4000 BC to 2020 AD, is that to short?

bertje121 · April 22, 2001, 07:20

Civ III will probably be played from 4000 BC to 2020 AD. I think that's to short. It also means there won't be any future techs.
What do you guys think about this?

Lord_Davinator · April 22, 2001, 08:51

I thought it would be a bit longer than that.

There are a few future technologies in the game, most of which are there cause someday we will have them... it adds a more realistic feature to the game and doesn't turn it into a sci-fi boggle like ctp1.

For me(I want historc accuracy to the game) I think its a good thing to do. Hopefully the game will be good enough so that we don't have a pile of fut. tech by the end of the game.

BTW any one thought of what they'll put in instead of the fut. tech? making it more usefull than they were in civ2 in terms of affecting the game??

Ralf · April 22, 2001, 09:31

Its a very good thing that Firaxis decided to skip future techs & units in the main game.

On the other hand; it is also very likely that they will either bundle the main game or a scenario-pack, with some really nice futuristic scenarios, with all the future-style techs and units that you can possibly ask for. Everybody, incluiding SciFi-fans, wins by Firaxis decision to cut-out the SciFi-stuff from the main game.

Lets say the main game comes with 110+ techs and 75+ units. Thanks to the fact that they wisely decided to furnish only 4000 BC - 2020 AD; the main game will become much more enriched & ample. Also, any Sci-Fi scenario-creators can more easily start their work from a clean sheet, without having already existing main game SciFi-techs and units to worry about. There will pretty quickly be futuristic mod-packs available for download - available to every SciFi-scenario creator out there.

[This message has been edited by Ralf (edited April 22, 2001).]

MrFun · April 22, 2001, 11:27

Hopefully, they won't allow too many years to pass for each turn.

Ralf · April 22, 2001, 13:30

quote:

Originally posted by MrFun on 04-22-2001 11:27 AM
Hopefully, they won't allow too many years to pass for each turn.

I woudnt mind if they raised the total ammount of game-turns from 500 (in SMAC, I believe) to, lets say 600 turns.

SerapisIV · April 22, 2001, 14:15

Going on the assumption that culture has significant importance in CivIII, I think that the future techs will give increased culture ratings, which would also increase score. I can't think of any other usefulness of future techs, but score and culture.

I also think that although the future tech/sci-fi should not be included in the main game that the game should have extra turns. Of course this could be done by just making 1750-1850 be 1-year turns instead of 2-year turns and similar type moves. The assigning of game years is arbitrary anyway, designed only to give a kind of epic feel and rel-world correlation to the game. It's the number of turns that actually matters, so why not bump that number up.

me_irate · April 22, 2001, 17:24

I seem to remember a long time ago when sid first decided to make civ 3. He was planning on making ac2 and civ3 and some game to put them together. It seems to me that leaving off at 2020 and not having a spaceship, he will then make his next game from 2020-whenever and make it finish with the lauch to alpha centauri. It could even be an expansion with maybe 200-300 more years that would be added to the end of Civ 3.

Ilkuul · April 22, 2001, 20:10

quote:

Originally posted by Ralf on 04-22-2001 09:31 AM
Its a very good thing that Firaxis decided to skip future techs & units in the main game.

They did!? Where/when/by whom was this stated?

Ilkuul · April 22, 2001, 20:14

quote:

Originally posted by me_irate on 04-22-2001 05:24 PM
...not having a spaceship...

No spaceship either?! You guys are wrecking my whole concept of Civ3. Where does that piece of info come from? Yes, I'd gathered that the ending was not going to be AC exactly as in Civ3... but to me that didn't necessarily imply no spaceship. I love my spaceships!

Lawrence of Arabia · April 22, 2001, 21:38

I dont think Civ3 should go too far in the future. Maybe have one futuristic advance for Land/Sea/air and one tech advance for economics/mathematics/scicen but not anything more.

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Its okay to smile; you're in America now

Cyclotron · April 22, 2001, 21:50

I think 4000 to 2020 is too short...

...But only if it uses Civ2 style time passage. I think there should be many more turns in Civ3, so I advocate a quarterly or even monthly system. More turns are needed, but 4000 and 2020 are good limits... so we just need more turns!

About future technologies: Been there, done that, it sucked

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- Cyclotron7, "that supplementary resource fanatic"

Jer8m8 · April 23, 2001, 00:00

It's a great idea; I agree
It's also not new

People have suggested, yes future techs, prehistoric techs (ex. agriculture), and shorter turns. I myself suggested you start as a nomadic tribe (1 unit) that moves, does not keep explored knowledge, and has to research city-building.

