The Implications Of Dinosaurs On Civ III

[Bkeela]

If this "evolution" game is to be connected in a viable way to Civilization and Alpha Centauri, will we see any "Dino" aspects in Civ III? For example; would a choice be given to play either as humans in a mammal dominated world, or as intelligent dinosaurs?
If there isn't any real connection between them, I am afraid to say that "evolution" will just be a dinosaur sim.
Any other ideas how the games could be linked?

Bkeela.

[onepaul]

I thought only Civ3 was to be connected with early civs and SMAC, but I might be wrong. Linking dinos and humans? I just don't see it happening...there better not be any Dinos talking to me in English during the game...

edit: damn spelling...
[This message has been edited by onepaul (edited February 17, 2000).]

[bcr3]

In all likelihood, the goal of the game will be to survive the extinction and evolve into mammals... That's not from Sid or anything, it's just what seems most likely to me.

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Anarchist Supreme of the Glorious PROT!
Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Audentior Independant Nation.

Frank: "You live at Apolyton, don't you?"
bcr3: "Pretty much."

[Joe Bourque]

Well, one would hope that the game does not involve dinosaurs evolving into mammals, as mammals already existed at the end of the Cretaceous and certainly didn't evolve from what we think of as dinosaurs. Similarly, as it was roughly sixty five million years between the death of the last dinosaur and the beginings of human evolution tying it to Civ3 could be difficult.

The only real way I can see to link the two games is if `Dinosaurs' is more of a `Evolution in General' game. You pick your species type (mammal, dinosaur, etc...) at the begining of the game and try to guide it through mass extinctions and other fun stuff until you develop intellegence. In a game that followed the `historical' path this would probably result in the dinosaurs going extinct half-way through the game and everyone playing mammals for the rest of the time.

As the game is titled `Dinosaurs', the emphisis will likely be on the dinosaurs. In that case, how will they tie it to the beginings of civilization? Not easily...

Joe

[Adm.Naismith]

So far the "Sweep of time" trilogy appear more a marketing hype than a real link between three games.

Some months ago I still believed Firaxis will link the "evolution game" to CIV in similar way as Joe Bourque is supposing:
grow your species to the conquer of intelligence.

I was wondering of a Birds' or Reptiles' race dominating the world at the beginning of CIV III (import by Dino option), with a (specific by race) Discovery Tree to cope with (but more or less same rules to keep the general CIV feeling).

Then, launching a starship to Alpha Centauri you would swith to SMAC II and let your race cope with aliens on Chiron, starting with some of their racial and tech plus (just a little bit of RPG element to make linking game more interesting).

May be it will be bitting more than programmers (and players) can chew, so let my dream vanish on the dawn of marketing.

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Adm.Naismith AKA mcostant

[MarkG]

A recent post by Tim Train indicated that the exact way of linking dinos with civ3 is not yet certain. bottom line, they want to do it, they havent decided exactly how to do it(and without messing up stuff in civ3). my guess anyway....

[DanQ]

That's correct, Zulu. It's official.

See our Misc. section for more info.

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Dan; Apolyton CS

[Zulu Elephant]

Tim Train doesn't work for firaxis anymore apparently (as of today or something)

[Adm.Naismith]

So apparently Tim Train solved the missing link between Dino and CIV III:
evolving, mutating and migrating

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Adm.Naismith AKA mcostant

[NoviceCEO]

I'm not willing to offend any of you, but linking Dino's to Civ3 or making it a game similar to Civ seems just plain stupid for me.

The dino game should not be similar to a Civ game. First of all, it would simply be another game to compete with Civ3. That doesn't make any sense.

Bkeela said "If there isn't any real connection between them, I am afraid to say that "evolution" will just be a dinosaur sim". I don't see what's the problem with that. In fact, I don't see why it shouldn't be like that.

"Dino's conquering the world?" (didn't that happen?). "Dino's fighting the mindworms?" (Why?).

[SailorUranus]

Dinosaurs probably evolved into birds not mammals.

