Check this Out http://www.pcgameplay.co.uk/home.htm

[jglidewell]

Kwel

[shuttleswo]

NEW SCREENSHOTS!

http://www.pcgameplay.co.uk/newscentre.htm

[Nemo]

ummm, the forests and marshes look like tey used a sponge and some paint
but i know they arent finished, and i am sure they will make it look very nice when finished. i mean, hey, look at the details of the mountains

can someone fed-ex me a copy of PC GAMEPLAY ? i have never seen that magazine in the states, but if they do sell it here, can someone let me know which nat'l chain store sells it? thanx
[This message has been edited by Nemo (edited April 26, 2001).]

[Nemo]

the "city queue" under the city name is sweet, but that and the city name are hard to read. i hope you can resize the map, like you could in civ II.
what are the little "F" by the cities? mybe a placemarker for the "F"lags?
and it looks like the national border ends where the city radius ends i was hoping the national border extended a few squares beyond the city radius (by maybe 2 squares or so), becuase the way it currently is forces you to put your cities on top of each other to maintain a connected nat'l border. how were borders in smac? i forget, did they stop at teh city's edge or extend beyond it?
[This message has been edited by Nemo (edited April 26, 2001).]

[shuttleswo]

What is the second screen shot? my guess is a wonder movie, but for which wonder? Maybe the apollo program?
[This message has been edited by shuttleswo (edited April 26, 2001).]

[jglidewell]

Does any one have the magazine yet?

[Nemo]

shuttleswo: i think so too, either wonders movie or intro (not likely though imo) or space ending (hmmm, could be that). yeah, probably wonder movie or space ending

[Fiera]

Hmm, I can't say I like the colors very much, especially the blue/green they've used for the ocean...

And I don't like neither the city icons nor the fonts they're using at all... If they don't change these things, I know I'm gonna feel nostalgy when playing Civ3...

[jglidewell]

In terms of color I can not tell? compare to the CGW screenshots.

[The diplomat]

The screenshot looks really promising.
I like the style of the interface. It is very minimal which is good because the more of the main map that we see, the better.
-The buttons on the bottom seem to be to fortify, settle, move. It looks like we will get different buttons for whichever unit is activated.
-I like the little windows for the mini-map and the unit info. Again, I like how they are discrete and do not hide the main map.
-I also noticed that the units will have colored circles to identify them instead of flags.
-We will probably access the other screens through our advisors in the top. Clicking our science advisor will bring up the science screen etc...
-I also noticed that below the city names, seems to be the current queue and the time to completion. Knowing the time to completion on the main map is very good!
-Last, on top we see the name of the civ, the govt, the total gold and the amount of gold each turn. Knowing the amount of gold each turn is very important info. This is really good to see on the main map. The player will be able to directly see how his/her economy is doing. great!

The interface seems to be designed to be as invisible as possible but still give us the necessary info. This is very good. keep it up Firaxis.

[The diplomat]

To those who have the mag, what other good info is there?

[SerapisIV]

The advisors are in the top right.

WHERE'S ELVIS??????

[Fintilgin]

Looking interesting...

I don't think those are swamps by the way, they look like irrigation. Look how they overlay the tan `plains' in the lower right corner. I agree with those who think they look awfully boxy and artifical. The hills and forests and coastlines are very nice looking though. I'm kinda upset with the `boxy' look though, overall, as with the snowy terrain and dryer terrain. The squares look big enough that they could put smoothing diagonal `fill' to round off the squares and still have be clear what terrain your unit was on. The ninty degree angles need to be smoothed off a lot more.

And honestly, I hope we get flags and not little colored circles. They make it look more like a computer game then a picture of a mighty empire, and seem really unnatural and unattractive. Europa Universalis has these wonderful little waving flags for all the units of all 90 odd nations. I think CivIII can do that or better. I really want flags, even if they're colored flags instead of national ones. National ones would be best though. They could fly over every unit and city, and be as clear, if not more so, then colored flags or circles ever could be.

Actually, it makes me wonder. Everyone keeps saying they're going to change these a lot, but are they? I wonder if they'd even BE releasing screenshots if they weren't /fairly/ close to the final product. Now, my impression of the graphics is a mixed bag. Some parts look very nice, and some look a little iffy. On the other hand, this is not a game I'll be buying because of the graphics, I'll be buying it for the gameplay. The truth is 2D tile-based graphics can only look so good, and these are fairly up there. I think Firaxis might have been better off going with a true 3D map which then had artifical `square' zones of movement superimposed over it.