Adm.Naismith · April 23, 2001, 04:51

quote:

Originally posted by Ilkuul on 04-22-2001 08:14 PM
No spaceship either?! You guys are wrecking my whole concept of Civ3. Where does that piece of info come from? Yes, I'd gathered that the ending was not going to be AC exactly as in Civ3... but to me that didn't necessarily imply no spaceship. I love my spaceships!

Hmmm, AFAIK the Spaceship seems will be keept, at least for continuity and link to the previus Civ episodes.

Of course it's totally unrealistic to have mankind in 2020AD ready to send a starship to Alpha Centauri; probably until then we won't go to Mars, for that matters.

This is still a case were I vote to keep a Great Dream over more realistic "inside Solar System" game target.

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Admiral Naismith AKA mcostant

schubert37 · April 23, 2001, 09:54

There could be an expansion set. I'm thinking of something like Civ ToT, that wasn't that bad after all. The graphics were bad, o.K., but I loved the idea of an extended original play.

Ralf · April 23, 2001, 13:21

quote:

Originally posted by Ilkuul on 04-22-2001 08:10 PM
They did!? Where/when/by whom was this stated?

Click on this Apolyton-link: Interview with Sid
The original Gamespot.UK link is: Sid Meier on Civilization III

[This message has been edited by Ralf (edited April 23, 2001).]

Mars_Col_44 · April 23, 2001, 13:55

quote:

Originally posted by Adm.Naismith on 04-23-2001 04:51 AM
... Of course it's totally unrealistic to have mankind in 2020AD ready to send a starship to Alpha Centauri; probably until then we won't go to Mars, for that matters.

...

What?! We are not going to Mars?!

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Service means Citizenship. I'm doing my part!

SerapisIV · April 24, 2001, 01:32

I think that 4000 BC and 2020 are just fine for technology limits, I don't want to see space/ocean cities in CivIII.

I think that the changing of time should change based on you tech. As some people have done, launching the spaceship around 1000AD. Well once you've gotten railroad, it doesn't take 60 years (3turns@20years/turn) to build a railroad in 920AD. I wouldn't mind an adaptive year scale, with time taking as long as your tech would allow. Once you have Industrialization, turns are 2year/turn, Computers, 1year/turn. That kinda thing.

Adm.Naismith · April 24, 2001, 03:48

quote:

Originally posted by SerapisIV on 04-24-2001 01:32 AM
I think that the changing of time should change based on you tech.

Serapis IV, are you considering that the more advanced player will force the timescale for all the others?
You know, it's not as you are really alone on the map

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Admiral Naismith AKA mcostant

SerapisIV · April 24, 2001, 04:13

Thats the idea. The years really don't mean anything to me other then give a baseline as to how long I've been playng (usually too long). It's just an idea, I really don't care either way, it doesn't effect the game.

Actually adding more turns (the length of the game, not the artificial years) would be a really nice feature, but then the game would require more depth, because I haven't played a game past 1950 in a few years. The same with SMAC, I rarely got past 2425. More stuff to do would be nice.

jdlessl · April 24, 2001, 07:11

I think the six thousand years will be plenty long _provided_ that the early and mid game isn't just blown off in a the game's rush to get to the modern age. In so many of my games absolutely nothing interesting happens until I get to gunpowder and it's really a shame. 20 or 50 years per turn in the beginning is just way too fast.

I agree with the "no space or sea colonies" sentiment. Fortifications at sea might be cool, but no colonies. Same goes for space-based weapons (nuclear and kinetic bombardment platforms) and defenses (ABM systems), as it's reasonable to think we could be using them in the next 20 years. Basically the stuff from SMAC; no colonies. Throw in items like communication satellites and weather satellites to provide happiness and food bonuses repsectively. Small improvements; SMAC satellites were , I think, a little to beneficial.

--
Jared Lessl

Jeje2 · April 24, 2001, 08:02

quote:

Originally posted by cyclotron7 on 04-22-2001 09:50 PM
More turns are needed, but 4000 and 2020 are good limits... so we just need more turns!

I second this.

SMAC is for future CivIII is past and today.
More turns could possibly be good, but CTP-midgame might then be a problem.
(Oh, haven't myself played CTP - heard rumors)
On the other hand I like it when a game of SMAC doesn't take too long.
I can play a game in a weekend. (And doing something else also that weekend.) Europa Universalis took me a whole weekend to finnish and then I'd been playing too fast. (Feels just too long for a game/scenario.)

