Recommend on: Civilization (where to start)

zhen_rogue

I'm a Civ virgin.
I'm also in the mood for some empire-building, turn-based strategy.

However, with five Civilizations to choose from (newer doesn't always mean better), i'm wondering what edition the "pinnacle" of the series is for me to purchase.

Here's some potentially helpful guidelines:
-Will be playing on a WindowsXP PC
-I care less about graphics, and more about how fun/dynamic the gameplay turn is overall
-The less deep spreadsheet economic management the better. I enjoy managing an economy, but I don't need fifteen menus, fifty sliders, and eleven "advisors" to deal with every goddam turn. I don't want to feel like I need an MBA to get the most out of my Civ.
-I want to play as Egypt.
-I enjoy surprises, random events, global dynamic variables, and other chaotic events that make it harder to simply hit a "threshold" and be assured of victory - and then have to play out 50 more turns just to get the "you win" screen.

Thanks!

urahonky

I believe Civ V is what you need. It's the easiest to get into and pretty much fulfills all of your requirements.

Machismo

Unfortunately, with the Civ series, once you hit the "threshold" you can know you've won the game. It is unfortunate. They have done a good job trying to limit you from getting too big, but you know when you have the game beat. You just don't have a victory yet.


Civ 4 is an excellent game. I presently prefer it to Civ 5 only because 4 is better balanced, presently. You don't need the expansion to have an awesome game.

That said, Civ 5 is much simpler. The economy is easier to follow (costs can get lost in the noise of 4). Either game though, most of the economy is in the background. You follow rules of thumb and your economy will always be in the green or better.

Honestly, ask youself if you want to enjoy some good military strategy with your Civ, 5 is it. The Hexes make this a capable strategy game as well as a Civlization game. If you don't mind MASSIVE stocks of units in a single tile versus other MASSIVE stacks of units, Civ 4.

Hahnsoo1

You can also look at Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. You won't play as Egypt (you won't even be on Earth), but Alpha Centauri is considered by many (read: just me, actually *grin*) to be the "pinnacle" of Civilization, even though it's not a mainline Civilization game. It is the most fun of all of the series (what other game allows you to melt the polar icecaps to drown your opponents' cities?), but that's my opinion.

Civilization 5 is probably what you are looking for. They rebuilt the game from the ground up, culling most of the cruft from the previous games. They simplified the mechanics and made them more cohesive. The non-stacking units is a giant plus, in my opinion.

None of the Civilizations require a spreadsheet or sliders or anything to manage the economy. Despite the appearance of complexity, the economy managements in all of the games are actually quite simple.

truck-a-sauras

I'm fairly new to the Civ universe and starting as a virgin with Civ 4 was daunting at best. Being self taught I'm sure I still have barely scratched the surface of inner game workings. I did get Civ Rev and was like, oh this is fun, but not deep enough to fulfill my desires. So shooting for something inbetween Civ Rev and Civ 4 I'm hoping Civ 5 is my answer. Also helps I recently got an Amazon gift card and getting Civ 5 for free.

I did fully enjoy Civ 4 after spending many hours trying to figure out what the hell was going on. So it isn't like it is a bad choice at all, just confusing at times having never played any of the previous games.

Lucascraft

There are other empire building games out there which are also very good, outside of the Civilization franchise. For example, the Master of Orion series is very good, and you can get the MoO 1+2 bundle on GoG.com for cheap. In fact, I think its on sale this weekend.

Drake

Hahnsoo1 wrote: »

You can also look at Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. You won't play as Egypt (you won't even be on Earth), but Alpha Centauri is considered by many (read: just me, actually *grin*) to be the "pinnacle" of Civilization, even though it's not a mainline Civilization game. It is the most fun of all of the series (what other game allows you to melt the polar icecaps to drown your opponents' cities?), but that's my opinion.

Civilization 5 is probably what you are looking for. They rebuilt the game from the ground up, culling most of the cruft from the previous games. They simplified the mechanics and made them more cohesive. The non-stacking units is a giant plus, in my opinion.

None of the Civilizations require a spreadsheet or sliders or anything to manage the economy. Despite the appearance of complexity, the economy managements in all of the games are actually quite simple.

Sir, I'd like you to know that I share your opinion.

Also, Civ IV is an awesome game and can probably be obtained on the cheap in whatever form (retail/digital) you prefer. This way you can check out what Civ is all about without having to pay new release prices. Civ III is even cheaper, of course, but Civ IV is all around superior to III.

ronya

IV: BTS should meet all your requirements, although the threshold problem is present on every sufficiently easy difficulty.

Wassermelone

Hahnsoo1 wrote: »

Alpha Centauri is considered by many (read: just me, actually *grin*) to be the "pinnacle" of Civilization

Why do you think its just you? Its not uncommon to think that.

Anyway, I think in terms of starting, I really think Civ V would be a good place. Its simpler, and it can get you into it before the expansions come out and make things more complex for the veterans.

rayofash

Civ 5 or SMAC, definitely.

There's also Freeciv: http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

GMaster7

I have to agree. Civ V will scratch your itch, for sure. It's like Civ IV, but with the annoyances eliminated and the strategy deepened. I'm also a big fan of the Medieval: Total War games, mostly for the political intrigue and storylines that you can invent while playing, but Civ does a good job of this as well. Get V, it's worth it.

