New BE stories

[Buster's Uncle]

Interview with Sid at Gamespot:  Discussing Humanity's Future with the Father of Civilization

[Buster's Uncle]

From IGN:  Firaxis Revisits Alpha Centauri With Civilization: Beyond Earth

[Buster's Uncle]

Did anyone else catch, in that last, that it says no tech trading?

[BlaneckW]

Did anyone else catch, in that last, that it says no tech trading?

Don't think of them as techs, think of them as class levels.  Beyond Earth has three classes.  You do quests to raise your level in the class.

[Buster's Uncle]

No class trading?

[BlaneckW]

No class trading?

Maybe they will branch them in an expansion.  I doubt that would make me want to play it, unless, again, these "branches" have as much depth as Alpha Centauri.  It's not a tech tree, it's Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim a "tech web."

However, I am reminded of another game I haven't played in quite some time, by the name of Diablo 2.

[BlaneckW]

To be perfectly honest with you, I don't get the impression that it's even really a strategy game.  It's a sort of Mars landing sim based around quests.  If that's what you want, get it.  I wrote a review earlier, but I no longer consider it fair, because it was a review based on it being a strategy game, comparing it to Alpha Centauri. 

You could probably remove the game from Alpha Centauri 2 candidates, though I think we should keep the subforum somewhere on the off chance we grab people off google and for relfection.

[Buster's Uncle]

A Will Miller podcast interview recorded at PAX East:  PAX East 2014: Civilization Beyond Earth Interview

[Buster's Uncle]

I'm juggling a million balls right now, and I should mention that a majority of links I'm posting have been shamelessly stolen from Lorizael, self biased and Aeson at 'poly.  http://apolyton.net/forumdisplay.php/381-Civilization-Beyond-Earth

If you're looking for BE news at any other Civ forum, look there - it's the best combo I know of of new stuff and not 15 million over-excited aspies burying what you're looking for in chatter.

[Yitzi]

What comes out most in the first two articles is how SMAC had a dark story already spliced in, but BE will let the player more or less decide how dark it's gonna be for his band of merry colonists.

The SMAC story isn't "dark" so much as "complex".  Yes, it has darkness; it also has light and nobility, and at the end, those are the aspects that win out.

By forcing you to choose between your humanity, technology, and a place within the new world, BE is going to be darker than SMAC(X), which allows you to choose all three in a way that lets them support each other, ever was.

[BlaneckW]

The SMAC story isn't "dark" so much as "complex".

Apparently some people are bothered by the "dystopic music."  I think they're just looking at it the wrong way. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkxvA0j4SEs

  Yes, it has darkness; it also has light and nobility, and at the end, those are the aspects that win out.

I'm fairly sure it's the lazers that win out.  But maybe you can have the light and nobility post lazer victory.

By forcing you to choose between your humanity, technology, and a place within the new world, BE is going to be darker than SMAC(X), which allows you to choose all three in a way that lets them support each other, ever was.

We can always make more humans if we need them.

[Yitzi]

I'm fairly sure it's the lazers that win out.

No; while some games (actually, nearly all MP games because offense is overpowered without modding) end up with conquest victory, the standard SMAC story ends with Transcendence by the Gaians, who at some point have overcome their "pristine world" approach and switched to a healthier "avert this tragic cycle" approach.

[thorn]

I have never thought of Alpha Centauri as 'dark'. 

[Buster's Uncle]

From GMA news: 'Beyond Earth' takes 'Sid Meier's Civilization' off-planet and into the final frontier

[Buster's Uncle]

The BE Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization:_Beyond_Earth