Still Stinks Out Loud

[DCMike]

But it wasn't even halfway through the game when everybody's attitude towards me was "furious", and that's pretty much where they stayed.
WHY??? Some of these countries I rarely even had contact with.

One sure way to get on the bad side of the other Civs is to ignore them. They seem to get mad faster if you don't have an embassy with them. I'll give them 5 or 10 gold as a gift every so often just to keep them happy (if I want them that way)

[vmxa1]

Brutus66 , that is what happen to many of us when we first started to play. We played like it was Civ2 and that did not work, it was ugly. We read the forums, tried a few things and managed to improve. Some of the traits the game displays, still annoy me, but I ignore them and crush all civs. As you move up in levels, you reach a point where you need to adjust your style as some things that work on warlord do not work so well in deity. Each time a patch comes out I start at the bottom and work my way back up. This is not needed, but how else can I learn the new tweaks? I mean an unpatched civ3 is quite different from a 129f one. Besides, it gives me a new lease on the game. Good luck.

[ACooper]

Wah!!

[jdd2007]

Originally posted by zulu9812
*yawn* another one

my thoughts exactly. civ3 has a lot of improvements over civ2, so get used to the things that are a little 'unrealistic' because there will always be them. also, try becoming a better player rather than crying about how other civs wont sign alliances with you.

[Brutus66]

Well, I suppose I got what I had expected in the way of replies. There were those that offered useful suggestions that I genuinely appreciate (like you, Ethelred, Lord Merciless, et al), and those who offered pithy remarks and felt that I was just sour grapes.
Oh, and the usual keen insight from ACooper. I'm told that he was raised by football hooligans, so I do forgive him.
But I wasn't really complaining about getting whomped; just expessing dissapointment with the mechanics of the game.
Like many, I thought Civ2, during it's heydey, was the greatest game there ever was. I can't say how much I looked forward to the third incarnation of the game.
I am not trying to convince anyone that there's nothing to like here- it certainly has some good facets. But for everything I like, there's something else that puzzles me ("what were the designers THINKING?"...like the non-upgradability of swordsmen for example) or annoys me (like pollution- give me an easy way to turn it off like Activision did, instead of diddling with the editor!!)
For the benefit of the die hard fan boys, I promise I won't go into how it was released half-fininshed, because I appreciate the fact that at least they are continually trying to fix what's wrong. Activision just put their product out there and pretty much said "that's it, like it or not".
Nor will I get into the fact that the Limited Edition was a blatant rip-off.
I won't go on about how we were originally promised multiplayer, only to have that feature withheld and sold to us in the expansion.
I do praise the designers for the editor, even if the original version sucked wind and the functionality only improved in a patch-by-patch, drip, drip, drip basis. At least I can do something about some of the things that really bug me.
My fondest wish is that the next game in the genre is made by somebody else with a fresh perspective and new ideas. I can't stand the idea that, someday in the future, I can see myself cleaning pollution in Civ IV and buying Civ IV Gold to get features that should have been in the original. Because it's gonna happen.
As a final thought, I submit that for every one of you that have hung around the forums and genuinely love the civ kind of game, at least as many other real fans of the genre have simply given up or moved on after being being shouted down with "if you don't like it, don't play it" every time they offered any criticism.
I think that one critic does more good for the game than one hundred sycophants ever could.

[DRoseDARs]

Originally posted by Brutus66
I think that one critic does more good for the game than one hundred sycophants ever could.

Amen to that!

[Ethelred]

Well one critic that was making legitimate complaints.

Complaints about AI cheating where there is almost none is not helpful. Nor is claims of invicible units that only exist in the minds of players that don't understand odds.

There have been many legimate criticisms of Civ III. Many of those have been addressed in the patches. Most of them in fact.

Multiplayer wasn't promised. It was expected by fans but it was not promised although early on it was definitly mentioned. Long before the game came out it was clear that multiplayer would not be available. Most games have features in the wish list that never come to fruition.

Complaints that Civ II had multiplay are just plain bogus. Civ II did NOT have multiplay. There was an expansion that added it exactly like Play the World will.

Brutus, the majority of your complaints were gameplay issues that were due to you not haveing learned how to play the game. That plus the fact that you posted your complaint one day after a clearly clueless newbie did the same thing (his fourth post on Apolyton along with a horde of errors) led to many treating your post as yet more glass of whine. Your timing was bad.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Brutus66
For the benefit of the die hard fan boys, I promise I won't go into how it was released half-fininshed, because I appreciate the fact that at least they are continually trying to fix what's wrong. Activision just put their product out there and pretty much said "that's it, like it or not".

Activision? Well, I'll assume you said Firaxis. In which case, I am puzzled... there have so far been 4 or 5 patches to the game, all with many new features, fixes, and improvements. This hardly smacks of a "take it or leave it" attitude. I can't quite see how it was put out half-finished, seeing as it was quite playable, but I hope you can see that clearly Firaxis cares something about the product. As for Infogrames, well... I think we can all agree they are the devil. But publishers don't provide game support; clearly the developer is very interested in making a playable and enjoyable game.

Nor will I get into the fact that the Limited Edition was a blatant rip-off.

Like I said, Infogrames is evil. I don't know about you, but I stopped buying LEs long ago. If this was the first time you were ripped off on an LE, consider yourself lucky.

I won't go on about how we were originally promised multiplayer, only to have that feature withheld and sold to us in the expansion.

"Promised multiplayer" seems to be a real rallying cry for many critics here, but I certainly was not promised that and I would be interested in seeing this promise. It's not that I assume you are wrong; I just have no evidence that you are right. Also, see the above note about Infogrames and think about how publishers like to rush projects...

