Why Did Old World FAIL Vs Civilization 6 And Humankind || The 5 Reasons Why No One Plays Old World

[@James009D]

I think Old World is an underrated gem and it will see its light after the STEAM release once it starts getting some DLC content and improvements.

[@jyutzler]

If you are a new franchise, you have to be able to attract players with your base game. Few people are going to have the patience to deal with you sorting out your kinks over a year or more.

[@Peckh]

Well it’s dead on steam so that didn’t happen

[@deplorabledegenerate2630]

Having a lot of DLC is a reason that I will skip a game. I am sick of the paradox business model.

[@wdremington]

Humankind is arguably more disappointing than Old World. According to steamdb they both have the same number of concurrent players per day (~1500) but Humankind sold a TON more copies. Granted, this means that commercially Humankind made more money, but it also means that almost everyone who bought it has stopped playing it. I have played both about the same amount of time and frankly I find Humankind to be boring after the initial land rush. The Stone Age play is brilliant and the push to claim land can be fun, but after that it is turn after turn of meh no matter whether you sim or warmonger. Civ VI is still the 800lb Gorilla, but unless they do something to radically fix the game Humankind really shouldn't be listed as a 'success'. The only recent 4x game that was more disappointing than Humankind, for me, was Imperator:Rome--which suffered from the same basic problem: boring mid-game in spite of the most layup of all layups for a game premise (everyone loves to be Rome and crush the world beneath their hobnailed caligae...) Will Old World recover? Who knows. I personally find it refreshing. That said, the first few plays through a 4x game I don't really try to understand it in detail. ("What the heck does 'Blessed' do?" "Do I want Pieface?" "Do I want the pet monkey?"... I don't know, pick one and see what happens.) As an avowed "I only play Diety" Civ min-maxer I get that people want to understand the game before they play it. But the surprises through the game are also a mode of enjoyment. I'm sure on my 20th play I will know that I need to do X to get Y event to get Z minor advantage. But much like CK or EU, I have also just sort of clicked "New Game" and enjoyed the ride. I like the families mechanic. I like the Orders mechanic. Undo is the bomb even if you can use it to cheat (that is up to you on how to play the game). Each Civ has a nice unique flavor that fits quasi-historically. The tool tips are how the tool tips in every 4x game should be from now on.I like the minor role playing aspect of the leader development as a much simpler version of CK's global genetic ubermench hapsburg simulator. (Love CK, but anyone who praises CK and in the same video claims that OW is too complex is suffering from familiarity bias... CK is amazingly complex for new players and the tutorial and in game help are really, really bad.) I still spend more time playing Civ VI. But I think we should give Old World another year or so. It is a polished game with good core functionality and with a decent event system and solid mechanics there is lots of room for growth.

[@james_90]

For me at least I'm waiting for Old World to come to Steam first, but I think the game looks really interesting.

[@TheCivLifeR]

I think thats a big part of it, no way theres less then 100 people (I think) playing a game that came out 8 months ago

[@luisgutierrez8047]

Same, at this point I won't buy it full price tho. Already needlessly waited a long time for it, so nothing will change if I wait for it a lil more...

[@aprespunk]

Revisit

[@zache5486]

I think restricting it to antiquity and getting rid of Civ’s dumb immortal leaders is a strength. Just Civilization without the dumb, immersion breaking conventions of Civ (the ancient Canadians building the pyramids, racing to get space age tech by the Iron Age, a single leader and a single strategy for the whole of human history) would have sold me. That said, I found the UI and mechanics not great.

[@shawnbass101]

I said the same thing about the same leaders after generations

[@TheSwiftFalcon]

While I mostly agree with your points, I do personally really like Old World. When it was first released, it didn't hook me. This was in part because it was unfinished, but also because of its complexity and unusual mechanics. It looks like a lot of games I've played before, but there's actually quite a learning curve, and it does feel overwhelming at first. For me, though, that feeling of being overwhelmed turned to curiosity once I started noticing just how well designed the mechanics of this game are. In particular, the way you develop cities is really enjoyable to me. This is one aspect where I feel Old World does much better than its competitors, and especially Humankind.

[@dmitrygubanov846]

As for me, the best Civ-clone ever. I always hated post-feudal era period in Civ because it was too silly. Use the same mechanics for ancient polises, national states and the Cold war empires is not the best idea. Well detailed classical era is much better, the game is deep now and shows necessary accents. Only because of Old World I had to install Epic Game.

[@Fightersword]

