Sim Civilization!

[Jason Beaudoin]

What do you think?

Everyone keeps thinking in terms of TBS vs Real-Time, but what if you're civilization grew according to your decisions and actions rather than direct intervention?

Your empire expands and new cities form as new land is discovered, and if there's enough food in your existing cities.

Domestic politics plays an important roles as you struggle to expand your empire while attempting to maintain the fragile mood of your civs.

Scientific discoveries occur spontaneously as time goes on and at a rate that is greatly dependent on your government policies.

[Lemmy]

i don't know, what about military and war?
how are the units produced if you don't directly control cities ?

what sort of decisions do you have to make, examples ?

[dainbramaged13]

good idea, but again, implementation?

[Lemmy]

i do like the domestic politics thingie, will you have to deal with political parties, or maybe even rebel groups if your population isn't too happy?

[TCO]

I like the idea of more chance in the science progress. You could still maybe direct how much concentration is done on science or even say peace vs war science. But it would be neat cot to know exaclty when you get an improvement or which one. The micro-managers would hate it...but they are weenies. It would be nice to make the game more challenging and replayable.

[The diplomat]

This sounds like an idea that I had for a hypothetical civ game.
Basically, the player would be the actual leader of the country. There would be screens for domestic policies, military policies, agricultural policies, diplomatic policies etc where the player could determine how things work, from tax rates, trade tariffs to military draft etc.
There would also be a "law screen" where the player could actually create any kind of law that he/she wants by combining different elements in any combo. For example, the player could pass a law that encourages 5% pop growth. Or, the player could pass a law that bans freedom of speech. The amount of political power the player had would determine how many laws the player could pass in a single turn. And of course if your country has a senate, they might have to vote on your laws before they became actual law. And the senate could pass it own laws.
The player could see the effects of their policies as cities grew, shrank, as population migrated, as popular opinion rised or dropped, as even revolts popped up etc
It would be very dynamic. The best of all is that the player would have a great sense of what kind of leader they were by lookng at their policies. Are they a benevolent dictator? Are they emphasizing agricultural development instead of industrial?

[Inverse Icarus]

how about The Similiazations brought to you my FirMaxis?

where you can get into the head of every Sim in your empire and have them mate or work the fields?

[dainbramaged13]

Originally posted by The diplomat
This sounds like an idea that I had for a hypothetical civ game.
Basically, the player would be the actual leader of the country. There would be screens for domestic policies, military policies, agricultural policies, diplomatic policies etc where the player could determine how things work, from tax rates, trade tariffs to military draft etc.
There would also be a "law screen" where the player could actually create any kind of law that he/she wants by combining different elements in any combo. For example, the player could pass a law that encourages 5% pop growth. Or, the player could pass a law that bans freedom of speech. The amount of political power the player had would determine how many laws the player could pass in a single turn. And of course if your country has a senate, they might have to vote on your laws before they became actual law. And the senate could pass it own laws.
The player could see the effects of their policies as cities grew, shrank, as population migrated, as popular opinion rised or dropped, as even revolts popped up etc
It would be very dynamic. The best of all is that the player would have a great sense of what kind of leader they were by lookng at their policies. Are they a benevolent dictator? Are they emphasizing agricultural development instead of industrial?

I like it - freeciv2 anyone, cuz it aint happenin from firaxis

[jdd2007]

BOOOO!!!!
Down with the RTS heretic!!!!
*grabs a pitchfork*

[Jason Beaudoin]

My key message in this post has nothing to do with RTS. Although it would be a game with more RTS qualities, it would feel more like a simulation.

For example, you wouldn't see instant results from your actions, but rather, a series of actions would create an certain type of atmosphere, much like what we've seen in Sim City.

Of course, the logistics of programming in units and combat would have to worked out, but I would welcome the idea of trying to meld the concept of Simulation into an Empire building game.

[Earthling7]

Not the same thing, but this reminds me a bit of CyberJudas.