I submit that for every one of you that have hung around the forums and genuinely love the civ kind of game, at least as many other real fans of the genre have simply given up or moved on after being being shouted down with "if you don't like it, don't play it" every time they offered any criticism.

It's really more the way the criticism is offered. Critics here tend to be of the angry variety; certainly it is easy to fume when typing. Even so, it is unavoidable that anger begets anger and soon these type of threads turn into a flame war.

I think that one critic does more good for the game than one hundred sycophants ever could.

I think you are wrong. First off, it smacks of ignorance to say that people are either completely supportive or completely against the game. I, for one, have voiced many opinions on how the game might be made better while still considering the game to be a really great one. Secondly, people who like the game still offer ideas for the next game. Look through the old lists and such for Civ3, and you will find a lot of suggestions in there, including many that were not put in Civ3, come from posters here that still like and think highly of the game.

What you fail to grasp is that liking a game does not mean that the game is perfect, infallable, and immune to criticism. I think that some critics here do absolutely nothing for the game, and the same could be said of some "fanboys," but to say that negativity is more helpful than positivity is reductionist, ridiculous, and utterly false.

[WarpStorm]

Many of the biggest fans of Civ3, the so-called fanboys are also some of its biggest critics. I find that the guys at Firaxis listen better to rational well thought out reasoning than to rants. They've listened to many of the suggestions posted here and on other forums. They read these forums and post answers to questions here too. Mike, Jeff, Dan, Soren, and Speedy have all answered questions I've posted.

I like Civ3. Is it perfect? No. I would love to see some of the diplomatic options from SMAC and the editor is still missing a few important things (diplomatic settings and pre-explored areas are the two things I most would like to see, followed by an event system). I just think that constructive criticism is better than ranting and raving.

[Zachriel]

Re: Still Stinks Out Loud

Originally posted by Brutus66
Hey Sid, I got some news for ya, it's not 1965 anymore, and every war isn't Viet Nam. Democracies don't automatically start rioting when the shooting starts. If they did, we wouldn't have made it against the damn Kaiser, much less Hitler.

In WWII, the U.S. was directly attacked by an Axis power. As in Civ3, there was a momentary burst of enthusiasm for the war, and the war was concluded rather quickly (less than four years). Vietnam, on the other hand, was a war in a foreign land, was not due to an attack on the U.S., and U.S. involvement lasted fully twice as long as in WWII. Even so, morale was reasonably high during most of the Vietnam War.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by cyclotron7


Activision? Well, I'll assume you said Firaxis. In which case, I am puzzled... there have so far been 4 or 5 patches to the game, all with many new features, fixes, and improvements. This hardly smacks of a "take it or leave it" attitude. I can't quite see how it was put out half-finished, seeing as it was quite playable, but I hope you can see that clearly Firaxis cares something about the product. As for Infogrames, well... I think we can all agree they are the devil. But publishers don't provide game support; clearly the developer is very interested in making a playable and enjoyable game.

Activision released CTP, I think the wires got crossed somewhere.

[Brutus66]

I said Activision and I meant Activision. My intent was to give credit to Firaxis where it was due.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by Brutus66
I said Activision and I meant Activision. My intent was to give credit to Firaxis where it was due.

Not your wires his wires.

[Brutus66]

In WWII, the U.S. was directly attacked by an Axis power. As in Civ3, there was a momentary burst of enthusiasm for the war, and the war was concluded rather quickly (less than four years). Vietnam, on the other hand, was a war in a foreign land, was not due to an attack on the U.S., and U.S. involvement lasted fully twice as long as in WWII. Even so, morale was reasonably high during most of the Vietnam War

Disagree with you there.
WWII lasted several years longer for Britain, and throughout all the setbacks that lasted until the first victory at El Alemein, London never went into revolt.

When you say thay morale was reasonably high during Viet Nam, I have to assume you were in another country at the time.

To be honest, Civ3 by it's very nature does a lousy job with scaling world conflicts. In the four years of US involvement in WWII, the war progressed across North Africa, through the nation of Italy, then across the channel from the UK through the western European continent. In the Pacific theatre, the amount of territory covered was staggering in Civ3 terms. Can you imagine doing any of that in a few game turns? A few cities in a turn is good progress in game terms.

The scaling of the game has always been a problem for me. What does a tank unit represent? Is it an armored brigade? Or is it just a platoon of tanks? I guess it's the grognard in me that has to know this stuff- it's just too damn abstract.

And as to you, Mr Cylcotron:

it smacks of ignorance to say that people are either completely supportive or completely against the game

I don't think I said that, but if I inferred it, it was accidental and I apologize if that's the way I came across. I just get revved when I read one line responses like "if you don't like it, go away."

A lot of folks took issue with the fact that I said multiplayer was promised.
Well, I can remember when the game was being developed, and they came out with these kind of claims. If it wasn't directly promised in writing, a lot of people besides me were somehow led to believe it was going to be included. Must have been mass hallucination, mob hysteria or something.
I knew when I bought the game that multiplayer was not included- I'm not claiming false advertising. They made it clear that MP was out by then. But I just can't help but wonder if it was a deliberate move on somebody's part to get us to buy the expansion: "Nah, don't worry about multiplayer- we'll just give 'em the Civ II Gold treatment. Worry about development of the single player game as a priority. Here, let's give those spearmen a little more power. The tanks are creaming 'em."
Maybe it was Infogrames rather than Firaxis.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by WarpStorm
Many of the biggest fans of Civ3, the so-called fanboys are also some of its biggest critics. I find that the guys at Firaxis listen better to rational well thought out reasoning than to rants.

I can vouch for that approach. Enjoy lethal bombardment.