CivIV: Beyond the Sword

[Jaybe]

Another thing I would like for BtS (or for Civ in general):
Remove armor's use for taking cities, remove the city raider promotion from them and give it to the unit type that IS used for taking cities: INFANTRY.

I have needed to consider that armored units (as they are now) are not primarily armor, but trucked (or armored personnel carrier loaded) infantry with armored support. I would prefer armor to be tank units.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Solver
Depends on what you mean by Civ V. You couldn't do a substantial upgrade of the graphics, because the engine would remain what it is.

Duh.

But you could definitely do just about anything you can imagine with the gameplay itself. As far as gameplay changes in the SDK go, the only real limitation is your coding skill.

That's what I just said. The point being that it's absolutely meaningless to say "you could do this with the SDK" because you can, in theory, do pretty much anything with the SDK. That doesn't speak to the value of an XP at all.

[greenday_234]

Which underlines my point: Civ is a very difficult game to do x-packs for because a choice has to be made between adding little and changing the core game. Personally I'd prefer they didn't bother and continued patching. But that will never happen.

I see, I suppose we are mostly in agreement then. I guess where we part was is that I think that they should be bold with XP's and change the core game up a bit. However, this does require them to be somewhat more beholden to the customer, meaning they take more time to test the XP and produce patches when they clearly screw up. As you said before however, this may never happen. Afterall, they have shareholders so the customer doesn't mean squat unfortunately.

[Solver]

That's what I just said. The point being that it's absolutely meaningless to say "you could do this with the SDK" because you can, in theory, do pretty much anything with the SDK. That doesn't speak to the value of an XP at all.

Just because you CAN do stuff with the SDK doesn't mean an official expansion would be bad. First, it's created faster - they have full-time artists and coders on it, so it would be done significantly faster than a mod of similar scale. Second, they have a few dozens of testers and skilled designers, which ensures fairly good balance once released. Third, of course, is it being official, which means an agreed standard.

At the same time, yep, there are already mods out there that have the scale of an expansion. I haven't played Civ4 mods much, as most of my playing time is spent on upcoming versions, but I'm very impressed by the scope of, say, the ViSa mod. They add a little bit too much in terms of buildings/resources compared to concepts for my tastes, but it's definitely a huge mod.

[couerdelion]

Originally posted by greenday_234


I see, I suppose we are mostly in agreement then. I guess where we part was is that I think that they should be bold with XP's and change the core game up a bit. However, this does require them to be somewhat more beholden to the customer, meaning they take more time to test the XP and produce patches when they clearly screw up. As you said before however, this may never happen. Afterall, they have shareholders so the customer doesn't mean squat unfortunately.

Interesting logic there but unfortunately I have to disagree with you there. In order to make money for shareholders you need to offer some value to your customers. It’s not the case that there is any monopoly held by the company which can be exploited since sites like these provide a way for civvers to customise the game and make quite substantial improvements.

Now that’s quite a competitive environment to be in so the only way to sell something is to offer good value to customers. If the xp were poor value then the product would not sell and shareholders would be unhappy too.

[bantams]

Ill probably buy it like everyone else!

one good feature would be to be able to see games with Mods in the main lobby without having to load the mod first like in a column like PB games are!

2 Are they sticking with GaySpy for the XP as that been confirmed yet would be nice and a good time to get a proper pay to play Server IMO! the last few weeks Gamespys been very poor and If it stays this way people will eventually give up and play some other MP game

[Kuciwalker]

Solver: I think we are talking past each other.

[Solver]

Oh well

[greenday_234]

nteresting logic there but unfortunately I have to disagree with you there. In order to make money for shareholders you need to offer some value to your customers. It’s not the case that there is any monopoly held by the company which can be exploited since sites like these provide a way for civvers to customise the game and make quite substantial improvements.

I disagree. The goal isn't to provide the best value to the customer anymore. The goal is to produce something you and I "will still buy". I can't tell you how many people I've talked to that have said, "I'm not excited about the xp but I'll prolly buy it." In this case there is a certain amount of inevitability with gamers out there as far as XP's are concerned. And the Gaming industry and their shareholders know this. So the soul goal of the company and the shareholder is to provide a product with the lowest possible COST, meaning, the least amount of features that you, the consumer, "will still buy". .

As far as customization is concerned there isn't as much competition there for two reasons A. A lot of newer mods are going to be created by the hardcore fan-base, the people who won't even think before buying the expansion pack, and what results is "Sorry my mod only works with Warlords", so the average downloader, without purchasing the new half-assed XP, is going to be limited when it comes to installing mods B. Everyone wants the "official stuff", they want the box, the "new manual" etc. They don't get as excited about the mod that was made by joe blow. The consumer isn't sitting around weighing whether to purchase the XP or wait for a really awesome mod. If the consumer thought like that then Take 2 would have never allowed for the mod-ability and would never have released the source code of CivIV...ever.

