Be careful what you wish for.
Next year all the 4X’s are going to come out. What I write below is not under some NDA. I know it because it’s my job to know it.
Let me walk you through the schedule:
1H2016: Stellaris, Master of Orion
2H2016: Civilization VI, Endless Space 2
I could be wrong on the dates. You could swap some of this around a bit but you get the idea.
Where is GalCiv III in this?
Stardock will be announcing its first expansion in January. I won’t go into details here but it is something we’ve never done before. 2016 we’re going to release a steady stream of GalCiv updates but we are going to do our best to stay away from the flood and work on the really big GalCiv III expandalone for much later.
GalCIv III has been a tremendous success for us. It’s kind of our Civ V. That is, with Civ V, a lot of long time fans were really upset that it didn’t do X, or Y like Civ IV had but it brought in a lot of new players. GalCiv III has done a good job welcoming a lot of new players into the GalCiv universe. 2016 is going to add a kick ass expansion (target release date February) and follow that up with a lot of updates to refine and improve the GalCiv III universe. But it won’t make sense to do another big expansion after February since all the 4Xs are coming out.
What should be in the base game versus some future expandalone?
Let me walk you through the things I think GalCiv III needs and how we want to get these things to you.
First off, Steam now supports upgrading to expandalones. This is a big deal because it means we can make a GalCiv III: X that is major game change but let people upgrade to it very inexpensively. In the old days, you’d have to “rebuy” the game. It also lets use do universal DLC which means that all the DLC you would buy for III will work on all versions of GalCiv III. As a gamer, that’ s a pretty big deal.
What we have decided going forward is that any really major changes will have to go into an expandalone. We had a pretty serious bit of pushback with the per-planet production wheel and we don’t want to go through that again. The per planet production wheel is a bad game design. We allow players to still get to it through a racial trait but personally, I’d rather see it die. But I understand players who feel attached to it.
But now there’s a lot of fear about making game changes that I think are objectively good. Let me give you an example:
In GalCiv II, I made it so that ship components used X + Y% of hull size space. Thus, an engine might use 3 units of space but also use 5% of the max hull space. This meant , no matter what you were very limited in how many engines you could have. GalCiv III doesn’t have the Y% and thus, inevitable, we have people designing ships that can move 73 moves which breaks the game balance. Do we bring back the Y%? Well, you know what will happen when/if we do. There will be angry people down-voting us on Steam. And to be candid, a game’s review score determines how often Steam will promote it. When we got rid of the per planet wheel, several people gave GalCiv III a negative review on Steam which hurts us even though we suspect most people were glad it was gone.
So on the one hand, making engines and sensors consume consume a % of hull space will make the game objectively better. But on the other hand, if we do it, we’ll upset some people who like having ships that can move 73 moves and some of them will give us negative Steam reviews which will in turn cost us a lot of future sales.
Let’s talk about the future
GalCiv III remains the first and only 4th generate 4X. All the other games out there are still 3rd generation (32-bit, DirectX 9c, single core design). Eventually, everyone will have to move to 4th generation. This was painful for us since we lost a decade of legacy code. But it’s something every franchise has to do sooner or later. So we’re in a good position for growing it into the future. It’ll just be a question of whether the fan base will stick with us or whether we’ll all great fractured between MOO, Stellaris, ES2 or whether Civ VI will annihilate them all.
Regardless, what I do know is that there are certain key ingredients on our road-map that I want to share with you guys:
These are intentionally vague so read into them what you will. But the game is called Galactic Civilizations. So over the next few years there’s just a lot of stuff to keep integrating into it.
So anyway, just some thoughts.
cheers,
-brad
elite founders will get it automatically.
Point taken, experience at that executive table tends to do that The issue with successful CEOs, especially good ones, is that their ego tends to take over and blind them. You have a great product it would be too bad if you missed out on opportunities to improve because the way they are passed on is less than ideal to you. You don't need PR, it is refreshing and differentiating to have you on the forums, quirks and all. Naselus loves your product and is trying to improve it in a way that seems to resonate with a rather large segment of your customer base, worth a look at least to see why.
I think most of us agree with many of the points people raise.
It's a question of severity and prioritization along with analysis.
I just watched the new Star Wars movie. I loved it. But if you go to the IMDB reviews, it has plenty of people giving it 1s. The point being, no matter how good your product is, there is always going to be a group that doesn't like it.
If someone wants to publicly argue that GalCiv III was at the "bottom rung of OK" that's certainly their right. But I have no reason to take their opinion any more seriously than the guy who gives the new Star Wars movie a 1.
It's a question of severity and prioritization along with analysis. I just watched the new Star Wars movie. I loved it. But if you go to the IMDB reviews, it has plenty of people giving it 1s. The point being, no matter how good your product is, there is always going to be a group that doesn't like it. If someone wants to publicly argue that GalCiv III was at the "bottom rung of OK" that's certainly their right. But I have no reason to take their opinion any more seriously than the guy who gives the new Star Wars movie a 1.
