It was a paid mod.
If this was sold as a standalone DLC, like Civ 4 Col was, at a price like a standalone DLC, I think it would have gone over better. It's still not good, but selling it as a full game was insulting.
I actually really like this game. It's soulless and has plenty of issues but the tech web makes the game very replayable. The amount of options you have blows up quickly and it only takes 50 turns or so for you to have a completely different economic strategy than your rivals. It's by far the best part of the game and the reason I still play it.
meanwhile, diplomacy is garbage and the different factions have no personality. The fact that they went with civ 5 style leader screens only makes it more obvious how little you care about these characters. AI is trash like all modern civ games. I don't know what the logic was behind trade routes: they take a ton of micromanagement but you have to in order to maximize their yields, it sucks. Maybe another expansion would've fixed it but I'm guessing it got axed in favor of civ 6.
ignoring diplomacy and playing more like a economic wargame it's pretty fun
Unit designer from a 24 yo SMAC mogs everything BE has to offer all by itself.
And there is also perfect random map generator and altitude mechanics, effecting shit globally. To the point you can get different outcomes even if replaying on the Planet's map.
Does SMAC have a tech web though? I like the tech web. The altitude mechanic is cool though, one of my favorite features from SMAC for the reasons you mentioned.
It was Civ5 that wanted to be SMAC with none of the flavor. The flavor that was there was completely blandified for mass marketing.
imo it was fixable, even keeping the affinity system in place. But they decided to pull the plug and make civ 6 instead. Doubt they'll try making SMAC again anytime soon.
Bryan Reynolds retired in 2015. Weird way to say "recently".
And that RPG already exists, too, and is copyrighted by ANOTHER company.
Pro-tip: anyone trying to just re-use the setting 1:1 is moronic, for it's a copyright nightmare. Which is also the reason why BE is so fricking bland: they were so afraid of EA lawsuit, the game doubled-down on lack of any tangible references to SMAC
Does it still have the moronic civ5 AI thing where conquering like 3 cities makes the rest of the world chain denounce you?
Does it still have global happiness?
i liked it, it wasnt that great but it was okay
till they added that dlc and any form of identity the 3 ideologies had went down the drain cuz now you get hybrid ass shit
Gameplay is fine, but it’s hard to care about the game when it is so disgustingly soulless, with every faction feeling absolutely the fricking same bland generic slop.
*More political
I don't know what less political would have looked like. I guess what I said: Just make you play as countries that can be whatever you want Civ 1/2 style.
Imagine playing AC with no evolving plot, or detailed story, and you have beyond earth with shittier mechanics.
AC right from the start left you to find things out on your own. It started with a literal mystery - the captains murdered, which one of the subordinates do you wish to be? You usually pick the one you identify with the most (or think you do) based on philosophy, without even concerning yourself with the bonuses (I remember picking Zach cause im so intellectual and science rules lol frick Miriam).
The cut scenes, the voice acting, the bits and pieces of plot unfolding around you steering your kingdom to victory felt completely separate from the actual game its self. You then spend the next 3 days playing the game slowly realizing that those philosophies shape the very way you view planet and how to evolve and grow... they weren't just politics, but rather the life of your game. And the npc your playing against literally hate you for your philosophy.... and also reward you for sharing theirs.
In BE you pick from a trinary of simple options, then basically ride the train from start to end. The conclusion is forgone, the end is written and your choices have no impact. Your just along for the ride. There was no fluff worth remembering.
And thats it, in a nut shell. AC was more than the sum of its parts, and BE was just a part of something else.
having this game be my very first CIV game (having tried to play a free weekend of on a completely underpowered PC in 2014 and managed to play it on a pirated copy a few years later).
Yeah, it is indeed civ 5 : sci fi boogaloo.
Still have fond memories of it and liked a few features, mainly the way you upgrade the unit.
I did hear that alpha centauri base game is much better and content filled than beyond earth and its expansion. So lending my ear and interest on that
Base game was so fricking deprived of any creativity or interesting parts that there were next to nothing that mods can salvage and be build upon... unless, of course, you are willing to invest humongous amount of time and effort, but, as
nobody was playing the game so why bother
pointed out, the playerbase and interest was so weak that noone was feeling it will be worth it.
I remember the AI being even more shit than normal civ since they never bothered to rush affinity techs and the affinity units were always straight up upgrades to the base units so it was always pretty easy to get a stronger military.
The factions have little identity, that's a big issue with it. In SMAC each faction had its own distinct identity, secret projects even had quotes said by the voice actors of the faction leaders depending on the faction. In Beyond Earth most of the identity is just what affinity you're going for, and the factions themselves are modular and focused on a gimmick (espionage, wonders etc) but not on an approach towards winning the game.
