No Mom, just one more turn... (Civ V)

[kupocake]

Yep, right about that kupo. Monaco is also in there.

You're presumably fishing for confirmation aboot Canada, guy? (Ottawa? Montreal?)

 

[StarBob]

IS... THERE... SPARTA!?

... or Athens?

 

[Wanted Bob]

You're presumably fishing for confirmation aboot Canada, guy? (Ottawa? Montreal?)

To be honest, there are a few cities I would like to see there, such as Sydney, Singapore (which is already there), Zurich, and yes admittedly I would love it if a Canadian city was in there.

I can understand that Canada hasnt made enough of an impact on the world to be considered a monumental civilization, but perhaps Montreal would make a good cultural city-state (not Ottawa as much as I'd like it, too boring). Hell, I dont even know if people would think Montreal is worthy as a city-state.

 

[Krynn72]

I hope Hartford, CT is in there. Would be so cool having a massive money sink of a city with high crime and no valuable exports!


That was mean.

 

[Letters]

Looking forward to tomorrow... I'm off work so I fully expect to start playing at like 2 PM and then proceed to ask what the **** happened when it's 10 PM the next time I check the clock.

 

[Acepilotf14]

I have a feeling it's not going to run well at all on my laptop.. so I may be in withdrawal until the weekend. Well, at least I have my flying.

 

[Lucid]

I'm going to be happy if it even runs on low settings... but considering I don't even meet the minimum reqs, it probably won't even start.

 

[Bad^Hat]

In the UK at least, the Steam version costs about £5 more than a boxed copy. Not good.

Poor you.

 

[StarBob]

I hope Hartford, CT is in there. Would be so cool having a massive money sink of a city with high crime and no valuable exports!


That was mean.

Isn't that just Detroit? Maybe they should put Stamford with it's overly clean streets and no parking.

 

[Hazar]

Poor you.

remember, it's your tax for having the best beaches

 

[kupocake]

New Zealand has beaches? If you scrape the sheep off first?

/runs

 

[Wanted Bob]

My game is validating as we speak

Lol, I got to about 20% in 2 seconds then came to a grinding halt. Time to make some breakfast then...

 

[Bad^Hat]

We have shit beaches. It's always windy and there are spiders in the sand.

He must be talking about Aus.

 

[Dynasty]

Clearly you haven't experienced UK beaches.

 

[Wanted Bob]

Ive experienced all three. Australia > NZ > UK

 

[Krynn72]

Lame, it takes 15 minutes to decrypt, and then has to download another gig's worth of content.

/impatient

 

[Dynasty]

I'll never forget the sand up in Cairns in Australia that would squeak when you walk on it.

In the UK youve got pebbles, dried sea-weed that is somehow sharp, dead wood, old people and water so cold you turn blue if you dip your big toe in.

 

[StarBob]

I'll never forget the sand up in Cairns in Australia that would squeak when you walk on it.

In the UK youve got pebbles, dried sea-weed that is somehow sharp, dead wood, old people and water so cold you turn blue if you dip your big toe in.

Well that's what you get for living on a frigid rocky island that the only thing keeping it from turning into a frigid wasteland is a little friendly gulf stream warmth.

Hopefully when I get home today everything will be downloaded and de-crypted. Hopefully....

 

[Krynn72]

uh?

 

[StarBob]

Looks like you have three Civ 5s and they're not complete.

 

[Wanted Bob]

Goddamn I forgot how addictive this game is

Gonna be late for class now...

 

[Shakermaker]

Did we do reviews yet? I think only the PC Gamer and GT one were posted, so wall 'o text incoming.

Eurogamer 8/10

The AI in Civ V is still curiously terrible. At its absolute smartest (what the game calls its 'normal' difficulty setting, before the AI starts receiving stat bonuses) the AI still makes inexplicable demands from you. It will refuse your demands, even if you've got an apocalyptic horde parked outside its borders. It will go to war with you, dash a dozen armies against your defences, then offer you everything it's got for a peace settlement. These aren't opponents that make for fond memories. Civ V is occasionally capable of clashes between equally-matched nations, but they're unforgivably rare. If you want respectable competition, you need to head online.