As a person who likes to play games for their mechanics and who very much does like Old World, it's honestly fairly obvious to me why it doesn't appeal to most people, at least from a gameplay perspective. Let's start with what I see as the big gameplay problem in terms of appeal: the game is very incremental. There's a ton of stuff you can do in old world to eek out an advantage (a lot of which you won't know exists for a dozen or more hours). You can influence nations or families for opinion boosts, tutor your heirs to give them more stats, and there's like a billion different adjacency bonuses in the game. The problem is when you do any of these things, there's no immediate huge effect. The adjacency bonuses are an easy example. One adjacency bonus that isn't as easy to notice in Old World as 'put quarry next to mountain' is that hamlets give culture buildings plus 10% yield per Hamlet next to it (the hamlets don't get shit from the deal, they just get 10 more gold if on a trade route, but if you aren't using them to land grab and want to culture up and money up, it's pretty easy to have them be together). Okay, so you should put your odeon and its upgrades next to a couple or more hamlets, right? Well, the odeon makes 2 culture, so you then get an extra... .2 culture, per Hamlet. Effectively that's one culture every 5 turns in a ~100-120 turn game, and one that's normally decided by killing your neighbors. It's the kind of difference only a min maxxer would love. The thing is, it definitely does make a difference for culture income, especially at large and when the other culture buildings are considered (all of which combined becomes a long term turn investment for a worker or two, so again, you're getting your pay off later), but contrast that with civ VI. I put my commercial hub next to a river, and gain 2 extra gold per turn as soon as just the hub is done. I put my campus next to mountain tiles and gain a noticeable amount of science per turn from the mountains once the campus is done. You notice immediate and tangible differences from taking advantage of those adjacencies, and they only get better as the game goes on with certain culture cards. Old world is absolutely filled with that kind of incremental stuff, which makes it unapproachable to people who don't want to try to maximize all of that. It doesn't help the game has 5 'hard' resources (wood, iron, stone, food, money), 5 'soft' resources (civics, training, growth, orders, and legitimacy, and research too if you want to count that), three of which are used to produce different things. In civ VI you just make everything with 'production'. In old world you make projects with civics, military men with training, civilian units with growth, orders with legitimacy, can buy orders with training, can use training to promote and place generals, can use civics to pass laws or do other interaction based stuff, the hard resources are required to make units or buildings in the first place, but to get them you have to make production improvements which themselves cost hard resources... Can you see the problem? And there's so many improvements to make with your workers too, and so many are locked until later in the tech tree, and so many interact in small ways, and so many often don't even feel worth it when you're just trying to steam roll your neighbor or culture up. God, I haven't even mentioned religion. In civ VI you just build the holy site and get a prophet. Easy. In old world, you either start as a nation with a family that gets a free religion, or you... Get specific improvements and tech, and often have to make specific specialists. Oh yeah, and if one of those free religion guys happened to roll the religion you'd be primed to make with your improvement like up, well, too bad. One of the big sells of civ games is the catharsis element. The whole 'I made battle ships to smash my opponents frigates'. The advantage is large and easy to see. Because Old World is limited to one era, you're not going to ever get that feeling. Sure, you can make stronger units and have a large advantage, but it feels a lot different to fight axe men with swordsmen and have an advantage compared to fighting archers with musket-men. It's that same incremental feeling where you're not eclipsing your opponent. Even if you are, it doesn't feel like it the way it does in Civ. Basically, what it comes down to is that the Old World experience is at its core very very strictly niche. If you really just like trying to maximize your strategy to the absolute brass tacks and smallest details, then Old World is 100% the game for you. That's basically what you do the entire game, trying to eek out the bazillions of small advantages that small decisions can offer to create a large main advantage, that you use to get a lot of VP or fulfill ambitions or roll over your neighbor, etc. If you like feeling like you're winning and making big strides forward, then you can play a whole game of Old World and not ever feel that very strongly, even if you win. I am one of the weirdoes that actually usually likes what Old World offers, because it feels like a very cerebral experience to me... For people that actually want to feel like they're playing a game and not larping as a classical age steward, it's probably best to just stick with Civ.

[@No-Kung-Fu]

Well said, I agree...but I think EU4 has the same exact issue.....and that game is hugely popular. Any thoughts?

[@Fightersword]

@@No-Kung-Fu I've not actually played EU IV, so I can't use it as a frame of reference. I have played Stellaris, so if we want to compare a PDX game, I could use that. What strikes me about Stellaris is that, while there are a lot of present mechanics and resources and there can naturally be a lot of min maxxing, the mechanics in isolation are fairly easy to understand. It feels more like a jigsaw puzzle with a bunch of simple pieces making a complex whole. Old World doesn't achieve that feeling in my opinion. The mechanics aren't as easily understandable or even accessible, and their correct application takes more work to understand. Obviously I'm not a perfect Stellaris player or anything like that, but I didn't have any trouble picking up any of the mechanics very quickly, whereas with Old World I felt like I had to hunt for mechanics and play a while to recognize them and then utilize them. Once you understand the mechanics it's not actually that bad to utilize them for the most part, like Stellaris, but unlike Stellaris, which makes that understanding fairly accessible, Old World does not, and that's really the dividing line for me. When something feels obtuse up front and your ability to access and understand it takes more effort, it doesn't matter how it feels several hours in when it clicks, that initial obtusity is going to be unappealing unless you really are just the kind of person that will power through it for whatever reason. There's of course other factors for why games like Stellaris (and EU IV afaik) are more popular of course, but just strictly talking about how they handle mechanical diversity, that's the big difference to me.

[@ReCoNiCiouS]

In my personal preference, I like the said complexity of the game, even if it means restricted in one Era, rather than thinking of it as a problem. Most of the times i find my self scratching my beard lost in thought, not knowing that 3hrs have already passed. I don't mean the game doesn't have problems, I don't say it's appealing, I say it's pretty, pretty addictive. I'm an ol' Civ 3 player, also a CK3 player/Admirer. I'm a man hungry for complexity and immersiveness and yes, it takes hundreds of hours, tens of playthroughs to know how a City's going to go when you see a City Site. The 2 biggest problems of this game is the rough, Epic games exclusive start and at it's first sight, not appealling at all. It's already 5 months out on Steam, but the rough start has drastically dropped a good headstart other games had.

[@andreicristian9575]

You simply nailed it. I just can't understand the people that find adding small bonuses with absolutely no feedback in the short term, not tedious, but exciting. Really wanna know how their brains work. I love having an array of options, but hate the options being tiny pieces of a 10000 piece puzzle. And the puzzle analogy is actually overselling it.

[@jyutzler]

I'm fine with having to get good at the mechanics, but what I don't like is that there seems to be such a limited playstyle. You must go wide through early war until you have enough cities (and therefore resources) to simcity your way to victory. It doesn't seem to matter if you go for VPs or ambitions - I've won both on the same turn before. If you get a bad spawn, there doesn't seem to be much chance of recovery. Well, I guess you can always go for Alliance Victory... Still way better than Humankind.

[@brucehilton1662]

Well I am playing continuously so I don't think I am no one. Seriously.