King Richard · April 25, 2001, 20:08

I like the idea of more turns! The first 4000 years (or more..) I usually just build cities and wonders anyway (kinda boring). I think that every turn should have the same amount of years gone by (let's say 5 years), then we'll need more techs for the early years, or some sort of slower science in the beginning. I prefer to have as many turns as possible. Perhaps if you can choose how long you want to play, instead of small maps (quick game), you can choose more turns (long game/full game). When it comes to future tech, I think that techs like the human genome project, the human brain, national missile defence (not SDI), a trip to the Moon and Mars and other more likely techs that we might just see in the future. Both a trip to the moon and the human genome project has been done, so these should at least be implemented in the game. A trip to Alpha Centauri isn't very likely to happen in a while, so this should be taken away from civ3!

Your.Master · April 25, 2001, 22:11

quote:

Originally posted by Adm.Naismith on 04-23-2001 04:51 AM
Hmmm, AFAIK the Spaceship seems will be keept, at least for continuity and link to the previus Civ episodes.

Of course it's totally unrealistic to have mankind in 2020AD ready to send a starship to Alpha Centauri; probably until then we won't go to Mars, for that matters.

This is still a case were I vote to keep a Great Dream over more realistic "inside Solar System" game target.

You know, the plan is to have people landing on Mars by 2010? And NASA said that it was a pessimistic forecasting. My source is Popular Science magazine. So Mars by 2020 CERTAINLY isn't infeasible for a parallel universe.

Ecthy · April 26, 2001, 16:40

I also think the game should be extended... but they should make those extensions in regard to time span covered by a turn rather than number of years the game lasts... for example, the middle ages were hardly touched in civ or civ2, not even mentioning call to power, were we had a direct connection between ancient times and renaissance...

I say let's have some 4000BC - 2500AD but more turns than in CIV2... and mor etechs and units between ancient and renaissance!! and between renaissance and modern times also!

Caber · April 29, 2001, 17:07

Instead of having a hard-coded number of turns built into the game, why not include it in a file like CivII's "rules.txt"? All that is needed is a simple variable that would tell the game how many turns it takes to go from 4000BC to 2020AD.

If someone prefers short games, they could set this number to 500 or less, while someone who prefers long games could set it to 1000. Obviously there should be a set minimum and maximum, or this modification could make the game unplayable.

The calculation to determine how many years each turn takes should be fairly simple, but I don't have the energy to figure it out right now.

Ralf · April 29, 2001, 17:18

quote:

Originally posted by Caber on 04-29-2001 05:07 PM
Instead of having a hard-coded number of turns built into the game, why not include it in a file like CivII's "rules.txt"? All that is needed is a simple variable that would tell the game how many turns it takes to go from 4000BC to 2020AD.

If theres an easy way to implement this - well, why not. Good idea!

Roman · April 29, 2001, 17:30

Well, even in Civ2 you could carry on playing after 2020, so I am sure the same will be implemented in Civ 3. Therefore, I wouldn't worry about this issue.

Sirotnikov · April 30, 2001, 17:18

Future units? Why the hell would I want that? I have SMAC for that, and I don't particulary care for it...

Increased number of turns is the option.

The thing is, Civ 2 used to decrease the number of turns drastically the higher was the difficulty. But that caused the ancient era and the middle ages to be forgotten.... If I had an Island start. I would have met other civs only around 100AD which isn't right!

more turns = more fun = more game play.

That's another reason why there is no way one couldn't conquer the world in diety. On a large map, you simply don't haave the time to build enough units... you have something like half the turns of warlord or something...

Roman · April 30, 2001, 17:26

quote:

Originally posted by Sirotnikov on 04-30-2001 05:18 PM
Future units? Why the hell would I want that? I have SMAC for that, and I don't particulary care for it...

No, don't worry about that. Luckily there will not be futuristic techs in Civ 3

. I am also greatly opposed to them and hail the Firaxis decision to exclude them. Continuing beyond game year 2020 simply means you get more turns - not the inclusion of future techs.

MarBaS · April 30, 2001, 22:42

Well from one of the screen shots, it shows a space ship blasting off, and from what i have heard there are no Wonder movies so you can be leaded to believe that it is either..

a) They have something where you blast off and go to the moon, showing the first people on the moon or...

b) It is the same ol going to Alpha Centauri, or at the end you go to mars. Hey this ways off the origanal topic of is the game to short, but its just my opinion thanks.