Firaxis, and Why Civ III is not what we *want* it to be...

[Ironikinit]

Charles (BTW, your name doesn't make sense. Chuck you Farley makes sense, in a spoonerism sort of way. No, I won't explain my handle to you, although I suspect you don't get it.),

Talking to you is useless, of course, but I'm stuck here and thus I have time to waste. Doesn't mean I'll waste a lot on you, but some.

Your little list shows me that you've not only not played the game, but haven't even read the posts about the game. For example:

"Unrealistic and poorly modelled trade negotiation, often losing more to the bargaining table with little or no gain, but a pissed off AI."

Uh, I guess you missed the whole tech brokering/ Pope strategy/ trade whoring thing people have been talking about for months now. Run a search and you'll see how foolish your criticism was. Now, trade can be criticized, but not for the reasons you gave.

Let's see. Oh, the thing where you couldn't access all the different civs via the foreign advisor. Yeah, that was a toughy. For one, because you have a problem playing against so many different civs due to slow down, you could try playing with fewer. Two birds, one stone. Then there's a button on the lower left marked D for Diplomacy (gasp) that brings up a list of different civs. Also available via hotkey! (Shift+D! Tricky devils.) Then you could go to your trade advisor and reach any civ you want, despite the bug on the foreign advisor screen. Games have bugs, get used to it. But this particular bug is pretty far from an inconvenience.

No control over ambient sounds... I dunno about you, but all I get from most games is a volume slider and an off switch, which Civ III has. Jeez, nitpicky or what? Who listens to the stupid music in games anyway? Well, I guess some people must, but I don't. Again, like your whole list, BFD.

A lot of your problems boil down to "it wasn't that way in Civ II". Well, no, and I'm glad. I didn't want a warmed-over expansion pack for Civ II, I wanted a new game. That's what I got. Don't blame other people for wanting what they want. If you're not happy, that's your problem, not mine, nor is it Firaxis' problem, given that there are plenty of satisfied customers out there. (Ooooh, the price went down. That happens, buddy. Some games don't, but if you can find it remaindered at your local mall... Well, you won't, not for some time. Hey, I can find Myst for 5 bucks. Must've been real unpopular.)

Some of your problems will be fixed, I suppose, by Firaxis, although at this point, I don't really care because I'm happy as it is. Others, like the start location one, that was fixed by a third party, as I understand the situation. Flexibility might help you in this situation. I'm pretty sure that you don't want to be helped, though. You just want to whine. It's a free internet, I suppose. Well, not really. Somebody pays to let you and I post here. But if they don't mind you whining, I hope they don't mind me whining back. Personally, I'd've banned you, if it was my fan site.

If you can't fathom why we fans, people who like and play Civ III, don't appreciate your little crusade to find fault and generally be a jerk about a game YOU DON'T EVEN PLAY, try going to a fan site for, say, the Detroit Red Wings, and badmouth them there. Can you predict the result?

Not only do you not play the game, you don't know the game, you don't know the industry, you don't know jack. No negative reviews indeed. To anyone I've annoyed by talking to this jackass, I apologize. I just iggied him anyway. Life is too short.

[Worthingtons]

Cor Blimey!, I set up a post on the Firaxis and the computer games industry and it develops into another brawl and hundreds of massive reply's!

I wish i could have wrote as much in my English essays at School, as you people write in one reply here

[OneInTen]

As far as price demand goes, last I checked a weekend or two ago, the game was selling for $100 AUS, from it's release price of $100 AUS. So on the basis of this anecdotal evidence, I guess we have to call it a draw.

As far as hijacking goes, I've tracked down the thread in question ...

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=13094&perpage=20&pagenumber=2

My first quote in that thread is a response to the statement (made by you):
"But since I'm a realist, I would have to say the world-wide civ-consumers that use these forums lay somewhere in the 30-40% margin."

Now if to respond to that (oftopic to the thread to begin with!) - stating that the percentage of people who play civ that use the civfantatics forums is well below 30 - 40% - is thread hijacking, then I am guilty as charged.

As to your whole "fanboys" and "whiners" can't get along so they should stay apart, well, you've yet to tell me why it should be the "fanboys" who should depart. And ironically, if you check the first page, there are 4 posts from me and none from you ... yet it's somehow my fault for dragging you down?


Who am I to be worth responding to? I'm another poster on the board. You can choose to ignore me (there's a convenient ignore function provided by the forum) if you don't think I'm worth your time reading. What I am saying though is that if you're going to take the time to read and reply, I believe it reflects poorly on you if you do not do so in a manner which logically addresses the points I make.

Nobody can force you to be logical, of course. But as the professor who gave lectures in a class called "logic and rationality" at the university I attended said - "I can't tell you that you have to be logical. I advise you to do so though as it has been shown there is a strong correlation between those who take a logical approach and those who have success in all walks of life". He also went further and said "Some people say that they have a right to their opinion, but I believe that unless they can logically justify their opinion they do not infact have that right". Don't know I'd quite go that far though.

To address your points:

* No zoom levels in map editor (how do you see what your drawing?)

Agreed, this is a problem, severity minor (doesn't affect gameplay, and doesn't stop editor from being functional).

* No "start locations" available (you can create a scenario if you dont mind the USA starting in Africa)

There are third party tools to achieve this. Invalid.

* Bugs and Corruption still exist even with the newest patch installed.

Do you mean corruption as in the game concept, or save file corruption?

As for bugs, well, all software has bugs, and civ 3 is no exception. But the remaining bugs in civ 3 are mostly fairly innoculous (there's only one crash bug that I'm aware of). The number of known bugs in civ 3 is also not particuarly high. Unless you can provide data to contradict this, I'm saying it's severity minor.

* Only 8 leaders available in foreign advisor menu, where are the other 8 in 16-player game? And how would you access them?

This one has been answered by Firaxis. Civ 3 was designed to be an 8 player game, 16 players was added as an extra feature late in the design process.

