Civilization V- Might actually be good now. Stay tuned.

[Malakili]

I played the first C&C. I think I did play Red Alert, too. That's about when I gave up on that.

I played some DoW and it seemed pretty cool, though I still think it would be better TBS :p

Anyway, to me something like this just looks dumb and anachronistic:

*shrugs* I think the gameplay is fantastic, its not nor was it ever meant to be a realistic war game. 

[Soulflame]

haha, that terran built bunkers, plus researched the upgrade! what a noob.

[Merusk]

Gee, somehow I got to the top 3% on the SC2 ladder without ever opening a spreadsheet and playing an average of 3 games a day.  I did hit the wall there, but for gods sake, exaggerate much?  The time problem I ran into really only happens at significantly high levels of play.  You're talking about a characterization of SC2 that is cute and funny and lulz asian APM and build orders, but has little to do with the way the game is actually played.

EDIT:  My point being that if your ONLY concern is being able to mull over strategy, SC2 can provide that, you just spend 5 minutes in between games quickly watching your replay on x4 or 8 speed, seeing where you went wrong, and resolving to try something different next time.  Thats very accessible and easy, and doable at any level of play.

Let me rephrase. You play for the meta game, I play for the game.  I'm not going to watch replays, chart things or even take fucking notes.  I'll go, "well fuck that then" and move on to different games.  There's more games than I have time for, any that require homework beyond watching a youtube video once or review of my gameplay aren't going into my bag.   I could be spending that time gaming or doing something else.

[Stormwaltz]

February patch notes have been posted. There's not much February left, so I imagine it will show up soon.

Working with our “Frankenstein” gameplay test group, we have been looking closely at the tradeoffs between building a Wide empire (one with lots of smaller cities sprawling across the map) and a Tall empire (one with just a few highly populous, highly productive cities). With this patch you’ll see a number of changes to the economic side of the game to bring these two play styles in closer balance with each other. City spacing, building effects and the Liberty and Tradition policy trees are where the most extensive changes have occurred. We’re now seeing games where a Tall empire can match or even exceed a Wide one in production and science output even deep into the game.

http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread.php?104604-February-Patch-Notes

[Sky]

Good to see they didn't even bother with testing two core empire styles. I wonder if any game has single-handedly earned that much ire before. Firaxis has a lot to prove to people who have been loyal fans for almost twenty years.

[dusematic]

I'm done with Civ.  Maybe I'll buy Civ 6 when it's in the bargain bin for $2 in 9 years.  Maybe.

[Tannhauser]

I hope they don't toss out the hexes for Civ6.  Assuming there will be a six.  I have never finished a game of Civ5, despite putting over 80 hours into it.  I just reach a point in each game where I lose interest in continuing.

[Stormwaltz]

Civ games follow the same "even numbers" rule as Star Trek movies. I recall Civ3 also being a dud (at least I only played it a couple of times), and Civ4 redeeming the franchise.

The next one will be our Undiscovered Country.

[Merusk]

I liked Civ3, but you're right. There was much bitching about it, too.

In fact, I disliked that they took some of the cultural border pushback out of 4.  It was so easy to flip enemy cities in 3 by abusing that tactic.

[ghost]

None of the Civs have really done it for me since Civ 2.  It was easy to dive in and get started and feel the fun immediately.  Only Civ 4 came even close, but it still felt like a bloated mess to me. 

[Tannhauser]

Civ games follow the same "even numbers" rule as Star Trek movies. I recall Civ3 also being a dud (at least I only played it a couple of times), and Civ4 redeeming the franchise.

The next one will be our Undiscovered Country.

Ooo someone hammer out a ST mod for Civ5!  Each system could house one city with other planets and moons as 'terrain' and resources.  If you could have it out in a week that would be great.  I'm off to buy my 2 liter Code Red MD and value size bag of Cheetos.

Full disclosure:  I'm on painkillers.

[Sky]

The reason I keep mentioning Kael is he kinda saved one of my favorite gaming franchises, imo. My ranking from best to worst:

FFH2
SMAC
Civ2
Civ3
Civ4
Civ5

I don't recall enough of Civ 1's or Colonization's gameplay to put a ranking in there. But overall my feeling has been the franchise has been moving steadily downward into more bland, streamlined and un-fun play.

[Paelos]

I want to mash Civ and Pirates gameplay together.

