Civilization V BNW vs. Civilization IV: complete edition

[Mister K]

So I've revisited Civ V few weeks ago and messed around a bit with it. I must say that I liked what I played. Later I've read that Brave New World dlc fixes many issues Civ fans had with the 5th installment and thought about buying it.
BUT. I saw that Civ IV is also there (i.e. on Steam) and I also heard that many people think that part IV is better.

So, a question to Civ fans and enthusiasts: What is better to buy, BNW for Civ V or Civ IV complete edition?

P.S. Also, after logging in I saw that Valkyria Chronicles is out. HOLY SH*T! It's only 12.59 USD!
If you haven't played it, buy it. It's really good.

 

[Zontar]

Civ IV was the one I sank much, much more time into and got much more joy out of playing. It's the mechanics, I prefer them to V's. Even at the same price I'd take IV over V any day of the week.

 

[Slayer4472]

I enjoyed V with all expansions more than IV with all expansions. This is of course a personal conclusion, so your milage may vary.

You may want to ask around in here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/?s=57e3256a1e3a8cf11dca313f602313de

That's the Civ fan site, and you'll be able to get a wider range of opinion.

 

[Recusant]

Four. Definitely four. Five made some enormous changes to the formula, and while I not only don't begrudge the team for trying something new, I actually respect them for making big experiments with a two-decade old formula. The catch is, these big changes (which rippled down to affect nearly every area of the game) made things worse. The grand experiment didn't work. The expansions fixed the worst excesses, but the core is still rotten. There's still fun to be had, don't get me wrong; but aside from a possibly smaller multiplayer community (if that matters to you in a game like this), there isn't a single aspect of 5 that puts it above 4.

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

I have to say I prefer fives system with units only being one per space. Instead of just having death dots where battles come down to who produces more you can actually use the terrain a bit. I had a one city game in V that involved my units holding a mountain pass with water on the side. Kept me safe against huge armies nicely.

 

[Yuiiut]

Personally, I found 4 to be slightly superior to 5

4 Pros:
Much better (IMO) economy, micromanaging, tech tree, and expansion
The fact that each city has a individual health/sickness bar made it so much easier to build/plan, and it allowed you to really plan out your cities in a helpful way.
The espionage/diplomacy was a lot clearer and consistent in 4, making it easier to form trades/alliances in it.
IMO, the religion system made more sense in 4, with the world being divided into religious factions that tended to aid their brothers/sisters in faith and defend against any others.
Cons:
The military system in 5 is far better, whereas 4 had the 'stack of doom' problem.

5
Pros:
The military system in this is far, far better-although there's some realism problems with ranges, the fact that cities can defend themselves and the one-unit per tile thing actually gives the positioning of troops meaning. Honestly, in a game as abstract as civ, the realism doesn't really matter to me.
Being able to rush-buy any (non-wonder) thing makes a massive difference, giving a real reason to save up money. Honestly, it's the highest praise when you ask 'why wasn't this in the series all along?'-it fits in perfectly.
Graphics are (obviously) better
The map-generating system seems better in 5-creating mountain ranges which divide continents and civs and so forth. The maps on 4 just feel poorer now.
City-States, I guess? They've never really been important to me, and when I go for a diplo win it's always just a case of buying them out, so take that as you will. They don't really detract from the game at all, so I guess you could put them in the 'pros' category.
Cons:
The diplomacy can be really, really arbitrary sometimes. Once, I was asked to attack a civ- Austria, IIRC. While I was moving/readying my troops, Austria messaged me to say they'd noticed the movements, and asked if I was about to declare war. I responded that I was, only to have the civ that asked be to attack Austria in the first place denounce me for 'warmongering', which derailed my 'diplomatic/religious world government game' into 'wipe literally every civilisation out with my army, which no-one can even touch due to my ridiculous economy'.
I personally found 5 to be easier-on 4, I would stay round noble, maybe moving up to prince occasionally. On 5, it's king/emperor before I'm getting the same win/lose ratio.
I really dislike 'global happiness' and the luxury resources system, and found that all it did was make expansion harder for no rational reason. Why does having more cities make people unhappier? Abstraction is one thing, but the lack of any rational link is another.

