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Now I know people will think I'm just being selective, but if you wander over to the off-topic official MOO3 forum, these are the standard comments. So to the people who say that the whiners here are just a vocal minority, God help you all if even just ONE of the other gaming forums showed up here to register stuff like this:
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I sure hope that with all the changes QS is making from MOO2 that they don't do what Firaxis did to Civ 3 - i.e. take a great game and then ruin it thinking that they were "improving" it.
Case in point Civ 3 corruption issue "if player has too many cities then corruption will become rampant and this will improve the game" - WRONG.
"We want to streamline Civ 3 so we'll drop the movies and this will improve the game" again wrong. I for one, was expecting even better movies for Civ 3.
Wonder movies shouldn't have been axed. I spent lots of time, effort, and planning (heck, I can't even BUY it now) to get a unique wonder of the world and I don't get to see some gratifying movie... its just disappointing, like Cola without fizzle.
The game is formly based on warfare with the entire playing experience revolving around military units and declaring wars. Corruption does absolutely nothing to curb conquest, why would it? Corruption merely reduces your income and production in the farther cities, so what? Instead of producing 6 shields like a city close to your capitol is, it produces only 2- big deal, just use it solely for churning out your ancient swordsmen to attack your neighbors... it's better then having no city there! If there was perhaps a penalty for expanding too fast and far instead of just a diminishing benefit then it would actually work. More cities = more citizens = more research, so expand until the last tundra and desert has your flag raised on it.
And with the way they made the Civ3 AI, peace is not only boring but extremly difficult to maintain for the following reasons:
1. The AI still declares war and attacks without any logical reason. Sometimes a civ will be 'polite' with me, and I'm midning my own business and out of the blue he sends two units to a heavily fortified city and surprise attacks me. Why??? Also, AI will often randomly demand some token fee as tribute- like "give me 6 gold or feel our wrath!". Now, maybe a leader of an ancient despotism *might* actually do this, but a democracy in 2040?! Not only this, but usually the civ is weaker then me or supposedly "is in awe of" my culture. So much for culture making a difference.
2. Conducting trade with the AI is futile. The scenario is all too common. Civ A has strategic resource B. I have a few resources of my own, so I send my diplomat to work something out. I ask for his resource, and I offer a resource of my own which he does not have. No? Ok, how bout my resource plus some gold per turn? Still no??? Geez, ok how about TWO of my resources for your ONE resource? STILL NO!! I have a screenshot somewhere of my diplomat asking for Incense, and I put Dyes, Horses, Iron AND Furs on the table-- He refused! And I assure you, this is very common, the AI simply asks for too much from you, so why go through the hassle, just declare war and take what you want by force.
3. The AI likes to build in small otherwise useless pockets within your still forming nation... I know I've heard all the arguments about how it's a 'good' tactic but the fact remains, its annoying! You have a nice layout for a modest nation and while your culture borders are building up some jerk sends in a settler in a tiny pocket void of your cultural influence as of yet and settles there, ignoring the lush green valley to the north with gold and ivory... We're humans not computers, stuff like this #### us off and that's when the big stick comes out!
4. Border tresspassing- Why does the AI like to use your nation as a giant public race track for their units? And if you want to try to work something out through diplomacy, chances are they will declare war...
Sorry for the ranting, Its jsut that I had so much faith in Civ3... I honestly gave it alot of tries... hours and hours of gameplay trying to find something good about the game, but besides the nifty unit animations there just isnt anything there
But that might just be me..
The whole corruption model smacks of "no play testing". I've even noticed that if I build a few cities farther away, and get them established, THEN build more cities closer in, the corruption in my outer cities increases... (in my ESTABLISHED cities).
To add insult to injury, firaxis simply did not listen to its gamers, since the patch hardly addressed anything of real value. Just out of curiousity... how long has the game been out? And can fighters conduct air superiortiy missions successfully yet????
The only strategy that has held my attention at all is the tech broker strategy... which doesn't work even 1/4 as well post-patch.
What I love about the way the MOO developers are working is giving us tons of details on game mechanics and modelling, and keeping the super hush hush secrets in the realm of storyline and art. Keep up the good work lads!!
my other pet peeves are: having to move (and attack with) each unit individually; govt types; ancient wars lasting more than several lifetimes; advances based on weird techs (e.g. communism = police stations); ltd tech tree; advisors wearing someone else's national costume; no reflection of switch in emphasis on cities in ancient times, to land/castles/dynasties in medieval times, and then back again to cities in modern times.... rants on and on to ever decreasing effect
All in all, Civ 3 is one of the worst games i have ever had the misfortune to play. MOM is in my opinion far superior to the civ series. MOM had better pathfinding than civ 2 - units ALWAYS found their way. Better graphics, better combat system, more originality, just as good AI (1.3 patch). I spent far more hours on MOM and MOO2 than any other game! I just wish that MOM worked in windows
Well... i must also admit that civ3 wasn't all that it cracked up to be. I didn't get the game right when it was out... So I was actually pretty excited to get it. I kept looking on the site for more information and screenshots.. I ended up gettin it for Christmas. I played the game for about 3 days straight, no problems really.. seemed like a great game. (Although I really hadn't done much) When I first met a person, I really liked the new diplomacy, you could ask and give much better then anything i'd seen before. (Cept maybe Ctp2)
But that's when it started a downfall. The turns seemed to get longer and lonnnnger... and it soon took a full minute or so for the Ai's to take their turn. Now, i figured it wasn't that bad.. and i played on.. I soon conquered a few enemy cities, and i was learning about culture a bit more.. I found out i could take cities culturally, and I set out to do it. I also learned about the corruption, now, i found it wasent bad, and i still played on.