You can still access the other civs by shift clicking the leader portraits (as I recall, it might be shift right click or something, but it can be done).

Since there's no problem here, only a bit of an awkward interface issue, I'm marking this one as severity trivial.

I'll also take this chance to note that this demonstrates how adding features late in the software lifecycle is not a simple matter and can cause problems.

* Bombardment issues with modern units

Care to elaborate on exactly what you mean by this?

* Air Superiority missions deemed recently "useless" and non-functional.

Huh? Air superiority works in the patched game, at least as far as I am aware. Can you give details of the circumstances that cause it not to work?

* AI is always "kill kill kill kill kill" with lack of realistic alliances and treaties on any difficulty level. AI will always break treaties regardless of merit.

Untrue, I've played games without an AI ever going to war with me. I've also played other games where some civs were almost constantly at war. It depends on the game state. Invalid.

* AI bugs and micromanagement flaws

Again, you're going to have to give more detail for me to know what you're referring to.

* Game tedium way too slow and high due to coding and performance problems; poor graphic engine; poor micromanagement - AI. Etc. Game takes 2-6 mins/turn on PII's and PIII's on a large map/diety level 16 civs.

Game speed too slow? That's obviously processor dependent, but on my machine (PIII, over 2 years out of date) it runs fine (I turn animations off of course). Certainly turns can take a bit longer on larger map sizes, but that's the price of a better AI routine and a large data set. I think it's a general trend across the board in PC gaming that if you have a machine over a year old then your gaming experience may not be completely optimal.

However, I have heard reports of a bug dealing with AI behaviour and the city limit that may be the cause of additional slowdown on huge maps.

Given that conversely other people report turn times on the top of the line athlons to be 20 seconds max on huge maps modern era, it's hard to know who to believe, and to get a definitive handle on performance.

Performance is always an issue for any game, and civ 3 is very playable on the standard map size on a lower spec machine than most games coming out these days. Sure, I wish it was faster but I wish every game was faster. Minor issue.

Poor graphics engine? Explain what you mean by this.

Poor micromanagement? The AI does an acceptable but not optimal job at this. You can win quite easily on regent and monarch (and possibly higher) while letting the AI handle a good deal of the micromanagement for you. How much better do you expect it to be, given that you've already complained about performance, and better AI is going to result in worse performance?

Given that you can win at the middle two difficulty levels while allowing the AI to run much of your empire for you, I've got to say this is a non issue.

* As noted above, unit movement boggles AI MM and creates lengthy turns resulting in a loss of a appeal or interactivity.

Unit movement boggles AI MM? Explain further.

* Game becomes unstable with little or no paramaters preventing editorial damage, simply don't change editor values and your fine. (What's the editor for again?)

Ideally, this wouldn't happen, I agree. But the editor is for people wishing to create mods, and you should expect some degree of issues in play testing these. Ideally they wouldn't crash the game though. I also suspect the number of people this affects is fairly low (given the ratio of mod authors to players). I'd rather this a minor issue, although I could concevably see it being rated as a moderate issue, depending on how bad it really is (my understanding is post-patch it's much improved from pre-patch)

* Unrealistic/generic artwork and poor representation of a decade old game acredited for its glory and historical splendor - now washed away and meant for a more youthful audience.

"Realistic" artwork? You're stuck with representing a frigging forest that spans thousands of acres with a few trees. Of course the artwork isn't going to be realistic. Unless I'm missing the point behind your observation.

Art is one area where it's very much a matter of taste. I happen to think the default artwork is a vast improvement on civ/civ 2/SMAC. It's also easy to make changes (I've downloaded some, and also made some myself) if it doesn't suit you. As such I'm rating this as a non issue.

* Limited to two zoom levels with little or no point to the "zoomed out" feature, multiple zooms allow the player to observe more advantageous angles (Civ2 for reference).

Never found a use for the zoom feature in civ 2 myself, zoom in and things are too big to see much of the map, zoom out and they're too small to see what's what. So I think the utility of such a function is a matter of personal preference. However, since I can't see why this feature couldn't have been included (other than perhaps ease of programming only one level of zoom), I agree that there should have been such a feature. Since it doesn't stop you from playing the game in any way though, I'm going to say it's a minor omission.

* Unrealistic and poorly modelled trade negotiation, often losing more to the bargaining table with little or no gain, but a pissed off AI.

Nothing about the game, or civ 2 for that matter, is realistic (civ leader living for 6050 years?), so I don't think you've got a leg to stand on with that part of the claim.

As to the trade being poorly modelled, it's clearly superior to civ 2. I'd say it's on par with SMAC - you have different options though owing to the differences in game style.

Given that, I can't really say I consider this to be an issue.

* Workers become "dumb" through various settings and circumstances, when all units should have a perpose at all times with a proper engine this could have been achieved.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "dumb", however I'll attempt to tackle it anyway. Workers on automatic polution clean up is a case in point where I can agree with you - they don't do that particuarly well at all. Infact, they do it worse after the patch than before.

I'd rate this as a moderate issue, as it's annoying and somewhat neededlessly management intensive without actually breaking the game in any way, especially since it seems fairly easy to fix.

* Editor only good for altering existing rules and values, but not able to create/invent new ones as per traditional civ history and standards.

There are third party tools that allow you to do this. Invalid.

* No control over the ambient sounds and music, ancient war drums still beat in a modern aged scenario, if it can be called that.

You can replace the ambient sounds and music rather easily, as they're just files. Invalid.

* Bombers cannot be shot down by fighters on air-to-air missions like in reality, which adds to the un-realistic behavour of this new game.

I'm not sure I understand - if you set your fighter to air superiority it will shoot down enemy bombers. Where's the problem?


Well, from your list I find a grand total of:
1 case where I consider the issue to be trivial
4 cases where I consider the issue to be minor
2 cases where I consider the issue to be moderate
7 cases where I can't find an issue at all
6 cases where I'd need further explaination to be sure of what you're talking about.