Like take Pirates and the ability to sail around blowing shit up with the ability to micromanage my cities, have them gain levels, controlling my pirate empire, etc.

Also, no dancing.

[Jade Falcon]

I want to mash Civ and Pirates gameplay together.

Like take Pirates and the ability to sail around blowing shit up with the ability to micromanage my cities, have them gain levels, controlling my pirate empire, etc.

Also, no dancing.

Just picked up Commander:conquest of the americas on steam for 15$ gives game and both dlc's has both those elements.Lot's of complication and lack of instructions but it is a paradox game after all.You don't play as a pirate but one of the nations settleing the new world manage your colonies expand through diplomacy or force from Canada to the Caribbean.Haven't had a lot of time to spend on it to get through some of the frustration of figureing things out but has been entertaining for the price.

[Brolan]

Has this gotten any better?  I was going to skip it but got it as a gift for Father's Day.  I was wondering if they had any significant patches lately?

[Malakili]

Has this gotten any better?  I was going to skip it but got it as a gift for Father's Day.  I was wondering if they had any significant patches lately?

I don't think its gotten any major patches lately.  It did have a major patch a while back that I think didn't satisfy the hardest of core Civ players, but I think its still worth firing up for a game or two at the very least.  Its still always in the top few games played on Steam every day, so there are a lot of people who like it.   It doesn't quite have the pull that other Civ games have had for me, but even still I always enjoy the time I spend on it when I fire it up from time to time.

[Bunk]

It's not a terrible game - if you got it as a gift it is certainly worth installing and playing. It just didn't have the same compelling replay factor that predecessors did.

[Modern Angel]

If you don't play it, you're saying you don't love your children. You have to play it.

[Murgos]

Has this gotten any better?  I was going to skip it but got it as a gift for Father's Day.  I was wondering if they had any significant patches lately?

There is a big patch due 'very soon now' and there was a big patch in April.

I'm just finishing up a game after having put it down since launch.  It's not Civ IV with all it's expansions but it's not horribad either.  The AI is better but still has problems with attacking coherently, the game works, it's not too buggy and it's probably worth a run through or two.

[Soln]

The reason I keep mentioning Kael is he kinda saved one of my favorite gaming franchises, imo. My ranking from best to worst:

FFH2
SMAC
Civ2
Civ3
Civ4
Civ5

I don't recall enough of Civ 1's or Colonization's gameplay to put a ranking in there. But overall my feeling has been the franchise has been moving steadily downward into more bland, streamlined and un-fun play.

funny, that's pretty much my ranking as well.  I seriously wish someone would buy SMAC from Interplay (?) and make a new version.

Honest question: other than the UI and some AI changes, what's really different or better about Civ5?  I never understood how they sold it as "better than Civ4 and thus must buy".  Felt like they were trading on the fan love only. 

[JWIV]

Patch notes released this afternoon with a late June/July timeframe.  I'd put the list here, but it's even too long for the spoiler tag.  It's a massive patch.


http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread.php?108900-June-July-Patch-Notes

[WayAbvPar]

Heh was just coming to post that. I will definitely play a few games after the patch and see how it feels.

[Sky]

Some stuff sounds decent. Some sounds bizarre...like Caravels losing extra sight on upgrading or Carriers no longer requiring Oil.

Just seems so primitive after playing you-know-what.

[Kail]

Honest question: other than the UI and some AI changes, what's really different or better about Civ5?  I never understood how they sold it as "better than Civ4 and thus must buy".  Felt like they were trading on the fan love only.  

You mean, Civ5 vs. Civ 4?  Or Civ5 now vs. Civ5 at release?

For Civ5 vs. Civ4, I think the big change is that there's no more unit stacking; you get one unit per tile, so no more "stack of doom" scenarios where entire wars are decided out in one turn by a giant fifty unit stack engaging the enemy's fifty unit stack, and then you get a hundred turns of mopping up.  At least, that's the theory, I think there were some issues with how it was impemented.

The game also changed to a hex map (rather than squares), and there were some major tweaks to the economy (gold is super important, and you don't end up building many city improvements compared to civ4).  There were some AI issues early on, too, I don't know if they got looked at.

[Ingmar]

The hex map and lack of unit stacking in Civ V were enough to make Civ 4 feel a bit dated to me when I went back to it. YMMV of course. (Also, I  the city states.)

[Malakili]

The change to Hexes over squares was probably the single biggest draw for me personally.

