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Hermann the Lombard
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Hoboken, NJ, USA
Jun 1999 time: 00:17
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quote: Originally posted by Locutus
I'm seriously considering to 'host' a succession game myself - I don't really have time for that either but if it can bring that tradition back to live again I think I'm willing to make the sacrifice (it's less time consuming than MP games).
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AHA! You just volunteered! (At minimum, you didn't step back fast enough!)
If you host a succession game, I'll be happy to play in it. My preference would be for a "Cradle" game this time...though it might be *very* interesting to use the same map and start position under Cradle and MedMod in parallel (or 'Poly, or "Patch" or any combo).
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DeanToth
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San Diego California
Apr 2002 time: 21:17
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i can't speak for others, but I had put Call to Power II on the shelf for many months in anticipation of CivIII....
CivIII is such a disappointment.... Yes it does have some neat little features, like the strategic and luxury goods and such, and it does LOOK GOOD graphically, but overall the evolution of these turn-based civ-games (for me at least) is best envisioned in CTPII.... Public works and stackable armies alone make the game better for me (others say this is a "tired" argument).
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Tamerlin
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Toulouse (South-western France)
Apr 2002 time: 06:17
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Hi everybody,
So there is a CTP2 resurgence and most of you agree, at least to some extent, to link this phenomenon to Civ 3 and the disappointment it has generated. Though, as I read the various posts many other reasons have been exposed :
- The game can be customized
- A very active community
- Good concepts (public work, combat system, armies...)
- A rich gameplay (11 governments, special units...)
- Quality of the mods we can find at Apolyton,
- The good job of Locutus
- Etc, etc.
A a newcomer, I can play the "Candid". A as I don't really know what is the equivalent in anglo-saxon litterature, let me explain what is a candid for us french. Candid is the name of a famous character depicted a long time ago in french classical litterature, the name of this famous character is now used to quickly describe someone who is very naive, simple and pure (the later I fear I'am not... ). "To play the Candid" roughly means acting as someone who don't know a subject and can thus think without being influenced by any preconception and thus as someone with can have an unbiased opinion. As I registered a few days ago, thanks to Locutus, I'am not too involved in these forums to display a biased opinion, at least I think so.
I discovered Civ2 in 1997 and played it endlessly for several years. I was rather disappointed by CTP1, good new ideas mixed with very annoying game events and a bad time flow. I bought CTP2 a few months after the game was released, although the game was "overbugged" I really appreciated the experience and almost stopped playing "Civ2 : Test of time".
Meanwhile I fell on Apolyton Site and read some people were designing "Mods" and moreover that a Mod to play CTP2 "as it should be" was available. As I'am reluctant to play mods which are "changing" the concepts of the original game the Apolyton Pack appeared as a boon.
When I heard Civ3 was to be published I stopped playing CTP2 and anxiously waited for the release and regularly checked Apolyton and the Civ3 official site for news and hints. As soon as the game was released I bought the US version and started playing the tutorial. I knew what to expect from the graphisms (which I don't really appreciate) but had to discover the new concepts of Civ3. They were indeed very interesting and were greatly improving the original game. I greatly appreciated the game, but as Primarch wrote it I found the game lacked something I couldn't really figure out.
Yes, what a pleasure to see your culture and frontiers growing, at last we don't have to move these spies and planes no more, entire stacks are no more wiped out after a lost fight, at last we have a powerful diplomatic system, etc. But I got quickly bored to move all this workers at every corner of my ever growing nation, I got angry when a newly conquered city reverted to its original owner although the said city was garrisoned with an army powerful enough to invade another nation, and what to say about the fact this said army had vanished in the process... ).
Basically, I think Civ3 is a very good game which, in spite of its great new concepts, is less funny to play than its predecessor and moreover than CTP2.
There is another thing which really bothered me a lot. The subject I'am about to write about is a sensible one and I would like everybody here to understand I don't want to hurt anybody. If someone feels hurt about my words, I sincerelly apologize in advance. ).
I have not appreciated at all the hasty removal of Fundamentalism as a goverment in Civ3 although I'am perfectly understanding the reason behind this. Though I have never used this government form as a player, Fundamentalism is a part of our history since many centuries and should be included in any game pretending to simulate the growth of competing nations throughout history.
Fundamentalism could have been implemented as an option when you create a new game for example, a warning could have been displayed when you select use this option...
In a way, I'am considering Infogrames has judged me unable to make the difference between a game and a terrible reality.
Considering the pure gameplay, Alfred Hitchcock used to say "Better the villain, better the movie". In CTP2, Fascist and Theocratic governments near your border are annoying neighbors that make for "excellent" villains.
For all these reasons I'am coming back to CTP2 although I will certainly give Civ3 another chance.
But, are there other reasons ? Yes.
So I decided I would rather play CTP2 rather than Civ3. This naturally bring me back to Apolyton and all the mods available. This new interest prompted me to better check the mods and news in relation with CTP2. I discovered a very active community of people regularly exchanging point of views about every aspects of the game, people actively promoting their favorite game and constantly trying to improve the said game.
Last week, I contacted the creators of Apolyton which kindly and quickly redirected me towards Locutus which replied as kindly and quickly, a very good starting point.