Ignoring the one's I'm unsure about, that leaves 7 out of the 14 on your list as being able to be explained away.

If you really think that the remaining 7 issues are game breakers, then that just underlines my point about how things affect different people to different degrees.

I'm sure I can name 7 issues off the top of my head for just about any game I've played a few times, including my all time favourites. And most of those are games that have been patched multiple times.

Heck, I can name 7 issues you haven't already listed with civ 3 (and will on request).

The point is that while you apparently consider these to ruin the game, not everyone does. There's plenty of people who are happy playing the game right as it is. The difference is while you kick up a fuss about what an awful company Firaxis is, and how many issues the game has, the "fanboys" don't bother stating over and over the issues and wish lists that have already been made aware of Firaxis.

Some of the stuff will probably get fixed in future patches. Other stuff will no doubt be put in the too hard basket. In the end the game will be better, but it will still have flaws. Complaining vocally over and over about this isn't going to help it, and it may well hinder it, as it makes it harder for Firaxis to see the forest for the trees in here.

Your peanut butter response is incorrect, due to the fact that Civ 3 is not just Civ 2 all over again. It's a completely different product. Just because you like civ 2 will not mean you'll like civ 3, and vice versa. It's like saying that because a Big Mac and a McChicken burger both come from McDonalds, and I like the McChicken burger but not the Big Mac that it proves there's something wrong with the quality of Big Macs. All it really proves is that I like McChickens and not Big Mac burgers, just like all you've really proven is that you like Civ 2 and not Civ 3.

As for overhauling the game, hard work alone is not enough. To use an anology, writing software is kind of like painting the floor of a set of hallways. As you go along, there are many doorways that you could choose to open. But once you decide to paint down a particular hallway, you can't change your mind and go back, at least not without making a big mess of the work you've already done.

Firaxis has made decisions on how the game should work. At this point it's too late to make major changes to that without a vast amount of work. Small changes that don't affect too many areas can be done fairly easily (so long as the code is good). Large changes may not be able to be done at all, or if they can, may introduce all sorts of complications.


Civ 3 took 2 or 3 years to develop. To implement perhaps 10 of the big ticket, game changing suggestions being thrown around here might take them an equal amount of time they've already spent just to undo the assumptions they've made, rework the code, insert the new features, rebalance the game, test it and get it out to fans. During which time we'd be unlikely to see any results of their labour (once you commit to making big changes, it's hard to release half way through).

Firaxis would have to consider the amount of money to be made by doing so pretty huge to even consider such a risky venture.

On scenarios, I'm not saying there shouldn't be scenarios. I am saying criticising civ for not having a WWII scenario (or I'm told the ability to make such a scenario) isn't really a valid criticism because civ doesn't claim to be based around WWII, it claims to be based around the entire period extending from 4000BC - 2050AD. If it has a WWII scenario it's a bonus. Certainly nobody should be too disappointed about it since if they wanted to play a WWII game they knew they were buying civ 3 and not a WWII game when they spent their money.

And saying that the customer is always right is a ridiculous oversimplification. If customer A wants feature X, and customer B wants feature Y, and feature X and feature Y are contradictory, then you can't please them both!

Civ 3 is not a case of the consumer not getting what they paid for like in the case of a broken DVD player. When I bought my DVD player it was broken. I returned it and got a replacement. The reason I could do this was because it didn't do what it said it would do - play DVDs. Civ 3, on the other hand, has all the things the developers claim it would have. You can't claim the product is defective in the same way as the broken DVD player.

I'd love an open ended limitless editor. But as I've explained before, generic things take approximately 3 times as long to code, and require more specialised, skilled people to design, write and test. Additionally they generally suffer performance penalties when compared to less generic systems. I believe Firaxis made a compromise between being generic and getting the game finished and running at a reasonable speed.

Whether they've made the right compromises, I think remains to be seen. They promise a more advanced editor is in the works, which would imply they feel there are still features that they feel can be exposed in a generic way. Since editability is mostly about long term replay value, I think it's fair to take a long term view on this item.

Finally, even if the game were fully editable, I still think a lot of people would find reason to complain. There are things that people are complaining about that are a case of the engine not supporting the feature than it having the feature rather than it having the feature but not being editable. Group movement, UI issues, and bugs spring to mind as some of the things that have been mentioned.

Bah, this post aint long, it's still well under the post limit.

[Worthingtons]

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by OneInTen
I could go on, but these are the first 4 gaming sites that came to mind, and each and every one of them had a critical review within a couple of clicks of the main page. I didn't have to go hunting, they were presented right where I would expect to find them.

Care to explain how this can happen given your view that bad reviews if given at all are always hidden away?

Yeah blah blah blah... heh... you could go on, but the truth is you were only able to hen peck through them and find that not only was the "mysterious" bad review burried, but VERY rare. But you can think what you want, if you don't agree with me, start a thread on "Are reviews biased or exagerated" and I'm sure your entire poll will show you the light. Until then I'm going to write this off as you have no proof and appear to be 'sucked in' by reviews. Each to their own I suppose.

PS. Another fine example of you twisting my words, I never said "always" hidden away, I said "most of them burried" don't get so flustered to reply, make sure you read my posts carefully, otherwise you end up looking half-assed.

Charles.

[notyoueither]

No Lib.

It seem that Charles and One are made for each other. A perfect match.

Maybe we should all exit gracefully to the left and leave the young couple to themselves.

Blah, blah, blah...

[/asbestos on]
Flame away

Salve

[notyoueither]

BTW, ****gy. What the h*ll happened to your name?

If you keep losing letters like that pretty soon we'll be calling you SaRA. Are you getting any shots on any regular basis?

Salve

[notyoueither]

Why the h*ll did I want to reply to this thread in the first place? Before I got lost in the excessive verbiage I had a point. Hmmm, maybe I put it down over there? [rumage, sort, what the??? I thought I lost that a long time ago, rumage, dig, give me a minute] Oh yeah...

