As a preface, I wanna note that I wrote this for reddit, I'm reposting it here because it might interest you guys, here's the link if you wanna check the original out

Also idk if this should go here at game design or general, please tell me if I put in the wrong place

Also I had to change the title because it was too long, the original was:

South American Wishlist: A very long post on my hopes for post release Cultures from Pre-Columbian South America

Whithout further ado:

Can't say much about the historical accuracy but I really like these. Especially the Norte Chico as they seem to be among the first developed cultures in the region.

I'd like the base game to have all the "original" cultures represented in the ancient era so skipping Norte Chico in favor of Olmecs doesn't seem a great pick. Sure, there's a limit how many cultures can be added but still. From a historical POV, Norte Chico seems more important since it's older and thus influental over later cultures. Yeah, they're far from each other geographically but 2000 years or so is a long time.

That, and I just happen to love the ancient South America cultures. They are great looking and interesting and the archaelogical remains are really marvelous as far as I'm concerned. There's just something mystical and appealing about them, dunno.

Maybe the devs could reconsider their design choices or maybe add the cultural picks per era to 12 instead? Or heck, 15. I don't see why the limit would be exactly 10 per era besides development resources of course. There's so many cool and interesting cultures out there.

The devs have confirmed that they will be adding more cultures in future expansions, and that those will likely come in the form of geographically themed DLC.

Really interesting post, but do you think than some of your suggestions could be grouped ? Andeans for exemple, it's possible ? Or it's a totally wrong blob ?

And do you think than some of your suggestions could be city-states instead of a major faction ?

And don't exclude Mapuche or Guarani so fast ! It's cool to have the most complete list possible, even if it's early modern.

Narcisse wrote:

Really interesting post, but do you think than some of your suggestions could be grouped ? Andeans for exemple, it's possible ? Or it's a totally wrong blob ?

And do you think than some of your suggestions could be city-states instead of a major faction ?

And don't exclude Mapuche or Guarani so fast ! It's cool to have the most complete list possible, even if it's early modern.

Yeah "andean" is absoutley too broad, like I said all of these cultures are andean in real life, and they're all very different from each other.

I think Norte Chico, the Incas and the Muisca are necessary additions, but there's a lot more competition in the classical era, I'm thinking if I didn't choose Tiwanaku and Wari it could be the Nazca and Moche for example.

Maybe I'll make a second post on them both specifically, I'm also about to finish something on terrain, resources and wonders from South America on reddit, I'll repost it here later but I'm way more active there than here

When they first started making the game the first Era was "Bronze Age". They decided to rename it later, as people took exception to the connotations of that. So the fact that all ancient cultures are bronze age cultures is an artifact of the development of the game, not a rule that would dictate possible cultures moving forwards.

pineappledan wrote:

I wonder if Norte Chico/Caral isn't too ancient for the ancient era, based on what the designers have laid out?

• They selected Babylon and Assyria for Mesopotamian civilizations, as opposed to older cultures like Sumer or Akkad.
• The Chinese civilization they chose for the Ancient era is the Zhou, which was founded in approximately 1050BCE, as opposed to the older Shang or Xia.

It looks like they are trying to base the ancient era around 1500-800BCE, most likely to capture the Bronze Age Collapse and the Olmecs. Norte Chico is very, very old in comparison, but the Chavin culture fits neatly enough into that time frame, so that would probably be the culture I would choose for an Ancient Era Andean.

re: the Inca, you might consider Pakayok, or "Ear-Plug Men" as a worthy inclusion. Pakayoc were fully-initiated men of the imperial army. Their initiation rites were long and grueling, and make for an interesting read. 

A Tambo certainly makes the most sense to me as a unique district for the Inca/Tawantinsuyu. Tambose included management of the nearby Qullqas, and often contained both a small garrison and a Chasquiwasi, in addition to being halfway houses for dignitaries and travellers. They were hotels, supply depots, barracks, and pony express system all rolled into one, and formed the nervous system for a vast and complex empire.

I don't think the importance of the Mit'a and Qullqa systems as a tool of diplomacy and empire can be understated. If you lived in a small Andean village, and an envoy of the Tawantinsuyu offered your tribe access to a large empire's extensive system of warehouses and trade, in exchange for a month of labor tax, it could be a very attractive deal. In addition to the obvious military protection and trade opportunities, living at such high altitudes can make agriculture unpredictable, so food security and insurance was a compelling reasons to join the Tawantinsuyu.

