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Ask The Civ IV Dev Team
On Monday, we asked you for questions for industry legend Sid Meier. Today, we're asking for question to put to the folks behind the technology of Civilization IV. Besides the actual coding and development that went into the game itself, the team has made Civilization IV infinitely moddable through technologies such as XML, Python, and a fully developed SDK. Led by lead designer Soren Johnson, the team will answer your questions about the creation of the fourth chapter in one of the most influential game series out there. So, fire away with your questions. One per comment, please, and keep them topical. We'll pass the ten best questions to Johnson and the team, and the answers will be posted as soon as we have them in our hands.
If so, how?
As a player, I almost always find the key to really taking control of a game is to react well to the overall shape of things. Nuances with the terrain, the way cities are arranged in respect to each other, grabbing some resources at the expense of others -- this all provides opportunities for the human player that I wouldn't think an AI could easily pick up on. How can you get the AI to "consider the map", so to speak, rather than simply reacting to the stimulus around it and carrying out a set of predetermined functions (which, at least in my estimation, is the limitation that prevents it from competing fairly at high difficulty levels in the previous Civ games).
Or does the AI find its effectiveness in, say, it's ability to reexamine every city every turn? Or will it, you know, just continue to cheat to compete at advanced levels?
Thanks!
PS: My wife's traveling on business most weekends over the next couple of months. If you wanted to, you know, mail me an advanced copy... Just tossing that out there.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Will there be a Mac version and will it be released at the same time as the Windows version?
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
Is there any chance we'll get to see some of the Civ titles moved to portables? I think the game would play wonderfully on the DS.
Will the game ship with a Linux installer? If not, will an installer be made available?
Will the game support Internet as well as LAN play? How extensive is the multiplayer going to be (if any)?
By making such a good game, do you think you are culpable of the effects of the game _at all_ and are you thinking about putting in counter measures to allow people to better set limits for themselves within the game?
Will there be any limitations on the moddablity of the units in the game? This ranges from the textures (the way they look), the abilities (can new ones be added), and stats (A/D/B). Or to rephrase the question, what do you expect modders will look forward to the most when it comes to modding the units in the game?
I couldn't think of anything witty to say, so...you're stuck with this.
Have you considered maybe making each wonder you do progressively harder? That is to say if you already have 4, then the next one will be harder for you than someone who hasn't made any. It might balance the game a little better and let me build one of the bloody things once and a while.
...since I'll probably be too busy playing it once it comes out... Can I have my life back?
Planning on releasing a Linux version? Or any other OS other than Windows?
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
In regards to adding units with custom/new graphics to the game..
In civ2 adding units was very simple. Cut/Paste an image, add a line to a single text file. In civ3 this was a serious PITA, we needed to use external software to render in hundreads of animation frames, hope things were on scale and lined up correctly, then edit no less than three config files just to add a single unit. Can you give me, any hope that adding custom graphics for a unit to civ4 will be easier in the vein of civ2 and less like the crosspatched swamp that was civ3?
-GenTimJS
Why is Zonk still an editor? Bring back simoniker, anyone.
What is this guy's name, Sore Johnson?
My question is, do the developers suffer from the same Civilization Disease as the players? What I mean is telling yourself, "Just one more turn..." and the next thing you know, the sun is out again, the dog's starved to death, and your cloth is back in fashion again. I really hope not because I can't wait that long for Civ IV.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
With Civilization IV being so flexible and moddable, do you see a Civilization V in the future? Or do you see IV becoming a platform where new content become expansion pack, just like The Sims franchise?
Growing up, playing games with the family meant getting out classic boardgames like Monopoly, Risk, etc. The Civilization games seem like a prime candidate for breaking into the family-game-playing field. What, if any, steps has your team taken to bring your game(s) to the level of "game night with the kids?" What technologies, such as display and control, need to be developed before such an environment is realized?
IWARS.
People, in general, disappoint me. Politicians even more so.
How much will CiV4 use political shifts in countries as a cyclical change in approaches (e.g. new democratic leader with a different political alignment will form different alliances).
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Was there a question in there somewhere?
-ds
Civilization IV will use the Python programming language for modding purposes. It is not the only recent game to use it; the Battlefield 2 developers have followed the same path. Is this a coincidence? Why have you chosen Python over other languages, such as C or Perl for example?
It seems like every sequel that comes out Sid is less and less involved in the product. How much is Sid involved in 4? Does he help code? Help design? Help produce? Or stamp his name on the finished product?
No bad vibes, meant to the Gaming God... just curious how involved he is with the 5th (counting "Alpha Centauri") cantation of his classic...
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I have a two-parter. Which parts of Civ IV *will not* be moddable? And also, from my (extensive heh) reading, I'm concerned that there will be no way to play modded multiplayer games. Is that the case? As a developer myself, I can see why you'd want to avoid that can of worms altogether - but which methods have you considered (if any) to allow for multiplayer mods?
What was done wrong or poorly in Civilization and its numerous sequels and expansion packs that is being addressed now and provide a compelling reason to purchase Civilization 4?
Well, someone had to provide this link :-)
:-)
http://freeciv.org/
Ok, graphics are not are great, but the gameplay is still interesting
Opensource, of course.
Animoog.org
Boxers or briefs?
What version of Python are you using? Is it a mainstream distribution or one of the performance-oriented distros like Stackless?
behold
Sounds like you were running these on crap machines.
I never had that problem with any of my Civ games (1 - 3).
In Civ III there were unmanageable time delays in between each turn at the mid-late stages of the game. If you played on a large or huge world, it could take five minutes or more for the AI to complete its turn. And you couldnt just go and eat a sandwitch, because there would be prompts along the way for diplomacy and such that you had to be ready to click on. Is this new version of Civilization going to run faster, even on non top of the line computers?
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
Or is it suited for single platform (Win OS) only?
Multiplatform development has been wildly successful for Blizzard, it would profit Civ IV.
AZspot
What have you heard about the next Starcraft?
Just wait till some crappy band steals your nic.
Civ3 was wonderfully customisable as long as you were sticking with a civ-type game, but even basic reaching beyond this ran into trouble, e.g. I found no way to get the map generator to have different weighting of tile types, or extend the number of varieties beyond the land/sea split. Have all these kind of limitations been removed? How possible is a total conversion? What about conversions to a different game type?
I am trolling
Can we get an alarm clock / periodic reminder option, as in Master of Orion 3? (Not that I really needed it for that game, unfortunately.)
Will modders be able to create and modify the 3D models used in Civ4? If not, the modding will be somewhat limited (although the Python scripting and XML based configuration will be great). As I understand it, there are no open-source or free tools for modding the NIF 3D models used by the new version of Gamebryo, which Civ4 is using. With closed-source 3D models, no creating your own units or modding the look of existing ones. Maybe there's a tool in the SDK? What's in that SDK anyway?
