Are we a breed that is dying out?

[Cironir]

There are two genres that I adore: city builders and turn-based fantasy games. Oddly enough, there are relatively few new games in either of these genres. There's no new fantasy TBS in sight (that I know of), and CotN is the only building game that I'm looking forward to this year (there was another that eobet mentioned). I've tried to get into popular RTS games like Rise of Nations, but I get either bored or annoyed after just a few hours.

Are we a dying breed? Something that's left over from the earlier days of video gaming when CPUs weren't as fast, or do we just have "strange tastes"? Or, alternatively, are there a lot of gamers that simply don't know about these types of games?

[vovan]

... do we just have "strange tastes"? Or, alternatively, are there a lot of gamers that simply don't know about these types of games?

A mix of those two, I think. The most heavily advertised games - RTSs and FPSs, are also the most popular. They are, I think, much like the arcades of the old days. They stress coordination of movements much more heavily than the slow consideration that TBSs, and citybuilders, stimulate. And most people prefer such "mindless" games.

Of course, I should make an aside here, that by mindless, I don't really mean that mind is not occupied - just that a different part of it is exercised.

[Josh]

I think we are just the people who experienced games going from the board, to games that were too complex to be on a board so using a fancy calculator to figure out how many peices we get and to roll the die was great, and then games started moving beyond emulations of board games (squares became hexes, hexes became smaller (untill now we cant see them and concider them fluid movements) and turns became shorter, then movement and turns was introduced, then someone decided turns should just be done away with.

I would say turns are dead, remember we grew up when gamers were anti-social geeks playing in their dark basement, games didnt need to go fast, we could start a turn, survey the map, get a drink, make some moves, use the bathroom, make a few more moves, take out the trash, think "I think I might be able to click finish now" then we survey the land some more, and finaly click finish .. then we say "oh crap I forgot to..." as the computer clicks away.

Now that everything is multiplayer (which I do enjoy, playing against my friend's mind is as enjoyable as chess) If we tried to pull that we would get yelled at and our friend would leave the game.

Also we may feel like we are the minority in the gaming community now, but thats just because we used to be 50 percent of it (the other fifty composed of office workers playing solitaire) geeks long ago who liked strategy were playing chess when the cool kids were playing sports all the time, then computers came around and most of the geeks started playing on computers and the cool kids were still playing sports (and maybe the odd nintendo) then computers got 3D graphics and computers became cool, and now those cool kids are dwarfing the odd strategy gamer with their first person shooters, we didnt get any smaller, a bigger group just moved into our turf

I dont miss turns, I just miss games being a game...

Anyone up for some chess? :cool:

[Anguille]

Well,
I don't think that we are dying out. There are some games that, even if not turn based, shouldn't be too fast:

Spartan & Gates of Troy came out this year (TBS):
http://www.slitherine.co.uk

Medieval Lords (city Building) should come out soon:
http://www.montecristogames.com

Knights of Honor (slow RTS) where you build up an empire:
http://www.knights-of-honor.net/

Space Empires 5 due out next year:
http://www.malfador.com/

I haven't been really looking for fantasy games but i think that Stardock wants to make a sequel to Master of Magic.
http://www.galciv.com/index.asp?u=0

There's probably more...

Chess? ME ME ME ;)

[Josh]

If anyone really intrested in a game PM me, I wouldnt mind check-mating you* what else can we do to occupy our time waiting. ;)


*I probably wont be able to

[NeilV]

I blame Microsoft the moment Mr Gates decided that computers should be for everyone (when he introduced Win 95) I think it sounded the death toll for TBS their are still a few out their but they hide it so well that the average gamer thinks its a real time game (neverwinter nights etc) I even remember before online gaming was play by mail when we had a game of Stars going for about 18 months.

Hopefully with all the big companies cutting back now we will get some more independent companies that will produce what the gamers want.

And I am still managing to stay a geek as I have 5 PC's but no cool console
:rolleyes: :cool:

[EmperorJay]

Interesting question! I have been thinking about the answer for a couple of minutes but I don't have a definite answer.