Hmmm, maybe you're right about Norte Chico, I didn't consider that, I just read "ancient" and automatically thought of them.

Thank you for your recommendations for the Inca, I'll add them as footnotes to my original reddit post.

All of the support is greatly appreciated!

pineappledan wrote:

Personally, I think the Andean cultures are the most compelling civilizations the world has ever seen, purely from the perspective of "what might have been". More than any other cultures, the Andeans show us a complete alternative timeline, how technology and institutions could have come about entirely differently, how societies could be organized, and how people could interact with each other and nature.

• The Norte Chico don't seem to have ever discovered pottery, but we have extensive evidence of massive earthworks and rather sophisticated weaving technologies. It's also guessed that the Quipu knot system may have started with them. Imagine if writing had never really caught on, but communicating with knots was the primary means of record-keeping for societies. Imagine if our systems of "writing" prioritized our tactile senses instead of our visual ones.
• Tiwanaku architecture and religious symbols are found in places hundreds of kilometers from the city, yet we have no evidence so far of large scale military campaigns or of an empire, as we would normally define it. Imagine if a multiethnic, multicultural pilgrimmage site formed the basis for cultural preeminence, rather than pure strength of arms? It's like a pluralistic religious national identity that predates the concept of nation-states by a thousand years.
• The Wari and later Incan Mit'a system was a labour taxation method that mobilized an enormous work force to create public works projects through some of the most difficult terrain on the planet, and without the use of draft animals, no less. By Eurasian standards of technology, the Wari were only a bronze age civilization, yet these two cultures created one of the most vast and politically sophisticated multi-ethnic empires on the planet. Inca and Wari forms of statesmanship, taxation, and their instruments of centralized government far outstripped their technological achievements; they effectively skipped feudalism as a form of government entirely.
• The Andean civilizations, as established, were far behind contemporary Eurasian cultures w.r.t. metallurgy, shipbuilding, architecture, and mathematics. They didn't have iron, but Ecuadoreans discovered how to work with platinum before anyone else. They didn't have gunpowder, but they knew how to freeze-dry food centuries before anyone had invented refridgeration. They didn't have draft animals like cattle or horses, but they had the most versatile and healthful vegetable on the planet: potatoe. They even had chickens, which they had traded for with Polynesian sailors before European contact, which I think is the most hilariously incredible historical tidbit, that Polynesians took chickens from India, across the pacific, all the way to Chile at least a century before Columbus was born.

It's incredible to think of the potential histories that might have been possible if these cultures had prevailed and withstood European disease and colonialism. It's for that reason that the Andes' exclusion from the base game is the snub I took the hardest.

I agree with all of this, as someone living in the Andes the thought of this totally different world, where not even things like the wheel are present amazes me, I wish I could see how my ancestors' culture would have done if they haden't been colonized, some things like the quipu in particular really make me question how this system could have evolved into the modern day.

I'm honesty pretty miffed that they completely snubbed the Andes, I was really excited to play as indigenous americans from any part of the continent for that matter (I was born in Mexico so atleast I have the mesoamericans (oh and also why don't the aztecs have chinampas, that kinda annoys me)), idk why but I was 100% expecting the Nazca, and I was thinking of what cultures could have been included, and then I saw the list of cultures and was really disappointed, (who the hell are the mycaeneans? (and why are there 3 medieval european cultures? do we really need that many?)) I was also really surprised by the fact that there isn't a chinese or indian culture in all ages (like they're China and India, they are some of the most influential areas in history, but nooo we need to have the goths) but there's at least a sub-saharan African culture in all eras, that's nice, but oh wait there's also no First Nations culture at all.

I really hope that this is rectified eventually, just because the devs don't have andean heritage doesn't mean that they aren't important, if there's room for 1/2 european cultures per era there's room for 1 from each continent at least right? I'd love more cultures from other neglected parts of the world too honestly, like African cultures more southern than the Congo, or maybe something from central Asia, or the pacific ocean. Honestly there's a lot of places that deserve representation.

Soooooo yeah, this is my pitch for South American cultures, I really want Humankind to be the best it can be, and personally I think eurocentrism goes against the spirit of this type of game. I wrote another long post on resources and wonders from South America on reddit, maybe I'll repost it here like this one.