Imagine a small country becoming a trading / banking power, sort of like the Dutch (minus the whole tulip fiasco), or Switzerland, countries that can buy their immunity and economically dominate other countries.
Just a thought...
What would be required to make this version of Civ Massively Multiplayer, with expansive lands and server hooks for 10,000 players per game?
As a long time Civ player, I would have to say that I really didn't understand why it moved to 3D graphics. The 3D rendered sprites weren't really comparable to the 2d artwork, and it didn't really feel like a needed addition. Will having the engine be entirely 3D actually add to the gameplay in any way, other than have objects occlude one another?
When I say 'add to the gameplay' I mean, add to the game experience in a way 2D sprites couldn't. For example: Physics, multipls views, wind, etc.. (I have only really seen the 3D globe, and like the idea)
As a 3D game developer, I have seen so many of my favorite games rehashed into 3D versions just because the developers thought that a 2D sprite-based game cannot make it in this market, and that annoys me. From Pirates! to Monkey Island, it seems developers would rather make a 3D game without any real need for 3D art or gameplay elements. Do you feel this pressure, or do you feel that a 3D game is inherently better because it has a new dimention? (Even if it still has the same locked off camera angle and usually poorer quality art assets)
My question: I have recently adopted Pastafarian and would like to know if Civ 4 will support it ?
I'm curious if this new framework will make the game moddable something that plays like Master of Magic. I'm sure they don't want to get into any legal trouble with their claims, so I'll be a little more vague. Could it be readily feasible to have a spellbook to perform various affects from both combat and the overland map? Can the way combat is done be overhauled so that stacks of units can be controlled in a separate combat setting?
No I'm not trolling.
I used to play (in fact I'd hacked the dox check of) an old game called Empire circa 1989. The original Civilization's core gameplay appears to be copied directly from Empire. When Civ came out, I said to myself, "This is Empire done up right." Is it true that Civ is basically just a pimped up version of Empire?
I now have a unignorable timer that keeps me from playing games too long:
My eighty pound Belgian Shepherd mix, who pummels me with her forepaws when she's decided I've been sitting around too long.
Stefan
Which user-requested features are you implementing?
One of the things I've wanted most is the ability to name geographical features (Commander Taco Mountain, The River Sid, etc.). This is helpful both aesthetically and practically. Any chance of such an improvement in Civ IV?
I hope that rivers make more sense generally -- i.e., movement by river should be faster than overland. The model in Civ III leads to explorers going from mountaintop to mountaintop, which is not at all historically accurate.
Oh, also -- any chance you'd be willing to pay for a new computer for me, so I can actually run the game?
In this version will there be methods of turning off the new and fabulous looking, but inevitably cpu/gpu killer graphics and animations so that mere mortals can play this on their current PC?
In Soviet Russia, asses suck this joke.
Wondering if you guys ever considered using .NET as the scripting language (potentially using mono for cross platform ... ness).
For background, see what the second life guys are doing with it
And what would you do differently if you could go back and reverse that decision?
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
As the Dev Team, how do you feel working with Sid? Did you play his games before you became a game developer? If so, do you feel intimidated working with an icon of the industry? Were you part of Sid's original team? If so, how has project management changed throughout the years on his projects?
This should be modded "funny", not "interesting".
News for merdes. Shit that matters.
Ask me about my sig.
Why Python over Ruby?
Is there any plan for a short form game? It would be nice if i could sit down and finish an entire game in 1-2 hours instead of many many hours.
In light of recent world events, will some form of terrorism be included in the game?
For all you whiney little fucktards.
As many, I started with civ1, which was a nice game, for its time. I simply adored civ2, which I have played over and over again, and it continues - even today - to be a game I (re)play now and then. This may seem as no big deal, until one realises I have *never* felt an urge to repeatedly play a game several times; mostly I play it once through, and I'm rather bored by it, be it an RPG, a first-person-shooter, or a strategic oriented game - which usually I like the most and on average I play 3-4 times. After a while, *no* game can hold my interest I've noticed, the notable exeption being civ2.
Alas...when civ3 came out, it didn't do it for me. Despite the poor graphics compared to civ3, I still prefer civ2. It's not easy to put the finger on the the reason why, but I suspect it's because civ3 has become a bit *too* complex. It's all very nice to have borders of influence, and insurgents in cities, and elaborate negotiation...but, somehow, I find civ2 is just easier and more fun to play. Sometimes, one just wants to 'go for it', without all the extra complexity. Now, will it be possible to play Civ4 in a 'easy' mode, which makes it more simple and user-friendly according to the lines (and rules) of civ2? I really think such a 'easy' setting would be greatly appreciated by those who want less complexity, and more simple, user-friendly gameplay.
Alternatively, will you place the civ2 game (and engine) under the GPL or similar licence, so people might freely hack and expand on that?
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
After the Ubisoft PR department pretending to be the dev team:
;)
"Is this really the developer team answering these questions?"
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Recently, there was the big furore over the "hot coffee" mod for GTA, resulting in the game being taken off the shelves and recoded, and a patch being issued to invalidate the mod. Although the data was already in the game, and the mod only made it accessible, this has still had the apparent fallout amongst the general public and the government of making it seem as though developers are responsible for the actions they allow modders to make to their game.
Your game looks to be one of the most modable games ever, and presumably it's possible to make an offensive mod with it (for a given value of offensive.) Are you worried about possible ramifications of modders actions with your title, have you taken any action to limit potentially offensive content within your mod, and what are your feelings on the issue as a whole?
(Posting as anonymous coward because I've been IP banned for way over a year, and had no response to e-mails regarding the issue.)
And this one:
http://www.c-evo.org/
And its graphics are great.
Does Civ IV solve the tedium of moving a huge number of troops from one place to another? That seemed to plague all the three previous Civilizations...
Beetle B.
On my Linux box, I have the Firaxis game 'Alpha Centauri', ported by Loki Games. (As far as I know, Alpha Centauri is the only Firaxis game that runs on any non-Microsoft platform.) While any game could eventually be ported to any platform, choosing to use traditional sockets for networks and OpenGL for graphics and so on will make such action significantly smoother, and I believe is a strong consideration in choosing games for the Linux porting houses. Is there any thought going into portable design, any plan to release on any operating system other than Windows, and in particular, any plan - or thought of - releasing on Linux?
--Parity
'Card carrying' member of the EFF.
I agree with another poster above...
