Sn00py
King
Registered: Aug 2001
Location: From New Zealand
Posts: 2052 |
quote:
Originally posted by Cornax
Master of Orion had the well-nigh perfect research model. (After the initial research there was an increasing chance each turn to make the breakthrough.) Also, there was an interest rate to the accumulated research points based on each field's share of research funding (IIRC).
In Civ type games, the interest rate could reflect of freedom of speech (information) in each culture and exchange of information between cultures. These go up with communications technologies (compare scientists of 1905 [letters and newspapers, communications lag of months to share any findings] to those of 2005 [e-mail, blogs, findings can be shared as soon as they can be written up]).
Civ type games are completely missing one important ingredient, though: effect of private enterprise on information dissemination. When nations are in peace, entrepreneurs keep tabs on inventions and purchase licenses instead of inventing everything themselves. Also, even the knowledge that something is possible seems to make it easier to make the breakthrough (heavier-than-air aircrafts come to mind), and newspapers all over the world reported the first flight in 1912, stimulating emulators in the Old World.
In effect, this diffusion of different inventions and discoveries would be free research points to other nations that are researching the tech in question, and after however-many turns each tech would become freely available. In ancient ages there is no diffusion, as there is so little contact between people, in classical times the delay could be several decades, in medieval and renaissance perhaps a decade or two, and in modern times at most several years.
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The worst shortcoming of every single Civ game so far, though, is this: Regardless of the chosen goverment type, every single nation in Civilization is in effect a socialist state (the player, human or computer, owns all of the resources and dictates their use). This results in the micromanagement paralysis.
What I would like to see is a bit more Sim type game where the player can revert to Civ type micromanagement hell by selecting socialism (Communism or Fascism, or tribes, clans, monarchies, whatever in earlier ages) as the government type. In republics, democracies, constitutional monarchies and so forth, the nation would do its own thing (in practice, each city would develop itself and the surrounding area automatically more or less efficiently, depending on the age and government type), and the players would be limited to the tax income and deficit spending (which results in inflation), and could concentrate on whichever aspect game they prefer (guns or butter; manufacturing armies and waging war or subsidizing cities and developing economy to become an economic superpower). |
Cornax, a lot of what you say is already part of our plans in Humanitas, but how it will work exactly we haven't quite gotten to yet.
One thing we are planning to do is implement immigration and also migration between your own cities.
Humanitas is kind of set up so that your people do their own thing, they will do as they like, if you have a city of 100,000 people, and the city is getting attacked a lot, then a number of the people could leave that city and enter another one - or enter another civilization's city (if that civilization allows immigration).
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02-07-2005 08:41
(just kidding). I hope the best for you, at least because it'll mean a good alternative civ for us 
Good luck any way!