This is the reason I spent that week actively wrestling with my burning desire to click on the Civ V icon, despite it being such an astoundingly slick, engaging game. For all the hours it eats up, outside of its multiplayer it gives disappointingly little back, and it will continue to give very little back until Firaxis bites the bullet and admits that there are aspects of Civilization which deserve not just to be improved, but fixed.

Rock Paper Shotgun

Civ V’s reliably done what every Civ game has ever done (with the possible exception of III): eat my time as unashamedly as a dog in a pork pie factory. I laugh a little when I look back at my complaints a few paragraphs up. I say those things because they must be noted, but it’s not like they ever put me off playing. It’s not like they stop me from being profoundly glad and satisfied that there’s another Civilization icon winking cheekily at me from the desktop. I want it to be better, I want it to be bolder, I want it to address and improve the very foundations of Civilization, but it’s sure as hell going to sit on my hard drive for months anyway. Yeah, this’ll ultimately be remembered as one of the filler tracks on Civ’s best-of LP, one of the ones you never quite felt had real heart, real soul – but it’s a tune I’m more than happy to hum.

Think I’ll play a bit more RUSE for now, though.

Kotaku

With so many changes, tweaks, cuts and additions, it could all have gone so horribly wrong. Make too many changes and you infuriate one of the largest and most devout fanbases in all of gaming. Make too few changes and you risk releasing a game that's accused of being stale. Frumpy. Old-fashioned.

But it didn't, and we're thankfully left with a game that keeps the spirit of Civilization alive with one hand, while with the other, it casts aside twenty years of mechanical dead weight in favour of a faster, cleaner and more enjoyable game.

The Escapist 10/10

Bottom Line: My favorite Civilization to date. Hex tiles and no stacking makes combat fun and more tactical. The new systems work incredibly well without altering what makes the game Civilization. Civ V is an excellent game.

Destructoid 9.5/10

Civilization V makes huge advances to the series that do nothing but enhance the essential experience. Improvements to the user interface and AI at all levels result in it being more approachable for newcomers without losing any of the strategic depth that long-time fans crave. It vastly improves combat, making the micro-level gameplay both more complex and entertaining. It trims all the fat, leaving only decision-making, strategic planning, and the sheer joy of crushing your enemies. Civ V is the pinnacle of the franchise to date.

IGN 9/10

Civilization V is one of the best turn-based strategy games I’ve ever had the pleasure of playing. Whether teaming up with my friends for some multiplayer, or simply losing a whole night of sleep to the game’s endlessly replayable single player, this is one game that any strategy enthusiast, or, hell anyone strat-curious should check out. Sure, I miss some of the deeper inter-civilization relations that the more defined religion and government setup brought in Civilization IV, but that’s nothing anyone new to the series will even think twice about. With all the tips, advisers and tools in place, this is the first Civilization for PC that I feel is worth just about every person’s time. Go forth and create, subdue, and exploit. Do as Firaxis has done, and bring Civilization to the masses.

 

[Nabobalis]

I want this game

The demo only has 100 turns. IT is too little!

 

[StarBob]

Nice reviews. I'm concerned about the AI as from the first one, but hell beating cheater AI is something too. Maybe they'll deliver some kind of fix... chances are they won't. Seems like the same stuff that would happen in Civ 4 though. I guess it is not out of the question to ask for better AI after all that time though. I'll have to try it out when I get home. Still waiting... damnit...

 

[Nabobalis]

Nice reviews. I'm concerned about the AI as from the first one, but hell beating cheater AI is something too. Maybe they'll deliver some kind of fix... chances are they won't. Seems like the same stuff that would happen in Civ 4 though. I guess it is not out of the question to ask for better AI after all that time though. I'll have to try it out when I get home. Still waiting... damnit...

AI is always a problem no matter the game really.

But I hope they add a better AI in a patch and maybe some diplomacy improvements.

