Patch 1.20

[Rommel2D]

Catastrophic? You'd put the corruption and GPT bugs in the same catagory as the ones that caused MP drops and corrupt files with PtW?

[Antrine]

by Admiral PJ ...it seems most of the bugs are to do with Mod Editing which isn't important.

I wish to counter this ‘nefarious’ statement.

Modders are one; going to salvage the bloody game.
Two, modders will smooth over Firaxis poor service and buggy game.
Good modding full to brim with finely tuned, painstaking ‘work-a-rounds’, a list of which is longer than any of us really want to admit to is saving the ‘future’ of CIV.

These are not positions of arrogance, rather of cold logic. I buy poor games I might otherwise like, IF someone has modded ( fixed) them. Then the investment is worthy.

Someone in marketing can go boldly figure out the ‘numbers’. Moreover, if we here ‘keep’ trashing the game even though we may be justified so doing, new players will be scarce as hen teeth.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Admiral PJ
Alpha centauri and Civilisation 3 worked fine on release, so your statement that firaxis produce rushed releases, 'comrade' spiffor, is unfounded. Firaxis public style Beta testing system seems to work well. I don't know if its a true public beta system , but there seem to be a lot of people on this forum who are betatesters.

The public beta was performed to playtest conquests. A much more restricted beta was made for PtW, with much fewer testers. IIRC, Vanilla Civ3's betatesting was entirely internal.

As for Civ3 not being a rushed game back in Nov 2001, let's just say that the entire new aerial model was dysfunctional, since interception didn't work at all. Later, some Firaxians admitted they only tested seriously up to the middle ages, and didn't have the time to give serious tests for later eras.

And the editor was definitely incomplete as Civ3 came out. It wasn't even possible to place a city or a unit on the map, nor even mere fixed starting positions.

If Civ3 had the same kind of customer support as CtP2 did, it would have sucked really badly.

[LzPrst]

I would hope they are not using any code form any previous games in Civ4.

I'm hereby starting a rumour that Civ4 will be based on a hybrid of the civ 1 and the half-life2 engine, since they were so easily accessible

But seriously, until conquests came out I found civ3 and PtW to be insanely annoying. (may Sid strike down the idiot that did the civ3 combat system). conquests has made the game playable. BUT THATS NOT GOOD ENOUGH!!! It should have been playable when they started selling it. The idea of SELLING US the game fixes (ptw and C3C) is disrespectful at best. the original civ3 was a disappointment. now its workable. A free word of wisdom to atari/firaxis/infogrames/whateveryoucallyourself: Dont mess up again! MAKE YOUR CUSTOMERS SATISFIED FIRST TIME AROUND!!!
That they built civ3 from the old smac/civ2 engine is IMO INSANE!!! civ3 is actually just civ2 v.12.1 (not true, but not entirely untrue either..)

Final word of advice: firaxis, hire me as creative consultant, you need me

[Jarred]

Firaxis should take a page from Rareware, when deadlines didn't matter as much as getting it right...I doubt that they lost money, if anything, got some due to free publicity out of it.

[Boracks]

Originally posted by LzPrst

The idea of SELLING US the game fixes (ptw and C3C) is disrespectful at best.

[Old Argument]

Its actually a time honoured tradition. Back in the days of board games (remember those?), if you wanted the latest errata and clarifications to the rules, you had to buy the company magazine. Examples were 'The General' (Avalon Hill), 'Strategy and Tactics' (SPI) and 'Nexus' (for Star Fleet Battles). You could easily spend as much on magazines then as you do today on expansion packs.

But then, today patches are free to download so its actually better!

[/Old Argument]

Actually, given the content that was included in both expansions, I have no quibble with what I paid for them. And I have no problem waiting for patch 1.20 either. At least we're getting stuff fixed which is a lot better than some games I've bought.

Boracks

[Gunter]

I think the best answer that Firaxis can give is a strong patch this time ( also a precise readme ) ,otherwise I am forced to play Sid Meier Golf......


Gunter

[GarP2]

Comments about how Firaxis is raking in money and how we've had to pay $100 for a semi-working $30 game prompted me to make this post.

Originally posted by Andydog
I’d love to be proven wrong in all this – Civ is the only game I play – all the others just don’t interest me.

Me too!

It may not sound like it, but I do enjoy conquests immensely. I think that in general it's better than PTW, and that it's the best of the civ type genre that you can get.

Me too!


There is no other form of entertainment that I can carry out so cheaply, i.e., on a $/hr basis.

Book$/hr > cableTV $/hr > cable modem$/hr

not to mention the fact that I couldnt stand to watch TV as much as I play Civ.

canoeing/camping/fishing require equipment and transportation costs. Live music? hardly. Driving my 280Z? no.

The lack of total functionality of the game is frustrating, as is the fact that a lot could be improved, but it's still a great game, even in its present form. The high number of posters and lurkers in the forums shows how many think so, and the little labels by the posters names (chiefton, etc) show that a lot of people get as much from discussing the game as playing it. Add to that the realities of the computer game business, as nailed by vmxa1, and the bottom line is that we're lucky that we have a game this good. I'm not saying we should be satisfied and not suggest changes, because that is another important reason why we have a game this good, along with people like Jesse. But what I am saying is that when Civ IV comes out, will I buy it?

originally posted by vmxa1: yup.

[Rommel2D]

Originally posted by GarP2
There is no other form of entertainment that I can carry out so cheaply, i.e., on a $/hr basis.
[...]
The lack of total functionality of the game is frustrating, as is the fact that a lot could be improved, but it's still a great game, even in its present form.

Which makes me wonder: can we pay more to get a better game? CivIV Pro anyone?

[Antrine]

We need sub-licensing so we modders can start raking in the big bucks.

[Brundlefly]

:sigh: SO..... How about the fvcking patch, Firaxis?

[DrSpike]

Everyone's busy designing the '4' to go on the box of a different game.

[Wittlich]

@ Doc

[LzPrst]

why cant we at apolyton and civfanatics just design everything we want and have firaxis make it. of course there would have to be a consensus or at least a majority on each issue, but then I think we'd get what we wanted... and the source code could be released after a year or two so we could fix the things that firaxis wouldnt bother with cause they'd be working in CI:V

oh, the dreams of naivety...
fair enough, civ3 has given me a lot of game time for the $ i've spent, but almost equally much annoyance for each time something has buggered and not worked right. but I'd gladly pay 100€ if it was THE ULTIMATE civ game with everything working perfectly and me liking 99% of it. but civ 3 aint it. and I doubt Civ4 will be
but I hope...

[Harovan]

Conquests was close to be the ultimative Civ game. It looked very promising after release. It looks hopelessly effed up now.