Many people prefer fast paced action these days (ie. shooters) but I believe that there are still many people around who do have the time to play "slow" games. (Though games are as slow as you want them to be)

Are citybuilding games dying out? Certainly not and perhaps a 3D citybuilder will even catch the attention to people who never played the genre before.

As for (Fantasy) TBS, I don't know. TBS is not dying out either (Civ IV is in production) but I don't know about fantasy, I don't like that.

[Jayhawk]

There's no new fantasy TBS in sight
I fully expect Triumph to bring up another installment of Age of Wonders, though.

[Cironir]

I fully expect Triumph to bring up another installment of Age of Wonders, though.

I asked this very question on the HG forums a couple of days ago. The status right now is that Triumph Studios are working on "something else", and that there are no definite plans for a new AOW game -- at least not in the forseeable future (two or three years). Then again, considering that AOW:SM came out only one year ago, that's still not too uncommon. Other than the passive AI, I think SM is pretty much perfect as far as MoM type of games are concerned.

Earlier today, Iain McNeil of Slitherine inquired in the Usenet newsgroup comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic if there'd be interest in fantasy-themed versions of their historical TBS games (Legion, Spartan & Gates of Troy), after he had read a post by me about upcoming fantasy TBS titles (or the lack thereof). I haven't played Legion and Spartan, but the reviews of these didn't look too exciting. Has anyone played and enjoyed them?

I actually realised today that I had skipped Civ3 when it came out three or so years ago. Was recovering from a Civ2 addiction. ;) Since that game is now in the bargain bin, I'll probably get a copy.

Why can't CotN be ready and rescue me? :)

[Anguille]

Earlier today, Iain McNeil of Slitherine inquired in the Usenet newsgroup comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic if there'd be interest in fantasy-themed versions of their historical TBS games (Legion, Spartan & Gates of Troy), after he had read a post by me about upcoming fantasy TBS titles (or the lack thereof). I haven't played Legion and Spartan, but the reviews of these didn't look too exciting. Has anyone played and enjoyed them?:)
I haven't tried the previous games as i didn't have a good feeling about them. I have played the demo of Spartans and i think that their games are achieving a good level now. I'll be buying Spartan & Gates of Troy. I am pretty sure their next game may interest a broader audience.

I actually realised today that I had skipped Civ3 when it came out three or so years ago. Was recovering from a Civ2 addiction. ;) Since that game is now in the bargain bin, I'll probably get a copy.

Why can't CotN be ready and rescue me? :)
CIV3 is a very good game...be sure to download the patches.

[EmperorJay]

Be sure to get Civ3: Conquests too, that offers multiplayer and a dozen of extra civilizations etc.

[vovan]

And I am still managing to stay a geek as I have 5 PC's but no cool console

Pfft. Consoles are evil. Evil I tell you!

[vovan]

Be sure to get Civ3: Conquests too, that offers multiplayer and a dozen of extra civilizations etc.

Indeed. If anyone's up for a Civ3: Conquests PBEM game, PM me, and we'll set something up. ;)

[Cironir]

For some strange reason, "Conquests" is not available in Germany. I tried various stores, they all said there were "delivery difficulties", but didn't have any information beyond that. It is not a problem to get the base game, the "gold" pack, or the "Play the World" expansion, it's just "Conquests". Odd. Anyway, maybe it's a temporary problem. Civ3 was just fifteen bucks, and since I rarely play strategy games online or via email, I think it'll do. :) (Okay, expect me to be franatically searching for the expansion in a few weeks!)

[EmperorJay]

Don't buy Play the World, Conquests includes PTW so that will really be a waste of money.

That's why I recommend buying Conquests anyway, regardless if you play MP or not. It contains the additions of 2 expansion packs.

Edit: Of course that doesn't help if you can't buy it :p Amazon.de does offer it it seems though.

[Keith]

Citybuilders is a small genre but has a loyal following. After all, its all we have! I think as more people get older they will tire of the FPS genre and start looking for something else. The FPS games are aimed mostly at the adolescent male with short attention spans.

