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Supposing there is a SMAC 2 . . .
It turns out CivBE is very much its own game, according to the first reviews. But suppose there were going to be a SMAC 2, what would you want to be different? I'm sure this has been asked many times before, but I'm going to drag it up again, because fun.
My list:
--More interesting victory options. Adding dominance, as in Civ4, would be nice to spare us the mop-up, but a retooling of the other non-transcendence options would be good. Economic victory is an interesting concept, but the execution the one and only time I tried it was profoundly boring. Diplomatic, likewise, is a simple matter of ratcheting up your population or influence via SPs/being Lal, then clicking a button to win. It might be interesting to integrate either more fully with its associated systems somehow--economic with trade routes, diplomacy with actual diplomacy and/or espionage, and so on. Transcendence, while a nice alternative to the usual steamrolling, doesn't really simulate the process of altering a whole society.
--Combat. The unit workshop had promise, but didn't really deliver. In a podcast I heard once, BR said he regretted even including it. Personally, I'd rather tweak it so there are more options worth using, and move beyond the old land/sea/air paradigm somewhat.
--Resources. Planet always feels disappointingly drab compared to Civ worlds. I know it's apples and oranges to compare the two, but I'd like it if, instead of just having one big hunk of Monsoon Jungle and suchlike, there were different flora types, temperature zones, and special stuff worth controlling. I like the idea of resources that can be exploited in different ways; different tile improvements could give you different strategic/health/luxury/whatever resources for the same underlying terrain, and/or give different nut/min/energy values. As in, here's a special kind of forest; do I build a preserve to breed its cute fauna as exotic pets (happiness!) or a farm to harvest its flora for nutritious foods (health!)? It might also be fun to tinker more with the idea of hybridizing native and Terran lifeforms. Somebody on the OT recently floated the notion of health and happiness as growth factors, and food as a growth limit--the reverse of the way they're treated in Civ. Worth considering, I think.
--Extra faction flavor. Something akin to culture would be nice here, and perhaps even UBs. Just thinking out loud here, but perhaps after long affiliation with another faction, you could have a certain amount of cultural blending, as the friends start to adopt aspects of one another's values. So being Zak's friend for a long time gives you a bit of a research edge, but also a happiness penalty if you ever have to fight him. Or maybe that's a dumb idea, IDK.
--On a related note: less utterly psychotic faction leaders.
My list:
--More interesting victory options. Adding dominance, as in Civ4, would be nice to spare us the mop-up, but a retooling of the other non-transcendence options would be good. Economic victory is an interesting concept, but the execution the one and only time I tried it was profoundly boring. Diplomatic, likewise, is a simple matter of ratcheting up your population or influence via SPs/being Lal, then clicking a button to win. It might be interesting to integrate either more fully with its associated systems somehow--economic with trade routes, diplomacy with actual diplomacy and/or espionage, and so on. Transcendence, while a nice alternative to the usual steamrolling, doesn't really simulate the process of altering a whole society.
--Combat. The unit workshop had promise, but didn't really deliver. In a podcast I heard once, BR said he regretted even including it. Personally, I'd rather tweak it so there are more options worth using, and move beyond the old land/sea/air paradigm somewhat.
--Resources. Planet always feels disappointingly drab compared to Civ worlds. I know it's apples and oranges to compare the two, but I'd like it if, instead of just having one big hunk of Monsoon Jungle and suchlike, there were different flora types, temperature zones, and special stuff worth controlling. I like the idea of resources that can be exploited in different ways; different tile improvements could give you different strategic/health/luxury/whatever resources for the same underlying terrain, and/or give different nut/min/energy values. As in, here's a special kind of forest; do I build a preserve to breed its cute fauna as exotic pets (happiness!) or a farm to harvest its flora for nutritious foods (health!)? It might also be fun to tinker more with the idea of hybridizing native and Terran lifeforms. Somebody on the OT recently floated the notion of health and happiness as growth factors, and food as a growth limit--the reverse of the way they're treated in Civ. Worth considering, I think.
--Extra faction flavor. Something akin to culture would be nice here, and perhaps even UBs. Just thinking out loud here, but perhaps after long affiliation with another faction, you could have a certain amount of cultural blending, as the friends start to adopt aspects of one another's values. So being Zak's friend for a long time gives you a bit of a research edge, but also a happiness penalty if you ever have to fight him. Or maybe that's a dumb idea, IDK.
--On a related note: less utterly psychotic faction leaders.