Here we go again. European disease (not diseases? what's implied here) and eurocentrism blah blah. I won't hide it, I take great offense about all this Europe-bashing. Those guys survived the onslaught caused by Hunnic incursions and the forced migration of various tribes that made big old Rome fall to it's knees. Medieval Europe built universities, had theological studies based on reason and managed to hold against the massive superpowers of the southern caliphates. Instead of pointing the finger at those peoples at those times and call them barbaric and uncivilized, we could paint a picture of a heroic comeback after near total destruction and annihilation.

Taking offense aside (which doesn't really justify anything as anybody can get offended for whatever, a never ending circle of spite), we could stop and inspect the American natives with a critical look. Now, I love the aesthetics of those guys. Their cultures are really interesting and I'd love to see more of them but still... They did pretty nasty things and like this pineapple guy suggested in another thread, resorting to Whig History can give a biased POV.

What I mean is that we can't really know if Andean/Mesoamerican/NA tribes and cultures would've been such great guys if they would've instead explored the old world and spread across the globe. For all we know, they could've seen us all as dirty infidels that deserve to get flayed and eaten. Alive. For all we know, it might've been the world's great salvation that the European people did what they did. The lesser evil and all that. For all we know, the European people with their Christian tolerance might've been the thing that has allowed vibrant, different cultures to thrive.

Maybe if Norte Chico or Incans or stuff would've never been wiped out, maybe they would've sacrificed and enslaved us all in the glory of Quezacotl and other deities of theirs. Maybe they would've put us all to play the ball game and die a gruesome death. Maybe. We can't really tell. So glorifying the ancient cultures as something that would've been better than what truly happened historically is ignorant at best, malicious at worst.

Just take a look at this website for example: https://allthatsinteresting.com/human-sacrifice

Some quotes:

"The person to be sacrificed was often painted blue and adorned with a ceremonial headdress while being held down by four attendants."

The victim was apparently alive, held down? NICE.

"The Incas are most known for their sacrifice of children." Grab them while they're young, NICE.

"Many sacrifices were prisoners but archaeological records have proven that some children were actually raised specifically for these ritual killings." Sacrificial breeding pits? BEST CULTURE.

"-god of rain and lightning, Tlaloc. This god demanded children and their tears. The Aztecs would bring large groups of children to Tlaloc’s temple, where they were forced to solemnly and ceremonially parade up the steps. If the children did not weep, they would be forced to do so by any means of psychological and physical torture necessary." Torture? JUST MY THING.

"Other rituals included cannibalism, the live flaying of men, wearing of human skins, and other techniques of drawn-out dismemberment and bloodletting including the mass collection of skulls." Oooh kay. BOW TO OUR NEW JUST OVERLORDS.

So, there's always two sides to a story. But yeah to end on a bit more positive note, I look forward to seeing Ancient America DLC someday. Even with all the blood in their past, there's still a lot of cool good stuff. Just like with European cultures. And I didn't even know about Myceneans that much so I learned something new when I read up about them!

I really don't see your point @Starbound. People did bad things the world round, no one every said other wise. No one ever bashed Europe either. In fact Europe has hardly even been mentioned in this thread at all whatsoever. What you're doing is analogous to saying "all lives matter". Yes Europe has valid cultures, but they are already in the game. Pre-colonization Americas had many interesting cultures and so far they have only gotten one slot per era.

You're arguing that the Native American cultures have done evil things. So? All cultures have done evil things. No one once said that Europe should be excluded for it's evil things, so why even bring that up? Not once did anyone say anything about ancient Europe being barbaric and uncivilized. No one ever said that Natives had some pure ideological paradise either. Did you even read this thread? They both had flaws, they both did bad things, they both had some interesting cultures.

Why is it that including European cultures is "normal" but wanting Native American cultures in too is "glorifying" them? You say if Indigenous Americans had developed technology first they probably would have colonized Europe, and spread their religion the way Europeans did. Yet somehow you're using that similarity as evidence that they should be excluded. What? They are the same so they should be treated different?

Starbound wrote:

Here we go again. European disease (not diseases? what's implied here) and eurocentrism blah blah. I won't hide it, I take great offense about all this Europe-bashing. Those guys survived the onslaught caused by Hunnic incursions and the forced migration of various tribes that made big old Rome fall to it's knees. Medieval Europe built universities, had theological studies based on reason and managed to hold against the massive superpowers of the southern caliphates. Instead of pointing the finger at those peoples at those times and call them barbaric and uncivilized, we could paint a picture of a heroic comeback after near total destruction and annihilation.