Give it a break.

The game is flawed, yeah, that's right flawed. It has a face only a mother could love. I like it, but I guess that's just me allowing my feminine self to come out. Tone it down fans. Although I understand where you are coming from, the truth does not need denial as a champion.

Critics? Everyone's a critic. However it is the truly stupendously stupid critic who expects everyone to agree with him or her. The simple fact is that it aint so bad as some have made it out to be. It ain't some Plan 9 from Outer-Space (tm) intended to soften us up for colonization by Body-snatchers (tm).

Some people like it, some people don't. There is one thing we can all agree on (mostly). We're all hanging around here because we like civ'in. Some of us want to trade tactics, some of us want to see what will happen with the next patch, some of us want answers, some of us want to create new worlds. None of us wants to give up on civ. All of us want things to work out for Civ 3.

Now, you can flame me from both sides if you want (don't bother, I've been flamed by better for higher stakes). Or, you can reflect for a moment that you may have more in common with the people you want to flame that you do with most of the people you know.

Think happy thoughts.

Salve

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by OneInTen
Bad reviews heavily burried? Lets see:

www.gamespot.com - Click on reviews, and I found this review was linked from the front page:

Mortal Kombat Advance: Rating 2.9, and the pretty damning "MKA plays little to nothing like the game it's based on and should be avoided."

Mortal Kombat sucks, even the naive casual gamer knows this. It's the games that are "hyped" that count in this peticular matter, don't you read anything I type?

Hmm, lets try some other reviews site and see what they have ...

www.firingsquad.com - it's a hybrid game/hardware site, but click on games, the list a review of Doom GBA. 74%, although with the less than glowing comments "While it’s great to be able to play an old-fashioned shooter on the Gameboy Advance, it’s hard to give an exceedingly high score to a nine-year-old game." and "But if you prefer newer experiences, you’re better off spending your money on other titles."

Another poor example. " NEXT ".

www.happypuppy.com - click on windows, and one of the reviews is for Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare. It gets a 6.5 with the comment "Clunky controls and dated gameplay mar what could have been a stunning comeback."

Are you sure this isn't the Civ3 review?

www.gamesdomain.com - click on windows, then on Supercar Street Challenge. 2.5 stars out of 5. "An impressive array of techno songs is a nice addition, but in the end, Supercar is a flashy, nicely rendered arcade-style game that lacks re-playability and a compelling reason to keep racing."

Never heard of the game, but then again I'm picky. Is there a valid point here, or are you going to keep talking about un-worthy product gander?

I could go on, but these are the first 4 gaming sites that came to mind, and each and every one of them had a critical review within a couple of clicks of the main page. I didn't have to go hunting, they were presented right where I would expect to find them.

Care to explain how this can happen given your view that bad reviews if given at all are always hidden away?

Well letsee, one, two, three, (my god) on the entire world wide web you found (count em boys) four bad reviews !!!! God this must be a record. I'm sorry but my research shows a hell of alot more "good" reviews than an inconsequencial four - bad reviews. You're going to have to do better than that OneInTwo (er ah) OneInThree ... I mean OneInFour.

" let's see your ID, nope sorry that's fake, NEXT "



Charles.

[Encomium]

posted by Libertarian

. . .Unfortunately, the game's interface and design doesn't lend itself well to conducting manual enterprises in the modern age. If you go to war, you must be prepared to fight not only the enemy, but the interface as well. Thanks to bizarre unit activation sequencing, you will be routinely yanked away from your theaters of battle. Maintaining any sort of continuity is a hopeless exercise in futility.

I have dozens of complaints about this game from playability, to non-historical values, to a useless navy, to the AI, but that one I missed. It is indeed true you get jerked all over the board due to that "bizarre activation sequence". Most annoying.

"Domestic Nag", indeed! And Diplomatic relations remains another AI mystery (or cheat). In one turn a civ for no apparent reason went from Polite (as it had been for centuries) to Declaring War on me - a decision that cost them three resources in trade with me. I've seen even stupider AI civ decisions, some of which bordered on the suicidal: joining an alliance against me when the only other civ on the continent and very heavily outnumbered; or, refusing to acknowledge my envoy as I stormed into his last remaining cities. Dumb and dumber.

The game devolves into too much tedium as it progresses. Governors can help to an extent only.

We have a cheating AI that not only breaks its own rules to win, but that makes inexplicable and dumb decisions, such as starting to build a happiness Wonder while being invaded en masse. We also have factors so very non-historical they kill the enjoyment, such as bombers being unable to sink warships (I guess Sid never heard of Pearl Harbor) .

One of the most enjoyable parts of Civ II was making scenarios. We don't even have that option any more.

[CharlesUFarley]

This is too funny, he must think that the longer his posts are that the more "right" he is

[QUOTE] Originally posted by OneInTen
As far as price demand goes, last I checked a weekend or two ago, the game was selling for $100 AUS, from it's release price of $100 AUS. So on the basis of this anecdotal evidence, I guess we have to call it a draw.

A price un-wavering only proves one thing, that peticular country (or a small Island like Australia for example ) will maintain their price and maintain profit from a product that has already lost it's value in market terms. So hardly a draw! And the fact that I've proven (and you can do the research if you like) that a price reduction has already begun across Western Canada leaves little or no doubt for it's demise. As I said before the only way they can save this from happening is - a really good expansion pack.

As far as hijacking goes, I've tracked down the thread in question ...

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=13094&perpage=20&pagenumber=2

My first quote in that thread is a response to the statement (made by you):
"But since I'm a realist, I would have to say the world-wide civ-consumers that use these forums lay somewhere in the 30-40% margin."

Rule #1 - never take what your enemy gives you. And your hardly a realist, more like an "opinion cop". And as far as "hi-jacking" goes your horrible attempt still counts as just that.

