Patch 1.20

[AK47]

Does anyone know exactly why the Radio tech was removed ?
I never had any problems with it...

[sabrewolf]

it was one of the useless techs which you wouldn't research if it wouldn't have been mandatory...

however, why it wasn't removed completely, but instead given as starting tech to all civs is completely ununderstandable to me

[alexman]

I don't know this for a fact, but here's a collection of reasons of why I suspect they removed the Radio:

• With the removal of Electronics from Motorized Transportation, the lower branch of the tech tree became less improtant than it was before. Therefore, you expect fewer players to research Electronics than before, and even fewer players to research the Radio. A technology which would be consistently researched last became expendable.
• The lower branch of the tech tree became unconnected from the upper branch for four whole technologies (Scientific Method to Radio), that didn't offer many benefits if you lost the race to the big two Wonders of the age. That just looked weird.
• Before this patch, Advanced Flight was not researched often enough, so the addition of Radar Towers make this tech more valuable.
• C3C added two more technologies to the Industrial Age (Fascism and Ironclads), so the period became too long.

By the way, they made Radio a non-era tech and gave it to all civs so that nobody had the option to research it in patch 1.18. Jesse did that in case he wanted to change his mind and easily add the tech back in, I suppose. I hope that the final patch is done properly, with the tech completely removed.

[E_T]

So, Jessie posted 7 days ago that this patch is in lockdown and it seems to be making the rounds of the oifficial release approval process. My question is, how long does that take??

/me has been patently waiting for the patch, but is getting tired of the wait...

E_T

[Fistleaf]

I don't have C3C but I was considering buying it. However, I am put off by Jesse's comments about Civ4 having a higher priority than C3C patches. Civ4 is still in its infancy (who knows if it will even work properly?) and yet it is already more important than the retailed C3C. That really tells a lot about Firaxis customer support.

[vmxa1]

CivIII will not bring in any money from now on, so Civ4 must be their priority. Well if they made another packakge it could bring in some, but not big bucks.

[Fistleaf]

Civ3 Gold edition and C3C are still available in stores. Since they "will not bring in any money from now on", why don't Firaxis give them away from free?
The point is if Firaxis is not confident of producing an expansion pack without resolvable bugs, they shouldn't release it in the first place.

[vmxa1]

The way it works is that the stuff on the shelf is already booked in the account recieviable. The can be returned in some cases from the dealers and actually cost the company money, but won't bring in any.

The fact is I doubt they are manufactering more for distribution. They may have some in the warehouses to sell. If they don't sell, it is just costing them money.

In any event, they are not going to see appreciable income from CivIII in the future.

As to the bugs, they are not discernable to the general public. If you asked them, they would not know what you are tlaking about. From their perspective the game has no bugs. Just the hardcore players are aware of these issues and the company has little fear that we won't buy the next iteration.

[Fistleaf]

So I take it you will be buying Civ4?
Software companies are really raking in the money when customers are all so understanding.

[Antrine]

bitxh, buy, bitxh, buy... ( for x c )

Haven't heard the song.?.

Or was that 'buy first'... umm

[player1]

Well, Firaxis custom support was very good up to this point.

Better them most other gaming companies.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Fistleaf
So I take it you will be buying Civ4?

Obviously, until it turns out to be a joke.

Civ is an excellent concept that has been furthered by every sequel, Civ3 included (the introduction of culture and of an interesting trade concept is a clear progress, as is the betterment of the AI).
I hope Civ4 will provide us with more of what we want: revolts, more sensible government model, more sensible military model, etc.

At the very least, I expect Civ4 to be a progress over Civ3, and to have a more challenging AI than Civ3, as well as better graphics. If Civ4 has only this, I'll buy it in a heartbeat.

Firaxis is known for releasing rushed products, and even the now-worshipped SMAC was rushed at the beginning. Yet, there is a good customer support, and these people do listen to their fanbase and pick ideas from us. They have convinced me to buy their products again, although I understand less patient players will be cold at the idea.

[Admiral PJ]

All evidence points to C3C still being supported, there weren't any catastrophic bugs with it to begin with, anyhow. If civ4 is getting more attention or priority which no one knows for sure, then its not surprising.. its a completely new and large project. the c3c Patch updates won't take up a lot of work, it seems most of the bugs are to do with Mod Editing which isn't important.

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.

Admiral PJ
Creator of the 7 ages of man civ3 MOD

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Fistleaf
So I take it you will be buying Civ4?
Software companies are really raking in the money when customers are all so understanding.

Yup.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by Admiral PJ
All evidence points to C3C still being supported, there weren't any catastrophic bugs with it to begin with, anyhow.

Not to be awkward, but no it doesn't, and yes there were.

What has made people post their concern in this thread is an official post declaring Civ4 is the focus and declining to make a comment on when further fixes (and one would hope balance and AI tweaks) will appear, if at all.

As to your second point there were 2 huge bugs upon release, despite the beta testing. The corruption bug took Alexman a matter of hours to document, and the gpt one was noticed by many early on. To their credit we were able to get our hands on a beta fix for these problems, albeit a long while after release.