u/awildgiraffe

Over the weekend I played some Civ 5 Vox populi. My impression was that it improved Civ 5, but there are still so many things to dislike about the game, even with a mod that changes almost everything. And its pathetic that we need to download a mod that changes almost everything about the game. Just goes to show how bad Civ 5 was unmodded

Its unreal to me that so many redditors could spend 15 years on the civ subreddit kissing eachothers asses and loving everything about 5, whereas its perfectly acceptable to trash 4 and 6. Its like, what planet are these people living on? Besides the graphics, everything in 5 is literally worse than 4. Literally every single part of the game was a downgrade. I admit theres ONE THING I like about 5, but thats more of a "5 steps backwards, 1 step forward" situation

Makes me wonder what Civ 8 is going to be like. I will probably never touch Civ 7, even if its free. Looking at the screenshots theyve been posting, the game looks like a disaster. Dont care how many "updates" they release to fix the game. If they dont look in the mirror and admit that Civ 4 is better than 5 and 6, nothing they do will ever actually fix the series

Ive mentioned before what specifically it is about 4 that I like, but I guess now is a good time to make a list

1. Ability to zoom out and see the earth as a globe

2. ability to zoom in and hear the civs theme music as well as war music when zoomed in to cities

3. the trees and jungles look the best in 4 out of any other civ

4. diplomacy screen, being able to see all diplomatic relationships easily and quickly by clicking on a leader

5. having a scorelist on the right side of the screen, being able to see who has the most points, why they have the score they have, what religion they are, whether you are at war or have a defensive pact with them

6. being able to see an itemized point list of why a civ dislikes or likes you

7. civic system that isnt idiotic

8. doom stacks are much preferable to one unit per tile. While the AI is less moronic in Civ 5 with vox populi mod, one unit per tile is still an inferior system to 4. 1UPT is slow and tedious. The worse you can say about 4's doomstacks is that late game there are dozens or hundreds of units on one tile, but 4 is clearly a better system

9. Religion system is terrible in 5 and 6. 4 had great religion, and "culture" and "faith" were NOT separate systems, they were one in the same. Ive always hated religion in 5 and 6

10. map generation is best in 4. I play terra, and jungles appear around the equator, deserts appear only in certain latitudes, and snow and hardwood forests appear only in colder climates.

11. Not only is the map generation better in 4, so is resources. Bananas only spawn in jungles. Whereas in 5 and 6, resources are totally random and bananas appear right next to tundra. Embarassingly bad map design

12. To be continued? Add your own reasons!

13. The music in 4 is best, but still pretty good in 5 and 6.

I made this thread 2 weeks ago I believe. It got tons of great responses as well as lots of comments challenging my original post. I like this sub, and its one of the only places on reddit where I find there to be actual non PC discussion. I'm paraphrasing myself, as I dont remember exactly what I originally posted. I deleted the thread, fearing it was too political or a little too "on the nose". And Ive been warned about "stalkers" and "brigaders" here before. I very much regret deleting my OP as there was a great discussion happening. Heres my biweekly rant

It might be hard to believe based on the fact that college educated people vote majority democrat, but games seem to be getting dumber and more illiterate, not "smarter". You'd think that with increasing literacy rates things would be the opposite, but that doesnt seem to be whats happening. The most glaring example : The Battlefield series of games

Original BF1942 featured maps with paragraphs of text describing the real world actual battle that the map was based on. It would describe the battles context from the allied or axis perspective. Paragraphs of text you could read while the map was loading (back in the day, it might take as much as 4 or 5 minutes). Not only was BF1942 a literate game to experience, it was immersive. While playing as the Germans, Japanese, or Italians, you would hear nothing but German, Japanese, or Italian language on the radio chatter. In order to understand what the voice over was actually saying, you had to read the text on the screen. (Also, Germans only used German weapons. Faction specific weapons went away with the first Bad company game, and it was a terrible precedent to set)

BF Vietnam featured black americans. Black Americans were not featured in 1942, because as most people know the US military was segregated during WW2. It would be unrealistic to portray the US faction as integrated, while at the same time its accurate as well as characteristic of the general time period to portray black Americans in a Vietnam war game. As with 1942, in BFV there were paragraphs of text to read while the map was loading, and cool Vietnam war era music was playing too. The text on certain maps even described the culture of America and Vietnam during the 1960s. BF Vietnam was a literate game that could be enjoyed by educated and uneducated alike, and it strove to respect history in a way not many other games do (outside of milsims, which Battlefield never was)