Now if to respond to that (oftopic to the thread to begin with!) - stating that the percentage of people who play civ that use the civfantatics forums is well below 30 - 40% - is thread hijacking, then I am guilty as charged.

Your percentage is un-realistic - but ok. And your definately guilty as charged.

As to your whole "fanboys" and "whiners" can't get along so they should stay apart, well, you've yet to tell me why it should be the "fanboys" who should depart. And ironically, if you check the first page, there are 4 posts from me and none from you ... yet it's somehow my fault for dragging you down?

Well let's clear up an obvious misunderstanding - I never said that anyone should leave a thread, that's not my place to say - it's Ming's or MarkG's. But I merely claim that in order for two or more people to debate they have to have a common ground or basic goal to achieve by debating. In this case you're goal is to cut down my goals, how productive can that be?

Who am I to be worth responding to? I'm another poster on the board. You can choose to ignore me (there's a convenient ignore function provided by the forum) if you don't think I'm worth your time reading. What I am saying though is that if you're going to take the time to read and reply, I believe it reflects poorly on you if you do not do so in a manner which logically addresses the points I make.

But you're not making points, your breaking them. I express my point/opinion you cut it down and slander it with your cheap passive conclusions based on your version of the truth. NO ONE CARES.

Nobody can force you to be logical, of course. But as the professor who gave lectures in a class called "logic and rationality" at the university I attended said - "I can't tell you that you have to be logical. I advise you to do so though as it has been shown there is a strong correlation between those who take a logical approach and those who have success in all walks of life". He also went further and said "Some people say that they have a right to their opinion, but I believe that unless they can logically justify their opinion they do not infact have that right". Don't know I'd quite go that far though.

Did your proffessor play Civilization III ?

* No "start locations" available (you can create a scenario if you dont mind the USA starting in Africa)

This is undeniably an issue even with the casual gamers!

Do you mean corruption as in the game concept, or save file corruption?

Both, and the fact that they exist bothers me. But I am certain that after 6 patches they'll be gone.

* Only 8 leaders available in foreign advisor menu, where are the other 8 in 16-player game? And how would you access them?

This one has been answered by Firaxis. Civ 3 was designed to be an 8 player game, 16 players was added as an extra feature late in the design process.

I see, so the other 8 are just fillers, Gotcha.

Since there's no problem here, only a bit of an awkward interface issue, I'm marking this one as severity trivial.

Undeniably the point, but it is a problem.

I'll also take this chance to note that this demonstrates how adding features late in the software lifecycle is not a simple matter and can cause problems.

But they are problems!

* Bombardment issues with modern units

Care to elaborate on exactly what you mean by this?

Find it yourself, I'm not going to make it easy for you to "police" my posts.

* Air Superiority missions deemed recently "useless" and non-functional.

Huh? Air superiority works in the patched game, at least as far as I am aware. Can you give details of the circumstances that cause it not to work?

Sorry, I took the labour of actually reading the complaints, you should do the same.

Untrue, I've played games without an AI ever going to war with me. I've also played other games where some civs were almost constantly at war. It depends on the game state. Invalid.

Umm...er....ahh.... well... I guess it never happens then! Ya thats it!

* AI bugs and micromanagement flaws

Again, you're going to have to give more detail for me to know what you're referring to.

No, do your own research - it exists.

* Game tedium way too slow and high due to coding and performance problems; poor graphic engine; poor micromanagement - AI. Etc. Game takes 2-6 mins/turn on PII's and PIII's on a large map/diety level 16 civs.

Game speed too slow? That's obviously processor dependent, but on my machine....

Sorry I don't buy it. right... you hear that everyone? Now we have to spend a few more thousand dollars on a new computer just to play Civ3! Well my PIII - 1.2mhz, 400m Ram, 64m 3DFX Vid Card = FIVE MINUTE TURNS and I've heard of others, so what are you talking about?

Given that conversely other people report turn times on the top of the line athlons to be 20 seconds max on huge maps modern era, it's hard to know who to believe, and to get a definitive handle on performance.

Like I said before take it or leave it - the very existance or notion of a modern era turn tedium suggest a real problem with the majority of the fans.

Performance is always an issue for any game, and civ 3 is very playable on the standard map size on a lower spec machine than most games coming out these days. Sure, I wish it was faster but I wish every game was faster. Minor issue.

Wrong - major issue, the longer the turns take the more a player will lose interest, hence the game loses it's appeal and we pop out the CD and pop in a new one.

Poor graphics engine? Explain what you mean by this.

Animations aren't suppose to 'drag' across the map, I've played other games with the same or more detail and they don't seem to have that problem. It's pretty bad when you have to turn off the animations in an animated game.

Poor micromanagement? The AI does an acceptable but not optimal job at this. You can win quite easily on regent and monarch (and possibly higher) while letting the AI handle a good deal of the micromanagement for you. How much better do you expect it to be, given that you've already complained about performance, and better AI is going to result in worse performance?

I didn't say that 'performance' wasn't supposed to be a problem, all games have individual performance issues. I'm simply stating (which obviously keeps flying over your head) that the performance issue with Civ3 has gotten worse since Civ2's design, and IMO if something works, stick with it.

* As noted above, unit movement boggles AI MM and creates lengthy turns resulting in a loss of a appeal or interactivity.

Unit movement boggles AI MM? Explain further.

Read about it. It's an issue (problem).

* Game becomes unstable with little or no paramaters preventing editorial damage, simply don't change editor values and your fine. (What's the editor for again?)

Ideally, this wouldn't happen, I agree. But the editor is for people wishing to create mods, and you should expect some degree of issues in play testing these. Ideally they wouldn't crash the game though. I also suspect the number of people this affects is fairly low (given the ratio of mod authors to players). I'd rather this a minor issue,

But it's an issue!

* Unrealistic/generic artwork and poor representation of a decade old game acredited for its glory and historical splendor - now washed away and meant for a more youthful audience.

