Civilization II

[moz4prez]

my computer crashed a couple of weeks ago and lost among the wreckage was this glorious game. now is the time for all good men to come forward and admit to an addiction to Civ II. like to work up an "atrocious" reputation through excessive use of nukes against pauperized neighbors? compulsively break treaties you've brokered with rivaling nations who need your trade and are powerless to stop you? favorite nation(s) to pose as? favorite system of govnt? do you like it when Mahatma Gandhi's emissary threatens to wipe your pathetic civlization off the face of the earth? do you get a cheap thrill from revealing the secret of THE WHEEL to the Russians when you're already assembling a space station? and so forth?

also what makes Civ III so great? I keep saving up for it but usu. wind up blowing the $$$ on something frivolous and novel.

[Deja Q]

1. My officemax store has Civ III clearance for $7

Check yours, maybe they're all ditchin' the game! :D

[Leftist78]

2. Civ III

is as addictive as crack avoid it if you can. :freak: I "graduated" Civ II, and I'm afraid I wasn't a very nice ruler. I was untrustworthy to say the least. I would make peace with my neighbors long enough to build a military up, and make an alliance with someone weak so after I start my war my enemy will concentrate some of his forces on crushing my ally leaving his territory less well defended. :evilgrin:

[moz4prez]

3. crack, eh?

sounds cool. what are the differences? all's i knows is every nation has its own special warring unit, like the Persians have "immortals" and Indians have "elephants," or somethin'. also BORDER EXPANSION is a more gradual process? your territory eventually sort of swallows up weaker, neighboring countries? also you can compete with soft power AND hard power? which sounds . . . well it sounds pretty damned impressive.

[Bossy Monkey]

4. It's different in a great many ways, mostly for the better

Trade is completely different, as there are no longer caravan units. You can trade with a neighboring country only if your capitals are connected by road.

Rivers no longer let your units move 3 times as fast, which stinks. You can't irrigate with seawater anymore, although once you have electricity you can irrigate anywhere, as with earlier versions.

Bombardment units now have no defensive abilities and must always be guarded.

The way the borders work is that each city has a level of culture which grows as you build certain buildings (eg temples, wonders of the world). As the culture grows the borders expand, eventually growing together and, as you say, sometimes swallowing cities belonging to your rivals.

The nations not only have a unique unit, but also have certain unique advantages. These usually aren't all that helpful though; the only country with really useful advantages is France (lower corruption, higher efficiency).

The problem with Civ III (at least as a solo game) is the AI is underdeveloped. At the easiest level, the game is a total walkover. At any higher level, it's still very winnable, just a pain in the ass. The other cultures (whatever their characteristics and advantages) are insanely expansionistic. I kind of felt like a beta tester, to be frank. It's a good-looking game, but I never found it to be as addictive as the earlier Civ games, or Colonization, or even Alpha Centauri. On the other hand, I also find it hard to go back to Civ II now, so I guess most of the changes were indeed for the better.

[zelda7743]

5. territory

I like Civ III in that enemies can't come in and build cities in your established areas like they could in Civ II. I also like the automated functions for the engineers and the ability to have units go explore without having to directly control them.

[youngred]

20. Bombardment units suck too!

they don't have anything near the effectiveness that they did in I and II

[mdmc]

15. ever play civ 1?

civ 3 has the same recap that was the best part of civ 1. Much better. I just started playing civ 3. I play as the Buddha or Christ, so I don't have many conflicts. When I do go to war, its biblical! :dem: nice thread.

[youngred]

19. there are actual borders in Civ III

so if your borders expand (through buildup of culture, power, etc) to encompass the city square of another civ the city revolts and becomes part of yours.

[Feanorcurufinwe]

6. Wow I use to waste countless hours with Civ I,II and III

you've got me wanting to fire up the Windows cptr and play again... oh no!

[shockingelk]

7. my favorite game

I lost more hours to Civ III than I'd like to calculate. I never played Civ II.

It was an obsession during the lead up to invading Iraq. After it happened, playing it seemed gross.

At first, I only played as America. Once I got familiar, I never did as Expansionist is the least beneficial civ trait and it's unique unit really sucks and is not available until the outcome of the game is pretty much certain unless you're specifically going for a Space Race victory.

My general strategy was to not care how early I got into the Middle Ages, but to try to get the Wonders which increase Science - Newtons University, Copernicious and later Scientific Method.

These were also to set up getting Hoover Dam ... if you have enough territory and adequate resources, it's almost impossible to loose if you get Hoover Dam.

My favorite civs to play ads were the Babalonians, Persians and Germany. I think the Panzer is the best unique unit ... Samauri Warrior also kicks ass.

[shockingelk]

8. ps

This site is great http://www.civfanatics.com/

[Blue-Jay]

9. I love the Civ series!

However, I'll go against the grain a little bit. I like Civ II much better than Civ III. Sure, the graphics are better and there are more options, BUT more options don't equal a better game. That's just me, though. Civ III still kicks ass.

I've lost more hours of my life on the Civilization series than on any other game. (Might & Magic comes in a close second)

[Enraged_Ape]

11. Civ III took the pain in the a** of micromanagement to a new level

That was one thing that annoyed me in Civ II, and it just seems like they made it worse.