Last saturday night I decided to check the forum and found the thread started by Locutus. I discovered people coming from almost every corner of the world, people very different from each other, people with different cultures, backgrounds and histories, sometimes weird though (what a curious idea to be a soccer fan in the USA ). I decided to register immediately and post a reply to "Halt, who goes there thread ?" even though I believed no one would care about a totally unknown newbie who has never contributed to Apolyton before.
So why is there a CTP2 resurgence ?
1) In my opinion, some people have been disappointed by Civ3 and have looked elsewhere while others have unearthed CTP2 and found the game was more funny to play and even more so with a mod downloaded from Apolyton. Some others have certainly decided to give the game a chance as the price diminished.
2) The CTP2 community is very active and is constantly exchanging ideas, the forums are prooving everyday the game is alive although it has been abandoned by Activision. For a casual visitor or a potential newbie it is very important and stimulating to see some people are striving to improve the game, are achieving wonderful results, are working together to solve problems and are thinking about new perspectives. Somewhere, you feel the urge to be part of this whole...
3) The tone of the CTP2 threads is very refreshing, I have found adult individuals engaged in constructive debates, tolerant of each others ideas and with a solid sense of humor. All the members of this forum and Locutus have to be credited for this.
Though I'am sure I could find more, I think the three aforementioned points are the major reasons behind the CTP2 resurgence.
Respect to everybody in there !
Jeff
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DeanToth
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San Diego California
Apr 2002 time: 21:17
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quote: Originally posted by Tamerlin
the tone of the CTP2 threads is very refreshing, I have found adult individuals engaged in constructive debates, tolerant of each others ideas and with a solid sense of humor. All the members of this forum and Locutus have to be credited for this.
Jeff |
Hi
Yes I am rather disappointed by the non-constructive defensiveness of the "CIV III" forums (sorry to any rabid civIII'ers) but everytime I've mentioned what I think are areas for improvement in CivIII i get the old "If you don't like it, change the channel" argument. Or, "go work for Firaxis if you think you know so much" . . . "CTPII sold like 1000 copies so who cares" or my favorite one: "go back to CTPII if you like it so much" (I got that one down already ;-)
Additionally, many of these types of comments come from those who haven't actually played CTPII and so I think they are missing the point. They often respond with "CivIII is way better than CivII" - - well DUH.. no one is arguing that point. I think they think I am talking about Civ2 when I say CTP2!!!
Anyway, the cooler heads prevail here. I have to stay out of those forums now cuz my big mouth could get me in trouble.
"still waiting for the Civ4 patch to CivIII" -Dean
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DeanToth
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San Diego California
Apr 2002 time: 21:17
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quote: Originally posted by Haupt. Dietrich
wondering why can't I seem to play MP? I have the latest server.dat as per the FAQ #23. Installed it correctly but everytime I log on there are 0 players in all the hosted sites.
I'm desparate to play! |
Firstly, if you haven't done so, go check out the multiplay registry!
Secondly, I too have had some problems even after copying the new servers.dat file. Besides there being no one on the server, I often get a "entering lobby" warning that just sits there forever.
On one of the servers, a "connection lost" popup appears every 5 seconds. Another poster has suggested that these are just problems on those servers and I tend to agree.
PS - this happens on non-modded CTPII and with a DSL.
PPS - i am soon to be done with my tourny game and will be down to play some MP...
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DeanToth
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San Diego California
Apr 2002 time: 21:17
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General Ike:
There are many reasons I feel CTP2 is superior to Civ3, but the ones you list are high on my list.
Civ3's tech tree and unit choices seem limited. The choices of government are EXTREMELY limited! There are like 5 governments in Civ3 compared to a dozen or so in CTP2.
I like the Theocracy, Monarchy, Technocracy, and Virtual Democracy the most.
Civ3 gives us no leeway with gov'ts - which on top of the ridiculous "worker" method of placing tile improvements - instead of Public Works points - makes Civ3 a decidedly inferior "civ-style" game.
As another person posted elsewhere, there is such a thing as "CTP-phobia"....
When one tries to point out shortcomings to Civ3 on the forums, you get a lot of people responding with wholehearted antagonism rather than answering the points listed..
I feel that Firaxis had this same phobia in designing Civ3.
On the topic of workers, No "real world" empire ever had a solitary group(s) of people going around building EVERY SINGLE public improvement (such as roads, damns, irrigation, etc). Instead, the Public Works model works much better in that an entire governments' resources are poured into getting local workers to build local improvements.
There are many more arguments I could make, but I've made them elsewhere in other posts...
Perhaps a new thread here discussing the problems with Civ3 would help elucidate other issues. (there are such threads on the Civ3 forum, but you run into too many CTP-phobics there)
On the bright side, the expansion pack recently announced by Firaxis will indeed address some issues such as unit stacking and group-bombarding... so this is a great improvement... but fundamental game-mechanics such as PW and combination army attacks (where you have "flank" and "rear rank" attacks in a group, as well as Army Standing - peacy,alert, at war) are still not addressed.
These excellent improvements which the Activision team made are completely ignored in Civ3 - making Civ3 more of a Civ2.5 game... booo! :-(
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