Main differences:
In 5, the military system is more in depth and detailed. This can, however, lead to situations where the player has a massive advantage due to being human, and can wipe the floor with AI armies, so take that as you will.
The biggest 'not good or bad, just different' difference is in the religions-in 5 (with G&K), you can make and shape your own religion, giving you more options. However, I was personally a fan of the religious system in 4-it was a lot less detailed, but it shaped how you saw the world to a massive degree, as you would almost need to be the same religion as an AI you were trying to butter up, and the religious factions that would form made the world feel more 'alive'.
I've spoken before about the diplomacy system, but let me re-iterate just how much I loath loath loath the diplomacy system in 5. It feels like you're blundering about in the dark, with no real feedback for actions. Declarations of friendship, co-operation, denouncing etc just makes it confusing. I need a declaration of friendship to trade gold? Why? Fine, if they can't offer me what I want, I guess I'll just let the Aztecs overrun the bastards. It's (slightly) better now that you have the ability to see what they like/dislike, but the numbers game in 4 just made more sense. Yes, it was 'gamey', but as I said, I don't really care too much about realism.
The diplomacy in 5 can sometimes ruin the military side of the game-I once had the entire world DOW me for 'warmongering' because I wiped out England after they attacked me , then 10 turns later each individually peace out for all of their non-capital cities. Then I wiped the floor with them one by one.
The warmongering system in general in 5-IMO, it was a valiant effort, but didn't quite work. It doesn't distinguish enough between defensive and aggressive wars, and unduly penalises wiping out civilisations/taking capital cities, even if they repeatedly attack you. Sure, I could leave Monty with his one tundra city, but then he'll just try to attack me again. For the 7th time. Because I own his capital. Which I took the 4th time he attacked me. And no, I will not give it back. However, if that doesn't concern you-you're a science/culture player, for example-then you might like it. I do like the idea of diplomacy penalties for warmongers, though.
The economy in 4 was based on cottages and/or specialists, the one in 5 is based around trade routes. Honestly, this doesn't make too much difference to me. It does make isolated starts easier in 4/harder in 5, though.
In 4, the AI will throw up far more cities, but they mean far less-in 5, I tend to get around 4-5 cities/civ, in 4, it could be in the mid-20's. I personally like having big maps with lots of cities, but you may not. Also, if you're regularly conquering cities in 5, you'll have to raze them to avoid happiness caps from killing you, whereas in 4 you could keep a 'frontier' of miserable, angry, sick cities between you and the enemy.
Lack of technology trading. I liked being able to trade techs, but they got rid of it. I guess some people might like research agreements better? Subjective, of course, but I liked the tech trading, even if you did have the 'tech to alphabet, immediately backfill all the tech's you missed, become miles ahead of the rest' problem.

 

[Teoes]

Personally I've sunk hundreds of hours into Civ4 Beyond The Sword, to the point where I made myself stop so I could play other games. I've not given Civ5 any notable attention (I think I've got the lot, bar the most recent expansion) and will not be picking up Brave New World any time soon, though both of those are not due to anything in the games themselves. I expect that if I were to give Civ5 some decent time I'd likely enjoy it, but in different ways to my love for Civ4.

My question is though, why not both? Just wait for a sale to roll round and you can doubtless get the complete Civ4 package for a mere handful of your local currency. Civ5 won't be that pricey these days either. That shouldn't make an appreciable difference to the cost of picking up Brave New World.. and then you can probably kiss goodbye to a couple of months at least.

 

[Random Gamer]

V with expansions is quite close or as good as IV, so now, I can't really decide - I'll have to play a few more campaigns with Brave New World to be sure. Both are quite good with full expansions at least, so no wonder you'll see conflicting opinions.
And I really liked IV a lot.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

This is the kind of topic that polarises people.

In terms of content, they're both pretty good, with a decent amount of buildings, wonders, techs, military units to play around with. Civ4:BTS has corporations, which really spices up the late game. But the victory conditions in Civ 4 are very old school compared to Civ 5 with BNW installed, where the victory conditions are a lot more dynamic. Playing for a culture victory in particular is really engaging with archaeology, artworks, tourism etc to juggle - much better than in 4 where you just keep going until you fill the bar in enough cities.

In terms of how they feel, Civ 4 feels like a traditional civ game, particularly in terms of how the government choices are structured. You really have to balance the pros and cons of particular civics. On the other hand, Civ 5 is really just about opportunity cost - you pick what area you want specialise in and fill that tree up. It doesn't have the same fluid and authentic feel as Civ 4, and you can't really go from being a democratic paradise to a despotic commune the way you can in Civ 4.

Military in 5 feels a lot more engaging than moving stacks around in 4, but depending on the map it can become a massive pain trying to get everything through choke points. The computer is also terrible at protecting its ranged units, so it's relatively easy to defeat. The hex system in my opinion makes for more aesthetically pleasing maps, but your tactical options are somewhat reduced.

You can't go wrong with either really. Civ 5 though does lag like crazy on large maps in the late game, and the turns can take forever. Go make a sandwich while the computer is moving.

 

[Pseudonym]

I've spent hundreds of hours on both. These are some things I feel should help you decide.

Civ 5 is a little easier to get into.
Civ 4 has more functional multiplayer. (recently a patch pretty much broke civ 5 multiplayer but maybe they've fixed it by now)
A game of civ 4 takes shorter.
Civ 5 has more interesting combat, though the combat in civ 4 isn't really that much worse once you understand all the factors and the AI isn't really good at either but in civ 4 there is at least less to screw up. The civ 5 combat does have the advantage that it is a factor in where you want your cities. Hills and mountains are easier to protect. Because in civ 4 all the siege units except for the last ones, and all units with city raider until tanks move at one tile per turn it doesn't matter if there are hills blocking your path because your units are equally fast over hills as over plains. You can't get slower than a tile per turn.
If your computer isn't too strong civ 5 on a huge map lategame can take forever because of the load times.
You actually have some kind of control over civ 5 traderoutes as opposed to the civ 4 ones which are just kind of there.
Civ 4 culture pushing is much better than in civ 5 imo.
Civ 4 is more militairy oriented. Civ 5 more science oriented.

 

[Pink Gregory]

I very much like Civ V's design decisions, like no unit stacks and the social policies.

But if you're planning to ever play multiplayer, bloody hell Firaxis dropped the ball. AI leaders won't communicate with each other, form deals or alliances of their own, or instigate relations with you in multiplayer. That's...well...unacceptable, really.

I 'unno, I feel like Civ V is a bit more dynamic, if lacking on the technical front, while Civ IV is closer to the classic formula that has a tendency to show its age.