[Earthling7]

This is what Sid says about CivI on the CivIII website:

"SimCity inspired Civilization in a way. The first prototype of Civilization that I did was a real-time game like SimCity, in that you placed cities and moved things around, but cities grew without you. You basically seeded the world in a kind of SimCity-esque way. Instead of zoning, you seeded things, and you said I want a city over there, and why don't you do some farming over here. What I didn't like in that version of Civilization is that you did a lot more watching than you did playing. So SimCity, Empire, Railroad Tycoon, and the Civilization board game were the different ingredients that we stirred together to get to Civilization. "

[Tjoepie]

Sounds like a promissing idea, but I think that before such a game is developed some big progress will have to be made in AI.

The danger if AI is not up to specs in such a game is that it will seriously hamper replayebility.
You'll think , "ok but that's same in Civ" , wéll yes for your opponents , but here you'll even need AI on your side aswell!
I for one would be very frustrated if "my" AI ( being the population) would always react the way I wanted it to without any "intelligent" surprises since I don't have any direct control to have some fun.
( And AI stupidities don't count ! )
Anyway, my humble opignon is that in a strategy game where control is indirect, one needs a very intelligent AI to make it fun.
RTS is less affected by AI stupidities since fast action is a big part of the game and it's easier to play multiplayer games.

I hope the AI in Civ III will be seriously improved because thats what makes or brakes a strategy game that probably most of us will play single player due to its length.

[Timtopia]

That's a great idea, I think you should call it "SimNation" as you may recall from SimCity 3000 you city is actually part of SimNation and the people coming to your city are from the "SimNation". Lets get Will Wright and Sid Meier on this project.

[red_jon]

The Sim Civlization concept sounds a lot like Tropico...

[Jason Beaudoin]

Thanks for the info Earthling7! I never knew that Sid had tried that out, and I guess he's right. There would be a lot of watching rather than playing.

[Sabre2th]

Why do people keep trying to do this? If you make it that different, it's not civ. If you want a game like SimCity, play SimCity. Civ is unique in many ways. If you make it like other games, it loses what makes it special. Leave civ alone.

[dainbramaged13]

maybe it oculd be a multiplayeronly game

[Sava]

Originally posted by UberKruX
how about The Similiazations brought to you my FirMaxis?

where you can get into the head of every Sim in your empire and have them mate or work the fields?

LOL

[Urban Ranger]

Sounds suspiciously like Tropico, which is quite a sad game.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Tjoepie
Sounds like a promissing idea, but I think that before such a game is developed some big progress will have to be made in AI.

The danger if AI is not up to specs in such a game is that it will seriously hamper replayebility.
You'll think , "ok but that's same in Civ" , wéll yes for your opponents , but here you'll even need AI on your side aswell!

You hardly need AI for opponents - this is would be more of a solitaire game like caeasar 3 - opponents would be more abstract - realize thats harder in a nation-building context than a city-building context, but still the idea would be to give up on MP, and, using assymetry between human player and others, have the design subtitute for the AI (am I making sense?) Would not so much need AI for your side, but "models" of behaviour, as simcity has a migration model, transportation model, etc. These could be play tested (aka validated) and refined.

I rather hope that this is what Sid intends as eventual fruit of Maxis colloboration, not more golf games.

LOTM

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Sabre2th
Why do people keep trying to do this? If you make it that different, it's not civ. If you want a game like SimCity, play SimCity. Civ is unique in many ways. If you make it like other games, it loses what makes it special. Leave civ alone.

Or rather what I dont like about Simcity is its limitation to a single city, its failure to fully model a national economy, its absence of national politics, its failure to model research, and its absence of international affairs. Really, "simnation" would be half way between simcity and civ. Not having played Tropico, I cannot comment on that.

LOTM

[Falconius]

Like the great Sid says, "You'd be doing more watching than playing."

Yippee. I may as well watch television.