CTP2 must be better than CTP

[jbs]

Activision is coming out with CTP2 and want and expects us to spend our hard earned money to buy the game. Many positive things were released that had me waiting in anticipation and then the negatives started rolling in.
No more than 8 Civs
No Hotseat
No PBEM
No Canals
Rumors of a lot of bugs with no time left before the release date to fix.

Now it is quite obvious to me that Activision did not listen to the Civ community. How many times even with the original CTP was more than 8 Civs requested. The CTP patch included hotseat and yet they don't even have something as basic as that in the initial game. If the basic things like hotseat and more than 8 Civs don't work, what does that tell you about the quality of the game. It tells me that Activision knows the game has bugs and is trying to hid them. More than 8 Civs will stress the game, having HOTSEAT stressed the game. The fact that they are not present means that the game does not work when stressed. Why? If I were a betting man, I would say that they were initially incluced, but had bugs. So instead of fixing the bugs, they just dropped the features. That means the bugs are still there, they just don't show up as often so Activision hopes they can sneak it past us poor dumb consumers.

What separates a great game from a mediocre game? I believe it is in the attention to detail and the simply things. All the great games and the medocre games have great potential. However, the great games pay attention to the simply things and not just the big areas like diplomacy. So what if CTP2 has a great diplomacy if the simple things that make a great game are missing or broken. Should I buy CTP2 just because it has a great diplomacy. IMO, that is a bug fix and should be given away free or at most a $20 add-on to CTP1. I would pay $20 for a better diplomacy add-on for CTP1, but I will not pay $50 for another CTP1 with great diplomacy. Yes the reviews all sound great and the great new features have us all salvitating at the bit that we can't wait to buy the game bugs or no bugs. Remember the hype before CTP1. How we all couldn't wait. How all the new special units and the graphics and the other great features were going make this the best Civ game ever. Then remeber how disappointed and frustrated and made when the simply things didn't work. How we all swore on our Mother's grave that we wouldn't buy another broken game from Activision. That we wouldn't be played for suckers again. Now the cycle begins again. Great new features, going to be the best Civ game ever. I can not wait to buy this game who cares about a few bugs. Then the rumors that simply things like more than 8 Civs don't work, no canals, no hotseat no PBEM. Some rumors of bugs that of course Activision denies. Than the Christmas release date that the bean counters want so bad. Again the decision makers at Activision say to the developers. Yes we understand the game isn't ready and it has problems, but we have to make the Christmas relase date. The public are suckers they will buy the game problems or no problems so why should be expend the extra effort and delay the Christmas release date to actually put out a quality product. People will buy the game low quality or not and we get our money and that's all we care about. And besides we can always fix it with a patch. Well I will NOT be a sucker again. I will not buy the game with bugs. I will not buy the game with no Hotseat. I will not buy the game without the ability to play more than 8 Civs. I am still content with playing CTP with the various mods, and am still working on my own. I have no incentive to buy another game from Activision that has great potential but is broken. Good luck to whomever decides to actually buy the released game. May the Civ gaming force be with you and may your frustration and disappointment level be low.

[Dida]

I was very disappointed to know that there is no canals in the game.

[lev]

> No more than 8 Civs

Never played with more than that, nor wanted to.

> No Hotseat

Would be nice, but I never used that, either.

> No PBEM

Same as above

> No Canals

For me, the one-square city-as-canal has always seemed enough.

> Rumors of a lot of bugs with no time left
> before the release date to fix.

Unfortunately, this is pretty standard for game software. It has such a shorter shelf-life than other kinds of software, that there is great pressure to keep it moving.

In all, my impression is that Activision is releasing a game with a lot of features people asked for, but without some features that a few people wanted.

Sounds good enough to me!

[Tical_2000]

To correct my ignorant friend above,

SOME people did not want more than 8 civs. SOME people did not want canals. SOME people did not want multiplayer support. The fact is that over 1000 posts were made on this very site requesting/discussing that these changes be made in CTP2. So don't ever speak for the majority again unless you have your facts straight.

[joseph1944]

Mark or Dan, can you or would comment on the "over 1000 post for MP, canals, ect. Was it over 1000 different people or a few hundred re-posting it over and over.

The canals would be nice but are not a big deal to me.

I do not play MP, and I have no interest in playing MP., But I hope they will make an MP patch for the player who want it.

