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Published on June 14, 2021 By Frogboy In GalCiv IV Dev Journals

During the development of a game, many ideas will look good on paper only to be found to not work out in practice.  Normally, these ideas get killed off before implementation and even fewer ever get seen by the public.

In the case of Galactic Civilizations IV, because we’re going out in ALPHA, you will get to see some ideas fully implemented that we have already decided didn’t work out. Today’s example for discussion: The Ideology compass.

image

Here’s how it works:

There are 4 axis’s:

  1. Collectivist
  2. Libertist
  3. Authoritarian
  4. Individualist

Through the course of the game, players will encounter situations that give them awareness points in a particular area.  You can’t spend these points they simply unlock the ideology perk.

Later, players can earn culture points through completing missions (quests) in the game.  THEN they can spend a point to unlock something where their options are based on what perks they have awareness of.

Unfortunately, this is proving to be quite limiting and begs for political compass memes.  So even though it’s fully implemented, it’s going to get scrapped.

In its place are going to be Cultural Spectrums.

 

Cultural Spectrums

With cultural spectrums, players will have several different spectrums to choose from such as:

  • Individualism <---> Collectivism
  • Traditionalism <---> Innovation
  • Xenophobia <----> Xenophilia
  • Harmony <----> Honesty
  • Shame <----> Guilt

It also opens the door for us to keep adding more.

When a player makes a choice, they will increase their stance on the spectrum.  However, now, gaining +1 stance in individualism means losing a point in collectivism.  As a result, when people unlock culture points, they will generally only have access to the ones that are near the “middle” unless they are playing pretty extreme.

________________________________________________________

During the development of a game, many ideas will look good on paper only to be found to not work out in practice.  Normally, these ideas get killed off before implementation and even fewer ever get seen by the public.

In the case of Galactic Civilizations IV, because we’re going out in ALPHA, you will get to see some ideas fully implemented that we have already decided didn’t work out. Today’s example for discussion: The Ideology compass.

image

Here’s how it works:

There are 4 axis’s:

  1. Collectivist
  2. Libertist
  3. Authoritarian
  4. Individualist

Through the course of the game, players will encounter situations that give them awareness points in a particular area.  You can’t spend these points they simply unlock the ideology perk.

Later, players can earn culture points through completing missions (quests) in the game.  THEN they can spend a point to unlock something where their options are based on what perks they have awareness of.

Unfortunately, this is proving to be quite limiting and begs for political compass memes.  So even though it’s fully implemented, it’s going to get scrapped.

In its place are going to be Cultural Spectrums.

 

Cultural Spectrums

With cultural spectrums, players will have several different spectrums to choose from such as:

  • Individualism <---> Collectivism
  • Traditionalism <---> Innovation
  • Xenophobia <----> Xenophilia
  • Harmony <----> Honesty
  • Shame <----> Guilt

It also opens the door for us to keep adding more.

When a player makes a choice, they will increase their stance on the spectrum.  However, now, gaining +1 stance in individualism means losing a point in collectivism.  As a result, when people unlock culture points, they will generally only have access to the ones that are near the “middle” unless they are playing pretty extreme.

________________________________________________________

[confluence title=""]https://stardock.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/SUP/pages/1447493641/GalCiv+IV+Dev+Journal+Links[/confluence]


Comments
on Jun 14, 2021

Sets about playing my Race of Religious Zealot Xenophobes.    

 

"Your lack of being the right race disturbs me, your unwillingness to bow down to the great and powerful Jeff angers me greatly.    Die"

 

 

That said I am glad you are scrapping the political compass.  It would have worked, but it seemed....  lazy.

on Jun 14, 2021

I like the (add one remove another) which forces a player to choose. This is great as actions have consequences. Not major ones but significant enough that some players may map out choices to get the cultural spectrum choices they want. I am looking at you collectivist perk for shipyards and colony distance reduction. 

Question, > Will the traits themselves stay within their current ideologies or will they be reworked a bit? 

on Jun 14, 2021

Nice work team! That compass looked flash but I just didn't "get it" ... the spectrums definitely make more sense... I guess you'll need to decide where each race fits on each spectrum

on Jun 15, 2021

Instead of having a single value in a range (+1 collectivism results in -1 Individualism), what if you allow them to accumulate separately?

For example (C vs I):
1. Middle neutral tier unlocked at beginning. Accomplishing missions allow you spend points here as soon as you get them. 
2. Access to minor and major tiers on each side require ideology points -- more extreme you go, the more points you need to unlock tiers
3. Make the top tier an exclusive choice. If you unlock top tier collectivism, you cannot unlock individualism's top tier. 

This way you get some gray area and some flexibility. Otherwise, you'll be forced into one extreme or the other and picking incorrectly could throw you back towards the middle, thus wasting ideology points. 

This is similar to Mass Effects Paragon/Renegade accumulation. You can get some perks on both sides, but if you do, it's hard to max it out. I think when I just played it through, I had 80% paragon and 20% renegade, and I couldn't unlock the extreme paragon dialog options. 


on Jun 15, 2021

It's being scrapped and I actually liked it over the GC3 ideologies. 

on Jun 16, 2021

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