I'm going to buy and play it but I think an expansion pack or two will make it much better in the end.

 

[Acepilotf14]

Yeah, my laptop hates it. I get to wait until the weekend to play it on my PC.

 

[AJ Rimmer]

AI is always a problem no matter the game really.

This. There are very few strategy games that have not enraged me in regards to the AI.

 

[Letters]

I just finished my tutorial "play as you learn" game (really just a regular game on settler difficulty against 1 AI). I really like the city-states and the puppet cities a lot... should be quite interesting in a bigger game. I had to end it pretty quickly (by 660 AD or something) just 'cause my opponent wasn't being any fun. So I got "Augustus Caesar" as my rank at the end. Ego boost!

I was having some problems queueing up movement over multiple turns with some of my units... like they'd just stop doing anything but it'd never go back and say they needed orders either, leaving me to go looking for them to move manually. Anyone else have that issue? Oh, and sometimes I'd hit next turn and some more stuff would happen but it wasn't actually a new turn...

 

[Wanted Bob]

Played for five hours straight as Nobunaga. It's fun, but I put it on Prince, which is way too hard for me :/

I would start anew on a lower difficulty, but I cant find the heart to quit now. In terms of score, I'm actually doing okay (well, everyone on my continent was around 220, then one guy came from overseas at 450 ). I admit it is kind of annoying how aggressive the AI can get. I've had a ton of wars declared on me, but only started one myself. I was able to hold things together, but now everyone is hostile towards me.

Perhaps I'll leave that save for now and create a new game on a lower difficulty setting on a Pangea map.

EDIT: Hmm... spent a few hours on Warlord (or whatever the third lowest difficulty is), and its way too easy :/

 

[StarBob]

Well I've been playing for about seven hours. Learning all the ins and outs. I had some trouble with the settings it defaulted to (what game defaults to 75 hertz refresh?) and I've been lowering them. Some really weird shit was happening. When I scrolled it would actually bog down my system and make the fans run harder and flicker my lamp plugged in across the room. Makes me realize how much I need a UPS. I don't know how a game that's really not over the top visually can crush my system to hardcore, but I realize it's really processor intensive.

I really should go to bed though, I have more things to say tomorrow.

 

[Krynn72]

I played the tutorial thing too, and ended up beating it really quickly. Didn't notice the ranking though.

Now I'm playing on a continents map with 6 players on Warlord difficulty, and I've gotta say, the game seems really easy to me. Especially since I've never played a civ game before. I mean, I had Russia, the biggest power in the game, as well as America and Egypt all declare war on me in one turn. Then maybe an hour later I had destroyed America, Egypt was begging for forgiveness (which I accepted, being the merciful Poseidon I am) and Russia, through a sneaky settler move, managed to build a city right as I took down Moscow. She then proceeded to agree to my ridiculous terms of her surrender and I let her live, while raping her economy. A mere 4 hours later I'm undoubtedly the most powerful civ on the map, with my rating being >800 and Nebuchadnezzar being the second highest with ~275. Egypt is wiped off the map. Russia is a broke ass bitch. Theres only three city-states left, and they're all in my pocket, and when I closed the game I was in the process of demolishing Neb. I will probably take me only 30 mins tomorrow to finish him off, and then end Russia's misery to beat the game.

 

[Eejit]

Trying to start pre-load now

Krynn, Warlord is one of the easier difficulties iirc. It's usually only around Prince that the player doesn't get advantages compared to the AI. Also 6 players sounds like a fairly small map.

In the UK youve got pebbles, dried sea-weed that is somehow sharp, dead wood, old people and water so cold you turn blue if you dip your big toe in.

Speak for your own shitty corner, thanks. Only the poor temperature is universal.

 

[StarBob]

So a little more outside of strange things that happened yesterday...