In essence, the goal of the company is not to PLEASE the customer it is merely to keep them from complaining so that customer will keep buying despite his mild displeasure. As a result the shareholder will be thrilled because the company produced the "inevitable product" and maintained, not a quality product, but an extremely medicore, cheap one that everyone will buy.

Don't get me wrong, I think Firaxis has done an enormously fantastic job with its customers in comparison to many major industries these days. Go take a look at The Sims product line by Maxis and you will see a perfect example of what I discussed above, pleasing the shareholder at the expense of the costumer. My reason for posting this on these forums is not to knock Firaxis but rather to bring an argument to the table that is never discussed.

[DrSpike]

I'm not really looking forward to BtS. I will buy it.

[LDiCesare]

what results is "Sorry my mod only works with Warlords"

Well, Fall from Heaven II is a huge mod and does NOT work with Warlords, only with Vanilla. So I believe unless the XP is really good, this mod, and others, will be limited to vanilla cIV.

[greenday_234]

Well, Fall from Heaven II is a huge mod and does NOT work with Warlords, only with Vanilla. So I believe unless the XP is really good, this mod, and others, will be limited to vanilla cIV.

Well yes and thats 1 mod, no matter its size. There are many mods. I also realize that there are many mods that are cross-compatible thanks to some very diligent modders out there. However, the fact that there are many cross-compatible mods out there is not a testament to the EASE of making them so. Many modders spend days developing those two separate packages.

As I said before Firaxis is much better than many other companies out there, I'm just saying that they aren't exactly perfect either and that the lacking quality of some XP's on the market lately is, in part, due the industry/shareholder relationship.

[Edit]: Also couerdelion, another way in which the mods are not generating competition is partially due to the community that is downloading them. Not to knock the hard work that the modding community puts in everyday, but lets face it, they are "selling" a product to a fairly select group of people. Very few casual players are interested in spending hours digging through and reading about the plethora of mods that are out there to find the one they want. Not to mention the fact that many of these mods are not only buggy at first, making the average guy more leery of them, but also difficult to install for the uninformed computer user. I imagine my 10 year old cousin doesn't even know what a .dll file is let alone how to replace it properly. XP's have an efficient delivery system, everything you're getting is written on the box in colorful lingo, and when bugs arise they have a phone number to call.

[Jaybe]

greenday, your "profit is the only justification" argument ignores the credibility issue. When an expansion is just a flash, without substance of value the company's longer-term suffers (ala Atari).

What bothers me is how Firaxis got itself associated with Atari in the first place. I hope Take-Two doesn't get into the same boat, for it was definitely a boat that was going to sink. ( Isn't hindsight marvelous!? )

[greenday_234]

greenday, your "profit is the only justification" argument ignores the credibility issue. When an expansion is just a flash, without substance of value the company's longer-term suffers

I didn't say profit was the only justification, I just think its the major problem. One problem at a time

As for credibility, I'm guessing, and I admit just guessing, that poor civ expansion packs wasn't the downfall of Atari. (I'm not being sarcastic though I'm sure it sounds like it) You would have to refresh me on the details with Atari, in order for me to really discuss it.

Anyway getting back to credibility, the Civilization franchise's bottom line didn't seem to be hurting even after they came out with credibility destroyer's like Civilization: Test of Time, or game-breaking aspects of Civ3, or the content-less, game breaking XP's for 3 like PTW and Conquests. If credibility is a big concern, they're not batting very well, hell the franchise should have been dead after TOT, yet people continued to buy and in record numbers. Which, once again gets us back to the "inevitability" aspect. The ability to sell crap, because they know that we're willing to buy crap and the lack of concern that they're selling us crap...If anyone can follow that statement.


Edit: Heres how I think they've been doing these days:

Civ 4:
Well done, clear intent to make the customer happy. ATI problems fixed relatively quickly.

Warlords:
Content less garbage. Felt rushed and uninspired. Save scenarios for the SDK modding community.

Beyond The Sword:
Remains to be seen...They're heading the right direction from what I've seen.. Doing a what should be done in an expansion, a "sampler platter" of new stuff for each part of the game, nothing insane yet nothing boring either. (from what I know thus far)

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by greenday_234
I disagree. The goal isn't to provide the best value to the customer anymore. The goal is to produce something you and I "will still buy".

That's always been the goal.