[Merusk]

Some stuff sounds decent. Some sounds bizarre...like Caravels losing extra sight on upgrading or Carriers no longer requiring Oil.

Just seems so primitive after playing you-know-what.

I think the primary problem (other than the stupid AI) is that the game IS so primitive.  Kael's mod pointed out just what could have been done in 4 but wasn't.  The flavor of each culture, and the actual differences in gameplay are huge.  In Vanilla 4 it's barely noticible.  In civ5 I haven't noticed ANY significant difference between civs in the games I've played wtih the exception of Ghandi and the Japanese.

[Xuri]

I haven't played Civ 5 since shortly after launch, and didn't play it much even then, but in the few games I actually played it felt like I was controlling a bunch of loosely connected city-states instead of an actual nation that would stand the test of time, and all that stuff. :/

[Aez]

I recently bought it and finished a game at difficulty 4 and 5.  AI still need some work.  I was able to destroy 5 time my number with a wall of canon/artillery.  It was still a lot of fun to kill the zerg.

There is a lot of great systems:

The culture policy are amazing - I won both my game with a cultural win.
City states is huge addition - It improves the game and diplomacy.
The planes system is well done.
Puppet city seems cheap but it's very efficient to keep the turns rolling for a huge empire.
High city defense is also interesting.

[Sky]

It's too bad we won't get to see what Kael could do with it. 

I never understood how they sold it as "better than Civ4 and thus must buy". 

To go back and answer this, if Beyond the Sword and FFH2 had never happened, I might think Civ V was a decent game. I wouldn't be thrilled, but it wouldn't be so starkly bland and uninteresting.

[Murgos]

Seriously, if Civ IV hadn't happened, much less FFH, Civ V would probably have been hailed as a major achievement.  But that's not what happened and Civ V hasn't been able to surpass its predecessor.

[Sky]

Well, I thought Civ IV was pretty generic and unfun when it was released, so I push it to BtS. FFH2 is just a given 

Like my current FFH2 game, I'm faced with a psychotically aggressive Sheelba who is trying to maintain a constant state of war because she's hell bent on this one city I dropped in a bottleneck and Lanun, who is pretty mellow but the #2 ranked power with an obviously mighty navy. So far he's been very cool, but he's also extremely tight with Sheelba and has given her his naval tech, so I'm pushed into baiting out her Frigates to gang tackle with my vet privateers and a fire wizard on the coast™ (fireballs to soften up the frigates, privateers to get the kill/xp). I've just got my empire in order to start pumping out upgraded wizards, but Sheelba is putting my back to the wall because she now has ogres, and I'm still on str 4 warriors and hunters with only two wizards (one of which is on the other side of the empire supporting the navy). So I've got all but three of the warriors in my entire empire in the bottleneck praying she doesn't unload a ton of troops somewhere (which is why I'm pushing the naval war). Lanun won't help, won't even stop trading with her.

I think there are 3 neutral (2 of which are Lanun and me), one good (two if you count the just-summoned Basium), and eight evil empires (counting Infernals). So the armageddon counter is cranked up to about 33 right now. I'm just hoping my plan of deferring my wizard army until I could make mega wizards (free death 2 or 3, plus free xp thanks to cave of ancestors and 6 mana sources) doesn't bite me if the Horsemen pop too soon...

[Draegan]

I liked the game enough when it came out.  I didn't have any major complaints.  Felt like Civ to me.  But I didn't get crazy with it this time around to find the flaws.

Civ1 was the best though.  Could be my rosy glasses though.   

[Malakili]

Civ 5 had one of the same problems as SC2.  By the time it came out, the previous game (Civ 4, and SC1) had matured and refined to such a degree that a new game, regardless of the polish or mechanics, wasn't going to have the same impact right away.   I think since then the uproar has dies down  (in both games), and people have just started accepting the game for what it is. Sure, there are some Civ 4 players who will just hate Civ 5 no matter what, and some Brood War players who will say SC2 is shit, but it seems like over all the reception have been fine.  Hell, Civ 5 is always in the top 10 most played games on Steam every day... up with the likes of CoD, that can hardly be seen as too big a failure IMO

[rk47]

They can't even get diplomacy right. Open borders has no trade benefits? If a nation has no resources or money, they're essentially worthless and random tech trade award...wtf? I never played a Civ 4 game hoping I would find unique resources to cash in and buy units to rush like Civ 5 did. It was a bad change to make money so important.