Then i found out that the turns got longer... it soon took a good 4 minutes of waiting for an AI turn to complete... I realized a few loop-holes in the AI diplomacy. (Some have been mentioned) But others were the in-ablity to offer, or to demand cities. The AI simply wouldn't give em up, and they didn't want to give anything for mine either. I could offer every one of my cities for 1 gold, and he wouldn't take it. I could also do some other things. I found he would go to extra-ordinary measures to get advances.
But still, I decided to play on. Now, i was gettin pretty darn annoyed, it was now taking a full, if not more, 8 minutes of waiting for the AI turn to complete. (That is just sittin there, waiting for the little "Please wait" sign to change.) I soon tryed a few things, takin enemy and allied moves off, taking every other possible thing that could bog the game down off, and it only got worse.
But... i played on.. i was deturmined to get up to Modern tanks. I did, and i was dissapointed. I also noticed a few military loopholes. Knights defeating tanks etc... I remember them talking about luck, but is it at all possible for a knight to beat a tank? No. Also, i would have liked a bit more varaity in modern units. Tanks are obviously the beat choice for almost anything. Modern armor are for defending. That combo can't be beat.. except by nukes. And even nukes (when i got them) wern't all that pleasing... they just wern't as evil as they were in the other civs... i didnt feel as satasfied. The land destruction around the blast zone was nice, but i would have liked the chance of units surviving to go down to about... 20%?
Bah.. and one more thing.. the pace of the game was Un-barably slow. It's taken me since Christmas to get to the modern age. I still havent gotten everything. I decided to stop playing for awhile...
Bah... overall.. it was a good game in the beginning, (When it wasn't bogged down, and it didn't have as many overall problems. And it was terrible late game...
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After looking for equally postive comments to post here, I gave up. Feel free to post the one or two that you might find. By the way, I am not saying I endorse any of these particular gripes, but I certainly do endorse the overall sentiment that Civ3 is a horribly sub-par game, and I think it is worth mentioning that the Civ3 criticism is strong (very strong) at other sites besides here.
So? Patch like crazy, Firaxis!
_____
I sure hope that with all the changes QS is making from MOO2 that they don't do what Firaxis did to Civ 3 - i.e. take a great game and then ruin it thinking that they were "improving" it.
Case in point Civ 3 corruption issue "if player has too many cities then corruption will become rampant and this will improve the game" - WRONG.
"We want to streamline Civ 3 so we'll drop the movies and this will improve the game" again wrong. I for one, was expecting even better movies for Civ 3.
Wonder movies shouldn't have been axed. I spent lots of time, effort, and planning (heck, I can't even BUY it now) to get a unique wonder of the world and I don't get to see some gratifying movie... its just disappointing, like Cola without fizzle.
The game is formly based on warfare with the entire playing experience revolving around military units and declaring wars. Corruption does absolutely nothing to curb conquest, why would it? Corruption merely reduces your income and production in the farther cities, so what? Instead of producing 6 shields like a city close to your capitol is, it produces only 2- big deal, just use it solely for churning out your ancient swordsmen to attack your neighbors... it's better then having no city there! If there was perhaps a penalty for expanding too fast and far instead of just a diminishing benefit then it would actually work. More cities = more citizens = more research, so expand until the last tundra and desert has your flag raised on it.
And with the way they made the Civ3 AI, peace is not only boring but extremly difficult to maintain for the following reasons:
1. The AI still declares war and attacks without any logical reason. Sometimes a civ will be 'polite' with me, and I'm midning my own business and out of the blue he sends two units to a heavily fortified city and surprise attacks me. Why??? Also, AI will often randomly demand some token fee as tribute- like "give me 6 gold or feel our wrath!". Now, maybe a leader of an ancient despotism *might* actually do this, but a democracy in 2040?! Not only this, but usually the civ is weaker then me or supposedly "is in awe of" my culture. So much for culture making a difference.
2. Conducting trade with the AI is futile. The scenario is all too common. Civ A has strategic resource B. I have a few resources of my own, so I send my diplomat to work something out. I ask for his resource, and I offer a resource of my own which he does not have. No? Ok, how bout my resource plus some gold per turn? Still no??? Geez, ok how about TWO of my resources for your ONE resource? STILL NO!! I have a screenshot somewhere of my diplomat asking for Incense, and I put Dyes, Horses, Iron AND Furs on the table-- He refused! And I assure you, this is very common, the AI simply asks for too much from you, so why go through the hassle, just declare war and take what you want by force.