[@willywonka6487]

by that logic any game that has a singular person playing it is alive and well and making its developers millions of $$$ -_-

[@ArchonXzero]

100% of most games failures are launch exclusives. That kills most games regardless of the hype. When you limit exposure to a narrow market you're going to get a narrowed return. It's been proven time an time again, with only the big established franchise game titles (Halo, Mass Effect ,etc..)being capable of exclusive launches. An generally they're already on a platform that has a massive audience of users. I only recently stumbled on this title since it's become a Steam option. An I am impressed beyond belief, it's nearly exactly what I would want in a 4x grand strategy that offers RPG style political elements to nation building.

[@darthgroot4006]

Old World is amazing. I love Civilization and will always play it. Old World is fresh right now for me.n

[@donlively4334]

I think you jumped the gun here, mate. Let's see if this is still true after the game is out on Steam for a couple of months. OW has that special One More Turn feeling that very few games have, and is a lot deeper than you said, while still being much more accessible than Europa Universalis 4, which is much more of a niche game. I think people will still be playing Old World years from now.

[@TheCivLifeR]

game is about why it failed up to this point not the quality of the gameplay

[@donlively4334]

@@TheCivLifeR It certainly does not seem like being an exclusive has hurt it. I can't keep up with the Discord about it. 1241 playing on Steam right now. It's nice to see good devs get rewarded. The four most beautiful words in the English language? I told you so. 😁

[@ArchonXzero]

100%. This game is amazing, just picked it up through steam an it's close to exactly what I have been looking for in a grand strategy game. A nice balance between RPG, exploration an nation building, with a unique blend of carefully crafted diplomacy both in domestic an foreign. I always disliked the civ emulators an couldn't be bored more with bogged down mechanics of Europa or CK. The dynastic fate of events, family management an political interactions set in old World sets this game well above Civ series games an every other 4x RTS imo. I always disliked how the early era's in Civ were treated as both insignificant, as well quickly moved out of by the games rate of progress. To rushed.. to much like checkers an not enough chess imo. Not to say there isn't a thinking game to Civ.. but it's formulaic in how fast to get from A to B to C to win, an that's both boring.. an low in replayability. (just my opinion of course)

[@vladraduandrei5227]

@@ArchonXzero lol this game looks like shit compared to civ

[@vladraduandrei5227]

@@donlively4334 told him what ? its still a failure and it looks trash

[@OrinThomas]

Sounds to me like there is a wide open market for a canny KZbinr to corner the market on Old World hint videos before the Steam release.

[@billbutler335]

While I can agree with your comments, personally I like the game. have spent a lot of time on it and still play it ever so often. Like you mentioned, it's a personal choice. LOL, also I am a retired historian with an interest in the ancient world. Do like your videos, keep it up.

[@iamspamus8784]

Me too. I played it a bit when it came out. The played other stuff. I've gone back a couple of times and played through a game. There are some need interactions. It will never replace Civ, but it doesn't need to do so.

[@jessel3621]

I only agree with your first point. Old World is the best 4x game so far if you like the ancient world. I think your Reddit experiment was very flawed. It would be interesting to look at it now with the Steam numbers. But yes, there is a secret underground forum called Discord where most of the community is at.

[@Finwaell]

got it on steam, it's the best thing I played since Endless Space 2 in this genre (4x). enchanting, deep, complex with amazing smart AI, intriguing stories and unbelievable flow.

[@JulioFrosi]

I dont understand why developers do epic store exclusives. They lose 15% instead of 30% of revenue to the platform, but they sell like 1/100 of steam games, its just basic math.

[@Lucas-yp7li]

Epic Games exclusive pretty much killed the launch and game as a whole I think. Great video, funny jokes

[@TheCivLifeR]

appreciate lol

[@Alpha4Sierra]

The irony is that Old World only survived due to Epic Games' publishing monetary boost. I believe the devs were not going to finish the game with the loans they had and Epic Games saved them from going under. I think if they are able to break even and then release a sequel on all platforms, it will be a huge success.

[@Smenkhaare]

@@Alpha4Sierra Epic is just another platform I remember die hard gamers saying they would NEVER use Steam. I have been Playing videogames since PONG and individual discs in the Late 90s and early 2000s were the norm.

[@derekaarts4997]

Its an easy game to play, but a complex/difficult game to play well. My Summery of Old world, found by accident, did not get into it, now enjoying the challenge. (dropped it when Civ6 came on sale, now going back to it)

[@adicartson1]

Well i have and played civ 6, got boring after a while try oldworld and love it.

[@mooripo]

I just came to say I LOVE Old World and I find so original yet so similar to CIV and CK, blew me away.

[@ClanHawkins]

When you checked the latest released KZbin video did you try using the filter for date released or just scroll down checking dates? Might get a more accurate view with the filter.

[@HonestObserver]

How could Old World fail, didn't it not get officially released until after this video came out lmao

[@redsoxu571]