There are quite a few TBS games out there as you can see in the messages above. Another one using turns, is the successful Combat Mission series of WW2 games. Each player gives orders to his units during the "mutual planning" phase then they are carried out during the "mutual execution phase" of the game simultaneously for both sides. The old "I go then you go" type turn games may be a thing of the past, but the system used by Combat Mission seems to keep people interested.

I have Legion and found it a little on the dull side to answer a querry above. It uses turns and a combat screen with 3D terrain. You have to setup your cities to produce the right amount of resources to start producing a certain type of military unit. Once that unit is produced you have to slowly move them from that city on the province map to a frontier area turn by turn until you collect enough units to be wage effective combat against the barbarian in the next province. It was this slow moving of units "x" number of spaces per turn slowly to the frontier that proved very tedious. The battle has a setup phase. You select the location, speed, and formation for each unit of your "legion" before the attack. Once the attack starts the two sides move forward until engaged on a 3D style terrain. The battle is over when one side is either wiped out or the one side routes and retreats. The lack of control during the battle is a bit frustrating. Chariots and Spartans are supposed to be better but I'm not convinced.

I personally don't find the popular Civilization 3 interesting at all. I found it to be one the biggest "snore-fests" I've ever played.
http://members.aol.com/dheitm8612/horus2.gif
Keith Heitmann (http://mailto:dheitm8612@aol.com/) a.k.a Nuthinkhamun
Listen to the music of the CityBuilders while online:
Caesar III Music Player (http://www.geocities.com/kheitmann1/C3Player.htm)•Pharaoh Music Jukebox (http://members.aol.com/dheitm8612/java/pharaoh.htm)•Zeus Music Jukebox (http://members.aol.com/dheitm8612/java/Zeus.htm)•Emperor's Music Box (http://members.aol.com/dheitm8612/java/erotmk.htm)•Children of the Nile & Quiz (http://panzerblitz.proboards9.com/index.cgi#test)

[Azeem]

The same thing kind of happened to PC RPGs. They went under for a while and then suddenly resurfaced with many new RPGs and innovations. I think all genres undergo a sort of "recession" before they re-emerge. Trends are often very cyclical in nature.

As for turn-based fantasy, there's another one that hasn't been mentioned here yet - Dominions II. It has dated graphics and weak sound, but it is a very intriguing turn-based fantasy game.

[Cironir]

I have a copy of Dominions II, but I can't seem to get into it. It's the first game I encounter that I feel might be too complex for me. I still plan to defeat the learning curve some day, but it is really steep.

[Anguille]

Citybuilders is a small genre but has a loyal following. After all, its all we have! I think as more people get older they will tire of the FPS genre and start looking for something else. The FPS games are aimed mostly at the adolescent male with short attention spans.

There are quite a few TBS games out there as you can see in the messages above. Another one using turns, is the successful Combat Mission series of WW2 games. Each player gives orders to his units during the "mutual planning" phase then they are carried out during the "mutual execution phase" of the game simultaneously for both sides. The old "I go then you go" type turn games may be a thing of the past, but the system used by Combat Mission seems to keep people interested.

I have Legion and found it a little on the dull side to answer a querry above. It uses turns and a combat screen with 3D terrain. You have to setup your cities to produce the right amount of resources to start producing a certain type of military unit. Once that unit is produced you have to slowly move them from that city on the province map to a frontier area turn by turn until you collect enough units to be wage effective combat against the barbarian in the next province. It was this slow moving of units "x" number of spaces per turn slowly to the frontier that proved very tedious. The battle has a setup phase. You select the location, speed, and formation for each unit of your "legion" before the attack. Once the attack starts the two sides move forward until engaged on a 3D style terrain. The battle is over when one side is either wiped out or the one side routes and retreats. The lack of control during the battle is a bit frustrating. Chariots and Spartans are supposed to be better but I'm not convinced.



