Civ goes hexagonal

[Phelot]

Does civ 3 and 4 tech get into futuristic stuff like space travel and underwater cities and shit? I remember playing that civ spinoff (can't remember the name, but you built orbital cities and cities underwater.) but not liking it that much.

So, does the tech stop at modern weapons and shit like in 1 and 2?

Also, are there more techs in the latter games? Have they fixed the whole "phalanx against tanks" problems?

 

[Yeesh]

Does civ 3 and 4 tech get into futuristic stuff like space travel and underwater cities and shit? I remember playing that civ spinoff (can't remember the name, but you built orbital cities and cities underwater.) but not liking it that much.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_to_Power

I liked buiding cities underwater.

 

[Phelot]

Yes that was the one. I missed the extremely stereotyped diplomacy characters that 2 had

 

[Grunker]

Yes that was the one. I missed the extremely stereotyped diplomacy characters that 2 had

Both III and IV don't use any futuristic stuff in the core game.

One of the best if not the best scenarios for CIV IV, Final Frontier, does. Basically it's CIV IV on a universe scale. Each star roughly representing a city, each planet roughly representing a ressource.

 

[MetalCraze]

So that's like the mission from Civ2 Fantasy pack?
Sweet, gotta check it out

I don't think ZOCs are necessary in a game where every single unit in play covers an area of at least a couple hundred square miles.

Civ isn't about realism by far, there is just too much "schematic" stuff or something - it's about gameplay though. I always like how zones of control added certain tactical depth.
Like you could've terraformed the ground into hills on both sides of main routes and put forts there with defensive units. It was hard for attacking forces to tear them down.
Defensive lines also made sense and were useful. Civ4 was disappointing in those regards, especially when you had to play cat and mouse with enemy units that were simply going past your units like nothing happened which was annoying.

 

[Grunker]

So that's like the mission from Civ2 Fantasy pack?
Sweet, gotta check it out

I haven't played it so I can't say. Concerning Final Frontier, however, it can sometimes be a mixed bag. On one hand the design is extremely good, and the scope is huge; it's a professional remake of civilzation in space. This also means, sadly, that the details are neglected sometimes. It's worth checking out by any Civ-fan, that's for damn sure.

 

[Panthera]

it's a professional remake of civilzation in space.

In my opinion, GalCiv2 does a better job.

 

[Grunker]

it's a professional remake of civilzation in space.

In my opinion, GalCiv2 does a better job.

I tried to like GalCiv2, but I found it lacking in a lot of departments. I'm not saying Final Frontier is perfect, I just enjoyed it more. The Civ-gameplay is a lot better, in my opinion.

 

[nullspace]

it's a professional remake of civilzation in space.

In my opinion, GalCiv2 does a better job.

I tried to like GalCiv2, but I found it lacking in a lot of departments. I'm not saying Final Frontier is perfect, I just enjoyed it more. The Civ-gameplay is a lot better, in my opinion.

But Final Frontier lacks two of the best things about Civ 4: wonders and great people. It's an impressive graphical mod and worth playing as a variation of Civ if you already own BTS, but regular Civ 4 is better.

This is actually on-topic for Civ 5 because Final Frontier was created by Jon Shafer, who is the lead designer for Civ 5.

 

[Yeesh]

Civ isn't about realism by far, there is just too much "schematic" stuff or something - it's about gameplay though. I always like how zones of control added certain tactical depth.
Like you could've terraformed the ground into hills on both sides of main routes and put forts there with defensive units. It was hard for attacking forces to tear them down.
Defensive lines also made sense and were useful. Civ4 was disappointing in those regards, especially when you had to play cat and mouse with enemy units that were simply going past your units like nothing happened which was annoying.

Look, I'm an olde-timey enough gamer that whenever I play a game without ZOCs it just feels weird. I only mean that with the scale of Civ being what it is, you can already think of the massive space that each unit takes up as encompassing both the unit (somewhere in the middle of those hundreds of square miles) and it's ZOC already. See?

Again, I hope they scale the whole thing down. More squares/hexes, more tactical options. Then ZOCs would make more sense to me. But I expect the scale is going to remain the same.

 

[MetalCraze]

Don't forget that one move also takes hundreds of years in the beginning of the game. So I imagine 200 years will be more than enough for one army to reach another.
This was actually the problem of Civs - before you knew it you were already close to modern era and in the end it was all about building more stuff with the latest possible techs with starting-to-mid ages being completely useless. I think it took less time getting from 4000 BC to 1000 AD than getting from 1900 to 2000.

 

[Grunker]

it's a professional remake of civilzation in space.

In my opinion, GalCiv2 does a better job.