This is a reasonable review, so good effort here. This comment is to share disagreement from the perspective not of a big fan of the game, but of an almost brand new on (I started playing about a week before writing this, and then today finding this video). So there is *zero* negativity to take from my tone - I totally get how the video author reached his conclusions, and I'm only explaining how the points go wrong, not bashing the thinking or the overall video (especially as I don't think the author is wrong that the game is not thriving with player count and such). -The biggest miss by the author is in somehow not picking up the intent of the game. Part of the reason I bought this is that both the game-makers and reviewers shared the game's aim (beyond the obvious mash of a Civ and CK experience, which already seemed appealing): to bring as much polish to the 4x experience as possible. I looooove the Civ experience, and part of the issue I've had with non-Civ 4x is that each edition of Civ has done so well to create, expand, and evolve the genre as a whole. Civ has its gameplay imperfections (either from a pure gameplay perspective or from a representing-history one) but is overall strong, and most other 4x games at best meet the bar or fall short broadly but bring something specific to the table to make up for it. Old World explicitly sets out to engineer a better 4x experience, both in terms of quality-of-life gameplay as well as in terms of representing its "growth of a civilization" sub-genre. Obviously, that polish is not going to jump off the page; you either need to read it from someone's description or experience it for yourself, likely over time. But even at my early stage of playing I really like how this nails the general play and feel of Civ with layers of focused polish. -The learning curve is not as the author describes it, frankly. There is a learning curve spectrum in gaming: Civ approaches the easier side (it has always benefited from being so intuitive for new players and by linking the manner of play edition by edition for return players), while Europa Universalis and its brethren seem to approach the other end. Now, I'm not EU expert: I've played only EUIV, and only enough that I feel I understand all the various systems in play (without being an expert on them). Learning curve isn't binary, with games falling as one or the other; there's a wide range in between. Old World is at worse splits the difference, but best as I can tell it really falls closer to the Civ side of things. Unlike EU, which I remember having to learn a heck of a lot about just to figure out *how to play at all*, OW in general plays as Civ. Play the tutorial, set a low difficulty, and following the in-game suggestions, and you'll be playing the full game and enjoying all its elements. *That is not a high learning-curve experience*. Yes, *mastering* the various elements in play strikes me as overwhelming if one were to try to do it from the start, but that's the whole point about a gentle learning curve: you can get going easily enough, and with experience you'll get better steadily while perhaps picking up on a nuance or two that adds a little more enjoyment without having deprived you of a major element of gameplay prior to the discovery. If the learning curve has let anyone down, that's likely more due to poorly-established expectations, but that would be adjusting this "reason for failure" to a different explanation, rather than a validation of the idea that the learning curve itself was an issue. -I disagree with the thesis that 4x games automatically benefit from covering more historical territory. Again, Civ is great not so much because it covers all of human history but rather because it has never failed to sustain its level of quality and "sweet spot" of play. If anything, many longtime players admit to enjoying the earlier part of game sessions. Meanwhile, Paradox games are all about their targeted periods, as are the partly-4x Total War games. Have the hit editions of Total War suffered for their narrower focus? Naturally not. And the more limited player base for Paradox games is rather obviously due to the highly-difficult learning curve - the ability to hop into the desired time of history and rewrite it (while still having it feel like our history...so rather than being a new universe like in Civ, it feels like a close neighbor in the multi-verse) is to me the most amazing thing about those games! I think Old World potentially actually benefits from its narrower period-of-history scope. If there is anything behind older human history fitting better to Civ-style play than modern or future human history, then simply on that mechanics/representation basis OW has a leg up. Beyond that, the game sets out for sessions to be stories; you're not just playing the game mechanics (though you can), you're also having the entire session revolve around events and the influence of prominent (but constantly coming and going) people. Given that the game creates more in-the-game (as opposed to player-imagined) role playing elements than traditional Civ, it makes sense to keep a tighter setting scope in order to let the role-playing shine. -Speaking of role playing, that is the other major target reason to play the game (beyond its 4x polish). I've never, ever been one to play strategy games aiming to maximize my efficiency of the in-game mechanics...yes, I want to win and I'd like to do well at whatever goals I set, but it's not about max growth and max military efficiency and winning as quickly as possible and all that (not criticizing those who do, good for them!). I have always taken my time with each session, letting it breath and letting my mind add in some degree of imagined role-playing. Most 4x games are limited in how much role-playing is built into the game, so players are left to imagine it if they want it. OW very much builds it in, to the point that so far (as I've focused on picking up the nuances of the gameplay) I actually haven't even needed to imagine much. I anticipate that, once I get the gameplay down to a more automatic basis (and it's already getting there), I'll be able to take the in-game role-playing elements and mentally expand on them for a satisfying experience. -The single biggest accomplishment of the game so far for me personally (and I'm not exaggerating when I say this is *huge*) is that I have totally been able to play organically, resisting the temptation to quick load and save. Because I'm something of a perfectionist and because I play more for role playing in 4x, I struggle to accept when the AI just barely undercuts a plan (e.g. founding a city in a certain spot) or something bad happens. With the load button right there, eh, there is no "cheating" when it comes to single player game experience...you play to have fun, and while some "bad" outcomes are fine to me certain ones set back the experience.

[@redsoxu571]

Here? it's completely different. The amount of in-game roleplay means things going wrong are part and parcel to the whole bargain, as opposed to being gamebreaking bad luck. There are ways to make up for things going wrong, because they're supposed to! In something like Civ, it could be harder to incorporate bad outcomes into the mental roleplay - either it felt purely like part of the mechanics (and thus just an annoyance), or else it would work as roleplaying but set things back in terms of gameplay mechanics too much. The undo button alone saves the whole "I don't know what will happen if I do X instead of Y, guess I'll have to check each" common element of 4x, plus of course saves from the usual misclicks. But beyond that...in the session I'm doing now, I was enjoying my nice scholar (research-boosting) opening leader who was doing just fine...until he died rather earlier than I expected! For a moment I wondered whether I had to stick by this outcome or could work around it, but I could tell the impact wouldn't be huge (though it would change things...plus, dude had really started to come into his own) and decided to solider with his daughter-turned-Queen. Turns out, I hadn't appreciated the great education she had gotten on top of other personality traits...she was a research powerhouse! And her personal story was unfolding amusingly...she had been married off to a much older guy at an early age, so he dies early in her reign. Time to marry again, once again to an older guy (but not too old)...but he died before too long too. Third time's the charm, she marries a perfectly nice guy her age, I'm racing through research, all is steaming well, her goal to reach a certain technology surely will be achieved well within her lifeti...and then she died, just like that, without even an illness. Oh, losing that terrific research rate hurt, and for just one moment the itch to back up this outcome started up...until I realized how fitting it was that all the death around her had driven her to an early grave. She had worked hard all her life only to lose father, mother, and three consorts (and the only major non-family court member in her lifetime) in quick succession, and it finally rubbed off on her. My response? Musical chairs for roles: daughter ascends to the crown, brother who had been the court ambassador steps down to govern the capital, someone else's husband takes the daughter's former governorship, and then I had to ponder which decent-but-imperfect ambassador candidate to appoint. Pure gameplay mistakes (or momentary experiments) quickly reversible, and finally a game that broke my urge to save and load? Seems promising enough to me! -So anyways, like I said I certainly can't/won't disagree that the game isn't rocking out, and I'm not some dedicated fan who is offended at the very notion of game criticism. Whatever reasons are (because they seem to exist) behind the game not thriving outright, I just don't think it's as laid out in this video - absolutely no offense to the author and his efforts. It does plenty of unique/better things within the genre, and if we're going to stick to simple/broad strokes there was a nice place waiting for a game that sits between Civ and CK. A Civ-like general gameplay experience with a mess of CK-style roleplaying built in, all with lots of little improvements to the gameplay experience itself? Hey, whether that's popular or not it definitely is worth the attempt and also should spark the thinking of many other strategy game developers!