I'm very wary of this game. Personally, I think doing this is not exactly the best move for Firaxis. If it a RTS game, kill it, no questions asked. There is absolutely no way Firaxis could compete with Blizzard's Warcraft III. If it is a TBS game, the players may not take to it very well. However, I swear I've seen recent games that sounds ALOT like this game.

Added note: The idea of alternate species civilizations been done before in SimEarth, where it works, but the concept when applied to CIVIII just does not work at all. Not to mention, Dino's were long, long gone before primates (much less humans) even showed up.

I agree the concept of the "Sweep of Time" trilogy is nothing more than just a marketing scam... I mean, scheme... and nothing more. I just cannot see any possible way to link Dino to CIVIII without the use of bizarre and contrived "logic".
[This message has been edited by SailorUranus (edited March 05, 2000).]

[Slingshot]

From what I've seen, the whole concept of linking Dinosaurs to Civ III isn't too popular.

I posted a Monkey-to-Man thread, as well as some ideas about playing with competing species of humanoid (cro-magnon, homo erectus, neandertal, homo sapiens, etc) but no one ever replied.

Maybe people don't like my ideas.

I am still thinking that people just don't see the connection, and don't feel that the evolution thing is all that "Civ"ish.

[NoviceCEO]

People, please... stop linking Civ3 to Dino's. It's just nonsense when talking about gameplay aspects.

SailorUranus, let me comment some stuff about your post:

quote: Dinosaurs probably evolved into birds not mammals.

That's not correct. It's a possibility that birds evolved from dinosaurs, but the creation of birds didn't mean the extinction of dinosaurs.

quote: There is absolutely no way Firaxis could compete with Blizzard's Warcraft III.

Nearly no computer game can (except in Christmas). Having a game launched by the same time of a Blizzard title is not a good marketign decision. If it can be avoidable, better done so.

But anyway, Dino is not necessarly targeted on the same public War3 is. War3 will possibly sell a lot and similar games will have a tough time in market, but I've never seen (and I don't think I'll ever be able to) Dino's as a Warcraft clone.

quote: Added note: The idea of alternate species civilizations been done before in SimEarth, where it works, but the concept when applied to CIVIII just does not work at all. Not to mention, Dino's were long, long gone before primates (much less humans) even showed up.

Read the first part of the post, before commenting the qoutes.

Slingshot:

quote: I am still thinking that people just don't see the connection, and don't feel that the evolution thing is all that "Civ"ish.

I don't see why it should be "Civ"ish. Antietam wasn't, RailRoad Tycoon wasn't either...
[This message has been edited by NoviceCEO (edited March 06, 2000).]

[Omsat]

The only possible connections I can see are evolving into smart dinos or people (which we talked about) or importing the map you played on in Dinos (This isn't my own idea but I forgot where I heard it so I can't ask them about the specifics of it). I don't like the idea of evolving into smart dinosaurs because it won't fit with SMAC or the traditional CIV's very well and the evolving into people doesn't sound realistic. For the map thing Dinos might not even be a big world map game and you might get kind of tired playing the same map in two games. Of course maybe this is a grate idea and I'm just not seeing it.

On the other hand there doesn't have to be a connection at all for it to fit into the sweep of time thing, it just may not have the same connection that SMAC and CIV III do with the spaceship. Dinos takes place a long time ago with the dinosaurs, Civ III is the beginning of the human race, SMAC is the future.

[Slingshot]

Without a doubt, Novice, Dino's doesn't seem Civish.

Yet it is supported by Apolyton, while Antietam and Tycoon are not.

Maybe this just happened because MarkG and DanQ were misled. Recall that we all thought the Dino's announcement was really an announcement for Civ III.

Anyways, maybe the REAL reason why Dino's is part of Apolyton is because Mark and Dan know it will pave the road to a RTS/TBS hybrid that will also become Civ III! (I am half-serious about this ... But mostly my conclusions are toungue-in-cheek).