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Well, I was just re-reading this 'review' that I wrote a few months before the game ever came out. Some of it (the missing MP, for example) were terribly prophetic. Other things, like how I predicted the AI would *not* know how to secure resources, seems wrong.
Anybody care to point out how many things I got pretty close and how many I totally missed?
Thanks.
P.S.: Since people love to second-guess my motives, I am *not* trying to bash Firaxis, etc. I'm just honestly curious how off I was ... and since I'm in Korea and refuse to d/l warez, I won't be able to play for a while.
If you've followed the Civ-saga (and what die-hard TBS gamer hasn't?), you'd at least have a rough idea of Civ's history (the kind about the game, that is). You'd know that Sid Meier, the Founding Father of computer gaming, released his masterpiece, Civ 1, in 1991, and Brian Reynolds upped the ante with the surprisingly successful release of Civ 2 in 1996. Along the way, more than one game has tried to out-do the elusive Civ magic, but so far nobody has come even close.
No doubt this gave the Sid legacy and Sid's team a vote of confidence to give the title another overhaul and to see if, once again, greatness could be topped. Keeping true to their 5-years-between-Civ-games schedule, the Sid Folks (now simply called 'Firaxis') have carried on the torch and delivered Civ 3 just in time for Christmas 2001 sales. A sizeable portion of the jaded gaming public, however, will no doubt view that Christmas deadline as a warning sign, especially considering that as late as July, Firaxis itself openly stated that a number of important elements "Just aren't done yet."
Well, it saddens me to report: The jaded public is right. If you ever wondered what the term "Civ 2.5" meant, just install the CD and ask yourself what wonders another 6 months in development might have produced?
Consequently, despite moments of brilliance, more than one significant patch might be in the works for Civ 3 as all the promises of a "Better than Civ 2" experience struggle to be delivered months after the game itself. So, with this lump of coal in our stockings, the optimist in me seems to say: "Just give this thing enough pressure, and who knows what it could become?" Then again, I guess we should first consider how much pressure we are talking here.
GAMEPLAY
For those of you who were looking for something radically different from Civ 2, look elsewhere. While the additions of Culture and Resources sounded good on paper, in fact they seem to have added more tedious micromanagement at the expense of any strategic decisions. First, the concept of Culture is a tricky one at best, and Firaxis deserves credit for taking it head on. Unfortunately, the best they could come up with is the equivalent of "Making more and more of certain types of buildings will spread your influence over the map." What does this mean in gameplay terms? Obvious, isn't it? You'll be tempted to literally stuff your cities with building after building just to see how far your cultural influence can spread. Then a creeping question will settle in: "Wait, is this even fun or challenging? Does it really add anything to the game?" In a sense, it IS fun--for a while. After all, it takes quite a streamlined economy to support all these buildings, and one begins to feel at times that Civ 3 is a sort of grand Sim City or Tropico. And it IS challenging to afford the time and resources to seeing your Civ's color creep across the map, especially since creating "Art," for example, means you won't be creating as many troops, so the decision to build or fight has been made at least vaguely more interesting. Unfortunately, even when you do manage a huge cultural influence, you end up with one of two totally unsatisfying results: Competing civilizations will either simply bow to you (or be directly absorbed by you) or declare you a sworn enemy despite your best diplomatic efforts. Thus, push-over allies and maniacal foes will be your reward for having the world's leading culture. Not exactly subtle, is it?
As for resources, what are they mainly important for? You guessed it. Building stuff. This DOES add certain moments of enjoyable panic: "How do I build that Guest Relations Waiting Room to add to my Cultural Influence if I can't reach that Cow Square to produce leather for the plush couches?!" Of course, this would have been made all the more interesting if your computer opponents somehow took advantage of this situation themselves, but as you'll see in the next section, you'll often be wanting to either give the computer every chance it can get in order to craft a challenge for yourself--or to quickly put it out of its misery.
TRADE/DIPLOMACY
I have put these two together because, in essence, the new Resource system means you'll be hearing from the computer more than you ever wanted--and the conversation will soon become tired and predictable. The computer's first contacts with you will often surround their wanting you to share a certain resource that you have and they don't (the reverse is also true). This will seem at first like a logical and almost human way to approach things. Of course, since the computer is so inept at actually going out and securing these resources itself, you'll soon find yourself feeling like an over-worked parent who is being constantly nagged by his children for "More candy, Daddy! More candy! More more more more MORE!" Eventually you'll just want to go to war with these naggers just to shut them up. (No, you can't turn them off as long as you are allied.) I found myself on more than one occasion simply eradicating my neighbors just so I would have a few turns of peace and quiet. Here, again, the additions made to trade and diplomacy have added little more than constant annoyances and micromanagement. While it IS possible to make good use of these systems in Civ 3, you'll find yourself constantly reacting to the same situations in exactly the same way as you force yourself to oversee yet again another trivial transfer of goods to yet another whining neighbor. By the way, refusing to do so simply means war, so be prepared to go to war soon and often, which will really hurt your investment in Culture. Then again, we covered that already. Well at least we now know why they emphasized war on the box cover.