[@sleepysteve111]

I enjoyed old world, the problem is I only enjoyed it for like two weeks. Once you go through a play through and experience the dynamic events the game felt like it had nothing else to offer. I HATED the fact that units could move so far so I had to mod that out. So yeah I played it for like two weeks and never went back.

[@thumper8684]

It isn't out on Steam yet.

[@gerryscholz323]

This game rocks. Started playing about 6 months ago with all dlc. It is a freaking blast.

[@piotrdy9615]

Wow, funny to discover this video after I bought old world. The main 2 reasons why it has low playerbase is poor marketing (I didn't know it existed 2 weeks ago and I found out because I biught humankind recently) and people preferring really casual stuff nowadays (also maybe ui). Old world is literally the best 4x game out there atm. I won't even list all the reasonswhy civ 6 and others can't even compete. Let me just say that ai on lower difficulties is still way more competent in old world than civ highest difficulties. In old world you actually rule an empire and not just minmax yields.

[@andreicristian9575]

Stellaris is light years ahead. Extremely immersive and with meaningful decisions, while this is a modifier simulator. I'd rather do additions on a piece of paper than play Old World.

[@piotrdy9615]

@@andreicristian9575 in stellaris theres nothing to do lategame and it's for casuals only

[@snaphaan5049]

I only found out about this game! It seems Soren actually fixed a number of game mechanics from the Civ games that I love. Although, the movement restrictions could be a turn off for many people. Yeah, the AI is pretty good.

[@DrownedInExile]

I enjoyed watching PotatoMcWhisky's Old World streams. If the game ever hits Steam, I might give it a shot.

[@darkholyPL]

'...with Epic Games being the only competitor' GOG: I'm I a joke to you? Honestly dude, GOG was there before Epic, how can you say nonsense like that?

[@dennerribasamaral748]

Another proof the game dosen't go well: wiki. The wiki fan page is a good tool for strategy games, because it alow the playerbase to share basic information. Civ have a full wiki with lots of information including especific codes for the system mechanics and modders, or strategy guides. Humankind and Endless franchise are more basic but still usefull. Old world community is so small, that the wiki still lacking basic information

[@TheCheekyhalfling]

Civ has a few decades of fanbase built up, endless franchise has a decade at least, old world is a few months old.... Give it time.

[@Alpha4Sierra]

Their ingame encyclopaedia is comprehensive tbh. Better than Civ 6 IMO.

[@thesci-ficafe3050]

I think I might be three of the four Old World players you mention. Love OW to death, and honestly I can't say if it isn't better that the public for it remains small or if I'd prefer the game to have a larger player base. I feel like larger projects tend to lose their identities to certain aspects of popular demand, so... Anyway, thanks for the video.

[@babbaracos]

I installes Epic just for this game, and still play it a lot. Love the mechanics and randomness of the events. Got bored with Civ 6, rarely play Civ 6 these days, but when I do play, I never finish a game anymore, it became too repetitive and too easy in my opinion. Thanks for the video!

[@zaarm12345]

Start playing GoTM's at Civfanatics. Honestly, you will start enjoying Civ 6 lot more.

[@babbaracos]

@@zaarm12345 Thx! I'll check it out!

[@Smenkhaare]

This as an old Modder of Civ 3 (The Ancient Mediterranean Mod) and Civ 4 (Total Realism Mod) I find Old World and Humankind are much better than Civilization and its overly complex tile management system. Civilization 6 felt Like a Lousy day at work whereas Old World had a complex yet interesting Learning curve. Humankind was as easy to get into as old Civ3-Civ5 and Beyond Earth Civilization 6 is also too cartoony for the Likes of me to appreciate.

[@Smenkhaare]

@@zaarm12345 I will try this friend. Thanks.

[@brandonlbartlett]

I bought it on steam, and love it.

[@Breakfast_of_Champions]

Yup OW isn't quite dumb enough for the mass market. Everyone else can find a carefully polished gem that does almost everything better than its competitors. The dev left a treasure trove of design notes, and the considerations that went into OW are astonishing. Actually very playable in multiplayer, too.

[@ombra711]

Jumped the gun here. Steam release is everything for better or worse.

[@scrooge-mcduck]

It is an underrated gem, my absolute favourite. My only regret is that it's not in space.

[@WilliamTheBot]

Should I make my 3 times upgraded Hypaspist form a corps with a fresh hypaspist or another 3 one ? Is there a difference? Or just a waste to form a corps with a upgraded one ? Thanks buddy love the videos

[@jyutzler]

Duplicated promotions are wasted so pair a promoted guy with a green one. If you have the foresight, have guys with opposite lines on the promotion tree and pair those.

[@vincentv1432]

I play it and love it

[@noahprussia7622]

4:37 If you are gonna compare against other competitors, you should have included other subreddits and youtube videos.

[@wayneb2265]

Playing this game and loving it now that it has come out on Steam.

[@Spezifischable]

Same reason why so many other high quality games die early. Epic gamestore exclusivity. Diabotical is one of those games as well.