BF2 featured American marines, black and white, going up against a fiction Arab coalition as well as China. And yes, you would hear nothing but Arabic language radio chatter while playing as the Middle East Coalition. You would hear nothing but Chinese language while playing as the Peoples Liberation Army. The foreign languages was part of the draw for me. Battlefield was a series for serious history enthusiasts. And no, just because it was so called "realistic" in some ways, does not mean it was milsim. BF2 was a historically authentic, high IQ strategic action shooter. And only the US had access to American weapons, only chinese started with certain weapons. The goal of the game was to play as a squad and defeat the enemy team. "Scoring points and unlocking random shit" was only a minor part of the game. And BF2 was released at the height of the war on terror (2005) so portraying a semi fictionalized war in the mid east and China was perfectly acceptable for them to do. It portrayed a hypothetical war, while still sticking seriously to "historical realism" WITHOUT being a milsim. As in BF1942 and Vietnam, paragraphs of text giving context to battles while the map was loading

BF2142 portrayed a high tech futuristic world war. It was a spin off of BF2, used the same engine and everything. It was a great refinement of what made BF2 great, and the text was the only "story" there was at all. While bad company, BF3, BF4, and BF1 have lame singleplayer campaigns, with multiplayer being based on the singleplayer storyline, 2142's "story" was the paragraphs you read while the map was loading.

Bad company was a casualized experience for console peasants. It featured great graphics and great maps. There was a wiki section where you could read about weapons and vehicles, but reading about the maps themselves was out of the question. With bad company, Battlefield was starting to become low iq and illiterate

BF3, 4, and BF1 were decent games which failed to live up to established precedent. BF1 was a highly fictionalized version of WW1, which seemed to want to have history both ways : The majority of weapons and a huge portion of the maps were more fantasy than they were realistic. If we wanted context or story, we were expected to play singleplayer campaign. And as in BF3, 4, and 1, foreign languages are no longer spoken, but spoken with cringe broken english translator speak. If someone plays BF1 and feels its an "immersive experience" then I can clearly tell they never played BF2

I may have done a bad job paraphrasing what I said, but I thought I'd try again. Battlefield used to be a series which was "historically authentic". Lots of so called fans tell people like me to go play a milsim when I criticize modern Battlefield games, revealing that they dont realize even the original games were never milsims

Does Marxism have anything to do with this? This was the main question in the discussion 2 weeks ago. I feel as if things are getting dumber over time. Woke possibly might have something to do with that

And while we're at it, we should also discuss the trainwreck that was BF5

/rant

Posting this here because in r/civ i get down voted and insulted for posting criticism and no one sees it, even if I get some good comments

The past week I've played a few hours of alpha centauri. My first impression is that it's a highly complex game with a huge learning curve. Dare I say, it is perhaps too complex

One good thing I like about civ 4 is that it's a relatively simple game, with optional complexity. I do think the diplomacy in AC is very, very good, but I wonder how much better it would be if they used civ 4 as a base game, and alpha centauri was used the same engine and UI and design as 4

In one sense, the older civ games before 4 were less casual. Civ 4 was a sweet spot, with just enough simplicity and enough complexity

Civ 5 I have always had a lot of criticism for. The only change I like in 5 is how the resources work. Luxury resources are needed for happiness, iron is needed for swordsman, oil is needed for tanks, etc. That's the only thing I like about 5.

I strongly dislike 5s diplomacy. I strongly dislike 5s religion. And as someone who plays only terra in civ 4, it seems terra is broken in both 5 and 6. Whereas in 4 i have to get to the new continents as fast as possible, the AI doesnt seem to settle the new continents, ever, in 5 and 6. So for me, that tells me 5 and 6 are literally broken

6 did not fix 5s diplomacy or religion, and the Ai seems to be more stupid than it ever was. There are still a few good things about civ 6. The city districts make building cities fun. I think the great people in 6 were well done. And I always liked archeology, which was in 5 and expanded in 6

One thing that bothers me about 6 is the map generation. It's not as if civ 4 has perfect maps, but to me it seems better in 4. In 6, there are random mountains in the middle of flatlands. Random jungles next to forests. Resources seem to be generated pretty randomly.