One final note on this: You CAN make the situation somewhat better by simply choosing the "Massive Resources" option at start up. This will ensure that every civ has plenty of every resource, thus assuring the computer won't nag you as often. Then again, you'll wonder, what was the point of resources to begin with if the only way to have a good game is make the resources irrelevant?
SOUND
The few tracks that play in the background are done well enough that you might actually just let it run. On the other hand, the sounds associated with in-game elements themselves are so rudimentary and so repetitive that you'll be looking for the CD crack anyway so you can play your own stuff.
GRAPHICS
We all saw this coming with what we hoped were Alpha-graphic placeholders in the screen shots. Sorry, folks. Those weren't alpha-graphics after all. Even the roads still hang behind mountains, which I'm told has already been fixed in the upcoming patch. Supposedly Firaxis is shocked yet again by the cool reception their graphics are getting, especially after their promise to do better this time. "We were delighted with them in-house even after months of play-testing" said an anonymous source. Well, perhaps Firaxis should read some of the boards in the future or stop to play other games on the market just to see what CAN be done these days with graphics? I for one don't advocate graphics just to test my graphics card, but when colors bleed and units become indistinguishable, the game itself suffers--a lot.
AI
I leave the review on this section because the faulty AI in Civ 3 is by far the most glaring failure of the game. The only times I was ever impressed by the computer AI was when it refused to trade a valuable commodity to me unless I first signed a peace treaty with its neighbor. This was great. Until I realized EVERY trade has an almost identical "request." Why should I sign a peace treaty just to buy some coffee? Also, and this is important, EVERY trick that worked against the AI in Civ 2 is working EVEN BETTER in Civ 3, mainly due to the fact that the computer AI is so incompetent at securing resources for itself that it is crippled from the start and simply never catches up. Frankly, I am stunned that such a clearly vital requirement for the computer AI was seemly overlook entirely. Again, I might not be so critical on this point alone had the computer been programmed to make good use of trade and diplomacy to make up for it, but as noted, the computer AI is nothing more than a nagger or a warmonger with little or no intelligent moments in between.
Then again, Firaxis never promised anything with the Civ 3 AI. In fact, they never even mentioned it. On this point at least, Firaxis delivered all they promised.
CONCLUSION
Overall, while Civ 3 promises a great deal over Civ 2 in a number of potentially fascinating areas, the game simply fails to deliver due mainly to horrendous AI and shoddy implementation of features. The only good news here, and it's more like a wish than anything else, is that it seems that the computer AI can still be patched, and I assume that's where most of the public outcry will be focused. As for the lackluster graphics and sounds, however, few if any companies address those issues unless they can package an expansion pack to squeeze out a few more dollars.
At this point, though, unless I get some sort of rebate on my $55 purchase of Civ 3, I'd find spending even a few more dollars on this effort an insult to MY intelligence. As the computer AI often says when it wants something: "This choice is yours. Take it or leave it." Well, barring any miraculous patches, I'll leave it.
By the way, I'd tell you to keep tuned to the Firaxis website for the latest information on all this, but the Wizard has noted that it takes him an extra 10 minutes to style his hair these days, so we might be out of luck for official updates.
P.S. MULTIPLAYER Anyone? [edited in later in the day]
As you may have noticed, discussion of multiplayer was strangely missing from the review. This is because I was awaiting an official answer from Firaxis, which finally came from Kelly, their PR person:
"Dear Firaxis Fan:
We have recently been made aware of a mis-printing on the box that read 'Multiplayer out of the box.' What that SHOULD have read is 'Multi-layer out of the box,' referring to the layers of advertisements, legal documents promising not to sue for missing features, and mail-in offers for the manual (oh, and the CD, of course). All told, you'll find over 5 layers **thus, 'Multi-layer'** in the box. We never have claimed 'Multiplayer' anything. Well, somebody once claimed something about 'innovative and exciting multiplayer' blah blah blah, but that phrase never came from THIS office.
I understand, however, that the next patch might provide, free of charge, a Call-to-Power like system that will allow the player to hack files for weeks with little or no results. We hope this will prolong the life of the game as casual gamers teach themselves programming tricks in order to build this stuff themselves.
Again, we are sorry for your confusion. Anyway, who would want to play a TBS game through MP at any rate? That would take, like, hours and hours...
