"Civilization IV"... Confirmed?

[Toby Rowe]

PS,

Where is an "edit" button?
I heard Master of Orion 3 was mucked up- I only own MOO2, so what did they do that made it so bad. (On any gaming site I view, MOO3 seems to be the classic example of a developer really ruining a game, but I don't know why. Was it really that bad? Which company made it, and who released it? (so I'm warned!)

Toby

[Nikolai]

1) The Firaxis guys have said that they read the forums, so no panic...
2) The "edit" button can be found to the left of the "reply with quote" button.
3) AC wasn't bad at all.
4) Firaxis wasn't "chosen", it owns the rights to the game.

[Lambiorix_be]

Originally posted by Toby Rowe
Mate,

How about them simply choosing half-an-hour each day to simply read the official board to see what the customer comments are? I'm sure the tea-boy wouldn't mind doing it.

I noticed with dread that you say Firaxis are making the game, so after the awful "Alpha Centuri" I'll read all reviews before buying the game.

The company needs to move on and leave us Civ fans alone, imagine one company destroying two titles. not just one. (no potential was realised with the Alpha Centuri concept as the Fireaxis game was so bad it killed it stone dead).

How on earth did they get chosen?

Toby

1/ AC wasn't bad at all...it was even a very good game
2/Firaxis at least is investing money in the project and the fact that so many people bought CIV3 series implies that it was good enough for millions of people.
3/ if you read all the advice given by the civ community you will notice not only that they number in thousands but also that they very often contradict each one another. It is therefor not abnormal that a lot of the advice is not being taken into acount.
4/ If you don't like Firaxis doing the game then don't buy it and wait until another company makes a similar product (although I think that the wait could be very, very long...)

[Jon Shafer]

Firaxis has always been the team that's done the Civ games, so good luck in finding someone else to do it.

For Civ 3 the designer and almost the entire programming team left about a year into development. That would hamper adding things compared to the previous two versions, wouldn't you say?

And when Soren referred to building the game from the ground up, he was referring to the code base, not the game concept.

[Robert]

Firaxis doesn't own the rights to the game.
Atari does. Long ago Microprose owned them, later microprose was bought by..... [forgot company]
That company asked Firaxis to make civ3.
That company was bought by Infogrames, which was bought by Atari.

So right now Atari is the owner of the civ-franchise.

[Kuciwalker]

Are you sure they own the actual "Civilization" title, and not just the C3 game?

[Jon Shafer]

Originally posted by CyberShy
Firaxis doesn't own the rights to the game.
Atari does. Long ago Microprose owned them, later microprose was bought by..... [forgot company]
That company asked Firaxis to make civ3.
That company was bought by Infogrames, which was bought by Atari.

So right now Atari is the owner of the civ-franchise.

Yeah, but it's always been Sid and company doing the dirty work. As I said, good luck in finding someone else to do it.

[Jon Shafer]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Are you sure they own the actual "Civilization" title, and not just the C3 game?

Yes, Atari owns "Civilization."

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Toby Rowe
Hi all,

Hi, Kieth.

[Robert]

Originally posted by Trip

Yeah, but it's always been Sid and company doing the dirty work. As I said, good luck in finding someone else to do it.

Well, I wouldn't name that 'dirty' work.
I think most programmers in the world would love it to do that work! And most men in the world would wish they would know how to do it

[Jon Shafer]

Mere play on words.

[Toby Rowe]

Originally posted by notyoueither


Hi, Kieth.

I'm not Keith/kieth.

All,

I heard that company x was hampered by company y over ownership on the "Civilisation" title in a newspaper- I assumed that argument was over.

I noticed Atari (of the US) rose from the ashes from the strength of owning a couple of names on the old machine.

I'm still annoyed Microprose was ever brought- It was an excellent development house and should have stayed independent at all costs. They were the benchmark in gaming quality for me.

About Firaxis- AC encouraged you to develop a colony, once done it slaughtered you with pollution- to the point the game wasn't fun anymore.

Trying to educate people about pollution is one thing, destroying your entertainment is another, Civ 3 also falls foul of this. I simply don't build hospitals or factories as I don't have any control over it, unlike Civ 2.

I can't even prompt workers to "only clear pollution and don't bother me again-ever!" If there is no polluted tile-great! Have a tea break and work once one appears!!

I like micro-management, but some features I also want to totally automate, or else I just won't play the game as designed. Progression through the ages and Industrialisation are keys facets of the game.

Colonisation- I'd loved that title, there were some fans making their own Col2 on the net, but work was very slow. Anyone know of their current progress?

Toby

[Max Sinister]

Freecol? They're still working on it, but it's far from finished... look yourself at http://freecol.sourceforge.net

[BigFree]

HAHA(tm)!!! What a truley lame looking game! How it plays? I dunno; but they need some help with the GI!

[Max Sinister]

I didn't play it yet. Be fair, BigFree. Not everyone is a graphics artist (me included). Could you do it better?