We are doomed. We want a more complicated game, but the casual gamer doesn't

[Barnacle Bill]

If real life was clear-cut cause and effect, there would be no politics. If it was obvious what the effect would be of every policy, the politicians would have nothing to debate. Tax cuts, deficit, bail outs, all would be easily evaluated with no room for debate. So, why should a game that people play to live vicariously the lives of rulers be clear-cut in ways that real life rulers never experience. Frankly, I think EU/EU2 is great as far as it goes. I'd just like it expanded to cover the same gound as Civ.

[pg]

my take on this...

i've been thinking about something that relates to this(at least i think it does). i'm a quakeworld player(based on quake1, which is multiplayer first person shooter), and my main reasons for playing are the community and playing it as a sport(think competition, matches, etc). quakeworld(referred to as qw from now on) was released over 5 yrs ago. yet i still play it.

many things were done right in qw, and have yet to be surpassed by future games, so what is the reason to change to the latest and greatest(except for a bit better gfx)? qw is also opensource now, and we can modify EVERYTHING. there is a small community in north america, but in europe there is a community almost as big as that of quake3(which is the latest game in the series, and not opensource yet). qw players are an underground group of people and while we will never enjoy the mainstream benefits we will also never endure their problems.

i'll explain quake3(q3) a bit, and why it's not as popular with the very hardcore players. it was designed to appeal to newbies, from the level design to the game mechanics, there have been long debates that prove without a doubt(in my mind anyways) that was the sole purpose of the game design. it doesn't help when john carmack(the main programmer) makes comments that support him not understanding or not wanting to understand hardcore gamers. there was also an attempt at an unofficial fix(called promode, that's a whole new topic though), but i think you get the idea.

qw was made during a different time, as was civ2. years ago computer gaming wasn't mainstream yet, and now it is becoming such(if it isn't already). once you go mainstream things change.

the gaming industry is becoming more like hollywood, instead of the sub-culture it once was. you can actually make money by releasing old game designs with new gfx(graphics), and sound. there is not much more to it than that. all the old classics are just being released with updated gfx, and maybe a handful of new features(think doom, quake, wolfenstien, unreal, civ, warcraft, red alert, simcity, ad infinitum). gaming today is more about fanboy magazines, and marketing than innovativation and new gameplay. just repackage it and sell it again(hey, it almost always works, and probably has much better chance of success than new ideas)!

i know i'm ranting, but the crux of the problem is it's not economically feasible to release a game that we want. it's better to release conservative title after title. it doesn't matter if we complain as long as someone keeps buying it. which will happen since the younger people have never even heard of civ1 + civ2 and will love civ3 since they don't know any better(heh).

basically the kind of game really hardcore players want is not going to be made for them unless a developer does it by accident(a fluke!), gets lucky or is trying make a name for themselves. we want a game that is going to be a sport for us. simple rules yet endless innovativation from personal insight and strategy in the gameplay.

the developers know what we want, but why should they give it to us? paying $50 once for a game you can play for 5yrs is not a good deal for them. if you had a civ game that was opensource could be upgraded year after year, you would never need to buy an 'official' civ game again. why put up with corporate vampires when you don't need to. you have a choice, people like mark everson represent the future. i am sure he will even talk back to you if you message him(can't say the same for sid, he's probably got an entourage following him around)! why put up with firaxis and other game companies debacles when you could take part in projects like clash, and freeciv and liberate yourself.

i'm not the best writer, but i hope my point came across. if you liked my diatribe you might find this http://www.theunderdogs.org/scratch.php link interesting(it sorta inspired me). i'm not here to advertise the site(but i recommend you check it out, i think most of you will like it ).

[Venger]

Originally posted by Steve Clark
One of the biggest gripes about Civ3 is how long it take to play (and the onsetting tedium factor). Generally, by adding more complexity, whether to combat or other areas, the game and its turns will take even longer.

The problem isn't with time, it's whether it's time well spent. Right now, it's not, most of your time is tedium. Make the time spent enjoyable, and you get the "just one more turn" syndrome that kept us all up till way too late playing Civ 1 and 2. That's no longer there for me in Civ3, I feel like my time is not well spent, just spent...

Venger

[Venger]

Re: my take on this...

Originally posted by pg
i've been thinking about something that relates to this(at least i think it does). i'm a quakeworld player(based on quake1, which is multiplayer first person shooter), and my main reasons for playing are the community and playing it as a sport(think competition, matches, etc). quakeworld(referred to as qw from now on) was released over 5 yrs ago. yet i still play it.

QuakeWorld is still the purest, best FPS ever made. Where do you play it? I haven't played in a while, but did throw down overpowering ownership at it. Threewave CTF QuakeWorld is freaking pure GREATNESS.

many things were done right in qw, and have yet to be surpassed by future games, so what is the reason to change to the latest and greatest(except for a bit better gfx)?

I enjoy UT (demo only, don't like full) alot, but never have liked Q2 or Q3 much. The greatest weapon ever conceived is the Q1 rocket launcher.

