Civilization IV: standing the test of time

I am always drawn to the endless ebb and flow of creation and destruction in grand strategy games. Whether it's on a single battlefield, amongst the spires of a bustling metropolis, or across an entire planet, seeing something grow before my eyes that has been built because I commanded it to be done, is an exhilarating feeling. Civilization IV only serves to fortify my affections for the series, and the genre as a whole.

Civilization has always taken elements from each aspect of the strategy genre, and then multiplied these aspects by thousands of years of progress. Rise of Nations may have come close to matching this experience, but the player is still doing battle on individual maps, and the ultimate goal remains the conquest of your enemies through acquisition of territory and resources. Through its many incarnations, Civilization had many objectives for "winning" the game, the most intriguing being a technological victory as the first Civilization to enter Space.

The space race! It was an approach that transcended the conventions of strategy games, because it allowed players that enjoyed focusing on their cities expanding and evolving with the development of technology to do so, while leveraging this knowledge to suppress their enemies' progress instead of simply crushing their adversaries with rock hammers or Sherman tanks. It felt like the morally superior choice that avoided unnecessary bloodshed.

The trade system is a key component of this strategy. What a brilliant concept: force the player to use political tactics to get what they want from other Civilizations, and maintain a stable of allies that will contribute badly needed defenses, or to supply backup when their latest war campaign backfires. The open border policy works great when planning attacks, or founding another city that will envelop the outlying cities of your neighbors.

The culture borders are back after being implemented in Civilization III, which provide another layer to long-term strategy. Investing in culturally beneficial upgrades like theatres and colliseums will increase the culture value of your cities, improving the quality of life for your citizens, as well as influencing adjacent cities belonging to another civilization. In Civilization IV Religion is added, offering a substantial increase in culture and population happiness for the cities that have been converted to organized worship. Spritual leaders will often spawn within converted cities, who can be moved to spread the good word throughout your growing empire. Religion felt like the most underused feature of Civilization IV, as there is so much potential for exploiting historical events to use in-game. For example, civilizations at war could gain some kind of advantage based on their level of religious fanaticism. Specialized military units or settlers could also be created. As it stands, the game limits religion to a cultural bonus, and the way religions are founded seems too random. Moreover, cities within your civilization can have different religions, and there is no visible benefit to having a unified religion across a civilization.

While not explicitly requiring the need to micromanage, Civilization IV offers some other valuable new features to the series. Combat units gain experience through battle, and can be upgraded to improve their strength, defence on a particular type of terrain or their proficiency at city assault. As with many RTS games that seem to be following this trend, it keeps players from sending out waves of soldiers in bulk, and encourages the strengthening of existing units to build a more formidable army. Historical figures (like Shakespeare or Socrates) will often be born within cities, who offer bonuses to the city they are stationed in, or permanent upgrades in the form of unique structures for the city. Workers can now build cottages that grow into smaller villages and eventual cities, which provide additional income to neighboring cities, eliminating the need for costly and time-consuming settlers to expand your Civilization in the short term.

Immediately noticable next to the improved graphics is the interface. It's soft, cuddly and approachable - nowhere near as intimidating as its predecessors. In fact, I'd say the game overall is easier: it's easier to gain (and keep) income, easier to manage cities, easier to build improvements and amass an army. It doesn't take a micromanager to win at this game anymore. While this may serve the obvious purpose of attracting new players, it also allows seasoned strategists to focus on the big picture: evolving their Civilization.

The Civilopedia is what made Civilization as much an educational tool as it was a game. Explaining the in-game context of buildings and units alongside their place in history facilitated the player's entry into the game world. This wasn't really a fantasy, because this stuff actually happened. Well, plus or minus a few hundred years. In Civilization IV the Civilopedia is no longer searchable using text strings: you're presented with a giant blob of tiny pictures that represent buildings and units in the game. What you're looking for is probably represented - but how is it you know what you're looking for if you don't know what it looks like, or whether it's even there at all? It puts an absurd amount of guesswork into finding the information that is needed, and renders the Civilopedia useless within the game's context. This is extremely detrimental to the game's overall effect as a learning tool.

The game is also unusually reliant on pop-up windows to move the action along. This is great for new players who lack direction: even having only a small number of cities in a fledgling civ can be an intimidating task to manage. However, despite many attempts there doesn't seem to be a setting to turn these suggestions off. At the beginning of each turn it feels like the game is almost guilting you into building city improvements, more units or researching technology instead of leaving the player up to their own devices. As a veteran player of Civilization, I like being in control of my own strategy, and sometimes that simply means having a few outlying cities produce research and gold for my core cities. Gone are the advisors from Civilization III, and in their place are a series of summary screens that only really help those that already know what they're doing - the handy suggestions made by the talking heads are now the overbearing pop-up windows.

Though when you consider the entire experience, there is a certain sensibility to the gameplay that is appealing to both novice and seasoned players of Civilization IV. All units and cities can be micromanaged and upgraded individually, or automatically. Workers can be busied without your interference, or they can be commanded to farm the entire continent or build a vast road network. There's enough flexibility behind the game's unassuming exterior that contains the features familiar to experienced players allowing the execution of any strategy. This delicate balance becomes evident the more time you spend with the game - it's one of those intangibles that makes a good game, well, great.

Despite Civilization IV's greatness, I see this release as being the beginning of the end for the franchise. Firaxis has reached a plateau - there isn't much more that can be done with the core gameplay mechanics that have essentially remained intact since Civilization II. While the visuals may be the obvious upgrade to Civilization IV, enough subtleties have been added for the Civ faithful to make it worth playing. And if you haven't played Civilization, I'll refrain from the obvious insults and suggest you start here. This isn't a sequel as much as a thorough tweaking of the existing model of play; that is, Civilization IV can be considered Civilization the way it was meant to be, and the only version that need be experienced.

i wish the world was flat like the old days