Here's a thought though, I hope Firaxis sees this. If the advisors are featured so prominently on the interface, they presumbably they're being designed to be very useful. I'm sure you can see lots of info and tweak lots of things with them. However, may I suggest using symbols instead of faces on the main screen? The advisor heads would still appear once you opened them, but they strike me as counter-intuitive on the main interface.

In other words, the military advisor should be crossed swords, economic a pile of coins, diplomacy crossed flags, science a lightbulb and so forth. Then it would be /extremely/ easy to know where you're going immediately. Advisor access should be as intuitive as possible. We shouldn't be guessing which guy is the science advisor, and which is the economic advisor.

Wow. That message sounds much more critical then I intended, I'm actually very enthusastic about the game and seeing more screenshots.... I think there were some funny compression blurriness/scaling issues with that shot. I'll wait until I see some offical Firaxis shots before coming to any final judgements on the graphics.

Joe
[This message has been edited by Fintilgin (edited April 26, 2001).]

[SerapisIV]

quote: Originally posted by Fintilgin on 04-26-2001 02:30 PM Here's a thought though, I hope Firaxis sees this. If the advisors are featured so prominently on the interface, they presumbably they're being designed to be very useful. I'm sure you can see lots of info and tweak lots of things with them. However, may I suggest using symbols instead of faces on the main screen? The advisor heads would still appear once you opened them, but they strike me as counter-intuitive on the main interface. In other words, the military advisor should be crossed swords, economic a pile of coins, diplomacy crossed flags, science a lightbulb and so forth. Then it would be /extremely/ easy to know where you're going immediately. Advisor access should be as intuitive as possible. We shouldn't be guessing which guy is the science advisor, and which is the economic advisor.

Thats a great idea !! Simple and efficient. That or maybe the symbols behind the face, with the faces smaller. The faces do kinda add character to the advisors

[Fintilgin]

quote: Originally posted by SerapisIV on 04-26-2001 02:36 PM Thats a great idea !! Simple and efficient. That or maybe the symbols behind the face, with the faces smaller. The faces do kinda add character to the advisors

Oh, well, I suspect those little faces are just a sample of a larger one we'll see when we actually access the advisor. As such, they really shouldn't be on the main screen I don't think. I /know/ I'd be confused by having to pick between a bunch of faces to get info on my diplomatic relations. I'd probably end up messing with my economy instead!

It's interesting to note that the team working on Master of Orion III is trying very hard to add a `Fifth X' to the tradional 4X Civ style game genre (eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate). That of eXperience. As such, Firaxis should ask themselves if having the faces up there adds to the experience and feeling of ruling a mighty civilization or detracts from it. I think dramatic symbols would do the job better.

Of course with my luck, they're just place-holding pictures right now, and they've always fully intended to put appopriate symbols up there in time.

Joe

[The diplomat]

I agree about the advisors.
Keep the heads, they are really cool, but make it more obvious as to who they represent. I would hate to click on one advisor only to get another one, because I confused the military advisor for the diplomacy advisor!

------------------
No permanent enemies, no permanent friends.
[This message has been edited by The diplomat (edited April 26, 2001).]

[airdrik]

One thing I just noticed, is that instead of having one set picture per terrain, they have 4-5 pictures per terrain+2-3 different border styles between each terrain. They have 4 different bottom-layer terrains: grass/wet, plains/temperate, desert/dry, and tundra/cold, then they add other terrains on top of it. And is that raised terrain right beside the small world map?

I would just like to take this moment to say thanks to PC Gameplay for posting such a revealing screen shot.

I agree that the advisors should be symbols rather than heads. And as for the colored circles, perhaps you could just replace those circles with falg designs.

[ChrisShaffer]

7 heads == 7 players? Perhaps not advisors at all. None of those heads looks like the Sid science advisor head.

[airdrik]

Actually, I think you're right. Though they should add like a colored background/flag to them so that you know which one is which.

[Hundred Waters]

Sid is on the far right.
Can someone in the UK run out and get the issue?
Pretty please with sugar on top***

I'm sorry to say this but I don't like at all what I see. The irrigation and trees/bushes are ugly, cities look to me like some sort of armor units and in whole the game tiles are too squarish to my taste. I don't like the colours either; e.g. the grassland & sea has too much yellow mixed in. I must say that I was shocked when I with great expectations downloaded the 1. screenshot. I could hardly believe my eyes. I'm having hard time to say anything good about that screenshot. Only thing I like are the mountains with a river flowing down on them.