That is the problem with using the internet as a feedback mechanism, the anonymity that it provides has become much more conducive to negativity and idiocy than reasoned feedback and constructive criticism. The silent majority that just likes the product and uses it usually does not have the imperative to write anything about it.
Definitely looking forward to Star Wars.
In the meantime have a great Christmas, I have a Drengin empire to crush.
People shouldn't get so bent over Brad posting his feelings. It is his forum but he does not usually ban people for griping as long as it doesn't get insulting. For the most part he conducts himself like any other poster.
Once he has made his position clear, just stop trying to convince him that you know best. Maybe you do maybe you don't but just stop fcs.
Guy with 1000 hours of play time writes negative review in retaliation. Classy.
It doesn't follow that these voices should not be heard or listened to, but it may surprise some people to learn that forum users and people who download mods, let alone make them, are not, by any stretch of the imagination, the majority of any community that plays any game. In fact, the majority, a heavily weighted proportion for most games, just play it if they like it, and stop playing when they get bored, and the only footprint they leave is the money they spent on it. No forum posts, no reviews, no social media stuff, nothing. The 'Community' not even being aware they ever even played the game, and certainly having no idea whatsoever of what they thought about it.
This doesn't mean that discussion is bad, pointless or that it doesn't lead to some wonderful changes to games, but I think taking a step back once in a while to gain some perspective is a good thing. ie: Keep Rawrspooge Fartnoise the Rage Monster and its buddy, The Snark, in their respective cages. Nothing productive ever happens while they roam free, and you just look like a five year old.
Even if 75% of forum posters all unanimously declare a game a POS, all that will ever mean is that 75% of forum posters think that. There will be many who read the forums, but never post, so even that 75% is not 75% of all forum users. If 75% reviews on Steam are bad, all that will ever mean is that 75% of the Steam users that bother writing reviews at all think it's it's a bad game.
Let's not get carried away with words like majority and minority, because ultimately, the only people who actually know these statistics with any real and useful degree of accuracy at all are the people involved with development, publishing and sales of the game.
Arg double post
People like you are the reason why I think democracy is a failure. Entitled, whiny, hypersensitive babies. @Frogboy I made sure that I put in a good review on Steam for all the stardock games I have just to balance out the idiots hindering your design decisions. They play for over a hundred hours and then have the gall to post a negative review. Galciv 3 IS NOT your god damned life. It is a just a game, a damn good one and if it kept your attention for over 30 hours, it's worth a good review.The game designer is a person. And like a person he has people he likes and doesn't like. He doesn't like Naselus. End of story. Get over it.Edit: LOL! This Drakkos guy has over 1000 hours in it and the baby posted a negative review? Ridiculous! Get a life and some sunshine.
Thanks. I'm actually not the designer on GalCiv III. I designed GalCiv II.
So on the one hand, it is nice that people say they prefer GalCiv II, I remember going through the same thing with GalCiv II. Some of the posts were almost word for word the same.
I remember spending vacations doing doing AI work in the hopes that I could satisfy the people who said the AI was still not "good enough". It got to the point where in GalCiv II, I would have the AI actually simulate future turns in the background to determine what it would do next. I'd excitedly get a new update out with new AI work only to get the same people saying "I cant' tell any different, AI still sucks."
Those are the guys who will play 1000 hours of a game and then still go onto Steam and give it a thumbs down. There is never a scenario where they'll be happy.
That's one of the reasons why I'm so excited about these new games coming out. Some of them will find one of those games more to their liking and migrate to those communities. Others may find that none of them match their liking.
I am hearing very good things about the new MOO game for instance. And a good MOO will help us all. Same for ES2 and Stellaris. Each of these games is different and fun in their own way.
It is extremely disappointing to me to see Frogboy encouraging naselus to leave the GC3 community. Naselus is one of the few to do any extensive modding of GC3 - modding was a feature that was touted, but hasn't been utilized much. (for reasons I won't get into) A healthy modding community can do great things for a game. Yes, he offers many critiques of the game and that can be frustrating for developers who spend years building a complex and ambitious game. I often disagree with what he has to say, but just as often he has some very good observations. He's a rarity on the internet - somebody who's able and willing to construct a good argument. (whether or not you agree with that argument is beside the point) It's frustrating to me, as a player, to see the developer telling somebody like that to get out and leave them alone. Yes, he can come across as arrogant or condescending, perhaps insulting (as in his not-4th-gen post) sometimes. But a healthy community has people who are willing to share ideas, create content, and debate the various aspects of the game, whether that is in-game strategy, who's your favorite race, or their preferences for the future of the game. Sometimes players get passionate, that's a good thing. Sometimes that passion is expressed as frustration. I know Stardock wants passionate players, so they have to accept that their passionate fans will express their opinions -positive or negative - passionately.