"Realistic" artwork? You're stuck with representing a frigging forest that spans thousands of acres with a few trees. Of course the artwork isn't going to be realistic. Unless I'm missing the point behind your observation.

1) Anything is possible.
2) Yes a better representation than a couple of stupid trees would be more applicable.

Art is one area where it's very much a matter of taste. I happen to think the default artwork is a vast improvement on civ/civ 2/SMAC. It's also easy to make changes (I've downloaded some, and also made some myself) if it doesn't suit you. As such I'm rating this as a non issue.

It's an issue because the 'base' artwork that came with the game could have been better, anything that can be 'improved' is always an issue every logical game fan knows this. And obviously Civ3 has better graphics than Civ2 or Civ1, they're OLD games now. I'm comparing Civ3 to say "Age of Empires" or "Sim City 3000" or real classic "Caesar 3". I guess Firaxis rushed the artists too.

[QUOTE]
* Limited to two zoom levels with little or no point to the "zoomed out" feature, multiple zooms allow the player to observe more advantageous angles (Civ2 for reference).

I didn't say it would stop you from playing, and I never said it was a 'major' issue - I said that it was a re-occuring problem or issue with the modders. Which again, adds to the discompfort of the gameplay - hence issue.

* Unrealistic and poorly modelled trade negotiation, often losing more to the bargaining table with little or no gain, but a pissed off AI.

Nothing about the game, or civ 2 for that matter, is realistic (civ leader living for 6050 years?), so I don't think you've got a leg to stand on with that part of the claim.

Well maybe in your warped defective opinion Civ isn't realistic, but millions of fans would disagree with you, as would I. The very reason that it was not only historical, but an all around realistic empire-builder attracted a mass of adults, that were entertained by the position of being a king/leader of a civilization and making decisions based on a life-like scale of how things would end up. Sid Meier posted long ago that his entire intention was to re-create a realistic strategic enviroment for people who wanted a journey through history or the future of a civilization. I guess I have 6 legs to stand on now eh?

Given that, I can't really say I consider this to be an issue.

It only takes one person to not like something about a game, and such as life - it's an issue. I personally find the new 'negotiations' engine un-realistic and a waste of time.

* Editor only good for altering existing rules and values, but not able to create/invent new ones as per traditional civ history and standards.
There are third party tools that allow you to do this. Invalid.

Point is, Firaxis dealt a crappy editor with no customization. VALID.

[QUOTE]
* No control over the ambient sounds and music, ancient war drums still beat in a modern aged scenario, if it can be called that.

You can replace the ambient sounds and music rather easily, as they're just files. Invalid.
[QUOTE]

You mean find a way around a game flaw? No thanks, I'm not going to load mp3 players or winamp, or even dredge through the sound directories replacing hundreds of sound files (possibly causing a crash somewhere in this unstable product). They should've engineered the sound effects and music to suit the eras. VALID.

I'm sure I can name 7 issues off the top of my head for just about any game I've played a few times, including my all time favourites. And most of those are games that have been patched multiple times.

Exactly! And thats what were all in here debating my mis-interpeting friend - you're debating whether they are relevant, I'm debating that they exist - apples and oranges. Get with it.

The point is that while you apparently consider these to ruin the game, not everyone does. There's plenty of people who are happy playing the game right as it is. The difference is while you kick up a fuss about what an awful company Firaxis is, and how many issues the game has, the "fanboys" don't bother stating over and over the issues and wish lists that have already been made aware of Firaxis.

So what? I'm not here to discuss how much the 'fanboys' or 'opinion cops' love the game. I'm here to rant, complain, criticise, and even just "vent" my issues. Sometimes occasionaly (with the odd fool who won't shut up) I'll debate! I'm not here to change Firaxis, solely on one reason: they're IMO very un-reliable and un-dependable at this point in time. I stand a better chance pulling the horn from a live and very pissed off Rhino if you ask me. Nope, I'm just here to mainly vent my anger and see whats new in the civ community. I'm actually a very dedicated fan, I'm putting up a new Civ Site soon (in the making right now).

Some of the stuff will probably get fixed in future patches. Other stuff will no doubt be put in the too hard basket. In the end the game will be better, but it will still have flaws. Complaining vocally over and over about this isn't going to help it, and it may well hinder it, as it makes it harder for Firaxis to see the forest for the trees in here.

Still.. I love to express my feelings and opinion on the matter, and I do enjoy the occasional roast with a naive fanboy. But in the least we all come here to "vent" our anger and get updates on the Civ-Situation - so it does help. And I'm glad you finally come to the light of things as to admit the existance of these 'flaws' we've all been talking about, did you have one of those flashes of insight, or did you bump your head?

Your peanut butter response is incorrect, due to the fact that Civ 3 is not just Civ 2 all over again. It's a completely different product. Just because you like civ 2 will not mean you'll like civ 3, and vice versa. It's like saying that because a Big Mac and a McChicken burger both come from McDonalds, and I like the McChicken burger but not the Big Mac that it proves there's something wrong with the quality of Big Macs. All it really proves is that I like McChickens and not Big Mac burgers, just like all you've really proven is that you like Civ 2 and not Civ 3.

my peanut butter response is incorrect? PLEEEEAAASSEEE it was JUST A BLOODY ANALAGY come on "I am a robot, delete delete your response was incorrect! delete". Civ3 is a completely different product (game)? You're kidding right? It's the sequal you fool!

As for overhauling the game, hard work alone is not enough. To use an anology, writing software is kind of like painting the floor of a set of hallways. As you go along, there are many doorways that you could choose to open. But once you decide to paint down a particular hallway, you can't change your mind and go back, at least not without making a big mess of the work you've already done.