[@DavidSmith-mt7tb]

Saw Potato playing this when it came out and wondered how I hadn't heard about it, then found out it was only on Epic. Was interested as I like civ and CK3, but felt like I could wait till it inevitably goes to steam. Interested to see if it revives there. Keep in mind I'm a huge Borderlands fan and mostly play on PC but I literally bought a console to play BL3 on cause I just didn't want to mess with Epic (and cause a friend of mine had it on console). Wonderlands may have me playing Epic games for the first time ever. I think there are a lot of people that just don't want to support Epic's whole exclusivity scheme when all our friends are on steam.

[@jeffreyschnedar8020]

Really enjoyed the game. Go back and forth between this and Humankind. The epic launch hurt this game a lot. But they made DLC so the sales were there. Honestly, though this game appeals to old school Civ players who don’t pay attention to reddit and just hop on at the end of the day for a few turns and log off. Anyone remotely familiar with Civ needs less than an hour to adjust and not the ten hours you allude to. Its a mash of civ and crusader kings. Its not that complicated as this video suggests. In contrast i stopped playing Stellaris because after a DLC or two its a different game and I don’t want to relearn pop management.

[@Emerald13]

Did not know this game existed... Will check it out on steam

[@jarlGudmunder]

Imagine getting on Reddit, cringe.

[@TheCivLifeR]

couldnt be me lol

[@DasKame]

Played it on Steam, sadly this will never be a megaseller, but i privat liked it a lot more than civ6. But yeah, very very specific

[@RRSunknown]

That was me one of those 4-5 - I just wonders what happend to this game , because I didnt heard of it one year and didnt saw it in steam and searched google.

[@theendishere7]

Looks like I really suck at the combat in Old World... because I always get bullied and it makes me not like the game. Am I the only one who finds it extremely frustrating to have 3-5 warriors, 2-4 archers and a few chariots ( almost all fully promoted) and still get bullied by 2-3 warriors and not even one is promoted...?

[@andyjacques4948]

i didnt even know this game existed... its only because its coming on steam that i know now and that i will play it for sure

[@liammurphy2725]

Have you played it and is it worth it?

[@Lapeno456]

Ive only knew about its upcoming release on Steam, so im shocked to know the game ´s been out for a year or so already since ive been waiting to play it since then lmao

[@eddieballgame]

Not a video that offers much valuable info per why a game failed considering it has not been released on Steam or GOG. (your opinions are noted, however) Which, btw, is scheduled for May 18/19 th (?)...both on GOG & Steam. The, excellent, & more relevant (recent) videos have sold me. Their website offers much info, as well.

[@TheCivLifeR]

they have released it on steam I think that should help out a lot.

[@Talamare]

Where did this game come from?! Literally saw it released today and apparently Potato has vids dating 10months back wtf is happening. Feels like I just fell into the twilight zone.

[@TheCivLifeR]

lmao it was released on epic game and now is coming to steam

[@citizencalmar]

Posting from the future, when Old World is on Steam and there's been a DLC for it, and . . . yeah, pretty much this. I think keeping it off of Steam for the first year was a highly questionable decision, but even without that, I don't think it ever had any chance of being huge. I enjoy it, personally, but when a friend asked me how it was, I could only answer that it's very niche. It's a 4X game, but it's heavily dependent on character stats and interactions, it is packed to the brim with text-based events where you have to choose an option (which, for the record, I'm a fan of, and I want Civ to incorporate some of that), and most crucially, it's set entirely in the Middle East and Mediterranean in antiquity. (It doesn't even have any factions from Ancient India or Ancient China, which . . . why not?) Ultimately, what I said was that it's a lot of fun if that's the specific niche you're in the mood for at that moment, but that I highly doubt it's ever going to become anyone's go-to 4X game.

[@andreicristian9575]

It's a bad experience. That's my reason.

[@_Frexil_]

Compare it with Civ6 is like comparing Sim City of EA with the city builder game from Paradox wich is better

[@hardhatlunchpal]

If this game were to make it to the gamepass, it would also get a lot more players

[@Vladivostok29]

You speak fluently, what happened with the description? lol I had to read it several times to make sense of it.

[@GARCIIIAmonster]

kind of more useful than a review

[@adamwatkins3447]

Amazing game, just got it on steam due to potato mcwhiskey video. Love the ck civ combo

[@Trekkoazam]

Wasn’t familiar with old world. Saw the title and immediately my mind went to you memeing on New World

[@TheCivLifeR]

lmao, woulda been funny tbh

[@Herobox-ju4zd]

Haven't played it and I'm nog going to because it's only 200 turns. When I play Civ I always go the full 1500. 200 is waaaaaaay to short for a 4X game unless you have to micro manage a lot and I'm nog looking for that.

[@TheCivLifeR]

holy fk this man needs to be stopped

[@johansilencio]

Totally agree, standard game is too short. I always play on epic.

[@jorisgarcia6927]

I have read you can adjust the speed so that one turn is one quarter. So possibly 800 turns max?

[@ReCoNiCiouS]

@@jorisgarcia6927 Semesters= 6 months although limited time is still 200 turns. But anyway, you can still remove the time victory, although going up in difficulty time victory is very rarely an issue, since most of the times you win or lose 20-50 turns earlier. Generally, every turn is drastically more important than in Civ

[@kaydens6964]

Haven't played the game and just started to watch the video. It is awfully close to a civ 5 clone just by the look of it, maybe that's one of the reason it failed.

[@MegasXaos]

EGS means the game did not exist as far as I'm concerned. Install Chinese spyware if you wish, I won't make it any easier for China to steal my data. It's on Steam now, but meh... there are more interesting games releasing now(or soon). I'll wait for a big discount and pick it up, but it may just end up in my library unplayed like so many hundreds of other games.

