Firaxis on creating narrative in Civ: Beyond Earth

We caught up with co-lead designer Will Miller and senior producer Dennis Shirk to learn more about the soon to be released sci-fi strategy that is Civilization: Beyond Earth.

Will Miller went into some detail on how the seeded start process plays out in Civilization: Beyond Earth:

"This happens before you land on the planet. You're still on Earth and figuring our what your expedition is going to look like. So for the first time Civ players get to customise their civilisations, which they haven't previously been able to do. So you select your sponsor, that's your leader and the leader comes with a set of buffs, then you select your spaceship, cargo and the crew that you bring with you, settlers that you bring with you. And each of those choices influences the rest of your game. They're all good choices, so there's no positives and negatives - just a lot of good things to pick from, but everytime you play against an AI opponent they will have made those choices as well."

Dennis Shirk gave us some insight into the creation of the narrative for Beyond Earth, that's a little different than that of other Civilization titles:

"We're creating narrative this time. Obviously we have a completely clean slate. We don't have to worry about historic context. So through the quest system that holds little tidbits of story to help you go along. The victories all have a story lined quest system that you go through to achieve victory. Each of these sponsors, each of these people, they all have these unique histories written for all of them. Every unit. Every building. Every wonder. So it all contributes to this unique story that you're going to go through every time you play the game."

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