I'd like not only the ability to name geographical locations (like Salty Dog Sea or Cmdr Taco Mt.) but similar to SimCity 3K be able to plant named flags -- that the other players don't see, of course -- so that I can remember my strategy when I come back to the game. Kind of like you see in old movies where the Generals are discussing their war strategy.
For example, it would be really nice to be able to put a pin onto the map and label it "objective 3 - after tanks invented" or "Don't forget to reinforce here from London".
That way I could take a break, eat some food, get some sleep.... heck even wait for the next weekend. That would go such a long way towards convincing my wife I wasn't obsessed.
Mod this question down. It's fucking insulting, and would be poorly representative of the Slashdot community.
(actually, it would be perfectly representative of the Slashdot community. We just don't want it go get out.)
I understand there are 4 levels of "modability" - The world editor, editing XML configuration files, editing the game logic in python, and modifying the AI via an SDK.
I am wondering exactly how much of the game logic is written in python. What will the limitations be when we are modifying python scripts. Could we do something like add a fourth resource type (in addition to gold, hammers, and food)?
Also, if all of the game logic is written in python, would this make it easier to port Civ IV to a platform such as the Nintendo DS? This is something I would really love to see.
Thanks,
Daniel Plaisted
If you did have to throw out a substantial part of the original code base, how did you go about deciding what was worth keeping and what needed substantial reworking?
With the extreme modability will we be able to get classic modes of play?
for example will I be able to play Civ 1,2 or 3, and not just their rules, but their units, tech trees and civilipedia?
Will this be provided or will it (if possible) have to be user add-ons?
If they are user add-ons will the team help a serious community effort to help them get the propper algorythems for combat resolution and what not (so our precious bomber can still be killed by the phalax that walks away undamaged)?
Is this one question? I think it counts as such.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
Will there be any method of creating a group of units that move together. I'm thinking about assigning a military unit to travel with a non-combat unit. You could have a group of workers building a road with infantry to defend them, or control a fleet of transports and warships as if they were one unit.
Micromanaging large numbers of units bores or frustrates me (depending on my mood) and limits the amount of time I can continue playing in the medium to late parts of the game. I have never completed Alpha Centauri or Civ 3 because of this.
Playing a solitaire version of Civ is like reading an interactive novel, one where the player can affect the storyline, but not in all ways. With enhanced scripting, will it be possible to * change point of view? * bring about unplanned upheavals (civil war, natural disasters, famine, etc.) in the player's (or opponents') territories? * account for sudden dynastic changes (forcing political and cultural revolutions, say)? ... these things would make playing the game more like *writing* a novel, another step forward.
I heard it will be very extensible. Will there be support to plain 2D top-view graphics (something like a "classic"-mode), maybe even non-isometric? Sometimes the 3D graphics is too distracting from the gameplay... Also, will there be support for hexagonal tiles?
How, in constrast to how Masters of Orion 3, will the Civ team be addressing macro and micro management aspects of the game? RTS games are forced to place heavy consideration into managing in real time units and control and the scope of an RTS prevents a snowball effect. Turned based games become burdened by logistical considerations as a result of not having that same focus on micromanagment. Managing 55 workers in Civ3 along with 35 cities becomes a logistical nightmare when governor AI doesn't learn from your play style. Directing 22 to build 13 fortresses across a continent while running rail lines to each with production queues rallied to those location but only to a max of 25 units per fortress ares and having to manually intercept an invading force resultsed in a single turn while playing Civ3 that took 2 weeks to process (thats 2 weeks of play time. It actually took about 2 months to move to the next turn.) Additionally having a stack of 75 units attack a city is a rather dull event, even worse when the computer attacks.
Ken's Rule of Gaming: Complexity in feature should be inversly proportional to the amount of player control.
The more complex a process is in real life, the less direct control a person has, this is what MOO3 tried to resolve.
MOO3 was a real shock to many players but once you learned to let go of micromanagment the game becomes rather plesant and suprising. A good contrast is what Sim City is To Civilization as Civilization is to M003.
Which Direction is Civ4 taking?
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
One of the things I didn't like about Civ1 - Civ3 were how restrictive the game is on the number of AI players you have and the map size. In Civ3 lately I've been wanting to have large numbers of players even in the smaller maps. I've also thought that it would be need to have a "real world" scenario with say 30 AI players on a 500x500 map.
How about letting us choose any number of AI players up to the maximum on any map size? And letting the "huge" map be larger? I've created larger custom map sizes before, but with such a small number of AI players it doesn't work well.
And Civ I still runs on through classic! Try http://mac.the-underdogs.org/ for a copy.
Come on it's a fun game, but if you need to get it intravenously, maybe you should seek help.
Most strategy games release many expansions for the game that continue to keep the game profitable months and years after release. I was wondering if you are worried that adding the ability for users to create their own mods will decrease expansions sales? Do you think that the sales, and buzz, of the full game will make up for the difference in likely decreased expansion pack sales?
Java has no friends.
What tools do the developers use themselves, and what tools do they envision the mod community using to adapt Civ IV?
The docs don't always explain how the bonuses/penalties due to terrain/status/location etc.. affect the possible outcome.
Blar.
I like the idea of an AI reacting to the subtleties of the map.
But what I would like to see is an AI that reacts to how its opponent is playing.
For example, I would like an AI that evaluates how aggressive a player is. If a player is constantly attacking the AI, it should react by foregoing some research to build up a defensive army. If a player is defensive, on the other hand, the AI should patiently build up an overwhelming attack force, complete with research upgrades and such.
If a player shows a preference for attacking with one particular type of unit, the AI should "realize" it and start building counterunits. It would even be nice if the AI would do things like sacrifice some scouts to find out what its opponents are up to and compensate for it. Does the scout see some lots of planes in a city? Build some anti-aircraft missile batteries in surrounding areas. I've beaten lots of various players at various strategy games using these kinds of tactics. If an AI used them too, it would add a whole new dimension to player-vs.-computer strategy games.
Plus, it would be nice for developers to observe some really good players playing, make some notes, and ask the players why they do things that the developers don't understand. Are there any general rules that can be programmed that a human uses in making decisions like when he or she starts building military units, how those units are deployed, how much and what kind of research he or she conducts and when, and so on.
I think a cool AI feature of a game would be for the AI to "learn" how a player plays over the course of the player's games. If I beat the computer one way, it will know where it went wrong and play the next game differently, under the assumption that the player will still use some of the same tactics. Perhaps a game would even include some sort of profile manager so that if my brother plays the game, the computer will play against him differently. I've used that tactic several times in AoE2—record the games so I can go back later and study why my opponent did to spank me so badly. Next game I play against that opponent, he or she will be pwned by someone who has prepared for his or her tricks and strategies.