But God, I love that game. I still play Civ II today, Windows 95-ish graphics and all. And I've always been terrible at it. I'm one of those players who take it personally when another country threatens me, and I will nearly bankrupt my country trying to take one of their cities which invariably is reduced to ruins in the process.

[Liberal Veteran]

23. I like Alpha Centauri better than CIV 3.

Civ 1 was revolutionary.
Civ 2 was evolutionary.
Civ 3 was too much.


It reminded me of Sim City. It was a great game till they added the damn plumbing.

Alpha Centauri on the other hand was immensely enjoyable.

[RandomUser]

26. Alpha Centauri rocked

Many of the innovations in Alpha Centauri, like national borders, were incorporated into Civ3. But they left out other things like the unit workshop that really set Alpha Centauri up as a step above the norm. In many respects, Civ3 was a step backwards.

It's a pity the lead designer for Alpha Centauri left Sid Meier's Firaxis after finishing Alpha Centauri. I think the fact that they lost Brian Reynolds was the reason Civ3 turned out to be mush. Not only was Reynolds the lead designer and responsible for the improvements in Alpha Centauri, he was also the guy who did the bulk of Civ2. I only wish he had stayed and fixed up Civ3, or create a Alpha Centauri 2, or at least fix some of the bugs in Alpha Centauri.

[RandomUser]

25. Me too

I think the Civ line is great. And I don't believe you're going against the grain. Many people thought Civ3 was a flop.

Civ3 didn't really live up to the hype, and was a step backwards in many ways from the innovations in Alpha Centauri (also by Sid Meier).

[onebigbadwulf]

10. I hate civ in all forms

Sorry, but the combat/ turn system they use is atrocious

You have two options

1. Sit around and wait 15 minutes every turn for the computer to move every single one of its units one at a time and in some cases, have battles that will literally never end.

This has happened to me several times.


2. Make it so everything takes its turn at once in which everyhing does clump damage which is beyond devastating and unfair.

Hate the game.

The only TBS worth playing are moo2 and risk.

[jsw_81]

12. I loved that game

I would spend hours playing it until I finally won everything and conquered the world. Then I felt horrible because I realized I'd been wasting an enormous amount of time with a silly video game.

[Chovexani]

13. I admit my addiction

So many hours of my life wasted away in Civ 2. I'm a big nerd and hacked my version (which is surprisingly easy to do, they even tell you how) so that all the countries are kingdoms from David Eddings novels. I get a cheap thrill out of playing the Dalasians, giving all my tech to the Malloreans and then utterly destroying them. :evilgrin: I also like doing Netplay with Mr. Choxevani, who always plays the Aussies (of course :P). He's a real trash talker too, lol. Call to Power was ok, I got it pretty cheap but the Mac version was buggy as all get out, which is odd because that's usually not the case with Mac versions of games (which usually run better than PC counterparts). The patch fixed it up real nice though. I prefer Civ 2. One thing I did like about Call to Power is that you get more options for countries (maybe too many...is it really necessary to have Irish, Welsh and Scots? Can't we just have Celts and be done with it?).

I'm waiting for Civ 3 on the Mac to hit the cheap bin (20 or under), mostly because I keep blowing what little money I've got on console games.

[TroubleMan]

14. I enjoyed Civ III

Great game, but one real bad spot. Even with a fast computer, late in the game with large maps and large armies, you gotta wait like 10 minutes for the comp to move.


Here's a Civ III challenge for you:

Try to win in Deity mode on largest map, all victory options on, and maximum number of nations (I think it's 16). I never can come close in this one, even with the Bablyonians, whom I'm best with.

[Forkboy]

16. um...it's still installed on my PC

I dont think I've ever been without a version of Civ 2 since it came out (have the PS1 version as well).Civ 3 is good,but the super fast expansion ruins the fine pace that Civ 2 has.I like Alpha Centauri more than Civ 3.

Not many games suck up a night like Civ 2 does (though the empire building games like Pharaoh and Zues,and a couple of wargames come close).

[Guaranteed]

17. Civ III is the best game ever.

Love it.

[youngred]

18. Civ II is a marvelous game

One that caused me many many days wasted with repetitive keystrokes so much so that I memorized all of them (cheat strokes included when I made my own monster scenario about pan-continental alliances). I did make a point never to use nukes though, why if you're going to occupy and conquer would you want to decrease the population and productivity of your new colonies. My favourite system was Fundamentalism, extra money, offset the loss of science by boosting that way above the others, and no one questions your decisions.

Civ III is alright, the graphics are better (except the railroads) and I like that you can have as many players as you want, but there is too much emphasis on corruption.

[brainshrub]

21. Civ II is like crack

Once I start playing, everything else stops. I nearly lost my gf over that game.

[moz4prez]

22. a kick for crack

[leftofthedial]

24. addicted to Civ 1, the 2 now 3

Also to Caesar 3 and Stronghold.

I always like the Maxis Sim games too, until the sims.

[LSatyl]

27. Civ III sucks donkey's balls, at least imho

Civ II was the best single player Civ. Civ III is more geared towards multi-player, and therefore less enjoyabole than Civ II if one plays single player.

Less technologies, less work reshaping the world, less everything.

For me, the true successor to Civ II is not Civ III, but Call to Power II.