In civ 4 it's better. Jungles appear closer to the equator. Deserts appear only at certain latitudes. And forests look different based on the climate they're in

Anyway, its monday and i was bored, so i hope i can get a good discussion going. What does this sub think about alpha centauri? What about civ 5, 6, or 7? ​

Platform(s): Im pretty sure it was on a mac

**Genre:**Horror/adventure, maybe it was point and click

**Estimated year of release:**I remember playing it in 98, 99, or perhaps 2000

**Graphics/art style:**Basic graphics by todays standards

Notable characters:

Notable gameplay mechanics:

Other details:

There was an intro which showed astronauts landing on a moon like planet, or maybe an asteroid. It was kind of a horror game, what I remember was being terrified, something that didnt happen often with video games

I know theres not too many details, because I barely played the game, I was at a party and was watching other people play it.

I can play vanilla 6 and Rise and fall pretty decently on my 10 year old laptop, but trying to play after I downloaded gathering storm I can barely play the game. (My laptop can't run it well, at all)

Does anyone else have this problem? Is this a common thing to happen? Im betting the volcano and hurricanes and floods look gorgeous but it's probably killing my computer

**Platform(s):**Windows

**Genre:**Strategy

**Estimated year of release:**1998 or 99

Graphics/art style:

Notable characters:

Notable gameplay mechanics:

Other details:

The units were square icons and they had a health bar. Im pretty sure this game was turn based strategy

I can't remember exactly, but I think I remember some scenarios were based on ww2. It's confusing because I can't remember, but I think the intro also showed stone age people fighting with clubs? So im not sure if this was exclusively ww2, or if it featured different time periods

It might be hard to believe based on the fact that there's a well known correlation between graduating from college and voting for Democrats, but it seems to me as if video games have been getting more illiterate over time. You would hope that a series such as Battlefield would be getting higher IQ over time, but to me it appears to be the opposite

You may have seen my posts ranting about the history of the Battlefield series before, but hear me out, its time for my biweekly rant.

BF1942 had paragraphs of text to read while the map was loading. The text would explain historical context of the (real) battle from WW2 that the map was based on

BF Vietnam had paragraphs of text to read while the map was loading, including text about the culture of the 1960s, the culture of America or Vietnam, and at the same time we could listen to interesting songs from the 1960s

BF2 was based on a fictional war. The game was released in 2005, and featured fictional Arab and Chinese factions (they actually spoke Arabic and Chinese. You would hear nothing but Arabic or Chinese for 10 to 20 minutes while playing as these factions). 2005 was the height of the Iraq war, so I gave them some leeway. Instead of being hyper historically realistic, it was better for BF2 to portray fictional, regional conflicts. No one wanted to play a game based on real stuff that was happening, when the game was released. As in BFVietnam and 1942, the paragraphs of text you could read while loading the map, and it provided context to the game.

BF2 also had a wiki feature. Paragraphs of text you could read about different classes and factions. It was called "BFHQ". You could track your stats, the medals you earned, and vehicles, all in the menu (this was during CoD2 years. It wasnt until CoD4 that CoD caught up to BF and had stats, customization, etc etc. It seems quaint thinking about it now)

BF2142 : the only "campaign" or "story" were the loading screen paragraphs describing the context of the battles, and the general outline of the world in 2142. The only singleplayer in 2142 or the other 3 PC games were matches against bots. There was no "singleplayer campaign" or "story" mode that the devs wasted resources on

BFBad Company : I remember being able to read about the weapons, but there was no longer any text to read during the loading screens (is this because Bad company was when BF became a series for console peasants?)

It seems as if Battlefield has become more and more illiterate over time, coinciding with its transformation from being a PC series to becoming a console series.

Coincidence?

Ive been playing unmodded Civ 4 BTS Terra 18 Civs noble difficulty for about 10 years now.