I think it would also be cool for the AI to try a few odd tactics now and then to see how a player reacts. Start building a wonder. What did the player do? Immediately start one of his or her own? Use that knowledge to make him or her waste resources that could otherwise be alloted to the military. Declare war on a player out of the blue and see what happens. Does the player start making concessions to re-establish peace? If so, that player can be bluffed. Send a lone military unit to camp close to another city. Does the player attack him immediately, though he's no threat? If so, do the same thing, but have a larger army waiting on the other side of the city to go in while it's not as heavily defended.
I guess what I'm saying is that if we could get to the point where computers are "thinking" like humans, I can finally shed the last vestiges of my need for friends to play with, and that can't be a bad thing, right? :-)
"Civ4Life"
Do you remember Colonization? Why isn't there a sequel to that great game, it being even more addictive than Civ.
Fleur de Sel
Are there any plans to ever bring back AC in any form?
Some of us see AC as the best in the whole (greater) Civilization series. Awesome game.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Will the images of cities as they appear on the world map accurately refelect the developments in the cities? That is, if you build a courthouse in a city, will you be able to see that courthouse when you're at the regular zoomed-out view of the world? I always thought this would be a visually neat, and actually useful addition to the game; useful, because it would remove the need to zoom into a city to see what you've built in them.
So, why does Civ slow to a crawl on a large map with lots of cities and units?
You'd think there would be plenty of time between turns to let the AI do it's thing, so that the next turn could happen almost instantaneously. (Note: I submitted this quesiton anonymously to Sid the other day.)
Civ III requires the installation CD be inserted every time you play, even though none of the content on the CD is used by the game after installation. This annoys your customers by making them juggle CDs, unnecessarily wear out their hardware, and shorten their battery life. Consequently, many of your customers install "No-CD Cracks" to fix this flaw in your software.
How do you feel about the existence and use of such cracks? Will you include this CD requirement in Civ IV even though it does not prevent copyright infringement but still inconveniences your customers?
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
When loki games rises from the dead, most likely.
Bottom line is that the last time someone tried to make a profit creating Linux ports, they failed miserably. The market isn't there.
The cake is a pie
Will anti-globalisation and corporate rebellion movements be realistically depicted for those civilizations that are in the corporate/globalist role and will we be able to have Heroes of Open Source or other such Influence characters like Linus et al who can become focal points in letting peaceful open pro-enviro civilizations crush the corporate war-mongering technocrats and instill the Religion of Open Souce worldwide in a low-impact lifestyle?
...
Or will this not be implemented instead?
As the guy behind the Ecotopian Guerrillas in Illuminati (yeah, my name had two hyphens then), I was kind of curious
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Rationalle: As an fan AI-coder for CRPG's (I worked with David Gaider on AI in the Ascention mod of Baldur's Gate 2), it's my experience that with no deadlines and lot of playing experience (very important), a community of modders are willing and able to write a much smarter AI than any game engineer. Nothing would more increase my willingness to replay the game than the promise that this time, a newly modded AI really will give me a run for my money. In my experience, it only took several solid weeks of playing and a few weeks of coding before I could make a computer-controlled magic-user in BG2 who could regularly kick the ass of an identically-able human controlled magic user, without cheating.
For Civ-specific AI issues, here are the features of what I take to be the holy grail of AI:
1. No omniscience: The input information available to each country's AI would be the same as what would be available to a player if she controlled that country. (No "seeing past your range of view".) 2. The AI is completely blind as to which rivals are human and which are AI. 3. There are several very good AI's that each favor different strategies, and a meta-AI that determines which strategy is the best fit for the situation. 4. Exactly the same rules apply to the AI civs as to the human-controlled civs (regarding science, production, trade, etc.).Do you have any plans to include other means of warfare, such as economic warfare and the use of interest rates, bonds, companies and good old fashioned money to conquer? It could add another layer of depth once players approach the modern age
I for one would like to see methods like the British used in the Falklands War, where they parasailed in units that counterfeited large quantities of Argentinian money, or the current economic supports the Saudis (or I guess technically the Saudi rebels - how you can call 99 percent of a country "rebels" is another matter) give to the Iraqi Resistance in the current Iraqi War, or what we did in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation - anyway, I would love to see this in the final version of Civ that comes out.
Reality is sometimes stranger than fiction, and it's a heck of a lot cheaper to research and develop simulations for.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
We've all heard the horror stories coming out of companies like EA, with programmers working sweatshop hours and driven to burnout. How are the working conditions at Firaxis? Do you guys get time to stop and smell the roses? Or at least time to play other games?
The cake is a pie
It annoys me that every time I fire up Civ3 I have to tell it to turn on the grid. Can you make it an option that toggles on and then stays on? If not for the whole game, at least always on/off for all sessions in a scenario?
Will the communication, on multi player games be designed so that
1. 3rd party clients, can play games against CIV 4 clients?
2. will CIV 4 Clients be able to connect to 3rd Party servers to play multiplayer games?
--meh--
Civilization I was a game that you could play through in a few hours.
Civilization II (still my favorite!) sometimes took two sittings, but it was manageable.
Alpha Centauri took a bit longer, but the "storyline" helped break things up.
Call to Power and Civilization III each seemed to take longer than the last. I bought Civ III, spent several nights playing the same game, and uninstalled it.
Skill with a game is acquired through repeated plays, but each version of Civ has taken longer and longer to play through a game. Is Civilization IV continuing this tradition, or are you making changes to keep a game from taking weeks of real time?
It could be an interesting concept. Everybody would start out as either an entertainer, a worker, a soldier or a scientist. And you would have to get voted up the ranks by your peers!
For example, you could only advance so far as a foot soldier, when you were promoted to sgt you could get more abilities and you govern your troops.
And each civ would have an overall leader who decides what to do and passes down the orders!
Terribly complex, and very difficult for people to accept, but it would be a revolutionary game!
Hmmm witty sig or funny sig? Maybe elitest techy sig!
What, would it be better to have everyone come off as a brown nosing pussy?
If some part of their games suck, call them on it. Ask if it will be improved.
There's really no excuse for a game that isn't graphics intensive being such a resource hog. The post may have been a bit more insulting than necessary, but that doesn't mean it has no merit.
If the developers are so thin skinned that they can't field one harsh question from a group in which the majority are sucking up to them, maybe they should crawl back into their cubes and assume the fetal position.
Are you going to include a real-time clock in the game so us lowly players know when to quit playing so as to be able to schedule the lower priority but still necessary activities such as sleep, studying and work into our lives?