Okay, okay: gameplay & good AI etc. are the most important things in strategy games but still, this game is being published at 2000 century! My last sentence might sound like a blasphemy to some of you but to be honest I must say it: I really can't say that Civ3's graphics are any better than CTP1's. No offence intented to anyone. I'm just sad and disappointed. I really had so high expectations on this game.
[This message has been edited by Marko Polo (edited April 26, 2001).]

[Ilkuul]

Great to see these screenshots. The green sea is fine by me - makes me think of tropical beaches!

I must say I don't like the heads - I prefer Fintilgin's suggestion of crossed swords, coins, etc. Much clearer, and adds a touch of serious purpose to the game. The symbol represents the office, which happens to be held by a particular person. We wouldn't be too happy to receive a letter from the Treasury whose letterhead consisted of a photo of the current incumbent! That would reek of hubris. The office, represented by the symbol, is more enduring than the holder. In Civ2, though the face remains the same - a pleasant fiction to match the fact that the ruler remains the same over 60 centuries! - the costumes change, representing changing times. I'd like to see that continued in Civ3.

I guess the 2 unmarked buttons at the bottom are for functions yet to be decided... If the selected unit is a settler, there should be plenty of functions to choose from!

I like the look of the mini-map window; but isn't it rather small in comparison with the rest of the screen? Seems you'd be hard put to see the location of cities on something that size. Maybe it can be enlarged? That would be cool.

I disagree with airdrik that the cities look like piles of rubble! If you look at them at a larger resolution (or print the pic out to fill a sheet of paper), you'll see clearly that they consist of a series of single-storey buildings around a central circle (marketplace? forum?) - which presumably is the appropriate style for size 2 cities in 120 AD. I must say, tho', that I would have preferred more colour - they look rather drab. But maybe that's still to come...

It's noteworthy that both the Americans and the Aztecs have the same style of city: does that mean civ-specific city styles are out? A pity if so.

I can only assume there's a lot still to be tweaked, e.g. the font in which the city names appear. These are almost unreadable, even on the large printout I have in front of me.

But these are minor points: overall this looks really good - keep it up, Firaxis! (I specially like the mountains!)

Ug-lee, very placeholderish, but at least we can see a bit more of the interface here. Ugly map/unit
windows, I must say, but other than that very nicely scaled back. I like the command buttons. The
"Standing Unit" under St.Louis is probably the tall dark shape in the old Baltimore screenshot; what the
hell is it? Nice-looking advisors, and some interesting units...

[Gramphos]

In lower left corner:

Settlers

Regular

0.0.1/1

Sea

Does this mean that Settlers can walk on water?
[This message has been edited by vgriph (edited April 26, 2001).]

[Kaak]

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR............if i wanted to play ctp, or a game with that type of visual interphase, that's what i'd play. I PLAY CIV2 AND I LIKE THAT INTERPHASE. this sucks. I am VERY VERY DISAPPOINTED

[MarBaS]

These screen shots remind me alot of CTP. Im sure the game does not play like it but when i look at them it sure seems like it. Im definatley not impressed with what i see from them. PCGamer is haveing there own Civ3 preview and they usually got some pretty good ones so we should see some good screenshots from there.
[This message has been edited by MarBaS (edited April 26, 2001).]

the map thumbnail is very ctp-ish

the way the cities appear though and the borders are "copy-paste" from smac, as well the resolution of the units(this last one being pretty bad)...


BUT they are EARLY screenshots, so lets not rush into any final judgements

[EnochF]

I'm willing to accept borders exactly as they appeared in SMAC. It was a good system. And it looks as if the expanded diplomacy system is going to make better use of them, as far as international relations are concerned, than SMAC ever could have.

[VetLegion]

Seems like borders are from SMAC. Probably quite some more things are to.

map seems a little blurry probably jpg helped that. Units have those circles filled with color... I really find that ugly. Shields are better, or not - filled circles.

It seems to me with every new screenshot and piece of info we get that firaxis was quite conservative in all approaches to the game and left quite much for us alternative projects to do

I quite like the huge multitile mountain.

[Sirotnikov]

Haven't any of you read the interview in Gamespot UK?

It said something like: "we are constantly playing the game. we have a SMAC engine with Civilization type graphics modification and some rule changes. Nothing will be built for real until we decided upon it.

And this really looks like SMAC with a mod... some controls are changed, but hey, they're firaxis, they can design mods that way.

I hope I'm right in this way. I could be right in another one. This really is a SMAC ripoff only that is what they're going to sell. Knowing Sid's perfectionsim I find that hard to believe, but only he knows....

Sid? Dan Magha? Someone? Can you please put our minds at rest?