One thing I enjoy about the late game is the massive world wars. Not only do I command huge armies and navies, but often times I have vassal civs (who I try to maintain good relationships with) and they participate in the massive wars as well. Nothing is cooler than seeing huge armies from many different nations criss crossing the map, seeing the borders change, losing and then re taking cities, etc etc

One thing that is annoying to me however, is that I do not always have the option of giving a city I recaptured to the Civ I was planning to give it to. An example from just now : Mecca, Medina, and Baghdad were captured by the Sumerians. Saladin was my vassal. I eventually retook the 3 cities, but I could only give 1 of them back to Saladin (despite the fact that Baghdad and Mecca are over 90 percent Arab, and the Arab population in Mecca is revolting and causing unrest). I want to give these 2 cities back to the Arabs, but for some reason the game wont let me

What is even more strange, is that upon capturing the cities, the game gave me the option to give (liberate) them for China (another of my vassals). This is despite the fact that neither of the 2 cities are even 1 percent Chinese, and Mao never controlled them to begin with

I'm having a lot of fun playing Civ 4 today, but can anyone here explain what is going on?

Sorry, another rant from me, but KIA seems to be the only place my posts dont get downvoted or I dont get hounded by hordes of angry NPCs

Civ 7 is honestly such a trainwreck that not even normies can ignore its shortcomings anymore. Civ 7 added stuff to the Civ 6 formula, and 6 added stuff to the 5 formula. People might not realize it, but theyve been playing essentially the same game for the past 15 years, just with minor tweaks and improved graphics.. You can see this especially in Battlefield, which has been the same game, just with new maps and weapons and vehicles, since BF3 (2011)

There were a few things I thought Civ 5 and 6 did well, but it's more like "5 steps backward, and 1 step forward". It seems that no one remembers Civ 4 at all. And if you didnt play Civ 4 (2005), can you actually consider yourself a real Civ fan? If you just consume product, and wait for next product, don't you think in 10 years players might start to wonder why every new Civ feels the same? Does even 10 percent of the Civ 7 player base remember Civ 4? Does anyone realize that diplomacy and AI has been shit ever since Civ 5 (2010)????

You can see this in the Battlefield series too. I dont consider you to be a real fan, unless you played it on PC. BF1942, Vietnam, BF2 and 2142 are basically totally different games than what BF3 and onwards has turned the series into. And I havent liked the direction that series has been going, for 15 years. Does anyone stop and think, maybe I should play the originals? Maybe the new games are trash? Maybe eye candy good graphics are not the only thing, and maybe we should look under the hood instead of examining the painted exterior?

And yes,this does have something to do with Woke. The original BF games featured black soldiers, where and when it was historically accurate. Civilization 4 in 2005 had black leaders. But over the past 15 years, both series have gotten more and more politically correct. Slavery was removed from Civ, and now diplomacy consists of lame denunciations and cassus bellis, as if world wide leaders were politically correct politicians from the 90s throughout all of history. Play Civ 4, get familiar with it, and then play 5 and 6, and you'll see what I'm talking about

BF3 and 4 couldnt be considered woke. But BF1 inserted black people where they didnt historically exist, BF5 (2018) went even further than BF1 into historical fantasy land and let you customize your gender, so you'd hear screaming Japanese women and screaming German women at Iwo jima and on the plains of Europe. To explain the context, people have always said "well, Battlefield was never realistic! If you want realism, go play another series!" Plainly ignoring the fact that the original Battlefields were not woke, did not have women, and the original PC games THEMSELVES were never MILSIMS. Any moron who says to go play another series, clearly isnt a real Battlefield fan, and does not know and does not care about the series origins or roots.

Anyway, thats my bi weekly rant. Thanks for reading. And feel free to add to what I'm saying

There was a map that I was going to ask more about, it was a realistic but modified real earth map and the title of the post was "history rewritten" mod, or something like that. Did OP delete the thread? I was going to ask how to play that specific map

First off, let me say I've played mostly Civ 4 for the past 15 years, and consider it superior to 5 and 6 (havent played 7 yet. theres a chance I never will)

Although I have played a few mods in my life, I often times try to avoid them. My theory is that the vanilla product should be good enough. I dont like games which rely on mods to fix what should be a good game to begin with (such as Starfield, or Fallout 4, for example)

I've heard good things about both Realism Invictus (for civ 4) as well as Vox populi (for 5). I dont want to ask in another subreddit, I want y'alls opinion on THIS sub. Does VP make Civ 5 better? Does VP make Civ 5 more like Civ 4?