I've seen screenshots, and the entire landscape is in 3D. The units are in 3D as well, but they are still basically 'icons'. Was it ever considered to make the units a to scale collection of units instead of one large iconic unit. It would have been cool too see a column of tanks rumble into a city, and have the units fire... instead of one simple giant unit.
http://www.firaxis.com/community/asksid.php
Second question down.
ceci n'est pas un sig.
I have enjoyed the Civilization series since the beginning, but with the third incarnation it was pointed out to me that it's rather disappointing that the game continues to be played on a tube rather than a globe. If Civilization IV is also on a strip, could you explain what difficulties the development team is having in implementing what seems to be such an obvious and simple detail?
take your sig and shove it
If a player shows a preference for attacking with one particular type of unit, the AI should "realize" it and start building counterunits.
:-)
Alpha Centauri (another Sid Meier game, Civ on an alien world, in case you weren't aware) did this. For example, after I would develop aircraft I would normally tear up my opponents for a decade or so before they started fielding enough anti-air troops that my airforce was nearly useless, unless I could beat up on them first with ground troops. This basically forced you into fielding diverse armies. It also allowed for another level of strategy where you would switch what you were attacking with suddenly to take advantage of the AI's lag time in changing strategies to producing troops, which in some ways makes such "trainability" a disadvantage for the AI.
I think a cool AI feature of a game would be for the AI to "learn" how a player plays over the course of the player's games.
I agree, I've always wanted features like that. I may be mistaken, but I think the Descent series used some form of this, where the robots would learn what direction you tended to dodge shots in and such.
I guess what I'm saying is that if we could get to the point where computers are "thinking" like humans, I can finally shed the last vestiges of my need for friends to play with, and that can't be a bad thing, right?
It's funny... In a lot of games, mostly strategy games and fighting games, I actually do better against humans because I can work with the human's weaknesses and try to steer how the human thinks. With standard game AI, it's more about figuring out the secret algorithm used.
The enemies of Democracy are
my Dual Athlon MP 2800 System...when running Civ3...shows at least 50% of the CPU consumed at all times by the Civilization process. Even when it's just waiting for a click in a dialog box. I assume that the CPU is being used to plan future moves for the AI...
Blar.
As a long time Civ fanatic and a Mac user I found myself in a bit of a quandry with the release of the Civ III expansions that were, apparently, not ported to Mac because of incompatibilities with the operating system and the way Civ III online play was implemented. Do you - or perhaps those over you - plan on releasing Civ IV for Macintosh, Linux or even the next generation of consoles? The new Nintendo controller could make a really innovative input device for this kind of game. I would hope that the success of World of Warcraft on the OSX platform would be enough incentive to think about the rest of the gaming world that most developers don't bother catering to. =)
I've noticed many other games have engines based on lua. I believe the first two Warcraft series use lua extensively for level development and is what people wrote custom mods with if they didn't want to use the built in map editors.
.wad files?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a huge fan of lua or anything. I've only done minor programming in it. My question is why did you choose the language that you did (python + xml files), what are the advantages to this approach, what are the disadvantages and finally, how much development time would you say is needed using your SDK would take vs attempting to design a mod for some of the other popular games (Quake3, Half-Life2, etc.)
Oh and I guess one more thing. How far have we come in modding games since Doom I
Sumit
Civ III "broke" the Civilization games, IMO. The best game in the series was/is Alpha Centauri. While there were a number of "improvements" in CivIII (the concept of culture, for example), it just plain wasn't any more FUN than AC. In fact, it was more tedious and less fun. I know that there are people who feel differently... but what I want to know is, will CivIV be "fun" like Alpha Centauri was, or is it going even further along the path that CivIII went down? I don't want a civilization simulator... I want a fun game.
that is a good idea. i have always been annoyed how the AI would cross into my area, find a single open tile where the influence of my towns convereged but didnt cover and build a city. it would be like me moving to france and starting a city in the country and considering that city part of the u.s.. i did use this against the other civs since my culture was often much stronger. so my question:
will the other cultures in civ 4 truly respect my borders and not build in the 'middle' of my 'country'?
always mosh clockwise
The first bit is that all the AI races know where the yellow stars are off the bat. Human players have to research a tech to get that info.
The other bit is resources but it goes both ways. At lower AI levels, the computer gets less resources every turn(like 40%, 60%,80%). At Normal it gets 100%. At the higher levels, it gets 120% and so on.
Otherwise, it plays fairly, IIRC.
In CivIII I've noticed that when you get into the Industrial era, the rate at which you can build thing doesn't diminish. I start a city in, say 1900. It takes me a minimum of 40 turns to build anything and at that point it is literally years! While I love the game, taking 40 years to build a library is totally nuts. I understand that resources come into play, but once you are industrialized, how can it take so long to build stuff!?!
I know I want my own little Iran, and I sure would have more nukes than you could sheik a stick at :D
"It's too bad she won't live, but then again who does?" - Gaff
Do you have a solution for networked play that doesn't involve a central, irreplaceable node (say, for example, www.firaxis.net) or a specific brand (say, Microsoft) of firewall? A networking paradigm that works regardless of number of NATted players? That would make Civ dominate the multiplayer world in the same way that it has dominated its niche as a single-player game.
;)
Once a week, ever since the original CivNet was published, the droogs and I play multiplayer Civ on a home LAN. We've probably canceled six or seven games total in that time span- typically due to the host's wedding anniversary or something similarly earthshaking. Members of the group have literally driven through hurricanes and blizzards to make the game, and when the host (originally me, not anymore) is on vacation, spare house keys are distributed so that the LAN can still be accessed.
We like Sid Meier games, and we want you to keep making them, so we do not bootleg them. Every member of our group owns every (Sid Meier) version of Civilization ever published! We require that you own a CD in order to play, even though we use no-CD cracks and similar tricks to make network installations (this speeds up the game start and ensures patch level compatibility).
Each time a new version of the game has upped the hardware requirements, I've rebuilt all nine of the LAN's PCs accordingly. When I moved to a new house, the LAN was moved to another player's house first, so that the game could continue even while I was in the process of moving (and there it has stayed, incidentally). All the machines are built from dumpster-diving booty, except the video cards - Civ 3 required more video $$ than we could find in corporate dumpsters, so we each bought a card.
We have played every Sid Meier version of Civ so far (including Alpha Centauri and Alien Crossfire). Of these, the most robust is the original Alpha Centauri, followed by Civ2 (there are certain crashes characteristic to each version that show up when you play them thousands of times, AC and Civ2 have have the lowest frequencies of such problems in real use). We are very familiar with "messages from the network underworld".
I think I can authoritatively state that the quality and capabilities of the networking stack took a nosedive when you went to Microsoft's DirectPlay gaming system. The simultaneous movement capability, for example, was much better in the hoary old (Civ1 based) CivNet than it is in Civ3.
