In the future...

[Disgracian]

Does anybody else feel that Firaxis could have been a little bolder in their prediction of the future? I must confess to being a little disappointed to see Civ3 stick with the "Future Tech" concept which doesn't really lead anywhere.

I felt it would have been much better to see futuristic military and domestic units like submersible carriers, terraformers, energy weapons, mech warriors, ornithopters, genetically enhanced soldiers, orbital reconnaisance and bombardment satellites, etc.

Future technologies and improvements like aquatic cities, pollution-free transportation (no population pollution), telepathy, "clean" power (nuclear fusion or something else, maybe even some kind of enhanced solar power thingy), nano technology, and so on.

It wouldn't have been difficult to implement, as much of the groundwork had already been laid with Alpha Centauri.

I wonder if it would be possible for a future patch to make Civ3 more open ended by letting us add new technologies, units, and maybe even eras. Or will I be waiting for Civ4 to see any of this?

[Venger]

Absolutely - not only is there no future, alot of the units wait until the very last techs to be available.

People have been adding techs to Civ2 for years - does none of this ring the clue bell?

Venger

[Moraelin]

Yep, it's a bit disappointing. It would have been nicer to actually get some benefit out of being that far ahead on the tech tree.

At one point I've just sat around until 2050 and researched up to "Future Tech 54." I'm not kidding. (Admittedly it was only on Regent.) And other than the score, those techs didn't seem to help with anything.

At least in MOO, when you started researching Future Techs, you started getting discounts on older technologies. E.g., if you had a gun based on the latest actual tech, the more future techs you researched in that domain, the cheaper that gun would become. So it at least served SOME purpose. Here, it's not even that.

[General Ludd]

I don't want to see mechs, laser guns, and mutants in civ3. Civilization is based on historical fact, not some idiotic future technologies.

[Moraelin]

OK, I'll bite. History quiz time: Historically, in what year was the Cure for Cancer found? Or Longevity? In what year was the Search for Extra-Terestrial Intelligence successfully completed? When DID the colony ship leave for Alpha Centauri? Which civilization made Tanks out of Rubber, and what was their efficiency in combat? Which civilization has Modern Armor made of Aluminum? Which civilization invented ships that can never be sunk by aircraft, and in which year?

That said, I could also accept that instead of future techs, I'd have an option to play with a more detailed tech tree. Give me more ancient/medieval/industrial/whatever techs to play with, and sure, I'll do that instead of researching future techs.

[Yolky]

Osweld I don't want to see mechs, laser guns, and mutants in civ3. Civilization is based on historical fact, not some idiotic future technologies.

I am not trying to flame Osweld but where is the historical facts in CivIII? Heck the nations don't even start in thier proper locations and how the hell do the Americans start around 4000bc? tell me what nation started at 4000bc?

and how do you quote someone here?

Davor

[simwiz2]

the only problem i have with future techs is that they are hard to keep track of, and remeber what they do. like you can tell without going thru a hundred civilopedia entries that monotheism will give you some kind of religious building, and that steam engine will give you trains and steam powered ships (ironclad). but when you have future techs theres no way to get a good idea of what they do, and your left with a bunch of thechs to memorize example: if biospheres or anti matter fusion were put in, people would have no idea what they do w/o looking them up and memorizing them

and like someone already said, half the modern era is future techs