Taking offense aside (which doesn't really justify anything as anybody can get offended for whatever, a never ending circle of spite), we could stop and inspect the American natives with a critical look. Now, I love the aesthetics of those guys. Their cultures are really interesting and I'd love to see more of them but still... They did pretty nasty things and like this pineapple guy suggested in another thread, resorting to Whig History can give a biased POV.

What I mean is that we can't really know if Andean/Mesoamerican/NA tribes and cultures would've been such great guys if they would've instead explored the old world and spread across the globe. For all we know, they could've seen us all as dirty infidels that deserve to get flayed and eaten. Alive. For all we know, it might've been the world's great salvation that the European people did what they did. The lesser evil and all that. For all we know, the European people with their Christian tolerance might've been the thing that has allowed vibrant, different cultures to thrive.

Maybe if Norte Chico or Incans or stuff would've never been wiped out, maybe they would've sacrificed and enslaved us all in the glory of Quezacotl and other deities of theirs. Maybe they would've put us all to play the ball game and die a gruesome death. Maybe. We can't really tell. So glorifying the ancient cultures as something that would've been better than what truly happened historically is ignorant at best, malicious at worst.

Just take a look at this website for example: https://allthatsinteresting.com/human-sacrifice

Some quotes:

"The person to be sacrificed was often painted blue and adorned with a ceremonial headdress while being held down by four attendants."

The victim was apparently alive, held down? NICE.

"The Incas are most known for their sacrifice of children." Grab them while they're young, NICE.

"Many sacrifices were prisoners but archaeological records have proven that some children were actually raised specifically for these ritual killings." Sacrificial breeding pits? BEST CULTURE.

"-god of rain and lightning, Tlaloc. This god demanded children and their tears. The Aztecs would bring large groups of children to Tlaloc’s temple, where they were forced to solemnly and ceremonially parade up the steps. If the children did not weep, they would be forced to do so by any means of psychological and physical torture necessary." Torture? JUST MY THING.

"Other rituals included cannibalism, the live flaying of men, wearing of human skins, and other techniques of drawn-out dismemberment and bloodletting including the mass collection of skulls." Oooh kay. BOW TO OUR NEW JUST OVERLORDS.

So, there's always two sides to a story. But yeah to end on a bit more positive note, I look forward to seeing Ancient America DLC someday. Even with all the blood in their past, there's still a lot of cool good stuff. Just like with European cultures. And I didn't even know about Myceneans that much so I learned something new when I read up about them!

Uhhhhh what? I wasn't implying that the Pre-Columbian south americans were morally superior to europeans, I have no idea where you got that idea from.

Maybe I was a bit too rough on europeans sure, where I'm coming from is that I had european education, so I learned about the Greeks and Romans and a bunch of other dudes in school, they'r just a lot less interesting to me personally beacause I already know a lot about them, on the other hand I know nothing about the Harappans for example, I'm very much interested on learning more about them, and the fact they're in a game like Humankind might inspire other people to learn about them too.

Of course they did nasty shit, they were human, that's what we're made for, the Incas in particular were an Empire, meaning they conquered other people and subjugated them, of course they weren't perfect, I'm sure they would have been horrible if they had been the colonizers instead, but I wasn't talking about if they were good people, basically no one before the 20th century would classify as a good person with our modern morals.

Quetzalcoatl is an Aztec deity, and the ball game is mesoamerican, they had almost nothing in common with the Andes, it's kinda like saying that europeans believed in chinese folk religion just because they are in neighboring continents.

Why did you talk about the world's "greatest salvation" being the colonization by the europeans, that colonization brought misery to the world in an unparalleled magnitude, with things like Trans-Atlantic Slavery and Capitalism and whatnot.

Something that worries me specifically is "Christian Tolerance", yeah, specially in the spanish colonies priests contributed to the survival of some indigenous people, but at the cost of doing genocide not to them but their culture, one of the things I lament the most about colonization is the loss of the indigenous religions, all of the americas are basically just christian, I don't have anything against christianity but it's kinda lame that all of the Pre-Columbian beliefs are gone, there's so much philosophy that they probably invented that will never be remembered.

There I was talking about the spanish colonies though, in the north, the english were much more brutal against the natives, and the spanish soliders didn't always care about what the priests thought, what they did is absolutely genocide and should be remembered as such.