I can't talk about Legion nor chariots of war very well, but i think that Diplomacy, research and trade have greatly been inhanced in Spartan, even the battles have more options (i hope they keep on working on that aspect)...try the demo, you can do all the tutorials and try to campaigns (30 turns).
http://www.slitherine.co.uk/spartan/SpartanIndex.htm

[Hanarky]

"For some strange reason, "Conquests" is not available in Germany."

Cironir, I had no problems to buy it in my game shop. Usually they have everything, and what they do not have, they will get on demand.
www.pcfun.de - there you can order it online too.

I do not think, CB is dying out. But I do think, that many people do not know about them. When I hadn't installed a Pharaoh Demo out of pure boredom years back, I probably wouldn't even know, that this genre exists. There is not much advertising or articles in game magazins contraire to FPS and RTS and usually you find them somewhere in the back shelves in a pc shop. Also due to the nature of CB games, there is not a big online community like in the more mp-oriented games and so it looks, as if only few people actually play them.

I enjoy FPS games a lot, but there the main goal is to kill everything out of your way and story or complexity is nothing, that matters much. When playing a CB or strategy game, I very much appreciate a good story and complex interactions.
Now with all this readings about CotN, I have started to play Pharaoh again, lol. And it is never ending fun :D

Hanarky

[Gordon Farrell]

This is a great thread, and an interesting question to ask. I love city builders (which is why I'm here, of course), imho they're one of the few types of games that really give you the feeling of living in the world of the game, as opposed to build-and-kill style RTS games. I know of four companies that designed city builders:

- The SimCity people, who are unstoppable but only create contemporary builders, not historical ones

- Sunflower, a German company that makes a colonial-era citybuilder called "1502 - The New World"

- Firefly, who created Stronghold

- Impressions. Tilted Mill is made up primarily of ex-Impressions guys so I'm assuming the older studio is now completely defunct, along with their publisher, Sierra.

I don't think historical citybuilders were ever a huge market, but I think they have a passionate core following. With some new innovations (like, oh, lemme see... a 3D engine and walk-through cities!) they could easily be sparked into a renaissance. I think Impressions stopped doing city games because of Sierra's financial woes, not because of any lack of good ideas or dedication. Hopefully, the fact that so many Impressions designers are now at Tilted Mill will get the city building genre back on its feet.

[Cironir]

Cironir, I had no problems to buy it in my game shop. Usually they have everything, and what they do not have, they will get on demand. www.pcfun.de - there you can order it online too.

Thanks for the link! Tom of PC Fun just sent me an email and said that Conquests is sold out and Atari is not shipping fresh copies, because there will be a new Civ3 collection in fall. Probably Civ3 + Conquests as a complete set. He said he'll write again later after they try to get some copies elsewhere. If they can't get one for me, though, then the plain Civ3 will do until fall. :) (And if it's too close to the CotN release, I won't need any other games for a while anyway!)

[Hanarky]

Sorry to hear Cironir

Now, when is fall? In three months and how many copies don't get sold in these 3 months, because there are none . Looks like another failed business decision :mad:
Hope, they get you a copy :)

Hanarky

[GillB]

I even remember before online gaming was play by mail when we had a game of Stars going for about 18 months.

There's still plenty of PBEM games going on at AoW Heaven, both for the original AoW (which I play) and AoW2/SM (which I don't ... yet)

[Echnaton]

Europe is quite a good market for city building games, I think.

Sunflowers made Anno 1602 and 1503, Bluebyte made a lot of Siedler games. Both are German games and very popular in Germany, Switzerland and Austria.
Ecology simulations like sim city were popular here too.

To speak for this region here, those games wont die out :).

[Bizkit]

Same in Romania. The few game producing companies that we have are focusing on RTS's, but I think they'll cover all types of PC games in the next two or three years.
The demand for PC games is getting higher every year, you can see that from the increasing number of gaming magazines, shops, websites and even PC game cafes. These cafes are the first alternative when your PC lacks the minimum resources for a specific game.. Usually crowded with 12 year olds, who manage to buy a decent computer by the time they're 14 (these kids spend most of their pocket-money in the game room, to play in multiplayer mode and some are real experts in gaming.. After six hours of Quake 3 per day, you can get quite good at it).
Anyway, all of these things are fantastic in comparison to the year 1994, when we had one gaming magazine, no game companies and games would reach us after more than 6 months.. Our previews were America's reviews. Now everything's different. Every single kid in my school owns a PC, half of which are connected to the Internet. Most of them are packed with games.

