Civilization IV

[stoutfellow]

This may have been a mistake.

I've always been a sucker for "god-games" since the first time I played Civilization. If it's got Sid Meier's name on it, I'll snap it up: Civilization, Colonization, Alpha Centauri... (I'll go for games by other creators as well, of course: Master of Orion and Master of Magic also have swallowed up a good deal of lifespan.) I enjoyed Civ I and Civ II a great deal; Civ III wasn't quite as engaging, but I'd heard such good reports of version IV that, when I saw a copy at Target a few days ago, I picked it up.

I've been playing it fairly casually for the last couple of days, at the very lowest level. (I'm badly out of practice, and remembering how to keep all the balls in the air takes me a while.) It looks pretty good - much better than III - so far. They've gotten rid of the "pollution" problem, which was always a pain. The new treatment of resources looks good, and the "Great People" setup is a vast improvement on the "Leaders" bit from III. The technology tree is more flexible, and the governmental scheme looks excellent. (Rather than a rigid classification into Despotism/Monarchy/Communism/Republic/Democracy, they allow you to select from several options in each of several areas - economy, religion, labor, law, and government - each having different effects.)

Unfortunately, like its predecessors, Civ IV is a huge timesink. I've been trying to hold my sessions to no more than a couple of hours, with some success, but it's so tempting...

Comments

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

(Watches as SF sinks into the quicksand of C4)

It's been lovely chatting with you. See ya in a few months.

(J goes back to TAKING OVER THE WORLD! BWAHAHAHA!)