Of course the indigenous Americans weren't perfect, but neither were the europeans, you can't accuse me of revisionism and say that the europeans were "heroic" without acknowledging some of the bad things they did, the truth is that history is history, it shouldn't be thought of as "good" or "bad", because people aren't that simple, the only reason we think the europeans are good is because they were succesful in their colonization, and made the rest of the world think they were the good guys, while in fact they weren't better or worse than anyone else.

Waykot wrote:

I didn't take the time to read your first post entirely (but I will eventually !), but as everyone else here, I agree with you, andeans and amazonians precolumbians cultures/civilizations are worth being represented in the game. Hopefully we'll get them, at least with a South American DLC package.

I would add, to your list, the Moche and Chimù cultures, which were also predecessors of the Incas, along with the Tiwanaku and Wari cultures, and have had, as well, an important influence over the Incas. That would indeed fill the gap of Ancient and Classical Era, if the Incas are to be added in the base game in Early Modern Era.

Changing a bit the topic, I'd like to temper one phrase in your last post :

thehuman2cs wrote:
one of the things I lament the most about colonization is the loss of the indigenous religions, all of the americas are basically just christian, I don't have anything against christianity but it's kinda lame that all of the Pre-Columbian beliefs are gone

I wouldn't be so categorical. In most of the cases (of course, there are exceptions), indigenous peoples have managed to incorporate their former beliefs into the christian beliefs that the priests forced them to assimilate, starting from the Conquest until now. Those beliefs are what is called syncretic beliefs, they're a mix of christian and indigenous beliefs, even as of today.

I don't know much about it for the andeans and amazonians cultures, but I did studied about mayan cultures and beliefs, such as the Tseltal and Tsotsil (Chiapas, Mexico), Yucatec (Yucatan, Mexico). As a quick example, either in Chiapas or in Yucatan, farmers usually make offerings to different christian saints at the four corners of their field (the four cardinal directions), in order to ensure good crops.

This religious practice is heavily based upon what precolumbian mayas were doing (of course with different holy entities) but the goal was the same : ensure that earth and the world as they were perceiving it was respected, pleasing the gods to ensure good crops.

As a counter example to the christianisation, if you're interested, you might want to look at the Lacandon, who are a very interesting mayan group, who managed to stay away and fight against christianisation, and are practicing their own evolved mayan religion. 

I agree with you on what you said, I also considered the Chimu, and Moche, honestly I'm expecting the Nazca and Moche, they fit pretty snuggly in the classical era and we know a fair bit about them.

On the syncretic beliefs thing, yeah I know about that, I studied it at school actually! Most people I know (even non indigenous people) practice them, but honestly it's not a very big deal, you've still got things like churches and statues of the virgin in tiny vilages and stuff like that, apart from a few small things it just seems to me like straight up catholicism. 

Maybe because this is the christianity I grew up around it seems normal to me, but from firsthand experience there's not very much syncretism, but hey, I'm not indigenous and I haven't spent thaaaat much time with indigenous people (I'm not even christian for that matter, I'm very underqualified to be talking about this).

I'll read about the lacandon, I was born in Mexico so I also have some heritage from up there, I don't know that much about their ancient cultures because I didn't study there, so your link seems pretty interesting.

Take care!

Starbound wrote:
Maybe the devs could reconsider their design choices or maybe add the cultural picks per era to 12 instead? Or heck, 15. I don't see why the limit would be exactly 10 per era besides development resources of course. There's so many cool and interesting cultures out there.

The unfortunate truth is that "development resources" is very often the limiting factor on decisions.

Eulogos wrote:
When they first started making the game the first Era was "Bronze Age". They decided to rename it later, as people took exception to the connotations of that. So the fact that all ancient cultures are bronze age cultures is an artifact of the development of the game, not a rule that would dictate possible cultures moving forwards.

As far as I know, the name "Bronze Age" had never been finalized, it was simply the working title we were using when we started releasing the Culture Cards. So I don't think falling into this range of years is any sort of hard rule.

thehuman2cs wrote:
I really hope that this is rectified eventually, just because the devs don't have andean heritage doesn't mean that they aren't important,

I am not privy to all the details of the discussions about which cultures to include, since I wasn't part of Amplitude yet when those decisions were made (and even if I had been, I probably would not have been part of those meetings.) However, I know that we have a pretty long list of cultures we considered, the discussions about which ones to ultimately include for release were long (and possibly heated), and none of them were simply discarded as "not important." Andean cultures in particular are high up on our list of cultures that need to make it into the game post-release, but the decisions are still never easy.