I believe this is because a third party vendor, particularly when it's an OS vendor, has completely different motives than a game producer. You, the game producers, want maximum capability presented to the programming staff and the end users, but the vendor wants to use the game as a wedge to drive end users with other systems (or older systems) into an upgrade path that generates income.
I recommend a test case with 3 players outside a single-IP-address NAT gateway, and 3 inside, and one computer player. If you can do that, you have a clean multiplayer networking stack!
I hear that Blizzard is working on a new project called "StarCraft FOREVER!!", aptly named in honour of THE DUKE!!
pi=sigma{n:0-infinity}[(1/16)^n][(4/(8n+1))-(2/(8n +4))-(1/ (8n+5))-(1/(8n+6))]
Will the Mac version of the game have the same editors and customization options as the PC version? Or will we -- once again -- be left without any tools? It's a story that has gotten old, old and hurtful, in the Macintosh world.
On a different topic. . . I was disappointed to read that Civ4 will have lots of animation. Animation is cool when it corresponds with the user doing something. But simply staring at the map while it's "working alive" with units going through their little motions is awful. That only makes it hard to find your cursor. It's like camouflage.
I'm highly skeptical of all the religious stuff. Seems like something else I'll have to micro-manage in a game I thought should be made more streamlined, not more complicated. Just another complicating factor I have no interest in, that my enemies can use against me. (like culture. . . only worse?)
What I would really love to see in the game is an optional "Empire mode". It would be a simplified game mode where all the micro-management is bypassed, and the focus is just on fighting a war. Instead of having to spend hours and hours building up your civilization first, you could dive into military conflict quickly.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Alright, Civ 4 is supposed to be completely moddable, right?
...
Ok.
1. Can it duplicate AC?
-- Can you create units by parts, rather than only specific predesigned units?
-- Will there be any sort of modifications to the base landscape (flattening mountain ranges, etc)
2. Will there be any game-based terrain modifications?
-- Floods
-- Earthquakes
-- Elevations -- areas above or below sea water
-- Ability to construct dams/levees/pumps
-- Ability to attack enemy dams/etc
-- Global warming causing change in weather and sea levels over the entire map
-- Ice age/global cooling doing similar things
3. Will the networking/multiplayer code work, work well, and be included in the original game?
(grumble grumble civ2 network grumble grumble)
-- Using TCP to send information to other games
-- Not waiting around for a response from everyone, but just going ahead with the assumption that TCP will succede or close.
-- If I'm playing at 60 seconds per turn, in a three player game, then if I hit "done", I know that I have at least 120 seconds, plus however much time was left on my clock, before my next 60 seconds of moving units begins to count down, EVEN IF THE OTHERS END THEIR TURN EARLY. If not, then I cannot afford to ever end my turn early.
-- Not throwing away any changes that I'm in the middle of doing to a city just because the other players have passed the turn back to me -- let me finish what I'm doing (counting down my time, if necessary).
-- Dealing with the time needed for negotiations, etc.
-- Realistic time limits for units and cities that do not penalize people with lots of small cities.
4. Will you be continuing the traditional civ approach of "This unit has lived for thousands of years", or will you even consider switching to a "This civilization has military influence in this area" approach?
5. Can the sight ranges be changed? In particular, can the default/base sight range be made 2 instead of 1, can city development range be increased, etc.
6. Can growing nearby cities merge into megacities? Think, in particular, of the Los Angeles megacity.
7. Can a single civilization develop more than one tech at a time? I've never built any tech improvement when playing non-cheating computer AI's because, frankly, I can get to the maximum tech development in C3 without it.
8. Can we get automatic slider and city adjustment for country and cities, PLEASE.
-- In civ 3, I found that I could adjust the tax / research / entertainment global settings, and the per city settings (who was an entertainer, etc) to get a maximum benefit. I had to do this in every city, each turn.
It got boring very fast. It was impossible to do in multiplayer given the time settings. It is something that the computer could do for me, and I should never HAVE to do that much micromanagement.
9. Will we please see meaningful revolts/civil war?
-- Historically, civil war and revolts have been real concerns to deal with.
-- Historically, all the civ games have delt with it with slider and city adjustments.
-- The "Civilization" and "Advanced civilization" board games made civil war a very real concern, even if it was handled unrealistically.
Tech tree:
10. Will related techs give a price reduction? Can we create such a system with a mod?
11. Will the tech tree be seperated into theoretical and applied branches?
-- Theoretical advancements lead to other theoretical advancements
-- Applied advancements yeild new units, and a discount on "near future" advancements (after all, you know what you're doing).
12. Will first units of a given type have "prototype" status?
13. Will the tech tree be
Sorry, I can't really phrase this in a question. Here's a description of what I'd like to be able to do.
For a mod that has dual magic and technology research, I'd like to say that you can leave the stone age with either
A - Metal working, wh
I never played Civ 1; I was a huge fan of Civ II, which was and is a brilliant game. I regularly still play Alpha Centauri, which is essentially Civ two and a half. I have Civ III and have scarcely ever played it - it had nothing new to add over Civ II. And I think that the reason for that is that, as the turn based strategy game goes, Civ II is and always will be the classic.
You've been there. You've done it (very well). Why revisit old territory? Similarly with Pirates. I am having enormous fun with the new Pirates, which I find hugely engaging. But it really doesn't add much over Pirates I.
You've got an extremely talented team. Sequels and franchises are rarely better - and often worse - than what went before.
Isn't it time to move on?
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
If Linux Users (and Mac Users!) want to play Windows Games have they thought of creating a version of DirectX for Linux? If we can get O/SX working on x86 ssytems this shouldnt be too hard for some hacker or Vulcan Linux User to create.
If You can read this sig you are on the internet
Most RTS AIs adapt to their users nowadays. I think it started with C&C Tiberian Sun.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Online delivery of games is slowly becoming more and more prevalent in the games industry. Has the Civ4 team considered pursuing a method of online distribution? What were the reasons for the team's decision?
We hear a lot in general terms how testing and input from various sources influenced the game. Focusing on one game feature, how was it envisioned in the design document and what does it look like now?
I know that several people are asking for Linux support, and I echo that. But, I'd like to go further and ask about the possibility of specific Linux support, namely Maemo support.
Maemo is the version of Linux that is going to run in the upcomming Nokia 770 which will be a cool little tablet. I think it would be absolutely steallar to be able to play Civilization on this device, all over my house, while watching TV, etc.
So, is it possible that there will be Linux support in Civ IV? Maemo support? If not, why not? Support costs? Development costs? Both?