I found that the "Play Now" button actually launches you into a game with random settings and a random leader. I thought it would work like the Civ 4 where you get to pick out some stuff like general map settings and at least your leader. I guess you have to make a custom game for that. I did find the game to be a bit easier - but because of the random settings I have no idea what difficulty it was on so that could just be anything. In Civ 4, your enemy would have an assload of near-top-tech units just waiting for you to make a move they didn't like. I ended up attacking Persia unprovoked and beating them down without losing a unit. I also feel like they slowed down the whole unit building/upgrade thing so there are fewer upgrades and fewer unit types. I really like that I don't have to upgrade a unit a dozen times in the first 50 turns. Plus unit upgrades seem to be more effective.

With the system like it is, it feels like you get stuck with the same old units for a really long time, but I realized I Was in abou the same position as I Would have been in Civ 4 at around the same time period given my tech. Plus I was playing a lot slower so I could learn more about what was going on.

The battle system is a fantastic addition. I enjoy that units matter more and position is imporant... range attacks exist and cities are actually formiddable opponents without immediate backup. I like that it tells you what chances you have before you fight, though once it said I had a definite win and I got spanked.

City states are a fun little thing. Sometimes they're annoying but I think they're for the best. The new policy system trumps the government-religion-labor-econmy-whatever it was in 4.

Definitely a good game, but I hope the AI crappiness was just due to it being on an easy setting. For some reason my Egyptian friends only build one city. Maybe it was just a strange thing.

 

[Acepilotf14]

In Civ V, 'play now' starts you on the same settings as the last custom game you started.

 

[StarBob]

In Civ V, 'play now' starts you on the same settings as the last custom game you started.

I guess doing it first meant it just gave me Alexander since he's at the top and whatever default settings are. I'm gonna finish this game out since I'm kicking ass currently and see how time goes along.

 

[Bad^Hat]

Just tried the demo and I already love it. The game is changed so much just by the hexes and streamlined combat that everything else seems like window dressing. There's something about it that encourages involvement so much more than IV - in my very first game I was getting involved with my production at a city level and manually ordering worker improvements, something I've always left up to automation. There's something much more intimate about the interface, I think it has a lot to do with the altered scale, everything looks bigger and yet not as daunting. Hexes just seem more inviting somehow, and much more natural to work with.

Learned one important lesson, though - don't **** with city states on a whim. Thought I'd get in some combat practice by attacking a nearby one, next thing all but two of my units are dead and Elizabeth has declared war on me. Whoops.

 

[Wanted Bob]

Man, do I feel dumb. I realized why I was becoming so poor. In this game you dont need roads to resources, just trade routes. On top of that I totally didnt pay attention to city management costs.

Starting over, one last time, on Prince again.

 

[StarBob]

Man, do I feel dumb. I realized why I was becoming so poor. In this game you dont need roads to resources, just trade routes. On top of that I totally didnt pay attention to city management costs.

Starting over, one last time, on Prince again.

Yeah roads are just bonus. I just made my workers autobuild since there seem to be a lot fewer regions for building and it takes longer for them to finish. They basically build roads last. I also noticed that the city advisors didn't suggest all that many buildings until I was well established. Commerce policy really helps you rake in the money too. Also, I found out that expanding too quickly - something that was generally the best route - would result in everyone hating your ass both in your empire and other empires. I feel like the policies really add another level to the way you build your emprie. It makes it so if you get screwed in placement or something and have to stay relatively small, you can do that and still be successful. Plus you can have your policies to help you compensate for bad things happening. Like if you're lacking money you can get commerce to gain more or aristocracy to lower costs ( I think that's the one).

Well anyways I'm looking forward to doing some more fun Civ time whenever I get to leave this stupid work place.

 

[Acepilotf14]

Argh.. I have ground instruction on saturday which will end at 4-5 and then I have the rest of the day free on my PC. Gettin' ready for a marathon game.

 

[Wanted Bob]

Aaaahhhh... finally the game is working out great for me

With that bit of knowledge from before, I'm finally able to fit right in on Prince difficulty. Not too hard, but I'm never consistently in the lead.

I dunno why, but in every single game I've played so far, the Bismark is always a total dick. On the other hand, whats-his-name from Siam and I are always buddies.