As for the initial reason of this thread.. To tell you the truth, none of my friends play TBS's on a regular basis. Nor do I. And it's the same in the rest of the country. If you browse a Romanian gaming magazine, you'll notice that TBS's have a space of 1-2 pages out of 50. It's always been this way, don't know why. Everyone over here likes shooters, RTS's and simulators. City-builders are slowly starting to get a larger fan-base. I remember that a few years ago, everyone was talking about CIII and Pharaoh.. Then Zeus and Emperor came along, but most of the series' fans had already taken on RTS's as their favourite game type. I can only hope that CoTN will bring some revigoration to the CB scene in Romania. I can't really talk about a dying breed in Romania when the breed has barely existed..

[Yahya]

I enjoy FPS games a lot, but there the main goal is to kill everything out of your way and story or complexity is nothing, that matters much.


I have actually found the trend to be increasingly more story in FPS's. I find this pretty irritating. Once in a while, it can be fairly entertaining to "kill everything", but the last thing you want at that time is the story of why this guy is so upset, etc.

[PCDania]

How 'bout Unreal and Unreal: the awakening? OK, I've barely started on U:tA because I get 3D sick, but the original Unreal contained both a story and complexity to some degree as you had to solve some puzzles here and there for getting along in the game.

[Hanarky]

Now I have played Unreal and Unreal2, though first one was messed up with my old graphics card (time to replay now that I have a new one :)), but I was a bit dissapointed with Unreal 2, the story was not sequentiell, but more like single missions in a row. I expected more of it. But awsome graphics :)

Hanarky

PS. I love the quake series, have played Q1 trough Q3 and lots of fan made maps and scenarios. But what really turned me off was Q3, no story at all, run trough levels and only kill kill kill. May be fun for mp players, but for me, even an FPS needs to have least a bit of a story.

[JuliaSet]

I have played Chariots of War, beta tested Spartan, and was unable to test Troy early this summer, due to travel.

Several staff members at CBC also tested Spartan and enjoyed it for what it was, a small niche game, for a younger group of players. The games are not "builders", per se, but involve military action and battle ground tactics based on the land features on one level, and general planning and movement on another.

Slitherine is a small company which expanded the same engine for four games. They have wonderfully researched scenarios, which were the magnet that attracted me to testing for them. Since they are a very small company, they don't have the staff that can really make grand changes. I have wondered what would happen if they collaborated with others who had a ready made engine, and could ultilize their understanding of Greek/Roman battles. Their art work has also won Spartan a recent prize in the gaming industry. I'd like to see them develop something a little more involved next time round.

The engine for Conquests seems to have been "maxxed out", and word has it that Firaxis is working on a new engine, which should better able to include more complexity.

Many Citybuilding fans shy away from the military aspect of playing, but there is a larger pool of gamers that enjoy a good battle. Certainly developing the right proportion of ingredients will satify a larger fan base. As the new engine evolves, it will be interesting to see what emerges from the genius at TM.

COTN, seems to be in the lead now amongst these games, as they are ready with new innovations, while the others will be starting over, looking for bright new possibilities. Hurrah for the 3D aspect and all the wonderful new innovations we've heard about in CoTN!

Julia

[Annie23340]

I've played Civ games ever since they first came out. I found Civ 3 very enjoyable and bought the expansion pack PTW and that's when I discovered the mod Double Your Pleasure developed by the CD group. What a revelation! It's all that Civilisation should be - so much more complex and with many more civilisations and tech paths. I became a beta tester and then when Conquests came out I became a beta tester for their RAR mod. Anyone who enjoys Civ 3 should go to their site and investigate: http://civ3.bernskov.com/. There is also something called Vanilla Civ which might be a development for Civ 3 for those who do not any expansion packs but I'm not sure. However, I've found that DYP absolutely addictive.