Why don't you do a new version of Alpha Centauri? It was hands down better than any version of Civilization I've ever played. Civilization III was IMHO terrible. I recall some game ranking sight that still shows Alpha Centauri in the top 20 all time though it is ancient and hard to find now. If you could retain all the brilliance of the original, improve the AI's, add the ability to do mods, and get a new online community going it would return to being one of my favorite games to sink hours in to.
@de_machina
Why do you keep making the same game over and over?
I like my Win2K machine and I hate the new registration requirements for Win XP. They are too intrusive. Therefore I am migrating myself to Linux. My question is, Are you going to make Civ IV compatible with Win2k, or am I going to NEED to buy Win XP? I do not want to buy Win XP because win2k suits me just fine. On the oher hand, would it play on Linux?
It sounds like your wish will be answered.
IGN Interview
IGNPC: One aspect of the cultural game in Civilization 3 that really aggravated players was the lack of respect the AI showed for your borders. Are you planning to address this issue at all? Barry Caudill: In Civilization 4, the AI will have to respect your borders or declare war but you will be able to negotiate Open Borders to allow travel.
Ideally, our questions shouldn't overlap too much with what they've already answered elsewhere.
The old Civ II (on the Mac port, at least) was fantastic in its support for multiple monitors. Everything was implemented as its own individual window/palette- the main game screen was one window, the tool palette was another window, animations popped up in another window. This was spectacular for multiple monitors, since the main monitor was free to show the main game screen and only the main game screen, while all secondary activity could be displayed on the second monitor. Civ 3 destroyed this, and brought everything back into one single monolithic ueber-window, where any action brought up a dialog box/window which was drawn on top of the main game screen, obscuring game information. Will Civ 4 continue this approach and assume that everyone must have a single, solitary monitor, or will it go back to a floating palette approach, where those of us with multiple monitors can really take advantage of them? Thanks in advance for your time, -Natebrau
Civ3: great game. The inclusion of cultuarl boundaries was the missing element from the previous releases. The one flaw is the incredible pace at which the AI builds new cities. I do not think such an emphasis existed with 1 or 2. I find that one of the main keys to success in Civ3 is simply building more cities than the other cultures. How do you plan on addressing this in Civ4? Don't you feel other factors should determine a successful culture?
"All great things are simple & expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope." --Churchill
You guys are in the game industry. Have you heard any rumors about when Duke Nukem Forever is going to be released?
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
has a great write up by Soren explaining the extensibility of the engine with the Mod community in mind - I would explain more but my boss just peeked his head into my office asking when the new build would be ready...buh bye
Game making costs money, serious money. You guys can ask for a linux distro all you want, but I don't see many game companies spending the time on it anytime in the next five years. There's like one chance of that. If linux became the OS of choice in China, game developers would actually pay attention to the market. Aside from that, it's just not going to happen, so you can just skip the games articles on slashdot, because it's incredibly tedious to wade through 300 of the same comment. Don't want windows on your pc? Fine by me. Don't complain that you can't run windows only software then.
...or is the only way to make the game "infinitely moddable" to open the game's source?
Either way, it sounds awesome.
Like others I enjoyed the alpha centauri game and was delighted to hear that a group of Civ fans have already started to work on a alpha centauri mod. To what degree will the SDK allow them to achieve their goal, or are they better off waiting for an........ expansion pack.(nudge nudge, wink wink)
Trading reputation is a very tricky (and obscure) concept in CIV3. For example, if you have an active per-turn trade with A, and B cut the trading route, change is that you'd ruin your reputation which cannot be recovered during the rest of the game. How is it going to change in CIV4?
From what I read about CIV4, it looks like you'd need 3 cities to have a cultural victory. This would make One City Challenge (OCC, which means you can only have one city in the game) + cultural victory impossible. What are the Firaxis's considerations to support OCC and other variants in CIV4?
THat response doesn't address the parent post at all. Technically the AI was respecting his borders by building on the ONE tile that he didn't have cultural control over. It was violating the spirit of the law, not the letter. The guy's answer above just says they'll obey the letter of the law.
What he says is no different than CivIII.
IMHO of course.
I've been playing CIV3 for two years and the only reason I'm not playing now is because I'm waiting for CIV4. Yes AI cheats. They can see what you cannot see; they can see what they are not supposed to see. They build things faster than you do and more so when the level goes up. Some of the cheats we could live without, such as seeing all the maps and knowing where resources are so they could go there and settle. Some of them are necessary. For example, the building bonuses: how the hell would you make a more difficult level otherwise? The AI is the same, the only thing you could do is to give them additional advantages. It's just inevitable. This is true for all kinds of games. In a FPS game such as HALO you design a more difficult mode by deploying more enemies, for a strategy game such as CIV you need to have other kind of bonuses that the AI could outnumber you. The only fact is that in either case the AI is the same AI. An "easy" mode AI is as smart as an "hard" mode AI. So I wouldn't call it "cheat". It's just the way to make up different levels.
The step up from Civ 2 to Civ 3 was quite large graphically, but graphics are still not the selling point behind the series. I'm sure Civ 4 will be another step up in graphical detail, but how much power is available to modders who want to exploit the more beautiful side of world domination? Does the SDK provide tools that allow quick and easy integration of art, vertex and fragment shader assets into the game?
I suppose I really want to know just how powerful and extensible the graphics engine and tools are.
Will my tanks still get beaten by one spearman in a city? Cause if so, I'll uninstall as quickly as I did with Civ III.
How about my marines? Will they still get trumped by guys with bows and arrows?
I currently have no clever signature witicism to add here.
No, what he said was that the AI marched a settler _through_ his country, and found a spot inside which wasn't covered by culture yet - and built a city there. I have seen it happen many times too; if the AI was to actually build a new city inside your cultural influence, that would be an act of war even in CivIII. From how I read the interview, in CivIV it will be an act of war as soon as an AI unit enters your cultural influence.
So, IMHO, this question is already answered
Alpha Centauri had excellent diplomacy, and the A.I. players could have many intelligent things to say, e.g. Gaians got pissed at me for polluting, or the Morganites wanted to share their maps and coordinate their attacks. It also had a planetary council were decisions pertaining to the whole planet were made, like doing something to decrease global warming or decreasing human rights. Compared to that, the Civ3 trade-o-matic-screen was quite pathetic.
Which kind of diplomacy will Civilization IV be having?
One thing that I always liked from Alpha Centauri was that I could mix 'n match my tech to produce a unit that was exactly what I wanted. Any chance of something like that?
"Mission Accomplished" -- George W. Bush May 1, 2003
When you've got tons of units to deal with, it's great to be able to give long-range commands, like "all the tanks in this square, go over there. You three workers, built a railroad to this point."
