what a reviewer means finding problems noone has ever found before!

"... shipped with an annoying set of bugs that, depending on your system configuration, can either leave you unable to even boot the game up or cause an increasing number of crashes as you head into the later stages of the game".
I wont say the classic "all games have bug, get used to it", but I will say that he forgot the possibility of the game working just fine, without any problems, as many people have said on the forums.

THE SMAC-CTP COMPARISON ARTICLE
And now some quotes from the "SMAC-CTP shot out", as GC called it...

"On the one side, we have the enigmatic Alpha Centauri, brought to you by Firaxis and created by the legendary father of the Civ line, Sid Meier".
Sorry, but does the "A Brian Reynolds Design" on the box tell you something?

"Alpha Centauri comes into this battle with the clear advantage. The obvious clue that you are venturing into new territory is, of course, the fact that AC takes place on another planet".
So, if I was to take CivII, change the graphics, and place it on an alien planet, that would be a great innovation and I would be a geat game designer? :) I'm not saying that smac is CivII on alpha centauri, I'm just saying this isn't it's big innovation on the Civ idea...

"CTP has been designed in such a way that you'll often find yourself reaching for that trusty can of whup-ass, no matter how peaceful your inclinations may be".
Two weeks earlier Mr. Cirulis was writing "This (talking about the PW system) gives an added incentive to achieving periods of peacetime in order to divert your industrial power to improving the landscape, instead of just building bigger and better armies." I wonder when he was right...

"Without even an errant asteroid, black plague, or a small alien invasion to break up the classic routine, CTP just can't muster the same innovative firepower as the forward-looking Alpha Centauri".
So, CTP doesn't have random events. Is that such a big miss? Other than that, his love for science fiction (he is a SF writer actually!) becomes obvious (asteroid, alien invasion), and shows to me that this might be a reason for his comments...

"With the stuttering presentation of the mini-movies"
Sorry, but the movies don't stutter on my machine :) As for the "mini" comment, I wonder if he saw the "full screen" option...

JUST FYI, MY POSITION ON CTP VS SMAC
Just so that you don't think I'm a SMAC-hater or something, I will quote myself from our ctp preview...
"So, CTP is a great game for a civer like me(and probably you). But how does it compare with SMAC? Well, it's hard to say, and a lot depend on personal liking. CTP is based on earth, with real history for the bigger part, while SMAC is 100% science fiction. Some people will say that CTP rocks because of the graphics, other people don't care about it. Some other people think that CTP sucks because of the lawyer unit.

However, a couple of things are more certain. SMAC has a better diplomacy part, a real 3-D map, custom units, has a real story based on the conflict of seven different ideologies and keeps the CivII gameplay. CTP brings news ideas in conventional and unconventional combat, a realistic trade system, allows 32 civs, retains the civ feeling of "re-writing history" and reduces micromanagement..."

SO WHAT ARE YOU SAYING MARKOS? :)
First of all I'm not saying that SMAC sucks, and that ctp is the best game that has ever been developed by the human species. I'm not saying that positive reviews don't have errors. I'm only trying to say two things for reviewers of big gaming magazines and sites one, that they should be two times more carefull with what they write when they review important games like one that the Civilization name on it's title. And two, that it wouldn't be bad to mention in their review the possibility that they might be wrong and someone else might actually like the game. Lots of people depend on magazines and sites for their buying decisions and when there is no demo to see for themselves like in the case of CTP right now, reviews become an important factor if not the only one.

Next week, "Why I Love SMAC (But Play CTP For Now)" ...

The opinions expressed on this page do not necessarily reflect those of Apolyton CS or GameStats. They are just the personal opinions of the writer.