There are millions of people all over the internet who, when they encounter something they don't like, leave a simple, insulting, comment like "your game sucks, lol" or "your so stupid this feature is bad." Tell those people to leave. There are people who spam forums with their complaints, ban them. But when somebody is willing to put in the time and effort to tell you exactly what they don't like, and why, don't tell them to leave. Nobody has to listen to them, or like them. But these people are catalysts for productive conversations, getting players to really think and care about the game, and should not be dismissed and told to leave the community or play some other game. Like I said, passionate players express passionate opinions, but passionate players aren't going to have 100% positive opinions. Only stupid people have 100% positive opinions, or 100% negative opinions. Tell stupid people to leave. Not good, passionate players.
I don't want Naselus to leave. I have looked at his mods countless times and sent them over to the team. But at the same time, and this is the part that I don't think newer forum members understand: I don't have the option to just quit the forums. It is important (at least I think it is) that I go through the posts and take notes on what people want so I can pass it to the team. But it's extremely off-putting to have people cross from constructive to just plain insulting. I have a pretty high tolerance of it, but after a few months of it, it gets old.
While I understand what you're saying, and your frustration, this post in particular made it seem like you were telling him to leave these forums and the gc3 community altogether. While I absolutely agree that you have the right to post whatever you want, and request courtesy on the forums, sometimes the way you say things makes me feel uncomfortable. But yes, that has a lot to do with every other game publisher being very, very careful about what they say and how they say it, specifically to not upset or alienate anyone. I love the GalCiv games and, should I find myself with disposable time and money, I will certainly be playing other Stardock games because Stardock makes my kind of games. You are obviously a huge part of what makes Stardock amazing. But I feel community is an important part of a game these days, sometimes I get a little worried that your interactions with the community could be detrimental. Oh well, you do what you do. Just keep making amazing games.
Dear God, will everyone just chill out please?
It's very flattering to have people rushing to my defense, but it's really not necessary - especially leaving bad Steam reviews in response to this is just plain silly. Me and Froggy having an argument has absolutely no effect on the objective quality of the game, and the objective quality of the game is what everything I talk about is about. It's exactly not how I'd want people to act in my name, as nice as it is that you'd go that far in my defense, and every bad review GC3 gets directly damages the potential player base for my own mod. Let's not break down into sides over a tiny spat, because that's ridiculous.
Maybe I could've phrased my post better. Maybe Brad got a bit more upset than he ought to. Who cares? It's not like he banned me from the forum (which he could have done quite easily if he really wanted me gone), and while he invited me to go away I'm not going to be taking him up on the offer any time soon. I can't believe we're still discussing this two and a half days later, frankly. I'm over it, and I'd like it if we could get back to talking constructively about the game rather than wasting days arguing about me.
Let's just move on and get over it. If we really want to produce a bucketload of character witness statements about how awesome I am, we can open a new thread for it and stop hijacking this one, which is neither about my record nor about whether Brad's posting style passes some arbitrary politeness test. I'd rather have a real human being with feeling sand everything replying to my posts than canned bollocks from a mindless marketing drone, and if the price we have to pay for that is that there's occasionally arguments then that's more than worth it imo.
Oh, it's all fun .....until someone gets hurt...
Always good to see life in these here forums...
This is what i love about this place .. one big happy family .
oh and who the heck is Jafo?
No-one special..... though sometimes compared to the Evil Roy Slade ...
Come on Jafo what is your position at stardock.
Oh man Roy is the best!
Um....
....about 10,000 miles to the left....and a bit lower ...
Can I change the subject to climate change? Please?
What do you think is causing all that pollution? It's people setting up oil refineries all over the place and nuking each other in 4X games.
Kids these days.
Wow! I can't believe all of the negativity. The internet age has really emboldened unbalanced people. I hear this from touring musicians as well, that fans who pay for VIP treatment feel entitled to more than what the artists even have to give. This is a serious issue with Steam that I never considered before. For someone with 1000 hours of playtime to intentionally attempt to sabotage the success of a game they apparently love over a change in gameplay is astounding. And the stupid wheel was given back to everyone to appease the vocal minority anyway!
It is also completely unfair to compare vanilla GalCivIII to GalCiv II 2.0. Of course there are features missing or not implemented yet. This isn't a issue exclusive to this game or even Stardock for that matter. It's how PC games are developed. It's no longer exclusive to PC gaming either; consoles offer expansions and patches now too. For someone to complain that an already decent game continues to get better is asinine. Especially if they are an Elite Founder and get all the updates automatically for life! Enjoy the ride for goodness sake!
Incidentally, the internet empowered vocal minority seem to be driving U.S. politics as well. God help us all!
Don't pay any attention to what they write about you. Just measure it in inches.
Andy Warhol
The more of a train wreck, a thread becomes, the more people view it.. The more views, the higher GCIII climbs on Google searches.
It actually benefits SD to have these kind of threads. . There really is no bad publicity.
Question: is it possible to release the Galciv2 source code?
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