PC Zone preview

[Myrddin]

Preview from PC Zone

Written by RTS players so there will be a slant but there seem to be a LOT of changes

Game length
Aiming to reduce to 400 turns from 550 in CivIII

Victory conditions
Spaceship, Conquest, Domination, Culture (with 3 cities with near perfect culture) and Diplomatic

Game speed
3 levels - quick, medium and epic

Start
Can start in a particular era

Tech tree
'more flexible, .. one tree not split into eras'

Graphics
3D with zoom
Much more detail on the landscape eg 'pastures, wineries, watermills and windmills all represented in detail, ... with smoke billowing from a factory'
Style - see previous screenshots

Interface
'familiar to anyone who has dabbled with RTS'

Religion
7 real world religions; including Christianity and Buddhism
No religion bonuses but 'associations with certain technologies'

Resources
31

Civs
19

Civ leaders
28 including Ghandi, Cyrus and Montezuma; traits are associated with leaders
Unclear whether you can choose the leader for your civ

City limit
None

Great people
5 categories - artist,tycoon,prophet,engineer, scientist
Probably triggered by city performance in each category
Benefits available 3 or 4 for each person, including culture boost, academies, multiple golden ages,free techs
Plato, Shakespeare,Newton, Einstein, Michalangelo

Combat
Gain experience points for winning battles, more if odds are against them
Each level increase allows choice of extra abilities eg using enemy roads, bonus attack in cities, moving faster in forests
'end-up with high-level units with specific abilities'

Governments
No set government styles
Can choose attitude on such items as free markets, environment,slavery, conscription, emancipation

Health
Important factor alongside happiness and money

Moddability
Good, including AI

Multiplayer
LAN, Internet, PBEM and Persistent Turn-Based Servers
Currently Wednesday nights at Firaxis

Screenshots include
Japan and Persia
Spearman, Chariot, Scout, Galleys, Knights
Bronze Working
Units tagged by type eg spearman (melee unit)
spearman has 100% bonus against horse units

Edit - from another thread units have a single strength factor not seperate A/D values
Scout 1
Chariot 4
Spearman 4

[Locutus]

Wow, great stuff! Thanks for the info, Myrddin!

Great people sound interesting.

And governments, can anyone say Social Engineering?

So, 7 religions, 31 resources, 19 civs, 28 leaders. Let the guessing games begin

[Solver]

Alright, some of these news are good. Especially the government part, sounds like SE from SMAC. I hope the RPG elements in combat won't be too heavy for units, but gaining experience and bonuses does sound good. After all, in history, units that won tough battle did indeed become better because of the experience gained.

The interface we have seen in some screens... it looks a lot like AoE2. Not a bad thing per se, but I hope Civ4 doesn't become a RTS gameplay-wise. I still think we don't need 3D graphics and eye-candy zoom, but I can live with that. As long as it doesn't have ridicilous system requirements which would be simply wrong.

[Adagio]

I really like the sound of the governments part
I'm a bit unsure about the rpg'ish combat. It could work, but it could also make it worse

City limit
None

Civ leaders
28 including Ghandi, Cyrus and Montezuma; traits are associated with leaders
Unclear whether you can choose the leader for your civ

There's 19 Civs but 28 leaders? Does that mean nationX can have two different leaders so nationX acts differently in game1 compared to game2? And by the sound of this there'll be 10 nations with only 1 leader

Game speed
3 levels - quick, medium and epic

Game speed?
Isn't this a turn based game where you (in SP) can have as long turns as you want?

Game length
Aiming to reduce to 400 turns from 550 in CivIII

I'm not sure if this is a good idea. Often when playing Civ games I've felt the time between getting a unit until that unit becomes obsolete was too short. Taking away 150 turns will only make this worse

[Maniac]

As a democracy game player I'd applaud more RPG elements and special abilities for each unit. Then each DG player can command their own very unique unit.

[FrostyBoy]

Great stuff. Get those screenshots scanned

I guess there will be a female and a male leader for each civ.

I hope epic really is epic. I want to play month long games.

[alms66]

Originally posted by Adagio

Game length
Aiming to reduce to 400 turns from 550 in CivIII

I'm not sure if this is a good idea. Often when playing Civ games I've felt the time between getting a unit until that unit becomes obsolete was too short. Taking away 150 turns will only make this worse

I agree, and I don't think it's a good idea at all, but I know I'm in the minority. I would prefer a game that lasts weeks, and not because of lack of time to play it, or because it takes 30 minutes per turn for the AI, just because I like long, in-depth games that have lots of "history" to them. 1000+ turns would be great , and I'm already in the planning stages for a mod that will achieve this.

You hear that Soren? Don't put a limit on the number of turns possible in a mod this time around! And do your best not to put low limits on anything at all.

[Mr. President]

Not coming here regularly for a while, I've only just discovered the previews, and many things sound quite interesting, like experience points. But I'd also like to be able to get units that start off good because of their training, like in Alpha Centauri when you had a +5 Morale modifier. I remember finding the combat in Civilization III extremely difficult, especially in the early ages and even on low difficulty levels (yes, I suck) so I'd hope it's a little more aggressor-friendly the fourth time around.

[Vince278]

Re: PC Zone preview

Great info.

Originally posted by Myrddin
Start
Can start in a particular era

Hope this is an accelerated start and not a settler on a developed continent.

Originally posted by Myrddin
Religion
7 real world religions; including Christianity and Buddhism

Careful modeling Islam. Don't want to see a fatwa on Sid.

Originally posted by Myrddin
City limit
None

I imagine this refers to the 512 limit in C3C.

Originally posted by Myrddin
spearman has 100% bonus against horse units

And tanks?

[Addled Platypus]

Re: Re: PC Zone preview

Originally posted by Vince278


And tanks?

ROTFLO


My guess will be musketeers will be able to take them out..

but the spearman will be fixed

[Addled Platypus]

The link http://www.pczone.co.uk/

after searching by title, go to news for more


The screenie ...filth try again

[Addled Platypus]

The screenie

nothing at Firaxis yet

[Addled Platypus]

No Idea who Civrules is, but there is info there

tread at your own risk

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=108315

[Mr. President]

Re: Re: PC Zone preview

Originally posted by Vince278


Careful modeling Islam. Don't want to see a fatwa on Sid.

I'm sure they'll do what they can to make Islam look better than Christianity.

[Vince278]

Originally posted by Platypus Rex
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=108315

Awesome info. I hope I won't have to learn computer programming to do most of the modding.