More Gamespot screenshots

[Stuie]

Some interesting stuff here -

http://gamespot.com/gamespot/filters...454261,00.html

[Sean]

Thanks for the post Stuie.

[Pembleton]

Thanks, the screenshots from the final version of the game look awesome!

[Sandman]

Forests on mountains! Yay!

Still no snow-capped mountains unfortunately.

[Gramphos]

Cool, this is what I see.
1. Once and for all is the rumor about elephants connected to polytheism gone.
2. a new Montezuma for ixnay to work with.
3. you see the bombardment range of a catapult

[Gramphos]

Originally posted by Sandman
Forests on mountains! Yay!

Still no snow-capped mountains unfortunately.

We have known for long that forest can appear on any terrain suited for forests.
And you should be able to create snowy mountains with the editor if you like to, but why?

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by Pembleton
Thanks, the screenshots from the final version of the game look awesome!

Those are old screenshots!!


Dan
__________________
Dan Magaha
Web Wizard
Firaxis Games, Inc.
www.firaxis.com























Just kidding.... It's nice to finally see some screens posted that aren't several months old.


Dan

[Stuie]

Couple things I noticed:

American F-15 has the ability to perform Precision Strikes (along with all Stealth units). Cool.

The mountains do not have snow caps (some were wishing they did) and still don't look all that great to me - they don't flow together. Reminds me of the mountains around Phoenix AZ, they just sort of stick up here and there.

The maps look pretty full by just after 0 AD. Doesn't look like there's any room for new expansion. Maybe that's a function of the map size in play, though.

The shots are 800x600. Sorry, I know I keep harping on that, but why can't we see the game full size (1024x768)?

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS

Those are old screenshots!!

Dan

Glad you're having fun, Dan!!

[Ralf]

Those early steel-wool looking forests have apparently been replaced by something that looks far better.

[shum00]

I just noticed... the science rate for despotism is 90%... no limits? Unless they used the editor already.

[Pembleton]

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS
Those are old screenshots!!

Good one. You had me there.

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by Stuie
Couple things I noticed:

American F-15 has the ability to perform Precision Strikes (along with all Stealth units). Cool.

The mountains do not have snow caps (some were wishing they did) and still don't look all that great to me - they don't flow together. Reminds me of the mountains around Phoenix AZ, they just sort of stick up here and there.

The maps look pretty full by just after 0 AD. Doesn't look like there's any room for new expansion. Maybe that's a function of the map size in play, though.

The shots are 800x600. Sorry, I know I keep harping on that, but why can't we see the game full size (1024x768)?

Snow-capped mountains are in the game, but they were added relatively late in the game so websites with older screenshots don't have shots of them, and I guess Gamespot just didn't get a shot with them in.

I can't speak for Gamespot, but the reason the ones on Civ3.com are compressed is mainly for navigation -- we didn't want full-screen images popping up everywhere, especially when we don't know if the browser has enough desktop resolution to comfortably display the image or not.

Dan

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by shum00
I just noticed... the science rate for despotism is 90%... no limits? Unless they used the editor already.

It is my understanding that the science rate cap was removed from all governments in the default game. You can still set rate caps in the editor if you want, but the default state of the game is to allow you to max out science no matter what government you're in (except anarchy, of course )


Dan

[Fiera]

The Eisenstein city screen shows a population of 305000. The population increase steps from Civ2 have been changed then.

Was this already known?

[Ralf]

Originally posted by shum00
I just noticed... the science rate for despotism is 90%... no limits? Unless they used the editor already.

How do you see that? I have looked at that screenshot but I sure cant see anything that says 90%. In that little box it says Russian Despotism 1.9.0... but what does that prove? If history is anything to go by, the 90% allocation should be food, if anything.

------------- Edited:

Oops! Read Dan's comment above.

[d_dudy]

what are those circles with lines through them?


no science limit? cool (ahh.....civ1)

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by d_dudy
what are those circles with lines through them?


no science limit? cool (ahh.....civ1)

Those designate techs that are not required to advance to the next era, IIRC.


Dan

[Gramphos]

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS
Those designate techs that are not required to advance to the next era, IIRC.