With the much larger cities I believe that more than 8 to 12 civs, everthing is going to be crowded very fast unless we have some very large maps. In CTP the cities were only two tile from city center. In CTP 2 they will be four tiles from city center. Again in CTP city center to city center five tiles. In No. 2 nine tiles. North to south two cities in CTP ten tiles. No.2 eighteen tiles. Now if you don't mind an AI civs building a city three tiles from your city center no problem. I do mine.

I will buy the game as soon as it is release.

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[This message has been edited by joseph1944 (edited October 31, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by joseph1944 (edited October 31, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by joseph1944 (edited October 31, 2000).]

[samurai]

To anyone writing letters so long as jbs. Please try to cut them down or make them look more interesting.
Get uninterested just looking at them

[MarkG]

i was trying to read this extra long post when i noticed this

quote: Originally posted by jbs on 10-31-2000 12:28 PM IMO, that is a bug fix and should be given away free or at most a $20 add-on to CTP1.

a price between 0-20$ when the whole price is 40$? for a bug fix?

[MarkG]

quote: Originally posted by joseph1944 on 10-31-2000 10:53 PM Mark or Dan, can you or would comment on the "over 1000 post for MP, canals, ect. Was it over 1000 different people or a few hundred re-posting it over and over.

i have no clue to what he is referring to....

[This message has been edited by MarkG (edited November 01, 2000).]

[MidKnight Lament]

I can't believe I managed to read all of that without hitting the "back" button on my browser. I'm proud of myself.

Having read through it all I'll just say, "catchya round".

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- MKL
"And of course Henry The Horse dances the waltz!"
Shameless Plug: http://www.poetic-license.org celebrates it's First Birthday! All welcome.

[lev]

I stand corrected. Let me restate:

In all, my impression is that Activision is releasing a game with a lot of features people asked for, but without some features that a few VERY LOUD people wanted.

And to correct my rather uncivil acquaintance,

> So don't ever speak for the majority again unless
> you have your facts straight.

I did not speak for any majority, I clearly said it was merely my impression.

[Flandrien]

PBEM is the only reason why I play CTP.
Yet, I do not consider myself to be loud.

[lev]

Sorry, Tical's post set me off a bit. I apologize for snapping back.

Vocal, not loud.

[red_jon]

I wish they would implement a hotseat function.

I love playing against friends on the same computer. I hope hotseat is on a patch soon after the games release.


But what is the point in them not including it? They didn't in CTP1 and then released apatch including it- why do this with CTP2? Why not include hotseat in the first place?


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...And if the British Commonwealth and its people live for a thousand years, man will still say "this was their finest hour"- Winston Churchill.

[Pyaray]

quote: Originally posted by red_jon on 11-01-2000 02:16 PM But what is the point in them not including it? They didn't in CTP1 and then released apatch including it- why do this with CTP2? Why not include hotseat in the first place?

I have been avoiding this topic for a while now. But it seems to be something that's extremely important to some of you, so I guess I'll address it, but only a little bit.

The reason it was cut, and yes it was cut recently, was because of insurmountable bugs. There were a lot of really horrendous bugs that quite frankly we didn't know how to fix in the amount of time we have. We would rather ship a really solid good game than add more features that make it not solid, and buggy. So we have chosen to focus our energy on making what we are shipping as good as we possibly can, and anything we couldn't do "right" we didn't do at all. Will we be doing a patch for this game? I don't know. Would we like this feature in the game? Yes, we would. But frankly I don't know if it will happen or not. It was a difficult decision to make (I wasn't the one who made it, but everyone was involved to some degree), but the decision we made was what we thought was best for the game as a whole. Once again I'm sorry that this disappoints so many of you, but this is not a trivial spend an hour to implement it kind of feature. It is actually a very difficult to implement feature. I hope you all understand.

Pyaray

[Paulypav]

Thanks Pyaray, for once again giving us insight into the minds of Activision. I for one, would rather a solid game without PBEM and Hotseat, then to have PBEM and Hotseat and have it cause all kinds of problems. Apparently, this is a much more difficult to implement feature than many of us understand. We have all made the assumption that because it was done for CTP, albeit as a patch, that it could easily be done for CTPII. I'm sure those of us looking for Hotseat and PBEM will hope for a patch, if possible.

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"In war, there is no substitute for victory."
- Douglas MacArthur