Now he's comparing Civ3 to painting a hallway But I again disagree, if you wreck the paint, or change your mind with another color, then you go back and paint it over, unless your cheap,poor or unskilled or even lazy. Games can be revamped (reprogrammed) hallways can be repainted, and peanut butter can go stale (not sure what that one has to do with it, but it was yours to begin with) and lazyness can be cured by a concept called "effort".

On scenarios, I'm not saying there shouldn't be scenarios. I am saying criticising civ for not having a WWII scenario (or I'm told the ability to make such a scenario) isn't really a valid criticism because civ doesn't claim to be based around WWII, it claims to be based around the entire period extending from 4000BC - 2050AD. If it has a WWII scenario it's a bonus. Certainly nobody should be too disappointed about it since if they wanted to play a WWII game they knew they were buying civ 3 and not a WWII game when they spent their money.

I see your point, but your missing the point that was made in the first place. They maybe wording it like "Civ3 is a horrible game because it doesn't have a WWII scenario" but if you use any form of common sense or basic logic you can obviously read between the lines and realize that what it really means is "the editor sucks, and there is no scenario design tools capable of creating a proper and fully functional scenario".

And saying that the customer is always right is a ridiculous oversimplification. If customer A wants feature X, and customer B wants feature Y, and feature X and feature Y are contradictory, then you can't please them both!

Well feature X = Y = N = T ... what the F.. are you talking about! The saying "Customer is always right" only has one basic meaning: the Customer is paying for the product, so within reason or manufacturer ability the product has to be what the customer desires or a variation of that, and in the end the customer has to walk away pleased with the product. You nimrod!

You actually disagree, you feel that the customer should just walk away (happy or not) ? I wouldn't want to buy your products.

I WOULD LIKE TO APPOLOGIZE TO THE MODS AND THE VARIOUS READERS OF THESE FORUMS WHO HAVE TO READ SUCH LONG AND MEANINGLESS POSTS - BUT I STAND IN DEFIANCE OF THOSE WHO WOULD DEBATE AGAINST THE RIGHTS OF THE CIVILIZATION CONSUMER/PLAYER - IF WE DON'T APPROVE OF THIS GAME IN ANY WAY WE HAVE A RIGHT TO COMPLAIN AND SEE TO IT THAT THE ISSUES IN QUESTION ARE ADDRESSED. THANK YOU AND MY APPOLOGIES. - CHARLES.

OneInTen: If you limit your ranting and raving to a minimum, I will have less to debate and reply to, with all do respect to the other posters that have to endure this crap ofcoarse. I'm suggesting this because I won't stop until you do, within the policies and rights that are posted on this board ofcoarse. And I appologize again if I have strayed from them at any time. I have made my intentions clear, and my will to inforce my opinions and rights. You are completely aware of my un-wavering opinion if you reply to this you're only doing so out of personal amusement and irritation to a fellow poster, which would fall under the classification of "harassment" on this board. Otherwise make a bloody point and leave it at that.

Charles.

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by notyoueither
No Lib.

It seem that Charles and One are made for each other. A perfect match.

Maybe we should all exit gracefully to the left and leave the young couple to themselves.

People were getting sniped by 'OIT' because they had an opinion that he didn't agree with. He continued to snipe many more people because they had opinions that he didn't agree with. His mistake was thinking that he could 'snipe' me. Although I enjoy and look forward to his posts, I find no basis for his arguments other than that of the pleasure of debate. When I debate with someone usually its to achieve something, or a posative end. With OneInTen it's like arguing with my 17 year old cousin who talks forever.

Charles.

[Boney]

Civ 3 is not just Civ 2 all over again. It's a completely different product. Just because you like civ 2 will not mean you'll like civ 3, and vice versa. It's like saying that because a Big Mac and a McChicken burger both come from McDonalds, and I like the McChicken burger but not the Big Mac that it proves there's something wrong with the quality of Big Macs. All it really proves is that I like McChickens and not Big Mac burgers, just like all you've really proven is that you like Civ 2 and not Civ 3.

Okay, Civ3 is not Civ2, but Civ3 should have been an improvement. In my opinion this new version has been dumbed down withless terrain improvements and a poor tech tree along with a tiny choice of governments. Yin26 did the same as me, four games was enough, even though the first and second games were enjoyable, the lack of choices is deafening. Planes and helicopters are not fun. Spying is poor. I cannot be bothered to go on, just leave this game to the the newbies who will progress and the brain dead who probably all support Man U as this is the easy option.

[CharlesUFarley]

[QUOTE] Originally posted by Ironikinit
Charles (BTW, your name doesn't make sense. Chuck you Farley makes sense, in a spoonerism sort of way. No, I won't explain my handle to you, although I suspect you don't get it.),

It's obviously not my real name, and yes it's "Chuck U (you) Farley" the charles is to give it slang.

Talking to you is useless, of course, but I'm stuck here and thus I have time to waste. Doesn't mean I'll waste a lot on you, but some.

You've already revealed yourself as someone who can't resist amusing debate. Although your debate bares no importance to me, you've made it clear you enjoy the game - just because I don't share that opinion doesn't mean you have to foam at the mouth over it, allow people to their opinions! Move along.

Your little list shows me that you've not only not played the game, but haven't even read the posts about the game. For example:

Yeah your absolutely right, I've never ever played the game. Not only that but the thousands of other people all over the WWW who have similar issues - they don't know what the heck their talking about either, do they? You're a little slow aren't you?

"Unrealistic and poorly modelled trade negotiation, often losing more to the bargaining table with little or no gain, but a pissed off AI."

Uh, I guess you missed the whole tech brokering/ Pope strategy/ trade whoring thing people have been talking about for months now. Run a search and you'll see how foolish your criticism was. Now, trade can be criticized, but not for the reasons you gave.

Even if my reason(s) bare no weight which I feel they do. There are still numerous posts on un-realistic negotiation, and negotiation bugs so in essence you've only made yourself look even more stupid by attempting to call my bluff - unless you can convince everyone who complains about negotiation to all of a sudden become silent, can you?