Sincerely,
The PR Wizard"
Anybody care to point out how many things I got pretty close and how many I totally missed?
Thanks.
P.S.: Since people love to second-guess my motives, I am *not* trying to bash Firaxis, etc. I'm just honestly curious how off I was ... and since I'm in Korea and refuse to d/l warez, I won't be able to play for a while.
If you've followed the Civ-saga (and what die-hard TBS gamer hasn't?), you'd at least have a rough idea of Civ's history (the kind about the game, that is). You'd know that Sid Meier, the Founding Father of computer gaming, released his masterpiece, Civ 1, in 1991, and Brian Reynolds upped the ante with the surprisingly successful release of Civ 2 in 1996. Along the way, more than one game has tried to out-do the elusive Civ magic, but so far nobody has come even close.
No doubt this gave the Sid legacy and Sid's team a vote of confidence to give the title another overhaul and to see if, once again, greatness could be topped. Keeping true to their 5-years-between-Civ-games schedule, the Sid Folks (now simply called 'Firaxis') have carried on the torch and delivered Civ 3 just in time for Christmas 2001 sales. A sizeable portion of the jaded gaming public, however, will no doubt view that Christmas deadline as a warning sign, especially considering that as late as July, Firaxis itself openly stated that a number of important elements "Just aren't done yet."
Well, it saddens me to report: The jaded public is right. If you ever wondered what the term "Civ 2.5" meant, just install the CD and ask yourself what wonders another 6 months in development might have produced?
Consequently, despite moments of brilliance, more than one significant patch might be in the works for Civ 3 as all the promises of a "Better than Civ 2" experience struggle to be delivered months after the game itself. So, with this lump of coal in our stockings, the optimist in me seems to say: "Just give this thing enough pressure, and who knows what it could become?" Then again, I guess we should first consider how much pressure we are talking here.
GAMEPLAY
For those of you who were looking for something radically different from Civ 2, look elsewhere. While the additions of Culture and Resources sounded good on paper, in fact they seem to have added more tedious micromanagement at the expense of any strategic decisions. First, the concept of Culture is a tricky one at best, and Firaxis deserves credit for taking it head on. Unfortunately, the best they could come up with is the equivalent of "Making more and more of certain types of buildings will spread your influence over the map." What does this mean in gameplay terms? Obvious, isn't it? You'll be tempted to literally stuff your cities with building after building just to see how far your cultural influence can spread. Then a creeping question will settle in: "Wait, is this even fun or challenging? Does it really add anything to the game?" In a sense, it IS fun--for a while. After all, it takes quite a streamlined economy to support all these buildings, and one begins to feel at times that Civ 3 is a sort of grand Sim City or Tropico. And it IS challenging to afford the time and resources to seeing your Civ's color creep across the map, especially since creating "Art," for example, means you won't be creating as many troops, so the decision to build or fight has been made at least vaguely more interesting. Unfortunately, even when you do manage a huge cultural influence, you end up with one of two totally unsatisfying results: Competing civilizations will either simply bow to you (or be directly absorbed by you) or declare you a sworn enemy despite your best diplomatic efforts. Thus, push-over allies and maniacal foes will be your reward for having the world's leading culture. Not exactly subtle, is it?
As for resources, what are they mainly important for? You guessed it. Building stuff. This DOES add certain moments of enjoyable panic: "How do I build that Guest Relations Waiting Room to add to my Cultural Influence if I can't reach that Cow Square to produce leather for the plush couches?!" Of course, this would have been made all the more interesting if your computer opponents somehow took advantage of this situation themselves, but as you'll see in the next section, you'll often be wanting to either give the computer every chance it can get in order to craft a challenge for yourself--or to quickly put it out of its misery.
TRADE/DIPLOMACY
I have put these two together because, in essence, the new Resource system means you'll be hearing from the computer more than you ever wanted--and the conversation will soon become tired and predictable. The computer's first contacts with you will often surround their wanting you to share a certain resource that you have and they don't (the reverse is also true). This will seem at first like a logical and almost human way to approach things. Of course, since the computer is so inept at actually going out and securing these resources itself, you'll soon find yourself feeling like an over-worked parent who is being constantly nagged by his children for "More candy, Daddy! More candy! More more more more MORE!" Eventually you'll just want to go to war with these naggers just to shut them up. (No, you can't turn them off as long as you are allied.) I found myself on more than one occasion simply eradicating my neighbors just so I would have a few turns of peace and quiet. Here, again, the additions made to trade and diplomacy have added little more than constant annoyances and micromanagement. While it IS possible to make good use of these systems in Civ 3, you'll find yourself constantly reacting to the same situations in exactly the same way as you force yourself to oversee yet again another trivial transfer of goods to yet another whining neighbor. By the way, refusing to do so simply means war, so be prepared to go to war soon and often, which will really hurt your investment in Culture. Then again, we covered that already. Well at least we now know why they emphasized war on the box cover.
