Friday, August 3, 2007
Civilization IV (Real Time Strategy)
Game Score: 10/10, Sid Meier Does It Again
Social life ruined, all other games on the shelf, I bask in the glory that is Civilization IV.
I have never been more happy to pick up a game at my local EBGames than the day that I picked Civ. IV up. It surpasses all of my expectations.
The most noticeable change from Civ. III is the graphics, which are all in 3D now. I was a bit skeptical from the screenshots I had seen. I was not sure that 3D graphics could capture the vibrant, real world feel that Civ. III had. Boy was I wrong; the world in Civ. IV is amazing. Each tile, resource, and improvement mesh together perfectly. All of it is very detailed and immersive. My personal favorite is the water, I love the way the rivers look as the wind through the different types of terrain. The Civ. leaders look exceptionally good, so life like that I have attributed their faces to the real people in history.
Quite a few aspects of the game play have changed as well. The new unit promotion system works very well. Each combat unit evolves into a unique entity as they go through different combat experiences. The result is a highly customized military that you create through offensive and defensive warfare. Each unit is no longer the basic template following the same track. They also have one universal power rating now, and you won't see many spearmen poking holes in a panzer anymore.
New terrain improvements have been added, windmills, watermills, lumber mills, and cottages. They offer a balance between coin, production, and food that was not offered in Civ. III. It took me a few games to break the standard farm/mine combination of Civ. III. Also, Settlers and workers no longer take population from the city they are built in, city growth is stopped while they are in production.
Cities will no longer riot, a successful attempt at cutting back on micro managing. Instead, citizens will just stop working, and an un-happiness icon will appear. Easy to remedy, and not near as annoying as the old riots.
Great people add a new dimension to the game play. There is even a leader trait that will allow you to increase the birthrate of great people. You can specialize each city to produce different types of great people, they can grant free technologies, hurry production on a world wonder, found culture rich religious buildings, conduct trade missions to foreign cities for lots of gold, start a golden age, and all of them can join cities as super specialists.
The tech tree has changed for the better. The techs are no longer confined to specific ages in history; you can go down one path and ignore all others. It adopts an "or" approach instead of the old "and." Instead of needing "this and this" to reach a certain tech, you now only need "this or that." It makes deciding and planning what to research fun.
The game focuses on the quality of cities over the quantity. You can expand at a rapid pace if you like, but it will lead to financial trouble very quick. The game is much easier if you focus on improving fewer cities instead of trying to grab every bit of available land.
As I said before, it more than lives up anything I expected. Now, instead of a nice closing paragraph, I'm going to play Civilization IV.-Game Guru