Let's see. Oh, the thing where you couldn't access all the different civs via the foreign advisor. Yeah, that was a toughy. For one, because you have a problem playing against so many different civs due to slow down, you could try playing with fewer. Two birds, one stone. Then there's a button on the lower left marked D for Diplomacy (gasp) that brings up a list of different civs. Also available via hotkey! (Shift+D! Tricky devils.) Then you could go to your trade advisor and reach any civ you want, despite the bug on the foreign advisor screen. Games have bugs, get used to it. But this particular bug is pretty far from an inconvenience.

You stand correct, I didn't know about those keys - nor did I care enough to examine it. However I did read many other similar posts regarding this peticular problem, I guess it's a small "D" or "Shift-D" that is not easily visible (poor design) or rarely mentioned in the diplomacy areas of the manual and game tutorial (poor design) - again this is my opinion but still stands firm for debate.

No control over ambient sounds... I dunno about you, but all I get from most games is a volume slider and an off switch, which Civ III has. Jeez, nitpicky or what? Who listens to the stupid music in games anyway? Well, I guess some people must, but I don't. Again, like your whole list, BFD.

Yeah not only is there very little control, but no customization other than taking a huge risk and moving/altering sound files in the game database to more suit your eras. And yes I am picky!

A lot of your problems boil down to "it wasn't that way in Civ II". Well, no, and I'm glad. I didn't want a warmed-over expansion pack for Civ II, I wanted a new game. That's what I got. Don't blame other people for wanting what they want. If you're not happy, that's your problem, not mine, nor is it Firaxis' problem, given that there are plenty of satisfied customers out there. (Ooooh, the price went down. That happens, buddy. Some games don't, but if you can find it remaindered at your local mall... Well, you won't, not for some time. Hey, I can find Myst for 5 bucks. Must've been real unpopular.)

" If I only a had a brain " you're a smart one. Could it be that the entire mod/civ community which is clearly over 10,000 people world wide (out of about 5 million players) expected (based on the feedback from Firaxis) a (hmmm what do we call those things again... OH YEAH) sequal. Not only is Civ3 the sequal to Civ2 and based on the "Civilization (TM) concept" but to stray from it's engineering or concept would only (as OneInTen said) create an entirely new and different game altogether. But since it's called Civilization and the developers intended on maintaining it's splendor through its succesful history of predocesors than shouldn't Civ3 keep any and all good viable concepts and features - I mean hell, if it did so well then, why wouldn't it do well again? But no, there are the foolish (most of them probably only started playing Civ3 and haven't even tried the earlier versions) and there are the blind, the foolish represent the people who have no idea what they are talking about and for the most part talk out of their asses - such as you IMO. And the blind are people who know their wrong but would never admit it in public to save face and an over inflated ego, which puzzles me because you fit both of those categories, although only one can apply at one time. And if anything DROPS in price there is a reason for it - the game is becoming un-popular, which in turn means loss of sales. Figure it out genius.

But you are correct, it is MY PROBLEM. So allow me to have my freedom of speech and my complaints because I (like you) am a consumer and this is (as far as I know) a free board. I don't care what you think, never did. So why do you feel the need to tell me? Ignore my posts if you don't like it. Go cry to someone else about how much you enjoy Civ3 - find someone who cares.

Some of your problems will be fixed, I suppose, by Firaxis, although at this point, I don't really care because I'm happy as it is. Others, like the start location one, that was fixed by a third party, as I understand the situation. Flexibility might help you in this situation. I'm pretty sure that you don't want to be helped, though. You just want to whine. It's a free internet, I suppose. Well, not really. Somebody pays to let you and I post here. But if they don't mind you whining, I hope they don't mind me whining back. Personally, I'd've banned you, if it was my fan site.

I realize that eventually most of the issues will be dealt with, I don't think Firaxis is as dumb as most of the Fanboys are making them sound by suggesting that they are right for ignoring their community (good or bad). And third parties shouldn't have to mop up after Firaxis by fixing the bugs and creating mods to succeed where they obviously failed. I do want to be helped, just not by you. I'm hardly whining, to "whine" is to suggest that I'm complaining in an obscene child-like fasion with a selfish driven motive. If you're calling me a "whiner" then you're also calling me a "child" and I would say that you're doing this because your an insecure male who doesn't properly know how to distribute and express his anger in which you resort to name calling. And even if I was to become a "whiner" what do you call someone who "whines about a whiner" wouldn't that make you worse than I? hmmmmmmmmm... And if you banned people for having an opinion that differs from yours than you wouldn't have very many users. And I would certainly spread the word about how bad your board is.

If you can't fathom why we fans, people who like and play Civ III, don't appreciate your little crusade to find fault and generally be a jerk about a game YOU DON'T EVEN PLAY, try going to a fan site for, say, the Detroit Red Wings, and badmouth them there. Can you predict the result?

I have respect for people with common sense and enough dignity to allow room for people who (Oh my god, those words again - run hide!) don't like the game, and also allow their opinions to be expressed even if I don't agree with them. And I'll express my 'cross-opinion' ONCE not an insecure 20 times like yourself. Ofcoarse I have to keep repeating myself to each new individual that brings rise to my opinion or points. Well considering I can't stand hockey (sorry hockey fans) and have no desire to talk about it, that would be a waste of my time. However on the flip side, if I were stanced to debate hockey, and someone rivaled it, I would surely debate them down until I've not only expressed my point of view but shown that I am firm in doing so. Anything asside from that (like your intrusive posts apon mine) is a complete waste of time, and questionable as to whether or not the thread or posters should be silenced somehow by the moderator.

Not only do you not play the game, you don't know the game, you don't know the industry, you don't know jack. No negative reviews indeed. To anyone I've annoyed by talking to this jackass, I apologize. I just iggied him anyway. Life is too short.

"Nyah Nyah I hate you I'm going home" [...slam...]

Imaturity at the max man.

Charles.