Have I lost something?

[Rasbelin]

I was today struck by a question.
Have I missed something by not playing CTP2?

I consider myself as one of those civers that
want to stay to original Sid Civs. So therefore
I haven't played any Activision "Civs". But today I
started to wonder, if I have missed something
by not playing CTP2. Just even a brief commantary
report would be good enough.

I have recently been struck be nostalgia after
the Civ III release, so I thought that I should
perhaps try it.

[Dale]

Rasbelin:
I believe I have gained a lot from playing Activision's incarnations. Let me just point out a few "differences" between the two strains of Civ:
- Settlers vs Public Works (I prefer PW so I don't end up moving 100 settlers per turn in the endgame).
- Future Sci-Fi (I didn't like the sci-fi settings in CTP).
- More Civs in a game of CTP1 & 2 (up to 28).
- Hard to MOD vs easy to learn scripting language (As a MODder this was VERY important).
- CTP enhanced the "non-combat victory" situations from SMAC (I prefer playing diplomatically).
- CTP has many more Gov types (More variety and outcomes possible. Pity the AI didn't know how to use the Govs).
- CTP introduced "specialist" units (Some were good, some were too powerful. IE Slaver. You could kill a civ just with one slaver).

Basically, Activision introduced some good ideas onto the Civ platform. Unfortunately for them they implemented them pretty ordinarily and allowed MANY bugs to flow through that killed the gameplay. Of course Activision faced the same challanges that Sid 'n Co face, ICS, era-balance (phalanx kills bomber ), and many others. For the genre as a whole, Activision did a great job introducing new ideas, new ways to do things, and trying. Like Civ, CTP is a love-hate game. Those that stick with it love it. Those that hate it go back to Civ2 (Civ3 now).

For my version of Civ that I'm currently developing (see Alt-Civs) I've been able to provide better models based on Civ AND CtP.

My suggestion: If you believe you've missed out, you can now pick up CTP for $5 in the bargain bin. It can't hurt. At least that way it'll broaden your view to the Civ-genre and understand what us CTP'ers mean when we try to explain that some options in CTP are better than Civ.

[Rasbelin]

The con is that you can't get CTP2 here in Finland
as a bargain for the moment, so I'll have to wait.

But thanks for your views!

Anyone else interested to give a few comments or opinions?

[asoulie]

When I discovered CTP, I've never played once again with CIV.
I'll cast an eye on CIV III, just to be shure, but no more.

Concerning the bugs in CTP, they are all fixed in CTP 2. More than that, CTP 2 is much faster.

Is that a brief enough report ?

[Martin Gühmann]

Originally posted by asoulie
When I discovered CTP, I've never played once again with CIV. I'll cast an eye on CIV III, just to be shure, but no more.

Concerning the bugs in CTP, they are all fixed in CTP 2. More than that, CTP 2 is much faster.

Is that a brief enough report ?

I would say a too brief report. Of course CTP2 is better concerning terrain improving and some other things, like the slic language. It could be the best civ game ever, if Activision just had finished the game.

The slic language is a powerful tool to fix and finish the game. But it needs time. For now you should get ModSwapper, Activision's tiny patch and one of the mods. So far it looks that Cradle is the advanced mod of all the mods. Competive AI that uses nukes for example. You find Cradle in the CTP2 creation forum.

-Martin

[Dinner]

I like CTP2's versatility. Just because you are a head in technology doesn't mean you're going to stay there because CTP2 has literally dozens more technologies and units then is found in Civ2 or 3. Plus it has to be the best multiplayer TBS system I have seen. Civ 3 multiplayer will have to work hard to do better then it.

The biggest problems with the game was the lack of polish and play testing by activision before the game was released. Luckily our hard working mode community has fixed most of those problems. The game is worth your time to look at.