Ok after several hours, 25% of the achievements, and three full games, I'm finally ready to review the game: In a nutshell, I like it - it is probably my second favorite of the series (behind Civ II, which is still the best incarnation) The game is pretty - stuff swims around, foxes chase their tails, birds fly, deers graze - its all very nicely done. They kept the strategic view of the earlier games - which I used the same way, namely "oh shit, I don't have oil (or aluminium/uranium) and I need to find some!" This view is crisp and clean and is useful for resource hunting - but not really as useful for moving units around. Also in the pretty department, the leaders are well done and their background noise is in character (like the random screaming when you talk to Montezuma...) Unfortunately, there aren't really good ending movies, nor wonder movies, nor city zoom - I thought this was kind of lame since Civ II really did that well and they've yet to recapture that kind of "Wow, I just built the Pyramids!" cut-scene. Instead you see them being built on your map, and you get a little "wha-wha-whaaa" sound if someone finishes them before you (yeah, I got that achievement early) but nothing really flashy. Now, the wonders - they have good effects, but many (most!) of them can be somewhat duplicated via social policies (more later*) or by inherent abilities of certain leaders. They're not the show stoppers that they could be in earlier games, though they definitely help. I really want to play as Elizabeth on an archipeligo map (+2 ship move) with the Great Lighthouse (+1 ship move and +1 visibility) with Commerce (+1 ship move and +1 visibility) unlocked, but it might feel a bit like cheating. In the end, I've actually intentionally late-started some of my wonders in order to be beaten, you can get buckets of gold early on if you're a turn or two behind someone else especially in the early game when you can't "produce" wealth in your cities. Which brings us to Gold - its not just for bribes anymore! Gold feels much more useful in this version - you can buy buildings or units with it readily for a flat cost (there's no discount if its already being built mind you!), you can spend it on improving relations with other Civs or City States (more later**), you can trade it for resources and all the other stuff from the older games. The kicker is that it seems more right in some way - a colliseum costs ~500 gold, but a hospital only costs ~600 gold - using gold to improve your cities makes quite a bit of sense in this incarnation of the game, something I rarely did in other versions of Civ until the modern age. Also, because you can get a decent amount early if you play wisely, you can outright buy settlers - allowing your cities to continue to grow rather than effectively being idle during their production. Also you can outright purchase land around your growing cities, very useful if you want a resource near someone else and have the money. *Ok - so Social Policies - you use these to "tweak" your empire. They basically do away with governments completely and use these to replace them. Each individual policy is part of a larger group, each group has 5 policies and there are 10 total groups - from "Tradition" to "Order" or "Peity" to "Rationalism". Some policies prevent other policies from being allowed - you can't have a Pious and Rational civilization for example. I'm not sure what happens if you take one after taking the other - though it appears to be allowed - really they are too costly to change after taking, and probably with several unintended consequences. All of them give you an interesting, and generally useful bonus - though some bonuses seem to be much better than others. Part of this is when you can start selecting the policies. You pick "Tradition" way before you can pick "Commerce" - so its inherent +1 food in your capital city is worth quite a bit in the long term compared to "Commerce's" bonus to gold to your entire empire (which you can't pick until the Renaissance IIRC). Ultimately all of this means you have to plan how you want your civ to grow and how you want to win early on - almost no plan is going to be ruined by choosing "Tradition" - the bonuses inherent are useful to any strategy; however if you're going for a Science victory you probably don't want to pick "Piety" (Classical Age) as it will interfere with your later choice of "Rationalism" (Renaissance Age). "Honor" is useful to a military, more so than "Liberty" - etc. The real kicker with the policies is that the more cities you have the more they cost - which makes a cultural victory something that smaller empires seem to be able to do better than larger ones (my only cultural win was with a measly three cities) **City States are a HUGE new addition to the game, and they can give you some very nice bonuses. Low on food?--Befriend a maritime city. Want to be a peaceful civ, but not a pushover?--Befriend a military city. Want to win Diplomatically?--Befriend everyone! I really like the existence of city-states - the enhance the overall feeling of the game in many ways. (I used to mod 16 civs on a small/medium map in Civ 4, just to give the feel of a populated world...the city-states do this quite well without having so many other contenders). City-states can't win the game, but they can help you win (or lose) the game. So, that's all the stuff I want to write in any sort of depth right now, though a bunch of other things in one liners: Diplomacy is both better and worse. (maybe more later if anyone cares) Domination victories are more straightforward (keep your capitol and make sure everyone else loses theirs - to you or someone else) More cities != better, especially without the right social policies! Oil is important, but defensive units don't really need it. I still have yet to nuke someone but so far no annoying pollution or "global warming". Ghandi hasn't nuked me yet either! Montezuma isn't a complete asshole these days. The "hexes" are just fine once you get used to them. Cities with lots of culture can get REALLY big in terms of space on the map, though if something requires a "city built on desert" it means within three hexes, regardless of how big the cultural radius is. Combat is different too, but it actually feels more interesting than stack on stack fighting. (like diplomacy I can go into it more if anyone cares). Hope that was legible, a few more hours of work and then back to the game (maybe I'll play Ghandi and nuke me a few English...)
You don't actually have to go out and by it - you can download it on Steam! Of course, it takes awhile so... But you do have to authenticate with Steam when you play, which I don't much like, but I haven't had a problem with this game (unlike Empire: Total War). Really it means your machine has to be online when you start the game up.
Yes, you can disable ALL the victory conditions from what I can tell, forcing the game to goto 2050 and whoever has the most points wins. That said, I don't think either is easy, and you can track how well someone else is doing. Domination-style victories seem easier than all the other ones. I won my only cultural victory as France and built every cultural enhancing building I could get my hands on as soon as I could build it - and I only won in 1982. It wasn't as easy as in Civ IV. No, you just pay for it all up front, just thought I might save you a trip out to the smelly realm of teenage boys (EBgames or whatnot) if you had a good internet connection. Yes, yes you will...