Relating to Civ3, Civ2 took the best of Civ1 and improved it. I'm not sure what Civ3 took, it did take a different direction, directly ignored improvements from interim titles (CTP2 and SMAC), and created a product that is far less than the sum of it's parts.

qw is also opensource now, and we can modify EVERYTHING.

I heard it's made cheating a REAL problem.

Venger

[pg]

Re: Re: my take on this...

Originally posted by Venger


QuakeWorld is still the purest, best FPS ever made. Where do you play it? I haven't played in a while, but did throw down overpowering ownership at it. Threewave CTF QuakeWorld is freaking pure GREATNESS.

I enjoy UT (demo only, don't like full) alot, but never have liked Q2 or Q3 much. The greatest weapon ever conceived is the Q1 rocket launcher.

I heard it's made cheating a REAL problem.

Venger

i dislike q3 too, while i find q2 ok, rail is what ruins those games for me. i enjoy the first person shooter(or fps for short) medium, and communities with competition so much that i can even play sub-par games. doom is still ok but qw is the best combo of gameplay and technology while doom obviously lacks technology(2d sucks). doom gameplay still rocks in co-op though, especially considering i have like 300 custom wads on my hard drive(and played some co-op yesterday).

since you asked... irc.enterthegame.com #qwplayers, and #genocide(qwdm 4v4 tourney with cash prizes heh). probably a couple hundred active players(but very dedicated to qw) in north america and usually 50-150 on irc. btw, cheating is not a problem. it was a lot worse back when qw was popular. qw now has updated clients, servers, and new mods. the people that cheat most migrated to the newer games(counter-strike mostly). if you do stop by, message me(nick pg).

qw has changed a lot in it's 5 yr life span and it is still changing(the gameplay is way different now). qwctf is pretty dead(but it lives in au/eu). but we still manage to get a ctf games going once in a while. qwca/qwdm/qwtf are still very active and you can usually find pickup games or scrims any time of day.

anyways, i could talk about fps games forever(they are my true passion, but i enjoy civ too). the reason i brought it up is because the same thing that is happening in civ is happening in quake. we really got annoyed by the game makers and went out on a tangent. unless things change that might be the future of civ too.

[Mark_Everson]

Originally posted by Venger
The problem isn't with time, it's whether it's time well spent. Right now, it's not, most of your time is tedium. Make the time spent enjoyable, and you get the "just one more turn" syndrome that kept us all up till way too late playing Civ 1 and 2. That's no longer there for me in Civ3, I feel like my time is not well spent, just spent...

Excellent point Venger! Although if a truly immersive game would take a full month to play, the rest of my life would be in Big trouble. I have a friend who uses the expression "Computer Crack" to describe truly addictive games she wants to avoid so as to not lose big chunks of her life.

pg: Thanks for the plug. I really do think that if we fans really want something deep, and yet Smart in terms of AI, we're going to have to do it ourselves!

Steve: I agree utterly with the "constant feedback" point you raised. But the feedback needs to be on meaningful things!

[kmill25]

I didn't read the whole thread so forgive any ignorance in this post.

They should release a new edition. Say Civ III Professional or something to that effect. This Civ III professional will be a complex nation building game that only the hardcore gamer will love. And it should come with a warning stating that this is not for the casual gamer. That way you'll have two versions of the same game. Keeping in the same core elements. And let the consumer choose which version they will purchase.

[Alex]

They should release a new edition. Say Civ III Professional or something to that effect.

That is an interesting solution, but it simply is not feasible. Not only the game would take ages to be released due to all playtesting and whatnot, but the increased production cost would make it so expensive that you would think twice about buying it.

But I agree with Dissident: Civ3 is intended for the casual players. The designers wanted to update Civ with new concepts and new graphics, but they wanted the game to be accessible to anyone who never played a civ game before. Considering that Civ2 was released in 1996, there is a whole generation that never played Civ because they were too young to be interested in strategy games at that time.
Firaxis (and Infogrames) were not willing to release a game that could appeal only to veterans. Solution? Enter "Civ-lite", a perfect game for all the family!
I cannot blame them, though... Mind you, this is not THE main reason why Civ3 turned out to be what it is now. There are other things involved, but that "casual player" thing is most certainly a important one.

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by kmill25
I didn't read the whole thread so forgive any ignorance in this post.

They should release a new edition. Say Civ III Professional or something to that effect. This Civ III professional will be a complex nation building game that only the hardcore gamer will love. And it should come with a warning stating that this is not for the casual gamer. That way you'll have two versions of the same game. Keeping in the same core elements. And let the consumer choose which version they will purchase.

I've been reading through all the posts in this forum and definately noted all of the ideas. However, instead of using one or a few of the ideas in any future applications and risking the disapointment of the people who didn't get what they wanted in the expansion, why doesn't Firaxis just make an expansion that opens the "editor" portal to customize EVERYTHING. If everything could be edited and customized the way you could with Civ2, then there wouldn't be complaints, because everyone can customize the game to suit thier personal preference. That's what they should've done in the first place. But because they are in the "make more money" frame of mind, the very things that made Civ2 great will never be seen again. I know what some of you will say to this, that it can't be done or there is too much work involved that it might take another 6 months to come up with such depth and complexity but my opinion is that this game wasn't designed for "mindless" fun such as what you would find in a game like "Doom" or "Pac Man". Civilization was a concept that attracted adults and maturity because it had depth. People play strategy games because they want a challange, not mindless interactive childlike amusement. My vote is that Civilization could and should be a difficult (but easy to learn) TBS genre strategy game, with great great depth and realism.