The DLC also broke the game balance, the Pan-Asian Cooperative gets a free wonder in every city instantly, the affinity rework means you'll end up with a ridiculous amount of buffs regardless of which affinity you went for because all of the affinity boosts work.
The mods are pretty broken and you have to reload the mods to get them to work after configuring them.
The developers abandoned the game right after they released Rising Tide which is a shame because I think with some more improvement the game could have stood the test of time, but now it's just a pretty forgotten game. Not sure if the developers abandoned it because they didn't want to work on it anymore or because the publisher told them to abandon it, Firaxis didn't have a good track record afterwards with the release of XCOM 2 and Civ 6, popular games on their own but generally considered inferior to previous games (or even other franchises) by more experienced players. Nowadays the publisher frickery is evident with the Marvel card game.
>Not sure if the developers abandoned it because they didn't want to work on it anymore or because the publisher told them to abandon it
The actual reasoning was far more mundane: nobody was playing the game and the expansion didn't turn the trend. Meaning - no point wasting manpower and workhours on something that isn't going to generate any more money.
It's a shame they never released the source code for the game logic like they did with civ 5. I don't they've done it for 6 either. It's one of the reasons 5 is still going strong after all these years. I guess they can't have people playing old games when they should be consooming civ 7.
>The DLC also broke the game balance.
the DLC gets too much credit for "fixing" the game. It also fricked up the aliens to be way less aggressive so they're hardly a threat even early-game. Some stuff like the artifacts is just bloat to me. Water cities and hybrid affinities are cool though and diplomacy now sort-of exists where it didn't before even if it's kinda broken.
Lack of any sort of creativity. The most painfully generic and boring sci-fi setting possible. No sovl. Mogged by a game that came out 20 years ago.
>civ without civs
yeah
Literally everything
It was a paid mod.
If this was sold as a standalone DLC, like Civ 4 Col was, at a price like a standalone DLC, I think it would have gone over better. It's still not good, but selling it as a full game was insulting.
I actually really like this game. It's soulless and has plenty of issues but the tech web makes the game very replayable. The amount of options you have blows up quickly and it only takes 50 turns or so for you to have a completely different economic strategy than your rivals. It's by far the best part of the game and the reason I still play it.
meanwhile, diplomacy is garbage and the different factions have no personality. The fact that they went with civ 5 style leader screens only makes it more obvious how little you care about these characters. AI is trash like all modern civ games. I don't know what the logic was behind trade routes: they take a ton of micromanagement but you have to in order to maximize their yields, it sucks. Maybe another expansion would've fixed it but I'm guessing it got axed in favor of civ 6.
ignoring diplomacy and playing more like a economic wargame it's pretty fun
Unit designer from a 24 yo SMAC mogs everything BE has to offer all by itself.
And there is also perfect random map generator and altitude mechanics, effecting shit globally. To the point you can get different outcomes even if replaying on the Planet's map.
Does SMAC have a tech web though? I like the tech web. The altitude mechanic is cool though, one of my favorite features from SMAC for the reasons you mentioned.
there is but you had to buy a poster to see it fully cause ingame tech tree UI is atrocious
>tech web
>posts a tech tree
>Blind homosexual can't even notice how it is connected
>moronic homosexual doesn't even understand what the difference is
... so you're genuinely blind. Cool story, bro
I do think the expansion makes it better, it's still not great or anything but much better than the vanilla game
It was Civ5 that wanted to be SMAC with none of the flavor. The flavor that was there was completely blandified for mass marketing.
imo it was fixable, even keeping the affinity system in place. But they decided to pull the plug and make civ 6 instead. Doubt they'll try making SMAC again anytime soon.
SMAC is owned by EA anyway.
And pretty much everyone critical for making it happen retired years ago, even prior to BE entering development.
the guy who made SMAC retired recently and said even if he did 2nd game it would be a RPG
Bryan Reynolds retired in 2015. Weird way to say "recently".
And that RPG already exists, too, and is copyrighted by ANOTHER company.
Pro-tip: anyone trying to just re-use the setting 1:1 is moronic, for it's a copyright nightmare. Which is also the reason why BE is so fricking bland: they were so afraid of EA lawsuit, the game doubled-down on lack of any tangible references to SMAC
>Bryan Reynolds retired in 2015. Weird way to say "recently".
Frick yooouuuuu...
Does it still have the moronic civ5 AI thing where conquering like 3 cities makes the rest of the world chain denounce you?
Does it still have global happiness?
>its finally time to go Beyond Earth
>peer through a giant star of david window
pottery
it's just a hexagon, i think you need to take a break from /misc/
>/pol/
lives rent free in you head
>lives rent free in you head
Peak irony
yes you seeing /misc/ everywhere is quite an irony
I'm not even that anon, moron
you have negative self awareness
Seek help.