[@waltblackadar4690]

I'm much of the same mind. I'm not so worried about the Chinese Spyware thing but Epic's whole platform rubs me the wrong way. Buying exclusives that were Kickstartered and promised on Steam is sleazy. Not allowing any kind of reviews or forums means that they don't want your opinion - the platform is a pathetic Safe Space for developers who really don't want to hear from their customers. You can't even report a bug there. It's THE most anti-consumer PC gaming platform and that's why they have to give away free games - otherwise, no one would ever use that launcher. When it comes to the end-user, Epic is a terribly unfriendly platform. Personally, I like all my games under one umbrella and that's Steam. I was excited about Old World but when they decided to go to Epic it was no longer on my radar. It's on Steam now but that early enthusiasm that I had was lost. That's their loss, not mine.

[@MegasXaos]

@Walt Blackadar of course, is anti consumer. It's owned by China, that's a feature. As is the spying. Tim can claim all he wants that he's in control of his company, but tencent owns 40%: China owns 40%. EGS means the game does not exist to me. If/when it comes to steam, I may pick it up on steep a discount for my library. But I'm unlikely to play it.

[@deflavigny]

I was really involved with Old World when it initially released, and even discussed with the devs about potential improvements and changes on their official discord, and overall have a lot of time spent playing the game. The biggest thing that killed Old World is just how absolutely "dry" it feels. It's a very well designed, balanced and made game in terms of mechanics, but it feels like it neglects making itself interesting to the player. I still think the game could make a comeback with a Steam release if they do make the game more approachable for more casual players, make their soundtrack more appealing (I can only take so many no-melody chants) and also give rewards for completing goals that are more interesting than just extra numbers.

[@RomanianReviewsNews]

Both Old World and Humankind are failures....between 1k and 2k peak 24h players on steam at the moment... while Civ VI has 41,697... Civilization VI is a 6-year-old game... these games are nearly a year old, and they have a 2k player base COMBINED!

[@TheBrothergreen]

Information overload and restricted playerbase are mostly redundant. The people who play 4x games and especially the people who will respond to marketing calling Old World "A mix of civilization 4/5 and CK 2" are comfortable with relatively arcane mechanics. Paradox is famous for it's 1000 hrs learning curve. Being able to pick up Old world in a day was refreshing. Picking up starcraft 2 was harder, lol. The epic exclusive ends next week, so, that's not really a concern, going forward. And while you're right, most people can't play 5 hours of civ 5, and then play 7 hours of Imperator rome, and then play 3 hours of Old world, most people who like the 4x genre will bounce between multiple different games in the genre. Most people don't play these games competitively (unless I'm the outlier?) they play them to relax, like you said. You don't watch the same movie every day, and you don't play one 4x title every day either. That being said, assuming Old World doesn't experience a massive player renaissance starting with the GOG/Steam release, that leaves us with 2 reasons. 1) It doesn't do anything better than other 4x games. This statement, I can kind of see what you mean by that, but I disagree. This game does do a couple things better than other 4x games. The first thing it does better is the character/lineage thing. There is, in fact, not a single competitor to Old world in this genre, in this regard, and it does it well. Could it be better? Possibly. But Old world does a good job of getting you invested, at least a little bit, in the standout members of your court. That one guy with 6 courage, your princess who is a +2/+1/+4/-2. It's an interesting counterpoint to the advisor system in EU4 and frankly, nobody outside of Paradox interactive is even touching them... and frankly, I've grown to loathe paradox. Between them constantly breaking my game and hiding the "fixes" behind a paywall, and just one or two too many half baked and tacked on mechanics changes, I can't recommend anything they do anymore. A lot of people pay a lot of attention to the orders system. Frankly, I think the orders system is actually in the negatives column. I'd rather see every character being moves based, cutting the number of orders all the way to ZERO at the start, but leaving them in the game as a mid game/late game resource/unlock. Emphasize how special they are a little. As it stands now, it frankly feels a little artificial, like the MUST FOUND CITY HERE mechanic. It makes you feel like you're not doing enough if you happen to be wasting 7 orders per turn and it feels almost unfair if you happen to be short of orders on a turn where you aren't even doing much. 2) Visuals. I agree and disagree. I agree that Old World has an older aesthetic, but I don't really think that's an issue. The reading simulator, again, I get the point here, but again, that's literally the genre. Sure, you could hire a voice actor to read the notes for us, toss in cut scenes and hire the guys from epic NPC MAN to larp out some funny and quirky situations, but the problem, too many (mostly irrelevent) events, would remain. No, the poison pill they swallowed is not the 90s graphics, it's the 2010s. Specifically Civ 6. There's a reason Civ 6 decided to go all artistic and cartoony, and I suspect that we're seeing it now, in action. Too much detail makes it hard to treat the game like a game. Important things end up behind other things and the map gets crowded. The low saturation, muddy color palate only makes that problem worse. Back in the 90s when they did these games, they understood the value of highlighting resources. Old World wants to highlight forests and mountains and empty fields and "urban zones" that don't do anything.

[@LordJimsworth]

Im so sorry old world players but its basically just civ

[@thierroldan]

Didnt even know the game existed!

[@VasetoKonq]

Aged like milk, this video, lmfao

[@ulrichwentzel6327]

Old World is awesome.

[@s7rika7ul]

Your arguments are so subjective thus weak. For some of us civ fans this is the perfect game. I also play eu4 and having a in-depth limited time period is super awesome. Ofc, eu4 is much more accurate than old world appears but it’s basically civ set up in aoe1 with lots of paradox games features. You basically wanted not to like this game. Like many said, your only argument was it’s not on steam. But that’s about to change. So no, it’s not failing at all.

[@pacmanpakkas]

its on steam now

[@ThommyB]

Hahah I love your sense of humor.

