scale in time and space

Brent · January 16, 2001, 17:09

It takes decades to cross an ocean. during most of the game, it takes years to go any noticeable distance. This is not realism or historical accuracy. It wouldn't make sense as a game if you fixed that. Does this mean nothing has to be realistic or historically accurate? Maybe the main game should drop you anywhere from 4000 BC to 1500 AD and last only 500 years, and have each turn be only one year. I mean, 1000 years between high council meetings? Come on! Oh, and I guess time scale is wierder than spatial scale, but you can talk about either or both here.

Steve Clark · January 16, 2001, 17:24

Ok, Brent, you have a game whose time span is 6000 years. How many turns do you want to have to be "realistic"? 6000? 3000? 1000? 250-300 is plenty, believe me. The game has to playable and fun and remember, Civ is an abstract-level sweep of history game. You seem to miss the point of what makes Civ unique, it is not AoE, nor should it be.

Besides, if you want more "realism" in a Civ game, build or play a scenario. There you can concentrate on a specific time period and have each turn represent a day if you wish. For example, several folks here have criticized the 50 year per turn in the ancient period. You have to have that else you'd never get to the modern age. If you want more turns in the ancient period, then play Kull's Seeds of Greatness scenario.

Brent · January 16, 2001, 18:05

I was not arguing for more realism in this. I was merely asking what other people thought and pointing out that it would be ridiculous to demand it.

lord of the mark · January 16, 2001, 18:12

There was a discussion of whether it would be possible to create a realistic Civ like game on a 6000 yr time scale, in USENET on comp.system.pc.ibm.games.strategic some months back.the essential conclusion was no. The maximum turn length (in years) to make things work would lead to way too many turns.

Would you really want a 6000 turn game? and thats really not enough, would you want ww2 (or its equvalent) to pass in 6 turns, with carriers going around the world several times in a turn?

realism in a playable game requires a shorter time scale.

Im not yet sure whether the goal of greater realsim can best be achieved in a civ scenario, or in a game (like Imp2 or EU) designed for a shorter period.

Brent · January 16, 2001, 18:19

I know I don't want a 6000 turn game, that's why I brought up a 500 year game.