Dan

Can you go back to an earlier era and research something you have skipped later?

[Harlan]

Glad to hear about the snow capped mountains. Maybe that means there's still hope Firaxis has listened to the constant stream of complaints over here about the irrigation graphic and changed that.

I'm happy to see for once I noticed something first - Stuie I beat you by a good 10 minutes , but posted the notice on this thread:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...5&pagenumber=2

[Ralf]

Originally posted by Gramphos

Can you go back to an earlier era and research something you have skipped later?

Obviously. Check out this middle age section of the techtree. There are navigation-buttons that leads both to ancient and industrial eras.

[Gramphos]

Originally posted by Ralf
Obviously.

To Obvious to some programmers I know.
I once tested a game of them, and if you choose not to do something at the first time you could do it you could not do it later.

[Faboba]

On one of the article pages is a screenshot about smart weapons.

It says that precisions strikes can be done only by Stealth units and the F-15s

Now this could mean one of two things - The F15 has a special ability to be able to do precision strikes. This will be great if it doesn't have any other advantages ( like range etc ) otherwise it will be unfair on everyone else as all other unique units have had only one advantage.

Or it could mean that the F-15 instead of being based on the jet aircraft is based on the stealth fighter. I hope this is not the case as it is unrealistic in terms of invention progression and it would mean the americans are the only civ with a UU not obsolete at the end of the game.

If it's the first option though thats pretty damn cool.

[d_dudy]

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS



Those designate techs that are not required to advance to the next era, IIRC.


Dan

hey thanks! good feature, i'd say

[Faboba]

Someone's already mentioned the bombardment range for the catapult, as this is the case do you think it's plausible that later units will have a greater range, shelling simulated Afganistan from Simulated Pakistan without actually needing to go anywhere near the city.

This in my mind would more than make up for the Battship's lack of speed, if it can shell targets three squares away!!!!!!

[Sandman]

Luxuries seem to cluster together. I wonder, is this the only place where incense is found in the world? Or are there other clusters or lone tiles? I can see some big wars being fought over luxuries, especially if this is the only place. In fact the luxury clusters remind me of the landmarks in SMAC. Pretty cool.

On a more worrysome note, on the same screenshot, there are two possible AI weaknesses.

1. The AI has failed to build a road to the incense northeast of Tours, therefore it receives no benefit from it.
2. The AI has irrigated two deserts near Shantung, and ignored a plain. Although there may be circumstances which do not make this an error, like if the irrigation came from a bonus hut.

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Harlan
I'm happy to see for once I noticed something first - Stuie I beat you by a good 10 minutes , but posted the notice on this thread:

Start a new thread next time and save me the trouble!

[El hidalgo]

Anyone know what the deal is with the forests? Is one jungle, or are there two forest types? It looks like one is coniferous and the other deciduous. That would be cool. I wonder if you can add terrain types like you can governments? I wonder if all this has been asked and answered before?

[Harlan]

El hidalgo,
I think we can clearly see both coniferous and deciduous types, which is way cool. On some rare screenshots, you can also see jungle, though it is hard to tell the difference (the presence of the rubber trade good is a clue).

Since we've now seen forested mountains, there's got to be forested hills as well. In fact, some of the recent screenshots may already have some of those, but if so they're hard to distinguish as such (it appears the tile is part forest and part hill, rather than looking like hilly forest).

What I find REALLY cool is how sometimes you can see Plains underlying the forest types, sometimes Grassland. From the buttons associated with some units, it looks like forests can be cut down or built up pretty easily.

So forest isn't really a terrain type in and of itself, but rather vegetation on top of the "real" terrain type. What a great improvement!

[El hidalgo]

Originally posted by Harlan
What I find REALLY cool is how sometimes you can see Plains underlying the forest types, sometimes Grassland. From the buttons associated with some units, it looks like forests can be cut down or built up pretty easily.

So forest isn't really a terrain type in and of itself, but rather vegetation on top of the "real" terrain type. What a great improvement!

YES! That's way cool, because the soil under the forests in much of Europe is good for farming (=grasslands) whereas the soil under the forests in Siberia is not. Now one can account for the differences in one's maps. Excellent. Thanks, Harlan!