But what's frustrating is how my units do idiotic things. Like blunder into enemy territory instead of choosing a longer, safer path. I have to micromanage them to prevent that (especially if the borders change while they're en route).
I'd like to be able to give more specific orders, like "sail to this point but don't leave the coast," or "explore until you find a city," or "attack unless you face a unit more advanced than you." Basically the way a general would tell his underlings what to do, then trust their judgement.
Any chance of seeing that in the new game?
And what would you do differently if you could go back and reverse that decision?
That sounds like an interview question out of a HR script.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
This annoys your customers by making them juggle CDs
true. unnecessarily wear out their hardware
i know! I keep a shoebox full of spare cd drives cause those fuckers wear out so fast! and shorten their battery life.
yeah, that 2 second cd-rom read fucking drains the shit out of my laptop. Maybe you should stop buying "Suny Vayo"'s and pony up for the namebrand.
let's rephrase the question into a form with legitimacy: "requiring the cd for play is both annoying and easily defeatable: do you guys have any pull to ditch it?"
Do you use neural nets?
Do you do any game recording/playback?
Do you have the game play itself?
What kind of "tuning knobs" do you have?
Inquiring minds want to know!
Don't underestimate the power of The Source
Will the screen resolution be artificially restricted??
:)
Civ III forced a resolution of 1024x768 or similar, which was extremely annoying given the small amount of map area visible (a big problem with the game IMO). The ability to zoom will somewhat alleviate this problem, but it would also be nice to use the full 1920x1200 resolution I have available. This is particularly relevant to a tactical game like Civ where you often need an overview of an area for strategic planning, and having to scroll back and forth to get this is detrimental to the playability of the game.
btw. FreeCiv allows any resolution (being window based), so if an Open source clone can do it there's no excuse for a commercial release
Will Civ IV support hexagonal grids, eithere built in or via modding??
The screen shots I have seen are all square grids. Hex grids make for a fairer movement system, as opposed to square grids where a diagonal move costs the same but takes you further than left/right/up/down moves. FreeCiv provides a hex grid/tileset that I find preferable to the 'classic' square style.
If there is no support for hexagonal grids, what has been done to resolve the issue with movement points and other problems resulting from the use of a square grid system?
Will there be an option for real-time or concurrent moves??
I recall something like this for one of the multiplayer modes of a previous civ version (never played it tho). This could be an interesting option for providing different dynamics to the gameplay, both for multiplayer and single player modes. There would need to be a method to resolve conflicting moves etc (eg. two players move a unit to the same square), but I'm sure it could be done. This could either be quasi real-time, where players have a limited time to take their turn, or simply wait for everyone to finish before processing the end of turn. Either method would allow players (human & computer) to take their turn at the same time, and could remove some of the imbalance introduced by a sequential turn system (eg. kill one city just for the next computer player to build another city before your next turn).
Hi guys. Well, first up I have to say that this game is looking stunning-keep up the brilliant work guys :)!
OK, my question is a simple one-I posed it to Sid, but you are probably the best people to answer it:
How exactly does culture work in Civ4. Barry Caudhill said that culture was dependant on your funding via the culture slider, but that cultural improvements/wonders multiplied this effect on a city-by-city basis. Is this still correct? If not, then how will it be done?
Thanks in advance.
Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.
Hi guys. Well, what can I say, all the info coming out about Civ4 is making me practically drool with anticipation ;)! This is looking like the best civ yet, and you should be congratulated.
OK, my question is a two parter, but both relate to city development. Firstly, what role do food units (bread) and health actually play in the new population growth system? Secondly, do city improvements and wonders come with any kind of per-turn maintainance cost, as they did in Civ2 and 3, or will this all be subsumed into the new city and civic maintainance cost?
Thanks for your time :)!
Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.
That reminded me of a French comedy, about a French guy who believs he's actually American (at heart), but after the American embassy refuses to take him, he turns a housing lot in France into a self-proclaimed American state.
#1: How do you test the game? I'm playing endless hours on a single game..
#2: Will you add more automatic management features as introduced in the Conquest expansion?
#3: Do you have managers or AI?
My problem is the AI/comp will always be better at micromanagement than I, and therefore is more able to attain its goal.
So, I'll have to adjust to the AI's weaknesses in difficult settings of the game resulting in smallpox strategies (pump them settlers) etc.
Now, what do you think will make the game more enjoyable instead of making the AI tougher?
Final question: how do I win? :-)
There are question about Mac version and Linux version, I have another question - could you consider open engine source, so players would modify not just game rules but also system specific stuff, like fixing interface or video bugs?
It would be probably first famous commercial game released with open source engine (Doom, Quake, etc.. are GPL, but years after first release).
Will the "auto" feature of this Civ be like the last one, in which on a giant map every worker will take 30 seconds to think about what to do (a long time when you have 100+ workers), and then every worker will decide to go do the exact same thing on the other side ofthe planet and take the next 400 years to get there, just to turn around?
*cough*
What I mean to say is: will you TEST your product BEFORE you sell it this time, and will any thought be put into the most important unit, the worker.
But does it run [on] linux...?
After reading your post I'm actually starting to think that there still is hope for the Civ series. Thanks for the info, I think I'll point my browser to Gamespot now. :)
Hi guys, My question is a two parter, both relating to the interaction between techs and resources. First question is: Will all deposits of a resource become visible when you discover its prerequisite tech? If not, what now determines the chance of resource appearance? By the same token, what determines if a resource disappears? My Second question is: will it be possible to mod the game in such a fashion as to make some technologies Resource Dependant? For example, could I make 'bronze working' dependant on having access to copper? Thank you in advance for your answers. Yours, Aussie_Lurker.
The nice thing about Rome: Total War is the ability to round up the population of a city you capture, and put them to the blade. No more corruption or rebellion! Any chance of implementing this, so I can get back to gaming instead of spending all my time putting my boot in the back of every rebellious city's neck?
The original Medieval: Total War was a breeze to play. You could really whisk around the map and get through a game turn. With Rome: Total War, the 3D rendering really slowed things down with little value added. I think a game based on a hex or squared based map is ideal for 2D. It's simpy a better fit, and it doesn't require added electricity and
Let's admit it, it's the most beautiful thing in all of the Civ series. Losing your cherry to a spearman (wow, what a pun!).
Any thought given to expanding guerilla tactics?
Making cross platform games does not add any extra time, expense or difficulty. Nor does it makes the game a "lesser" game. Games are some of the easiest apps to make portable, since they don't use any of the native OS gui toolkits, and there are portable libs for everything. Hell, there's idiots who license an existing portable game engine like the unreal or quake engine, and then release a windows only game anyways. We need to keep telling these morons that we are here and want linux versions of games so they eventually get it through their thick skulls.