[EmperorJay]

AFAIK, Vanilla Civ is just the standard Civ 3 without any mods or expansion packs.

[Gordon Farrell]

Europe is quite a good market for city building games, I think.

Sunflowers made Anno 1602 and 1503, Bluebyte made a lot of Siedler games. Both are German games and very popular in Germany, Switzerland and Austria.


There's a popular theory that colonization games like the two Annos and the the Settlers series are really popular in Germany because, historically, Germany didn't get to do as much colonizing as, say, England, Spain and France. Consequently, it's more of an exotic fantasy to Germans and Central European nations.

I was wondering what your opinion on that might be?

[Keith]

For a country that didn't come into being until 1871, Germany did alright in the colony department:

Africa

German East Africa

German East Africa was Germany's colony in East Africa, including what is now Burundi, Rwanda, and the mainland part of Tanzania. It came into existence during the 1880s and ended during World War I, when the area was taken over by the British.

Tanzania

The United Republic of Tanzania (Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania in Swahili) is a country on the east coast of central Africa. It is bordered by Kenya and Uganda on the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the west, and Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique on the south. To the east it borders the Indian Ocean.

Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania (present-day)

Rwanda Rwanda is a country in central Africa. It is bordered by Uganda, Burundi, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Tanzania. The indigenous population consists of three ethnic groups. The Hutus, who comprise the majority of the population, are farmers of Bantu origin. The Tutsis are a pastoral people who arrived in the area in the 15th century. Until 1959, they formed the dominant caste under a feudal system based on cattleholding. The Twa are thought to be the remnants of the earliest settlers of the region.

German South West Africa

German South-West Africa (Deutsch-Südwestafrika) was a colony of Germany from 1884 to 1915, when it was taken over by South Africa and administered as South-West Africa, later becoming Namibia.

In 1883, Adolf Lüderitz bought land from a native chief in the area of Angra Peqena, and in early 1884 the Kaiserliche Marine ship Nautilus visited to review the situation. A favorable report from the government, and acquiescence from the British, resulted in a visit from the Leipzig and Elisabeth, and the raising of the German flag, on 7 August 1884.
Namibia

The Republic of Namibia is a country in southwest Africa, on the Atlantic coast. It is bordered by Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east, and South Africa to the south. It gained independence in 1990, and as such it is one of the youngest nations in the world. Its capital is Windhoek.

Cameroons

Cameroons was a British territory in West Africa, now divided between Nigeria and Cameroon.

The area of present-day Cameroon was claimed by German as a protectorate during the "Scramble for Africa" at the end of the 19th century. During World War I, it was occupied by British and French troops, and later mandated to each country by the League of Nations in 1922. The British territory was administered as two areas, Northern Cameroons and Southern Cameroons.

Togolaise

German New Guinea German New Guinea (Ger. Deutsch-Neuguinea) was a German protectorate from 1884 to 1914, consisting of the northeastern part of New Guinea and several nearby island groups.

The main part of German New Guinea was formed by Kaiser-Wilhelmsland, the northeastern part of New Guinea, at present part of Papua New Guinea. The islands in the Bismarck Archipelago situated west of Kaiser-Wilhelmsland and nowadays also belonging to Papua New Guinea, were also part of the protectorate.

German Solomon Islands

Caroline Islands

The Caroline Islands are a large archipelago of small islands forming a chain of many small islands in the western Pacific Ocean, northeast of New Guinea. They are presently divided between the Federated States of Micronesia in the eastern part of the chain, and Palau in the western end.

Most of the islands are low, flat coral reefs, but some are mountainous.
The first European visit to the islands was by the Spanish in 1543, and originally named after Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.

Mariana Islands

Mariana Islands (sometimes called The Marianas; up to the early 20th century sometimes called the Ladrone Islands) are a group of islands made up by the summits of 15 volcanic mountains in the Pacific Ocean.