I tried to like GalCiv2, but I found it lacking in a lot of departments. I'm not saying Final Frontier is perfect, I just enjoyed it more. The Civ-gameplay is a lot better, in my opinion.

But Final Frontier lacks two of the best things about Civ 4: wonders and great people. It's an impressive graphical mod and worth playing as a variation of Civ if you already own BTS, but regular Civ 4 is better.

This is actually on-topic for Civ 5 because Final Frontier was created by Jon Shafer, who is the lead designer for Civ 5.

Of course, I never contested that CIV IV's gameplay is much better. Final Frontier was also good, is all I'm saying.

 

[kris]

Don't forget that one move also takes hundreds of years in the beginning of the game. So I imagine 200 years will be more than enough for one army to reach another.
This was actually the problem of Civs - before you knew it you were already close to modern era and in the end it was all about building more stuff with the latest possible techs with starting-to-mid ages being completely useless. I think it took less time getting from 4000 BC to 1000 AD than getting from 1900 to 2000.

True. I actually have the biggest problem with the midgame, it is always just techrushed past with the first gunpowder units often not used at all. 1900-2000 generally take FAR longer than 4000BS to 1000AD, unless you have a long eternal peace those later years.

 

[MaskedMartyr]

The shift to limited resources is a double-edged sword, IMHO. On one hand, the placement of cities as a reflection of economy vs military will be highlighted more. You either expand to the nearest military resource but have a mediocre city in terms of economy, or choose the more growth oriented-placement.

On the other hand, if the number of resources in the map pretty much determine the number of special units you can make, the special units might be too strong or too weak balance wise. If they don't make the special units like horsemen strong enough, then players will stick to infantry and the strategic options would be limited. If they make it too strong, then the game will rely too much on luck (you either have easy access to resources or you don't).

It is strange to begin with that you can't spread living resources like pigs, wheat and horses. If you have horses available you should be able to build a horse farm to have them for that city... or have workers build it on the map.

I have a feeling they might implement "supply buildings" if you have access to the resource. Not overpowered, just like 2+ horsemen or whatever, and they take a bit to construct and might have drawbacks (like say decreased city health)

 

[Wise Emperor]

Fuck you Sid Meier and your fucking Civ 5.

Alpha Centauri fanboy.




















Goddamit make it already.

 

[Turisas]

Alpha Centauri fanboy.

You should direct your hatred at EA; they own the license and so far haven't shown any interest in doing anything with it. Meier couldn't do AC2 even if he wanted to.

 

[Wise Emperor]

You made my sad.

Still Meier could just do CIV in space.

Edit

Hope EA won't think of brilliant idea to resurrect the franchise.

 

[MetalCraze]

Alpha Centauri done by Sid would've sucked most likely.
Best Civ-games were done with Brian Reynolds leading the pack (Civ2, AC, Colonization). Look how Alien Crossfire sucked when Brian left.
Civ3 and Civ4 design wasn't led by Sid either.

 

[Ogg]

I'd love an Alpha Centauri FPS. Or maybe an RPG hybrid. That would be epic.

 

[Destroid]

I'd love a Fast and the Furious FPS but we can't have everything we want.

 

[Trash]

Dunno about the hexes but I sure as hell like those terrain graphics.

 

[Mantiis]

So is alpha centauri just civilisation on another planet? I just assumed it was and never played it. Sounds like I need to not remove it from an inventory...

 

[L'ennui]

So is alpha centauri just civilisation on another planet? I just assumed it was and never played it. Sounds like I need to not remove it from an inventory...

It's basically that, but it's also a much better civ game than civ ever was. You'll see... it has more atmosphere and substance than all other games like it combined, and remarkably good gameplay.

DRONE RIOT :!:

ON TOPIC: Hexagons are hot.

 

[MetalCraze]

SMAC lore and world were heavily inspired by Heinlein and Clarke so go figure

And it also has a unit constructor. If you like that in MoO2 - here it is done far better.
And there are no units that can become outdated (only their weapons). Even a mere infantry has a big bonus during sieges and later do drops right into the enemy city from sky (or space provided you have that one secret project)

Secret projects have cool videos, stolen from some art-house movie

There is one thing to dislike though. On the proper difficulty you are given only 300 years (read 300 moves) to play the game (compared to 400 on lower difficulties). So it makes it impossible to win the game via a world domination unless you play on a small map and who will want that. Arghh

 

[Ashery]

There is one thing to dislike though. On the proper difficulty you are given only 300 years (read 300 moves) to play the game (compared to 400 on lower difficulties). So it makes it impossible to win the game via a world domination unless you play on a small map and who will want that. Arghh

People who are OCD when it comes to managing their units and cities and would otherwise lose interest in a large map game due to spending well over an hour on an individual turn ;p