Sid Meier's Civilization

"The name of the game says it all"

There could have been no other game worthy of the title Civilization. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, pertaining to the history of mankind is incorporated in this game. You essentially start off as a single tribe of settlers looking for a nice place to call their home, and through a combination of intellectual research, tax, trade and military development, you seek to establish your people as the dominant civilization on earth. However, the form in which that domination takes is entirely up to you.

Several civilizations are available for you to choose at the start, including the Aztecs, Egyptians, Germans and Americans, or you can simply create your own tribe. You can also choose the number of other civilizations to compete against (or work with, depending on your strategy and their benevolence). The more peoples that populate the earth, the more difficult it will be for you, because chances are at least a few of them (can we say Zulus?) will attack you at every opportunity.

Building cities is one of the most crucial aspects of the game. The world map is broken up into tiles (e.g. forests, plains, deserts, etc.) and each tile possesses its own benefits. For example, placing a city in an area of grasslands will provide ample food for your townspeople, whereas building on a river boosts your trade. In addition, each type of geography has its own "special" tile -- building near a mountain is generally pointless, but building near a mountain that contains gold can reap large rewards.

Once you have established a city, you must choose what that city should produce. Generally speaking, the first thing you do is build a defensive unit to protect the town (otherwise, even the weakest of enemies can simply waltz in and conquer it). You can build a granary to increase your food supply, more settlers to build roads, irrigate farmland and settle more cities, or even a Wonder of the World (more on that below). You must also keep an eye on your townspeople's morale; too many unhappy citizens means Civil Disorder!, which halts all production and renders the city essentially useless. Decreasing taxes, building temples and increasing a military presence are a few of the ways to ensure a grateful population.

As you build more cities, your knowledge production will increase, and you will find yourself choosing which types of innovations to develop. Each new skill or technology that is learned will grant you access to even more advanced technologies, allowing you to maintain a healthy, wealthy and happy population, build more powerful armies and even colonize space!

Choosing your form of government is also one of the more important aspects of Civilization. You start off as a Despot, but will soon find yourself pondering a Revolution! to change to a new system such as Monarchy, Communism, or Democracy. Each government has its strengths and weaknesses. Democracy will allow your wealth and production to skyrocket, but try shipping a few soldiers out to skirmish on a foreign land and watch their home city's happiness plummet. On the flip side, a Despotic civilization will never land a citizen on the cover of Forbes Magazine, but nobody seems to care that half the population is away conquering their neighbors, and the few townspeople that dare to feel upset can be easily convinced that life is, indeed, quite grand by installing a few more soldiers to patrol the streets. It all depends on what your plan for world domination is; if you want to destroy your enemies as quickly and as ruthlessly as possible, then Despotism or Monarchy may be your best bet; if you want to build up a massive nation abundant with wealth and technology... and then destroy your enemies as ruthlessly as possible, then you'll want to lean towards a Republic or Democracy.

Lastly we come to the Wonders of the World. Each Wonder bestows certain benefits on the civilization that builds it (and only one of each Wonder can be built). For example, the Hanging Gardens makes everyone on the same continent a little happier, and the Great Library may surprise you by spontaneously discovering new advancements (or frustrate you by doing absolutely nothing). One of the downsides to building Wonders is that they take a loooong time to build, especially if a city's production capacity is low (read: you're on the ocean). Their benefits can also be negated by new advancements, meaning you'll toil for years building a Colossus only to see it rendered useless by the advent of Electricity (don't ask me why). Although some Wonders are crucial to a civilization, they mainly exist to give cities something to build when you can't think of anything else for them to do.

I guess I'll talk about the graphics for a bit. Yeah, it's an old game, so they're pretty lame. It's tile-based, and the units are all pretty simple-looking. Attacking another unit entails your unit moving on top of them and generating a little explosion (whether you're attacking with a chariot, a battleship or a nuclear weapon). Ironically, the nicest graphics in the game (e.g. when you discover a new advancement or construct a new building in a city) are the ones you'll probably end up turning off, because they can really drag the game on. But overall, the graphics are perfect for the type of game it is. It's a strategy game, so that means gameplay, gameplay, gameplay.

This game, in my opinion, is a perfect 10. Sid Meier is the Richard Garriott of PC strategy games. I've never played Civ II or later, so I'm sure they rival the original in terms of graphics (and maybe even gameplay), but this game is all I need to satisfy my urge to CONQUER EVERYTHING!

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 06/18/04