They are the southern part of a submerged mountain range that extends 1,565 miles from Guam to near Japan. The Marianas are the northern most islands of a larger island group called Micronesia. The Marianas have a total land area of 396 square miles. Guam is a United States territory, and the rest of the Mariana Islands are a United States of America commonwealth called Northern Mariana Islands.

Nauru

Nauru is an island republic in the South Pacific Ocean, formerly known as Pleasant Island. It is the world's smallest independent republic both in terms of population and land area.

Much of its past prosperity derived from phosphate due to the large amount of phosphate deposits on the island, believed by one school of thought to be of guano origin but by another to be of marine origin. The phosphate is used as a fertilizer around the world and the majority of it has been exported to Australia. With the exhaustion of the phosphate supplies, Nauru faces an uncertain future. Nauru currently houses a refugee detention center, under the control of Australia.

Marshall Islands

The Republic of the Marshall Islands are an island nation in the Pacific Ocean, located north of Nauru and Kiribati, east of the Federated States of Micronesia and south of the American island of Wake.

Samoa

Samoa (Western Samoa until 1997, German Samoa from 1900 to 1914) is a country comprising a group of islands in the South Pacific Ocean.
Samoa

China

Jiaozhou Bay Jiaozhou Bay is located in northeastern China, on the southern coast of the Shandong peninsula. Its most important port is Qingdao.
The Bay was ruled by Germany from 1897 until 1914, when it was captured by Japan. It was returned to China in 1922. Japanese rule was restored between 1937 and 1945.

Jiaozhou used to be romanized as Kiaochow in English and Kiautschou in German.

[Gordon Farrell]

That's an impressive list, Keith! But I think there's a reason you don't see games based on those experiences.... Since they all occurred in the modern period, they feel more like imperialism rather than the kind of spirit that is evoked in popular colonization games: Planting national seeds under bucolic though often challenging conditions, and watching the first settlements grow into major new cultures that ethnically mirror the mother country. That, I think, might be the experience Germans didn't really get to have, since they were preoccupied (as you pointed out) with issues of their own emerging national identity during those centuries in which the New World was being colonized.

[Cironir]

Hmm, an interesting theory, Gordon, but while intriguing, there's also the fact that any kind of economical games (Patrician series, Port Royale series, etcetera) are also very successful in Germany. Management simulations are bestsellers, too. Maybe we are just a nation of habitual bean counters. ;)

[Gordon Farrell]

I think the high level of excellence in public education also contributes to Germany's interest in games that appeal to intellectual skills --- as compared to, say, the shooters that dominate the American market!

[Osiris23]

There are two genres that I adore: city builders and turn-based fantasy games. Oddly enough, there are relatively few new games in either of these genres. There's no new fantasy TBS in sight (that I know of), and CotN is the only building game that I'm looking forward to this year (there was another that eobet mentioned). I've tried to get into popular RTS games like Rise of Nations, but I get either bored or annoyed after just a few hours.

Are we a dying breed? Something that's left over from the earlier days of video gaming when CPUs weren't as fast, or do we just have "strange tastes"? Or, alternatively, are there a lot of gamers that simply don't know about these types of games?


Actually Cironir have you ever heard of Heroes of might and magic? Ubisoft is making Heroes 5 one of my favorite games series of all time. They haven't actually announced it yet though, should be soon though.
Here's a good website to check in the meantime, http://dynamic3.gamespy.com/~homm/

[Little von]

A game that is not available yet in North America, but that has been out in Europe for a while now is "Crusader Kings." I have several friends in Europe that are playing it right now, and a couple more in the USA that ordered it directly from Europe via the Paradox site.

From the Euro feedback` there seems to be a few game bug issues that will require another patch. The guys in the USA are having a blast with it and say they had no bug issues the week they have been playing it.

Anyway, it sounds like a very interesting combo of a city/empire builder with a battlefield-tactical side, as well. Vassals, many-many competing factions/noble houses, religious requirements, food, tech research, housing considerations, construction projects, army recruitment, good in-game music..., it sounds very complete and certainly my kinda game.

