Civilization IV Discussed As GDC Slides Released

Thanks to Evil Avatar for pointing to a CivFanatics news post discussing new information about Civilization IV from this year's Game Developer's Conference in San Jose, recently released online as a PowerPoint slideshow. Apparently, the in-development Firaxis PC strategy sequel, not yet officially revealed, features "Continuous, immersive 3D world (what-you-see-is-what-you-get)... Drop unfun legacy (pollution, rioting, maintenance, corruption/waste)... New killer features (religion, civics)... RPG elements (unit upgrades/experience)... Coding from scratch (multiplayer, mod-friendly)", with the important note from lead designer Soren Johnson: "Can still take over the world!" There are also a host of other GDC slides/lecture notes now available on the official site, including "Winning the Race Against Pirates And Crackers: Next Generation Copy Protection" by Erik Simon (PDF), and "Managing the Hydra: Successfully Running Multiple Projects in a Videogame Studio" by Dr. Greg Zeschuk of BioWare (DOC, PPT including some fascinating graphs.)

Comments

You are describing SMAC.

[aetherspoon]

Police Units - check.
Multiple pollution/ecodamage reducing structures, check.
Methods of not having drone riots beyond increasing luxuries/psych, another police unit, or building entertainment, check.
Wider tech tree - check.
Corruption reduction - check.
Waste - doesn't exist.

Sounds good to me, what about you?
Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri fits all of those requirements... sure, it is older than Civ 3, but in my opinion it is vastly superior.