I have a different term: Mental illness.
i liked it, it wasnt that great but it was okay
till they added that dlc and any form of identity the 3 ideologies had went down the drain cuz now you get hybrid ass shit
Gameplay is fine, but it’s hard to care about the game when it is so disgustingly soulless, with every faction feeling absolutely the fricking same bland generic slop.
never played it, does it have unit designer?
It was a decent game but lacking in flavor.
I feel they should have either been less political or just made you play explicitly as countries.
*More political
I don't know what less political would have looked like. I guess what I said: Just make you play as countries that can be whatever you want Civ 1/2 style.
Imagine playing AC with no evolving plot, or detailed story, and you have beyond earth with shittier mechanics.
AC right from the start left you to find things out on your own. It started with a literal mystery - the captains murdered, which one of the subordinates do you wish to be? You usually pick the one you identify with the most (or think you do) based on philosophy, without even concerning yourself with the bonuses (I remember picking Zach cause im so intellectual and science rules lol frick Miriam).
The cut scenes, the voice acting, the bits and pieces of plot unfolding around you steering your kingdom to victory felt completely separate from the actual game its self. You then spend the next 3 days playing the game slowly realizing that those philosophies shape the very way you view planet and how to evolve and grow... they weren't just politics, but rather the life of your game. And the npc your playing against literally hate you for your philosophy.... and also reward you for sharing theirs.
In BE you pick from a trinary of simple options, then basically ride the train from start to end. The conclusion is forgone, the end is written and your choices have no impact. Your just along for the ride. There was no fluff worth remembering.
And thats it, in a nut shell. AC was more than the sum of its parts, and BE was just a part of something else.
having this game be my very first CIV game (having tried to play a free weekend of on a completely underpowered PC in 2014 and managed to play it on a pirated copy a few years later).
Yeah, it is indeed civ 5 : sci fi boogaloo.
Still have fond memories of it and liked a few features, mainly the way you upgrade the unit.
I did hear that alpha centauri base game is much better and content filled than beyond earth and its expansion. So lending my ear and interest on that
The real question is: Why couldn't mods add soul and fix it?
nobody was playing the game so why bother
Base game was so fricking deprived of any creativity or interesting parts that there were next to nothing that mods can salvage and be build upon... unless, of course, you are willing to invest humongous amount of time and effort, but, as
pointed out, the playerbase and interest was so weak that noone was feeling it will be worth it.
well thats funny since beyond individual civilization mods, I only see a small handful of total conversion mods for civ 5
I remember the AI being even more shit than normal civ since they never bothered to rush affinity techs and the affinity units were always straight up upgrades to the base units so it was always pretty easy to get a stronger military.
It doesn't have the colorful flair that AC had. Nor the personalities the latter's leaders had.
The factions have little identity, that's a big issue with it. In SMAC each faction had its own distinct identity, secret projects even had quotes said by the voice actors of the faction leaders depending on the faction. In Beyond Earth most of the identity is just what affinity you're going for, and the factions themselves are modular and focused on a gimmick (espionage, wonders etc) but not on an approach towards winning the game.
The DLC also broke the game balance, the Pan-Asian Cooperative gets a free wonder in every city instantly, the affinity rework means you'll end up with a ridiculous amount of buffs regardless of which affinity you went for because all of the affinity boosts work.
The mods are pretty broken and you have to reload the mods to get them to work after configuring them.
The developers abandoned the game right after they released Rising Tide which is a shame because I think with some more improvement the game could have stood the test of time, but now it's just a pretty forgotten game. Not sure if the developers abandoned it because they didn't want to work on it anymore or because the publisher told them to abandon it, Firaxis didn't have a good track record afterwards with the release of XCOM 2 and Civ 6, popular games on their own but generally considered inferior to previous games (or even other franchises) by more experienced players. Nowadays the publisher frickery is evident with the Marvel card game.
>Not sure if the developers abandoned it because they didn't want to work on it anymore or because the publisher told them to abandon it
The actual reasoning was far more mundane: nobody was playing the game and the expansion didn't turn the trend. Meaning - no point wasting manpower and workhours on something that isn't going to generate any more money.
It's a shame they never released the source code for the game logic like they did with civ 5. I don't they've done it for 6 either. It's one of the reasons 5 is still going strong after all these years. I guess they can't have people playing old games when they should be consooming civ 7.
>The DLC also broke the game balance.
the DLC gets too much credit for "fixing" the game. It also fricked up the aliens to be way less aggressive so they're hardly a threat even early-game. Some stuff like the artifacts is just bloat to me. Water cities and hybrid affinities are cool though and diplomacy now sort-of exists where it didn't before even if it's kinda broken.