[@evang7954]

i think old world failed solely because i never played it. 😆

[@wolfi4458]

ah Humandkind also failed, maybe not hard but its not a good game and in no World an opponent to Civ6. Many critism on Humankind

[@aoki6332]

first time i heard of this game and im a big 4x player and be just seeing the UI i understand why its falling you still seem to have less menu then eu4, stellaris and vic2 but there to much shown at all time and the fact that its en epic game exclusive is killing it like from the people i know who play these type of game not a lot had migrate to Epic or even just created an account there

[@jyutzler]

You must have read my mind. I was wondering what happened to this game.

[@TheCivLifeR]

I was surprised when I saw it on my desktop

[@TomSmith-bh5tz]

CIV 6 crappy. Old World- much more fun. Id rather play Old world by far! disagree with this persons review.

[@Quicksilver1227]

So I finally decided to play this and starting off it was really fun with lots of random possibilities. My major issues that lead me to stop playing it is combat and settling cities. The combat with AI is constant unit spam that is way faster than yours even on lower difficulties. Settling cities with city site just not that great especially with old world AI as it just constantly spams units so fast that it is hard to out settle the AI compared to games like Civ 6. The AI is smarter but I feel it "cheats" or at least less time needed to spawn units overall which also leads to slow warfare that are not worth doing.

[@usernametaken5619]

Epic store exclusive is the kiss of death for me. I don't use that "service" ever. But it usually works out to my benefit, I have to admit. If this would have released on steam in the beginning I would have bought it day one. But now its been locked up on Epic, come to find out it's a dead game. Looks boring tbh so even when it does go up on steam I won't buy it. Maybe in a few years when it's on a steep sale but I dunno still looks boring and I don't like being limited to the ancient time period either. So my thanks to Epic Games and greedy devs for saving me lots of money again! Next up will be Tiny Tina's Wonderlands locked up on Epic saving me big money! LOL I bet it sucks too!

[@samuraichicken2315]

Epic Exclusive = DOA??

[@loveboat]

Summary: Not made for women. I'm gonna try this game out.

[@AchillesofOblivion]

Never heard of her

[@YourCRTube]

For me a big, big charm of Civ was the massive time period and I just can't pull the trigger on Old World for that reason alone.

[@maximuscryptosx9424]

Meh .. I like Old World

[@erccdang]

Kinda think humankind failed too.

[@jyutzler]

At least people are talking about HK a little. Old World is completely dead.

[@lmadsen7118]

Say STEAM...

[@Diarmuhnd]

I loved how the Old World dev went to Steam to beg for votes while the game was still an EPIC exclusive. I wonder how Old World is doing now that it did hit Steam with day 1 (year 2) DLC.

[@jessevanhorn3726]

You talk about humankind as having revolutionary combat for a 4X game. But have you heard of Age of Wonders: Planetfall? That has the same idea of combat but imo it's more interesting

[@TheCivLifeR]

never heard of that game tbh

[@zaarm12345]

I am a Civ player and I wanted to know whether I should check out Old World or not, and came to this video. And this was really helpful. Out of all the points you mentioned, two really acted as deciding factor for me not go after Old World. First is that, the game has limited scope. Like, playing in specific era or such. Which is the main reason why we play Civ games. We play different Civilizations for different styles of gameplay. Second reason that made Old World really bad, in my eyes, is that there are specific spots where to build cities. Honestly, Civ games have always been all about city placement. And the decisions of choosing those spots is the most important one for us. If a game is limiting this decision, I'm sure that none of the Civ players would enjoy this.

[@ReCoNiCiouS]

I was a Civ 3 player! Now i play Old World this whole month XD

[@anab0lic]

you should watch some other videos on this game, its actually really good and I say that as a lover of the Civ games,,, it offers things that are different that make it worth playing.

[@martinolsson858]

I think the game is pretty good....but i am really having a problem with the whole character aspect. I really don't care about individual characters and all the decisions related to them. Just let me focus on building my civilization.

[@MrNylen]

Use the Option "No chars"....problem solved

[@R0bstar-YT]

I just played the game, and as I played, I began to understand what was going on. I don't understand catering to people that enjoy being stupid.

[@romanpechorin4798]

Humankind is hot pile of garbage, don't even mention their superior combat. Civ wins that even without the tactics of humankind. Humankind is like 3 people made the game and none of them talk to each other about it

[@royperdok5428]

Good lord it's 2022 and people still are on about civ 6 graphics 🙄

[@monarchtherapsidsinostran9125]

don't release on epic. sorry. simple as.

[@ezirsavan]

"Rome, greece, persia and carthage" thats it. Thats the problem...people who play 4x want to play as underdogs and not these repetitive, overused civs

[@zero_wing_]

Carthage was an underdog and so was Rome at some points of their history

[@militarygradepotato]

Then play as kush lol

[@TempoLOOKING]

1 is a lie as old-world has been on steam for 8 months

[@TheCivLifeR]

its literally releasing on steam this month lol

[@3phop960]

I tried to understand how the game works by pausing your video and reading those dialogues and one another video too. And now i can say i'm not liking it much cause of those events where you're up against a situation where you can't do something just cause there is not enough guts. If i want to play tyranny, i'm playing it. Another thing i understood that i'm not liking 'em all, paradox "EU/CK" games formula. If i build an army and want to conquer or wipe a neighbour, i need no goddamn reason. And no wiping technology (hello HOMM). Yes, after spending a few years in civ5 i boycotted civ6. Yes, civ6 looks ugly to me. 4x isn't just historical stuff, there's a scifi like Endless Space, Stellaris, Galactic civilizations, you name it. The informational overload looks pretty interesting to me. The prefixed town positions are not. I don't care about a playerbase. These games weren't designed for pvp. Sure you can do it still say, in Civ5 but it's not what it was mean for. Majority of mechanics will be unusable.

[@romanpechorin4798]

What a troll:)

[@jameshardin8814]

AI spawns units out of a single settlement at a insane rate on the easiest setting, which is what I play. Very aggravating.

[@FeZe1997]

looks like the mobile game for android 6