And as for the micromanagement, instead of "movement" of each and every item on the game map, you could also "toggle" that off or on, by turning the units off, you could be taken to a battle window like "Shogun: Total War" and conduct a real-time battle with realistic movements and each of those windows consists of multiple units fighting to represent armies. Or another option that should be "toggle-able" is to turn the battle's completely off, have a "win or lose" random determination. There are so many things that could have made Civilization by far the "deity" of all strategy games, with graphics that could have blown away what they used in Civ3. I beleive that realism and depth, accompanied by complexity would draw the youth and the casual players closer, because with splendid visuals and detailed interactivity they have a chance to "learn" and "evolve" so to speak with the game. But the main problem is that everyone wants different things, and obviously a game product can be designed to offer something to everyone, as game products have in the past.

However, my personal opinion is that without "complete customization" over every detail of the game (including the graphics & animations/sounds) the Civilization concept is nullified and will eventually die off or gradually lose it's audiences that once gathered before it. But in response to your post(s) in this forum, I beleive our next arrival will be that of an expansion pack for a price. And that will be the end of Civilization. I've already given up on them completely, I'm writing to various other game companies now, and depositing my ideas where I feel they will bare some weight and hopefully a company will rival "civilization" and teach them a few things.

PS. Unless the patch/expansion is everything I wanted and more (sheeaaaww... right.... like thats going to happen!)

Charles.

[MonsterMan]

Yes, Civilization needs to be made less complex and intricate so stupid people can play it too. Sheesh.

I want a game that forces me to use my brain, and rewards me for being smart. I particularly want specialized units in the earlier time periods; planning a nice invasion strategy is possible in the modern era, with all the components of a fleet. Destroyers to guard the transports, cruisers to spot subs, battleships to wreak havoc on cities before the ground troops are unloaded. That is very nice.

How about an offensive rifleman unit, 5/2/1? Weaker than cavalry, but better than sending defending riflemens. Or cannons drawn by horses (Dark Sheer's idea). Or 'highlander' units produced by cities with lots of mountains and hills in the area -- they get a 25% attack bonus if attacking from hills or mountains. Ideas along those lines make the game both more fun and more intricate. But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

[MonsterMan]

I totally agree with CharlesUFarley :-)

Especially about the editor.

The tech tree, civilopedia, units and civilizations should be completely open. By that I mean that I can add a whole new time period (future & distant future) with as many techs in them that I want. I can also split industrial into renaissance and industrial if I so desired, and reorganize the tech tree as necessary.

I should also be able to add as many units as I wanted, and define icon graphics for them etc.

Civilizations could be added as I chose to add them, which means specifying city square images, new palace styles to fit their culture, their own leader heads, their own diplomacy responses etc.

These new features would be the most important ones in a new patch or add-on, and ensure that Civilization III continues to thrive in the hands of the modding community -- and sell copies.

A good comparison can be made with The Sims, which has thousands of components that can be downloaded and keep the game fresh. That game has been in the top ten sellers list for *years*... or so it seems to me.

[Willem]

Originally posted by MonsterMan
Or 'highlander' units produced by cities with lots of mountains and hills in the area -- they get a 25% attack bonus if attacking from hills or mountains.

And Archers/Longbowmen should get a bonus for attacking from Forests. Unfortunatley I haven't seen anything yet that allows for that sort of thing.

[MonsterMan]

Originally posted by Willem


And Archers/Longbowmen should get a bonus for attacking from Forests. Unfortunatley I haven't seen anything yet that allows for that sort of thing.

That would be great, because archers would become very dangerous in forests -- 50% better defense, 25% better attack. In large forest areas, longbowmen would be the most dangerous unit until Cavalry comes along.

[cavebear]

I always thought that one of the weaknesses of Civ2 and Civ3 (never played Civ1) was that where the units attacked *from* was irrelevant, especially for the longer-range offensive units (archers, cannons, etc). If you are attacking with a cannon from a mountain, it's not like the cannon suddenly rumbles down the mountain and out onto the grassland to fight.

Considering that the combat is just formulas with values and probabilities, it shouldn't be all that hard to take into account. It would add a lot to the decision-making complexity of combat without making the game actually harder to *understand*.

[Willem]

Originally posted by MonsterMan



That would be great, because archers would become very dangerous in forests -- 50% better defense, 25% better attack. In large forest areas, longbowmen would be the most dangerous unit until Cavalry comes along.

As they stand now, they're almost useless IMO, especially Archers. I stick mine up in the Mountains and use them mainly for lookouts. I rarely use them offensively since the first enemy unit that comes along they're gone. Only the fact that Mountains have such a high defence value gives them a chance of surviving an attack.