Turn based, but no fantasy. It is a historical type game taking place in the Medieval era.

[Gordon Farrell]

Crusader Kings is made by the folks who do Europa Universalis. EU I and II were two of my favorite games, but I've stayed away from subsequent iterations like Crown of the North and Victoria. Anyway, I must admit Crusader Kings does sound very interesting and I'm considering picking it up. Apparently, after you build your kingdom in CK you can import it into EU II and continue playing it through another 300 years of history.

[claudio]

i think we arent dying out
per example over 500 000 people bought anno 1503

[Keith]

That may sound like a lot but it is really quite small. Caesar III sold about that many copies in its first year and is still selling after 6 years. Last I heard there are somewhere around 2-3 million copies out there, but even that is quite small when you consider a console game may sell 30 million copies its first year.

[EmperorJay]

With the emphasis on "may" I think. I think C3 did (does) very well, there are very few games that really sell millions and millions. If CotN sells 1 million copies, they certainly did a very good job. (IMHO)

[tobing]

Does anybody know where to find reliable numbers of sold copies of a game? In germany the GfK has some, but they are not free, my impression is that nobody knows exactly and the companies make some big secret of this number (I can understand that up to some point).

[Traxia]

I reckon it's because FPS's are easier to make. You make a character. You make some bots that are enemies. You make a few levels. Done. Occasionally their's a storyline but mainly the aim of the game is to get from one room to another while blasting as many aliens/zombies/enemies of the state/bugs/robots as you can hit with whatever gut busting weapon you can find at the time and not get killed yourself.

City building games need more thought. History/chains of technology/people/roles/complex belief structures/interesting ways for you to lose the game. They can't get away with doing the same thing over and over to new backdrops.

Also because they need this thought they aren't as popular as first person shooters. My fiance can put a few levels of doom 3 in when he's too tired to even sit up straight, but he can't do the same with city building games because they take too much thought. And at about 2hrs a level, they take longer too.

Personally I like the city building because I don't have the reaction times of a cat on steroids and I can't think all that quickly when I'm half way down a mountain using the fast route. Ususally its a 'panic because I'm falling' not a 'if I swivel this way a little I might not die so quickly' reaction.

[Bizkit]

CB's also need more work from the creators. I'm talking about historical research. When was the last time you saw that in a FPS? I remember an old FPS where you had to shoot vampires and the 'story' was based in Transylvania, Romania (that's where I live). All the characters' names were Czech or Polish. They simply don't care. It's all "bang-bang-next level". Imagine how CB's would be without a minimum of historical accuracy (that goes from the look of the buildings to names of places or rulers).
And it's still the FPS's that have a much larger number of fans that CB's.

[Reed]

That may sound like a lot but it is really quite small. Caesar III sold about that many copies in its first year and is still selling after 6 years. Last I heard there are somewhere around 2-3 million copies out there, but even that is quite small when you consider a console game may sell 30 million copies its first year. You have some inflated numbers I'm afraid. ;)

The biggest selling console game of the current generation (meaning PS2/Xbox/GameCube) is Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and that's at a little over 6 million at this point. A million+ is pretty rare, even in the console industry.

[Keith]

You have some inflated numbers I'm afraid. ;)

The biggest selling console game of the current generation (meaning PS2/Xbox/GameCube) is Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and that's at a little over 6 million at this point. A million+ is pretty rare, even in the console industry.
I kind of thought so. But I did read a article on the VU corporate website about the sales of Emperor about a year or so ago and in it they mentioned a console game as comparison, I think it was Crash Bandicoot. I was sure the figure given for the console game was 30M. Maybe they were talking about more than one game.

I did tryd to find the article again, but it no longer seems to exist even in their archive.

[EmperorJay]

I'm quite sure they're talking about the whole franchise then. There have been 2 kart games, 4 or 5 adventure games and IIRC some handheld games released, all with the name of Crash Bandicoot that could sum up to 30 million as, especially the earlier games, were much appreciated by owners of the Playstation.