Civilization 4

[Nightlord]

Well, Civilization 4 is out and I'm loving it. I've handed AOE3 down to a friend (an option which came only slightly higher than glueing it to my AOL wall). This game kicks much a**. The graphics are awesome, the AI is much improved over the other games, and the sheer number of different strategies which can be utilized are amazing.

Thus far, my favorite leader to play is Napoleon.

[toadthetoad]

I'm still playing AoE III and loving it. Is Civ4 better though? I've always been an AoE fan and have always been told to try Civ. Is it one of those things that most people like one or the other? (I'm just about to finish with AoE and I want something else to draw my attention ).

[quinriva]

Hmm. Civilization or AOE. For a long time AOE (1 & 2) out did Civilization (1, 2 & 3) but no more. I have been an avid fan of both series but where AOE 3 screwed up civ is the shiznit biznit.

AOE3 oversimplified the game by removing many features, no more supply depots (storehouses) - but overall the game didn't really add anything more than a few gimics (the home city).

Civ 4 adds so much. The game fixes many of the problems in civ3 (AI ignoring borders) and adds many new features that really improve the game and allow you to individualize your civilization. Both the enemy AI and your your AI (the AI that controls your cities and pathfinding of your units, etc.) is greatly improved. There are many improvments towards game length, you can play a quick game, normal or epic and each vary the overall speed of the game. For instance the nomal speed reduce the number of turns from Civ3 of about 800 to 500 (building things takes less time, etc.) and epic increases it to about 1200 (I'm guesing). But the game feels much smoother, and you spend a lot less time loading a save because of some silly mistake or oversight that causes your entire civ to colapse. Micromanagment has been greatly immproved and although more comlex, the AI handles it superbly. Combat has also been improved with an experience system (no longer a generic 1 point health bonus, but instead a choice of increase in strength, improved forest defence, improved speed, etc.) and groups of units. There are no longer seperate stats for attack and defence but many units get bonuses against specific units (pikmen do double damage vs mounted units) and in certain conditions (archers get a 25% bonus when defending cities).

And the graphics are pretty decent, probably better than Rome Total War.

If you liked any of the Civ series get civ 4. If you played Civ 3 or 2 and found it too annoying or time consuming than Civ 4 fixes many of these issues and you will most probably love it. I rate it 5 stars.

The only cons that I have discovered so far:

The cilopaedia sucks and really doesn't explain many of the concepts well. I've played Civ 1, 2 and 3 and was still confused with many of the aspects of the game.

Every now and again the game seriously lags for no reason, alt-tabbing out and back in seems to fix this issue. (Will likely be fixed in patch)

No quick start for new games like in Civ3, however you always start near a fresh water source so this isn't really much of an issue.

The world view (3d globe) warps the map too much (or not enough), although this is probably a comprimise between a 3D globe and eqally sized tiles.

5 stars because the only failings the game has are not gameplay related.