3. The AI likes to build in small otherwise useless pockets within your still forming nation... I know I've heard all the arguments about how it's a 'good' tactic but the fact remains, its annoying! You have a nice layout for a modest nation and while your culture borders are building up some jerk sends in a settler in a tiny pocket void of your cultural influence as of yet and settles there, ignoring the lush green valley to the north with gold and ivory... We're humans not computers, stuff like this #### us off and that's when the big stick comes out!
4. Border tresspassing- Why does the AI like to use your nation as a giant public race track for their units? And if you want to try to work something out through diplomacy, chances are they will declare war...
Sorry for the ranting, Its jsut that I had so much faith in Civ3... I honestly gave it alot of tries... hours and hours of gameplay trying to find something good about the game, but besides the nifty unit animations there just isnt anything there
But that might just be me..The whole corruption model smacks of "no play testing". I've even noticed that if I build a few cities farther away, and get them established, THEN build more cities closer in, the corruption in my outer cities increases... (in my ESTABLISHED cities).
To add insult to injury, firaxis simply did not listen to its gamers, since the patch hardly addressed anything of real value. Just out of curiousity... how long has the game been out? And can fighters conduct air superiortiy missions successfully yet????
The only strategy that has held my attention at all is the tech broker strategy... which doesn't work even 1/4 as well post-patch.
What I love about the way the MOO developers are working is giving us tons of details on game mechanics and modelling, and keeping the super hush hush secrets in the realm of storyline and art. Keep up the good work lads!!
my other pet peeves are: having to move (and attack with) each unit individually; govt types; ancient wars lasting more than several lifetimes; advances based on weird techs (e.g. communism = police stations); ltd tech tree; advisors wearing someone else's national costume; no reflection of switch in emphasis on cities in ancient times, to land/castles/dynasties in medieval times, and then back again to cities in modern times.... rants on and on to ever decreasing effect
All in all, Civ 3 is one of the worst games i have ever had the misfortune to play. MOM is in my opinion far superior to the civ series. MOM had better pathfinding than civ 2 - units ALWAYS found their way. Better graphics, better combat system, more originality, just as good AI (1.3 patch). I spent far more hours on MOM and MOO2 than any other game! I just wish that MOM worked in windows
Well... i must also admit that civ3 wasn't all that it cracked up to be. I didn't get the game right when it was out... So I was actually pretty excited to get it. I kept looking on the site for more information and screenshots.. I ended up gettin it for Christmas. I played the game for about 3 days straight, no problems really.. seemed like a great game. (Although I really hadn't done much) When I first met a person, I really liked the new diplomacy, you could ask and give much better then anything i'd seen before. (Cept maybe Ctp2)
But that's when it started a downfall. The turns seemed to get longer and lonnnnger... and it soon took a full minute or so for the Ai's to take their turn. Now, i figured it wasn't that bad.. and i played on.. I soon conquered a few enemy cities, and i was learning about culture a bit more.. I found out i could take cities culturally, and I set out to do it. I also learned about the corruption, now, i found it wasent bad, and i still played on.
Then i found out that the turns got longer... it soon took a good 4 minutes of waiting for an AI turn to complete... I realized a few loop-holes in the AI diplomacy. (Some have been mentioned) But others were the in-ablity to offer, or to demand cities. The AI simply wouldn't give em up, and they didn't want to give anything for mine either. I could offer every one of my cities for 1 gold, and he wouldn't take it. I could also do some other things. I found he would go to extra-ordinary measures to get advances.
But still, I decided to play on. Now, i was gettin pretty darn annoyed, it was now taking a full, if not more, 8 minutes of waiting for the AI turn to complete. (That is just sittin there, waiting for the little "Please wait" sign to change.) I soon tryed a few things, takin enemy and allied moves off, taking every other possible thing that could bog the game down off, and it only got worse.
But... i played on.. i was deturmined to get up to Modern tanks. I did, and i was dissapointed. I also noticed a few military loopholes. Knights defeating tanks etc... I remember them talking about luck, but is it at all possible for a knight to beat a tank? No. Also, i would have liked a bit more varaity in modern units. Tanks are obviously the beat choice for almost anything. Modern armor are for defending. That combo can't be beat.. except by nukes. And even nukes (when i got them) wern't all that pleasing... they just wern't as evil as they were in the other civs... i didnt feel as satasfied. The land destruction around the blast zone was nice, but i would have liked the chance of units surviving to go down to about... 20%?
Bah.. and one more thing.. the pace of the game was Un-barably slow. It's taken me since Christmas to get to the modern age. I still havent gotten everything. I decided to stop playing for awhile...
Bah... overall.. it was a good game in the beginning, (When it wasn't bogged down, and it didn't have as many overall problems. And it was terrible late game...
____
After looking for equally postive comments to post here, I gave up. Feel free to post the one or two that you might find. By the way, I am not saying I endorse any of these particular gripes, but I certainly do endorse the overall sentiment that Civ3 is a horribly sub-par game, and I think it is worth mentioning that the Civ3 criticism is strong (very strong) at other sites besides here.
So? Patch like crazy, Firaxis!
Need some help?
but lets try to see a bit beyond that, shall we?
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