How about “I’ve been playing Civ for 20 years and I was destined to be bored with it no matter what.”
Missing an option between ‘great game’ and ‘major issues’.
At the moment I’m still at great game. But then again this is my first civ game. However I can see that this might get a bit stale, especially due to the AI and especially the diplomacy.
I think they cheaped out on the art a bit.
Yes, the unit animations are just as good at Civ IV. The terrain and such looks great.
Why no animated advisors?
Why don’t fireworks go off over cities having “We Love the King” days?
Remember how Civ used to zoom in on units during a battle so we could see the cool animations?
And why, when my rig has no problem running Crysis and Far Cry 2, does Civ V bring it to a crawl?
Oh, and I’m walking over the AI when I’m used to going down in flames 3 out of 4 games.
Baroo?
Eh, I don’t get that. There’s enough changes to make this Civ unique.
There is a point to the game where I become less inspired to play - in my experience somewhere around Industrial Era the writing ends up being on the wall as to whether you’re going to win. In Civ IV there might not be clear winner so soon, but I’d quit because I’d tire of the amount of micromanagement needed each turn. In Civ V I’ve never gotten bored by the decisionmaking each turn, but once you’ve kinda hit that critical mass where there is no way the AI opponents are going to prevent your victory (and sadly, they probably won’t even try), but it’s still 150 turns off, it decreases the desire to play through those turns.
Can you actually lose the game because a computer opponent completed one of the special victory conditions first? I’ve honestly never even seen them try to build the spaceship or build the utopia project.
My friend Askia would like to have a talk with you.
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It blows my mind that only 65% of us think its a great game.
Where’s the “too busy playing Fall from Heaven and Dead Rising 2 on my PC” option?
I voted “Great game” but I think you really needed an option between “Great game” and “will be good after patches”. The latter implies the game right now is not good but will be in the future when patched. I’d argue that it’s a good game with flaws that will be better as patched. Great should be reserved for those who think the game is great right now.
I do find it interesting that Tom and Troy’s view seem to be the minority across various boards. A lot of people seem sucked into the game after enough hours that Tom’s “parabola” effect should be showing up if broadly accurate.
Some big issues, many many small issues; some great stuff added, some dubious stuff also added; some useless clutter eliminated, some nice little features eliminated as well. A step forward, and maybe a step and a half back.
I’m enjoying it and am glad I bought it. I enjoyed 4 more though (and yes, I enjoyed 4 more even right after release.)
This might be the first Civ game I actually love. The switch to smaller armies of individual units makes combat much more interesting and personal to me. Yeah, the AI doesn’t always make the best move. Neither do I, so it all evens out.
I love the addition of city states and what they bring to the game. I like diplomacy here better than in earlier games. As far as I can see, the AI players have always been homicidal maniacs, so no change there. But what the city states add in terms of trading opportunities is more interesting to me than just straight trading with the AI civs alone. I won a UN victory the other day - I hated trading with civs in the previous version because they were all so vicious. I never thought a UN vicotry was even possible - at least for me, anyway.
I’m interested to see how the game develops in patches & expansions but I’m more than happy with my purchase. Steam tells me I’ve played 42 hours and I’m still well on the upside of the Tom Chick parabola.
It’s a great deal of fun despite a few issues and it is sure is pretty, so I voted “great game.” I think Reldan nailed it in the first post - in its previous iteration, the game really dragged in the late phases, not so much here.
The civ leader 3D and terrain art is great, but I really don’t like the style of the drawn unit icons.
So far I’ve been really enjoying the game, although I haven’t played enough to determine how the AI is playing (I’m still on the initial slope of the Chick Parabola). The tactical combat system is great.
The one thing I really don’t like is the new civics system, it was much cooler when you had a radical change that caused revolt for a few turns. As Tom and Troy noted on their reviews, it just feels like a redundant tech tree.
Yeah, I prefer civics too. But the real selling point of civics for me was the ability to go and readjust them according to your needs. Policies are adopt once and you have it forever. I would enjoy policies more if I could go through a revolution and repick them all (at least the ones that don’t grant a one time boost).
Someday I should mod that in.
The only part of the art that has annoyed me is the few improvements that don’t look era-appropriate. Early-game mines and early-game manufactories to be specific. Also the river to ocean transition.
+1 Still I am having a lot of fun playing it and excited to try different civs and different strategy.
I didn’t think I’d care but I actually like the steam achievements. I was playing as France and had 3 Musketeers so of course I had to maneuver to get the 3 Musketeers achievement (kill a unit with a musketeer flanked by two other musketeers).
The truly unique difference between civs are going to encourage me to keep playing them. However, the many hours of gaming bliss I enjoyed with Civ IV of random civ, will wait until the serious AI issues are improvement and the many balance problems.
I am starting to think that one of the most serious issues is that you can research a tech twice as fast as you can build a unit.
Respeccing policies at some price would make a great mod - although compared to civics, none of the policies really have any drawbacks.
I’m at 41 hours played and still love the game warts and all - In his newest game diary Tom writes that his favourite way of playing Civ V is the duel map… something I’d never ever consider even trying, which just shows me, that while I enjoy reading his well argued points, he and I am coming at these games from complete opposite places.
I think it’s good but needs patches(or mods which I consider in the same spirit).
There are small things, like being able to hover my pointer over a territory and have a popup tell me who controls it(name AND civ), that I need to make playing it enjoyable. Too often I have to stop doing what I’m doing or thinking what I’m thinking in order to jump to another screen.
The Civilization games jumped the shark after Civ 2. Nothing tops Alpha Centauri. Nothing. If there was justice in this (game) world, we’d be polling Alpha Centauri IV.