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[Goran]

Actually, DF is the society of the future.

Anyone watched first episode of Futurama and remember the aptitude chip?

In the 31st century you take an aptitude test and are implanted with an aptitude chip which determines the job you will do for the rest of your life based on what you are suited best for. Plus there is all sorts of crazy automation and stuff...

[Urist McCyrilin]

I doubt humanity will even make it to the 25th century.

[Soralin]

Although accounts may vary, it is universely assumed he/she was guided by unknown forces.

..otherwise, why would have have murdered an entire village and then jumped into a volcano?

[quinnr]

I doubt humanity will even make it to the 25th century.

Maybe not, Humans aren't doing good about their planet, are they?

[Balathustrius]

I doubt humanity will even make it to the 25th century.

I sometimes wonder if we haven't done all this before.

Gurkha, flying a swift and powerful vimana
hurled a single projectile charged with the power
of the Universe. An incandescent column of
smoke and flame, as bright as ten thousand suns, rose with
all its splendor.

It was an unknown weapon, an iron thunderbolt, a gigantic
messenger of death, which reduced to ashes the entire race
of the Vrishnis and the Andhakas.

The corpses were so burned as to be unrecognizable.
Hair and nails fell out; Pottery broke without apparent cause,
and the birds turned white.

...After a few hours all foodstuffs were infected...
...to escape from this fire the soldiers threw
themselves in streams to wash themselves and their
equipment."

Dense arrows of flame, like a great shower, issued
forth upon creation, encompassing the enemy...
A thick gloom swiftly settled upon the Pandava hosts.
All points of the compass were lost in darkness.
Fierce wind began to blow upward, showering dust and gravel.

Birds croaked madly... the very elements seemed disturbed.
The earth shook, scorched by the terrible violent heat of this
weapon.
Elephants burst into flame and ran to and fro in a frenzy...
over a vast area, other animals crumpled to the ground and died.
From all points of the compass the arrows of flame rained
continuously and fiercely. "

From the Mahabharata, which was old when it was compiled from oral traditions in like 3,500 BC. 

[quinnr]

The Mayans think we will survive till 2012.

I think they are wrong. What about you?

[Andir]

The Mayans think we will survive till 2012.

I think they are wrong. What about you?

There is literally no possible way that humanity will be wiped out in less than 2 years.  Even a meteorite that brought a global winter would take more than 2 years to kill us all off.

[Demetrious]

I doubt humanity will even make it to the 25th century.

I sometimes wonder if we haven't done all this before.

From the Mahabharata, which was old when it was compiled from oral traditions in like 3,500 BC. 

...After a few hours all foodstuffs were infected...
...to escape from this fire the soldiers threw
themselves in streams to wash themselves and their
equipment."

.... are you kidding me? Are you seriously kidding me? You had best be messing with me.

[*Poster*]

The Mayans think we will survive till 2012.

I think they are wrong. What about you?

The classical Maya don't think very much at all, being as they're all gone. :p The modern ones don't make a big deal out of it. Snark aside, the end of the b'ak'tun never, in Mayan mytholgy/theology/etc. heralded the end of the world or universe. Quite simply it was the end of the calender, in a similar fashion to the year 1999 ticking over to 2000. Humans being Humans, I expect that if the Mayans were still around plenty of them would doomsay regarding 2012 (Remember Y2K), but in reality it would be nothing more than the equivalent of our Millennial celebrations.

As to the thread topic in general I'm unconvinced that real world -isms can generally be applied to videogames. It just doesn't work that well for the most part, because giving the player realistic influence means a realistic level of power, which tends to mean not enough power to make the game fun. A 4X game might well have democratic government types, but you're not likely to get voted out, and even if you do (As can happen in Galciv 2) your party loses power and you lose their bonus, but you're still in control. As for economics, well, with a few exceptions you're running a Command & Conquer Economy.

I'm convinced that more interesting things can be done (And have on occasion witnessed as much, e.g. Patrician III breaks slightly from this, and Vicky does to a greater degree) but there's a ways to go before we get to a successful, intuitive game in such a vein. Transport Tycoon is an interesting one, where you have absolute control over your transport network, but not terribly much say over anything else. The cities and industries build and develop based on how successfully you're providing the services they desire.

[Andir]

I expect that if the Mayans were still around plenty of them would doomsay regarding 2012 (Remember Y2K), but in reality it would be nothing more than the equivalent of our Millennial celebrations.

Personally, I think that they just decided 2012 was far enough to count. :p  But that's off-topic so I'll stop there.

[Kavalion]

Government works on a scale of 150-200 people?  Lies!  I can't even get a single neighborhood to agree to rezone some land from agriculture to residential so it can be put to use.  Corruption, greed, racism, all manner of stupidity plagues people's minds and makes cooperation impossible.

Imagine your dwarves telling you that you can only build farms where you want to put in some quarters.  Meanwhile, your food stores are overflowing and hobos are throwing tantrums.  This fact does nothing to sway the opinions of the dwarves.  So, you put in a smelly pig farm to piss them off.  Real world politics.

[Tizer]

I don't know about communist but those guys in the Curses forum really seem to think its Arch-Conservative.
http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=45131.0

[Nobody1225]

One or two such opinions were offered in that thread.  The prevailing opinion, however, was that it is most certainly not Arch-Conservative.  (It's not Elite Liberal, either, by a long shot.)

Having played Victoria, though, I'm glad for the Dwarven command economy.  Getting capitalists to do what I want when I want it is like herding cats.  Who are our direct competitors in the administration of the fortress.

Real Dwarven capitalism would be a pain in the butt.  On the one hand, sure, there could be some cool stuff with having the clothiers and craftsmen turn out apparel and finished goods in varieties people actually want, instead of shopkeepers trying to sell out a thousand dimple-dyed pig tail pairs of socks because I forgot to ever switch out the orders.  On the other hand...Dwarven defense contractors.

[Deon]

Conservative, liberal, all are just words and "models" which are here to occupy masses and entertain head figures, some kind of a game like chess but more complex and with people. In fact the politics work in a very different way.

[Arrkhal]

In fact the politics work in a very different way.

All they do is switch it up sometimes.  Used to be about every 50 years, now it's every 15, and it used to be that the parties themselves would switch (Lincoln was a republican in the era when republicans were the liberal party), but now they just swap issues behind the scenes.  Absolutely no one on the internet remembers that the anti-violent video game movement started with west coast liberal democrats in the early 90's.  A couple liberal demo politicians in California and Oregon.  Then they swapped.  And that was the ritalin decade, so now everyone thinks it's been "conservative" all along.  Yay?