The Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri and Alien Crossfire thread

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Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

One of the particular things about Alpha Centauri that gives it a touch of charm that few other games have? The faction leaders actually recognize - and ideologically dislike - each other. Instead of saying "America is becoming a threat to us all, we must act!", they instead saying "That tree-hugging hippie Deidre is getting on my tits, care to help me wipe her out?" or "I can no longer tolerate Yang's inhumane social experiments! Join me in eliminating him!" or "The Lord cannot abide your unethical quest for pure knowledge and tampering with that which belongs to God, Zharkov! Time to die!" It makes them sound like a pack of bitchy high-schoolers sniping at each other constantly and I love it.

# ¿ Jun 17, 2014 10:14

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 14:43

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Say, does anyone know if the interludes in the game differ in any significant way based on who you picked? I always wondered what the Transcendence victory looked like as Miriam.

(That reminds me, I ought to see what the interludes for the Usurper's Transcendence looks like sometime)

# ¿ Jun 22, 2014 19:02

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Hobelhouse posted:

-Is the Colonial Authority supposed to be the 'fascist' ideology faction? They kinda give off the vibe but not completely. Also their nerfs seem stronger then their bonuses.

As far as I can tell, the Colonial Authority is basically "What if Lal had been a soldier and not a doctor?" It looks like the leader is the highest-ranking of the Unity officers, and has gone a bit twisted trying to keep the Unity from fracturing, devolving into an authoritarian demand for unity as the only means of survival.

Also re: Leviathan Body, I'm not entirely certain either, but it looks like they're some kind of utopian anarchist/communist faction? No leaders, no central authority, just everyone getting along with everyone else to cooperate against the other assholes on Planet.

# ¿ Jun 27, 2014 08:06

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Reveilled posted:

Well, it certainly could be that, but phrases like "meet again on the other side" and the quite being from her "last testament" do in my mind lend themselves strongly to the idea that this is a suicide pact. However, there is some implication in her other quotes that Miriam ends up leading an underground faction of insurgents, rather than an independent faction in her own right. This is a bit more tenuous, but the relevant quote here would be:

Which suggests that Miriam is living in a society which does not subscribe to her ideals. This is further reinforced by the video for the self-aware colony:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwqN3Ur-wP0

If that is the case, then as society moves further and further into a technological abyss in which no dissent is actually possible any more, it's understandable that Miriam's believers might take their chances with the Lord's mercy instead.

I'm not entirely certain this quote supports the idea of an insurgency. I get the feeling that when she writes "We," she means more "Humanity on Alpha Centauri." After all, she spends a shitton of time in-game bitching out all the other leaders for not doing what she thinks right, so apparently she considers other people's business her business. Which, in the case of nanorobots, is actually kinda fair - if Zharkov creates nanorobots that eventually go grey goo, it's not just going to be Zharkov's problem.

# ¿ Oct 30, 2014 18:23

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Krinkle posted:

I was the morganites, and my usual bases were yellow. Suddenly my ven diagrams of control weren't touching and the one in the middle was orange and sparta was just staring at it intently like a dog at the dinner table. I rerolled four times since then I can't get a screenshot anymore.

What is nerve staple? I guess this is what that reference was from in that steam roguelike? I forget its name at the moment but one of the magic trees let you nerve staple and the flavor text said something about there being economic consequences. I thought I was being given a choice between two types of base mode where the one on the right is turning off the governor but then I moused over it and its nerve staple and the one on the left is just a talent or something?

I don't think it's EXPLICITLY said what nerve-stapling is in-game, but the impression I get is that it's something like a lobotomy - removing all ability and desire to dissent, at the cost of, well, the personality of the person in question.

Edit: In-game, it stops drone riots, but is an atrocity and will get you condemned by everyone else.

# ¿ Oct 30, 2014 20:42

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

DrSunshine posted:

The last few pages are the reason why I love SMAC/X and why I think it's a superior game to C:BE. Will we be talking about Hutama and Elodie in the same way that we talk about Morgan and Miriam, 16 years from now? I doubt it!

Well, at the very least, you'll most likely to remember at least ONE leader quote from Beyond Earth.

"No village was ever ruined by trade..."

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 14:14

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Strange Matter posted:

Is that supposed to be bleakly comedic?

Well, the quote is spoken by the leader of the African Union, whose backstory involves his being upset at colonialism, so it's possible that he's being massively sarcastic.

Which would certainly explain why he's decided to make it his personal mission to bug everyone he sees with that quote over and over and over again every time he wants to propose a badly lopsided deal.

(Other less notable quotes in that vein:

American Reclamation Corporation: As Adam Smith said, trade is the lifeblood of nations.

Polystralia: What's mine is yours - for a price.

Or as the impatient would know them, "No village -" "As Adam Smith -" "What's mine -")

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 14:35

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Fintilgin posted:

I dunno, but I do sort of roll my eyes at it. "Hey, I'm the leader of a unified African mega state which is scientifically sophisticated enough to launch an interstellar colonization effort, but hey.... villages, amirite?"

Maybe it's his version of a down home George W. Bush act, but....

Supposedly, according to his backstory which you can only get by reading the Civopedia and which isn't mentioned anywhere else in the game, people from the more developed economies started out treating him like an upjumped "simple village headman," which he was amused by and decided to deliberately cultivate to throw people off their guard as he helped build the African Union into something capable of competing with the other major powers of the world on an equal footing.

In the actual game, I can only imagine he's just being sarcastic by now. "Yeah, the village headman got into space, how about that, huh? Just a simple low-down village boy, that's me. Gimmie your stuff, I'll owe you a favor."

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 16:22

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 14:43

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Caustic Soda posted:

Yeah, the insults etc are often pretty funny. I also like some of the characters don't really get complimented, even if the AI is friendly. "[Chairman] [Yang], as always you are the most [ruthless] of us all, and your followers the most [unquestioning]." High Praise, that .

Or how about "I greet you formally as my Pact [Sister]. Together we shall both [pursue unfettered research] and [embrace the truth of the Lord's scripture]"

Well, I imagine Yang would consider that a compliment - what's wrong with being ruthless?

# ¿ Nov 2, 2014 21:07

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