On a related note, I did experience the dreaded "you know you've won but you have to play out X number of turns" problem that you mentioned during my recent first playthrough, but to be fair, I was on the second-easiest difficulty setting. Turning it up should solve that problem, although it was still fun to the end... mostly because I was on one continent, surrounded by city states, and it wasn't until late in the game that I discovered a whole other continent (and my mini-map expanded thereafter) with three warring empires and a bunch of city-states. One of the civs started getting super-aggressive and super-powerful and wiped out the other two, and then he started going for the city-states... so I packed my western shores with all of my military might and started sending troops over the ocean and "gifting" them to the city-states so that they could fend for themselves against their mighty aggressor. The freshly-gifted helicopters held off the other large empire, allowing me to finish building the space shuttle... And, in typical Civ fashion, it was three in the morning when I saw the victory screen. Go get Civ5.

DudemanX

Target has a deal on Civ V right now where you'll get a $5 gift card for buying it. Then you can just go activate on it Steam like it was a Valve game and throw your DVD away.

Pretty slick.

Hahnsoo1

Oh, another point for Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri... even if you are totally dominating the game, if you attempt an Ascent to Transcendence victory, you will be fighting against the Planet itself, as the planet entities try to purge the invading humans in a last ditch effort. You won't have a "you know you've won but have to play out the next 50 turns to win." You'll be frantically dumping all of your resources into research so you can Ascend before the alien Planet eats all of your population.

Arrath

Drake wrote: »

Hahnsoo1 wrote: »

You can also look at Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. You won't play as Egypt (you won't even be on Earth), but Alpha Centauri is considered by many (read: just me, actually *grin*) to be the "pinnacle" of Civilization, even though it's not a mainline Civilization game. It is the most fun of all of the series (what other game allows you to melt the polar icecaps to drown your opponents' cities?), but that's my opinion.

Civilization 5 is probably what you are looking for. They rebuilt the game from the ground up, culling most of the cruft from the previous games. They simplified the mechanics and made them more cohesive. The non-stacking units is a giant plus, in my opinion.

None of the Civilizations require a spreadsheet or sliders or anything to manage the economy. Despite the appearance of complexity, the economy managements in all of the games are actually quite simple.

Sir, I'd like you to know that I share your opinion.

As do I!

On that note, is there any kind of widescreen mod for SMAC? Or would I be better off playing it in a window?

eelektrik

Well, I ordered Alpha Centauri. Never did play it much when it was new off a borrowed copy, now that I have played other TBS games since then I might be able to appreciate it now. I'm looking forward to getting addicted to SMAC.

Arrath wrote: »

Drake wrote: »

Hahnsoo1 wrote: »

You can also look at Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. You won't play as Egypt (you won't even be on Earth), but Alpha Centauri is considered by many (read: just me, actually *grin*) to be the "pinnacle" of Civilization, even though it's not a mainline Civilization game. It is the most fun of all of the series (what other game allows you to melt the polar icecaps to drown your opponents' cities?), but that's my opinion.

Civilization 5 is probably what you are looking for. They rebuilt the game from the ground up, culling most of the cruft from the previous games. They simplified the mechanics and made them more cohesive. The non-stacking units is a giant plus, in my opinion.

None of the Civilizations require a spreadsheet or sliders or anything to manage the economy. Despite the appearance of complexity, the economy managements in all of the games are actually quite simple.

Sir, I'd like you to know that I share your opinion.

As do I!

On that note, is there any kind of widescreen mod for SMAC? Or would I be better off playing it in a window?

www.widescreengamingforum.com Is always the best place to check for widescreen support in games. Apparently you can get it to work with Alien Crossfire through a not entirely perfect, but playable, ini edit. Base AC is unplayable widescreen though.

rayofash

SMAC has a window mode?

Ego

I honestly think Civ:Rev is the best game for getting into the series if you're new. Doesn't fit your PC requirement, though. You don't happen to own a 360/PS3/DS/iPhone-pod-pad, do you?

Arrath

rayofash wrote: »

SMAC has a window mode?

Fucked if I know, but I just fired it up on my desktop and turned out it wasn't horribly stretched as I remember. Perfectly playable.

Machismo

Arrath wrote: »

rayofash wrote: »

SMAC has a window mode?

Fucked if I know, but I just fired it up on my desktop and turned out it wasn't horribly stretched as I remember. Perfectly playable.

Yes, it does, but it is VERY hard to get working and VERY glitchy. Basically, the more successful way for me, is to open to instances of the game. Alt tab between them and close one. The remaining one remains in windowed mode.

Deebaser

Hahnsoo1 wrote: »

You can also look at Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. You won't play as Egypt (you won't even be on Earth), but Alpha Centauri is considered by many (read: just me, actually *grin*) to be the "pinnacle" of Civilization, even though it's not a mainline Civilization game. It is the most fun of all of the series (what other game allows you to melt the polar icecaps to drown your opponents' cities?), but that's my opinion.

It's not just you. For over a decade, my computer shutdown has informed me "Please don't go. The drones need you. They look up to you."