One final note on this: You CAN make the situation somewhat better by simply choosing the "Massive Resources" option at start up. This will ensure that every civ has plenty of every resource, thus assuring the computer won't nag you as often. Then again, you'll wonder, what was the point of resources to begin with if the only way to have a good game is make the resources irrelevant?
SOUND
The few tracks that play in the background are done well enough that you might actually just let it run. On the other hand, the sounds associated with in-game elements themselves are so rudimentary and so repetitive that you'll be looking for the CD crack anyway so you can play your own stuff.
GRAPHICS
We all saw this coming with what we hoped were Alpha-graphic placeholders in the screen shots. Sorry, folks. Those weren't alpha-graphics after all. Even the roads still hang behind mountains, which I'm told has already been fixed in the upcoming patch. Supposedly Firaxis is shocked yet again by the cool reception their graphics are getting, especially after their promise to do better this time. "We were delighted with them in-house even after months of play-testing" said an anonymous source. Well, perhaps Firaxis should read some of the boards in the future or stop to play other games on the market just to see what CAN be done these days with graphics? I for one don't advocate graphics just to test my graphics card, but when colors bleed and units become indistinguishable, the game itself suffers--a lot.
AI
I leave the review on this section because the faulty AI in Civ 3 is by far the most glaring failure of the game. The only times I was ever impressed by the computer AI was when it refused to trade a valuable commodity to me unless I first signed a peace treaty with its neighbor. This was great. Until I realized EVERY trade has an almost identical "request." Why should I sign a peace treaty just to buy some coffee? Also, and this is important, EVERY trick that worked against the AI in Civ 2 is working EVEN BETTER in Civ 3, mainly due to the fact that the computer AI is so incompetent at securing resources for itself that it is crippled from the start and simply never catches up. Frankly, I am stunned that such a clearly vital requirement for the computer AI was seemly overlook entirely. Again, I might not be so critical on this point alone had the computer been programmed to make good use of trade and diplomacy to make up for it, but as noted, the computer AI is nothing more than a nagger or a warmonger with little or no intelligent moments in between.
Then again, Firaxis never promised anything with the Civ 3 AI. In fact, they never even mentioned it. On this point at least, Firaxis delivered all they promised.
CONCLUSION
Overall, while Civ 3 promises a great deal over Civ 2 in a number of potentially fascinating areas, the game simply fails to deliver due mainly to horrendous AI and shoddy implementation of features. The only good news here, and it's more like a wish than anything else, is that it seems that the computer AI can still be patched, and I assume that's where most of the public outcry will be focused. As for the lackluster graphics and sounds, however, few if any companies address those issues unless they can package an expansion pack to squeeze out a few more dollars.
At this point, though, unless I get some sort of rebate on my $55 purchase of Civ 3, I'd find spending even a few more dollars on this effort an insult to MY intelligence. As the computer AI often says when it wants something: "This choice is yours. Take it or leave it." Well, barring any miraculous patches, I'll leave it.
By the way, I'd tell you to keep tuned to the Firaxis website for the latest information on all this, but the Wizard has noted that it takes him an extra 10 minutes to style his hair these days, so we might be out of luck for official updates.
P.S. MULTIPLAYER Anyone? [edited in later in the day]
As you may have noticed, discussion of multiplayer was strangely missing from the review. This is because I was awaiting an official answer from Firaxis, which finally came from Kelly, their PR person:
"Dear Firaxis Fan:
We have recently been made aware of a mis-printing on the box that read 'Multiplayer out of the box.' What that SHOULD have read is 'Multi-layer out of the box,' referring to the layers of advertisements, legal documents promising not to sue for missing features, and mail-in offers for the manual (oh, and the CD, of course). All told, you'll find over 5 layers **thus, 'Multi-layer'** in the box. We never have claimed 'Multiplayer' anything. Well, somebody once claimed something about 'innovative and exciting multiplayer' blah blah blah, but that phrase never came from THIS office.
I understand, however, that the next patch might provide, free of charge, a Call-to-Power like system that will allow the player to hack files for weeks with little or no results. We hope this will prolong the life of the game as casual gamers teach themselves programming tricks in order to build this stuff themselves.
Again, we are sorry for your confusion. Anyway, who would want to play a TBS game through MP at any rate? That would take, like, hours and hours...
Sincerely,
The PR Wizard"
shut up yin
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