Has the scenario community given up on Civ3?

[techumseh]

Originally posted by Comrade Tribune


But Microprose was, on average, wayyyyy more consumer-friendly than Firaxis.

Absolutely! Following the release of Test of Time there was a lot of criticism of the graphics and the lack of built in editors. John Possidente of Microprose stayed right up to date on all the threads and was uniformly friendly and informative. When Microprose couldn't meet the heartfelt desires of some fans, he said so, and why.

Test of Time is easily the most underrated game of the Civ genre. I was initially a critic, but John helped turn me into an ardent fan. The opposite process has occured with Civ3.

[MarkG]

Originally posted by techumseh
Absolutely! Following the release of Test of Time there was a lot of criticism of the graphics and the lack of built in editors. John Possidente of Microprose stayed right up to date on all the threads and was uniformly friendly and informative.

that was the doing of one man, not company policy...

[Venger]

Originally posted by techumseh
Test of Time is easily the most underrated game of the Civ genre. I was initially a critic, but John helped turn me into an ardent fan. The opposite process has occured with Civ3.

Tecumseh -

I own Civ:ToT and have played it alot, what did you find in it that made you such a fan, from a scenario side? I never played scenarios, just the straight up game with my own special techs and unit mods.

Venger

[techumseh]

Originally posted by MarkG
that was the doing of one man, not company policy...

I'm not sure what your point is exactly.

Originally posted by Venger
I own Civ:ToT and have played it alot, what did you find in it that made you such a fan, from a scenario side? I never played scenarios, just the straight up game with my own special techs and unit mods.

Up to 4 interconnected maps each with it's own terrain graphics and characteristics, animated units and terrain, vastly enhanced and enlarged events capability (for example, you can turn specific events off and on, use multiple triggers, etc.), improved AI, unbribable units, impassible terrain, invisible units, techs and units can be limited to specified civs, 81 unit slots, 100 tech slots, lots of old bugs cleaned up (you can now change improvements and production in a barbarian controlled city without the game crashing) and new things are now editable (helicopters pick up goody huts [y/n], lose X points for each betrayal. etc).

On the down side, there are no built in editors which means that scenario building takes more time. This, and the increased complexity, has meant relatively few scenarios have been produced so far. I've got several in various stages of completion, none finished except some converted from FW. (my new Russian Civil War scenario should be available for playtesting by the end of this week ) Kestrel has probably done the most with ToTs' potential. His and other scenarios are available from Cradle of Civiilzation along with some excellent scenario tips. Several excellent utilty programs have been produced which greatly enhance its' capability, including Angelo Scotto's CPSL program which is amazing and probably deserves a whole thread to itself.

[MarkG]

Originally posted by techumseh
I'm not sure what your point is exactly.

you gave credit to microprose for something that john possidente did out of his own good will and love for the game

[CapTVK]

Originally posted by MarkG
you gave credit to microprose for something that john possidente did out of his own good will and love for the game

You know, there's an important moral hidden here somewhere.


So it comes down to the actions of individual people that help out on their own accord instead of the nameless corporations that they represent in name? My my my...what an interesting concept!

If that's the case why not ditch Firaxis&Infogrames inc. at once and put our money, passtime and individual interests were it matters: small companies that care, or try to, about their customers and open source projects like Freeciv, Civ Evo and Clash.

Far better returns in the short AND long term.

[Grrr]

Consumers vs Corperation!

This is really a point of what INFOGRAMMES and FIRSUX (firaxis) will do and disable each other from doing, and as usual, us consumers are in the mid-ground of the battle, recieving shells from both sides, and help from neither. So eventually our only hope is for a few disentry employees of Firaxis to release the source code illegally, or make their own third party add-ons. I see no real hope that Firaxis will really GIVE US what we WANT, rather, they will CHARGE us for what THEY will GIVE.

For the time being, let's start making our own add-ons, stuff the license agreement.
Mine didn't have a scrollbar, so I could only read the first page anyway.

[techumseh]

Originally posted by MarkG
you gave credit to microprose for something that john possidente did out of his own good will and love for the game

Well I'd be the last person to want to give a corporation credit for something done through the goodwill of an individual. What's your basis for this observation?

[Grrr]

I find that corperations such as Microprose and Firaxis are only as good as their employees, and be it not for a few like John Possidente and Dan Magaha, who actually listen to us apolytonians, then we would have abandoned such corp's long ago. It is a pity however, that not only does Firaxis not listen to the good ideas of my fellow Apolytonians and I, but also to many of it's employees.


FIRAXIS

[MarkG]

Originally posted by techumseh
What's your basis for this observation?

on the simple fact that while John started posting a little bit after the release of ToT, stayed active for over 9-10 months only to stop because he left microprose! by that time, mps executives had most probably forgotten what tot means

[techumseh]

Well, he defines customer service to me.

[Civfan]

*bump*

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by kittenOFchaos
Libertarian

I remember reading more than a few "suck up to Firaxis" threads BY you just after the release of civ3 until you found some other people here to emulate...unfortuantly some of your trash was deposited in civfanatics.

I do it too. (suck up that is) it's sometimes the only way to communicate with them in a sort of misleading way in order to gain their audience for a duration long enough to suck information out of them. Ofcoarse we always have the smoking gun approach but they usually just hide from that!

Charles.

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by MarkG
i dont know if you have realized this(after being explained several times by firaxians participating in our forums and chats) but Firaxis, as a company, has taken a certain (official) stance towards making specific promises or any kind of predictions of what they will do with civ3 in the future. so if you expected a "from the stuff you suggested, we will do #1, #4 and #6 in the next 5 weeks" response in your thread, you're out of luck.

on the general issue of improving customization abilities there HAS been a response, repeated many times. if you dont like the response that's a different issue


now if you consider the above post as "cheerleading", i'm terribly sorry for having a different opinion that you...

I agree with Tech, and I believe he was stating that the response was un-acceptable but you obviously saw that. Not only was the response un-acceptable but it wasn't classified as any real response at all! Yes, we didn't like their response, and yes it bothers us, and yes we do honestly believe that if they expect us to show respect and patience they should do exactly that in return. Who will bend? I would like to think we already have Mr G.

Charles.

[BrotherLal]

[

Firaxis failed to deliver on NONE of it. (Not counting a couple of bugs, like for air defense.) And all of a sudden, just a couple of days after release, the bi+chers and moaners hit the boards with a vengeance. And you think THIS is bad, you should see the snobs at Apolyton. Suddenly Sid is the devil, and all the good people at Firaxis are deliberate con men who set out to defraud and mug us.


I'm still laughing like hell . . .