Civilization IV (PC DVD)

Anyhow, on to the actual review...I am a long time Civ player who can still recall sleepless nights at college with the first in the series so I will focus on the major changes from earlier versions and how they impact the experience.

- the removal of micro-management hassles (pollution, civil disorder, much better automated workers) is a double-edged sword. On the one hand it is great to not have to bother but on the other it can feel as if the game "plays itself" and also means it can be easy to not keep track of cities so closely which can lead them to becoming very inefficient. You need to discipline yourself to still check in on each city frequently.

- the streamlined interface is a great improvement, with many things available on the screen at all times (of note are the sliders controlling distribution of resources between research, culture and cash) instead of tucked away in a seperate screen.

- the 3D interface is slick and smooth, it is easy to use the zoom feature to recreate a top down view (a la Civ 2) or an isometric view (a la Civ 3) or to zoom out to see the whole globe. A big improvement that is not obtrusive.

- the change from government type to five categories of "civics" each of which has five options is a great one, adding real depth and providing much more flexibility in how you run your city.

- the addition of religions is a nice touch, religions are founded in a city of the civilization that first hits a key technology and then spread automatically or via missionaries. Each other city with the religion then sends gold back to the holy (founding) city which can get quite lucrative.

- the technology tree is a lot flatter and gives you more flexibility than in previous versions, penalising you only by making it cost more and more to acquire techs if you head far up one branch instead of building a broad base.

- the diplomacy model is much better than Civ3, other leaders are far more reasonable in their demands and trades and much more balanced in not just declaring war on you as the human player when you hit the lead.

- civilization boundaries work much better, other civs can not enter your boundaries at all (unlike Civ 3 when they would keep doing so and refusing to leave unless you actually declared war) unless you sign an "open borders" agremment. Even then they can not attack you without declaring war at which point they get dumped back outside your borders.

- trade works very nicely and smoothly (better than the caravans in Civ 2) with an emphasis on founding cities on rivers and coastal squares (where they become automatically connected) and logical decisions produce trade routes generating money and sharing resources both within and between civilisations.

- on a subtle point, almost all game features require unlocking (e.g. you can't build a quarry until you discover masonary) and then interlock in a pleasing fashion (once you quarry stone construction times for several buildings and wonders are halved) which gives many more options than before for strategy.

- it is worth reading the manual that comes with the game, at least up to page 96. There are a lot of major changes to the game which you won't pick up on without it. The in-game tutorial was worth half an hour of time also.

- for decent players of Civ3 (and I am not a master by any means), the "settler" difficulty level is likely to be a walkover (I just won in 1979 on my first try without having to fight anyone through the whole game). I'd recommend starting above this. The Spanish are a nice civilization to pick as they can change civics without anarchy which gives you a good chance to experiment.

- finishing the game at "normal" speed on a "standard" map took me a total of 4 hours and 9 minutes, a far cry from the eye watering times it could take to complete a game of Civ 3.

In summary I feel I have only scratched the surface of the game and need to ratchet up the difficulty level and start to tweak more aspects of my strategy (you'll note I haven't commented on the combat system as I don't feel I have had enough experience with that important aspect of the game yet)...and I haven't dared to go online for a thrashing yet...but even from my first, full single player game I am convinced that this is an excellent evolution of a brilliant series. I only wish all the people having such trouble with getting it to work luck, once you do it is well worth it.