Civ as MMORPG?

[child of Thor]

Originally posted by Grumbold

None of them have been runaway smash hits, but the Paradox games are very educational. EU1 and 2 especially are brimming with historical events that fascinated me.

The problem with 'Edutainment' seems to be that anybody that starts by trying to turn education into a game format fails miserably. The ones that succeed are really fun games that manage to add a layer of information on top without ruining the playability.

I liked the 'Ceasar' games for the same reason - fun games with a smattering of real world history thrown in. And of course Civ is the ultimate example(for me) of such a succesfull combination of a fun game and education.

@vovan - dont you find that civ is kinda an rpg as it is? In that you take on a character for your civ - you play a good guy/bad guy and you civ's 'stats' improve over time as you invest in war/infastructure etc?

The main problem you'd have if you wanted to do a traditional rpg slant on a civ game is the time period a civ game covers. So how best to represent your character and the thousands of passing years? Would you have children(like in Medieval Total War)? Its a difficult one to do well and maintain the overall game cohesion.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by child of Thor


I liked the 'Ceasar' games for the same reason - fun games with a smattering of real world history thrown in. And of course Civ is the ultimate example(for me) of such a succesfull combination of a fun game and education.

CoT - ever read my column on Civ and history?

Sometimes, like with Civ, some of the cooler aspects of the history are hidden. As if the developers were afraid it would turn people off. In addition to the Civ stuff i discuss in my column, theres the food situation in Age of Empires (1). As long as there are berry bushes and gazelles its more efficient NOT to farm - which ACCURATELY represents the anthropoligical consensus that hunter gathering was more efficient than agriculture - but as your pop grows, and resources decline, youre pushed to farm - again reflecting the understanding that agriculture both enabled and was required by pop densities growing beyond natural resources. and this happened in - yes - the late neolithic, what AOE calls the "tool age".

Yet AOE is just a silly RTS. Cause its time, number and space scale issues DO make it just an RTS, and not a sim. Yet within that silly RTS are some REAL historical lessons.

[vovan]

Originally posted by child of Thor
@vovan - dont you find that civ is kinda an rpg as it is? In that you take on a character for your civ - you play a good guy/bad guy and you civ's 'stats' improve over time as you invest in war/infastructure etc?

Hmmm... You could put it that way I suppose. After all, reloplaying is more how the player plays the game than how the game is structured.

Though I still fail to see how one could make that into a "classic" RPG, where you manipulate the one guy and do stuff. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

[child of Thor]

Originally posted by lord of the mark edit......

CoT - ever read my column on Civ and history?

No, where is it? i'll go have a look

@Vovan, well one way is the old 'populas'/'megalomania' way - your char is god like, which has its own drawback on a historical/educational type game.............

I sort of get the feeling this civ MMORPG will be more like starcraft than actual civ as we know it - but as you say we'll have to see as time progresses and we hear more info

[Ben Kenobi]

Yet within that silly RTS are some REAL historical lessons.

Same with Civ, particularly in the scenarios, where you get a much better sense of the geography, and how all the nations relate to each other.

[lord of the mark]

My column:


http://apolyton.net/misc/column/183_hegel.shtml

[Spiffor]

I don't like to bash new ideas, they drive innovation, but a Civ RPG?

It's definitely not a Civ RPG in the making. The only similarity between that game and Civ is the word Civilization in the title

Remember, Civilization is a common word of the English language, and can't be trademarked alone... The trademark we know and love is Sid Meier's Civilization... As such, anybody who wants to attract the Civ player can put the word Civilization somewhere in the title; this has been done in this particular occurence.

[pg]

just in case someone doesn't know a catass is a guy whose house smelled like cat ass because he wouldn't get off EQ long enough to clean the litter box.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Spiffor

I don't like to bash new ideas, they drive innovation, but a Civ RPG?

It's definitely not a Civ RPG in the making. The only similarity between that game and Civ is the word Civilization in the title

Remember, Civilization is a common word of the English language, and can't be trademarked alone... The trademark we know and love is Sid Meier's Civilization... As such, anybody who wants to attract the Civ player can put the word Civilization somewhere in the title; this has been done in this particular occurence.

It'll probably be as good as the other games that have tried this