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Always something to disappoint...

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 5 / 15
Date: December 27, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Some aspects within the game that annoyed me were that there are no World Maps and that some Civilizations only have one leader. For example, the Spanish only have Queen Isabella; Phillip should have been added for male players like myself.

Overall, the game appears to be better than Civilization III (which was a total disappointment).

Actual opinion of the game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 11
Date: November 07, 2005
Author: Amazon User

A note to all who are worried about whether the game will run or not: I've installed this game on two separate machines: 3.6 GHz with X800XL card and 2.8GHz with 9800 card. Note that both machines are running ATI cards. I have had zero (0) problems running it, even with the graphics options turned all the way up. I would recommend any ATI users out there to update their drivers before installing this game, but that's solid advice for ANY game.

In many ways, I think I could compare this game to Civ II-- it's a graphically superior game to its predecessor, with some improvements, but doesn't seem to be as much fun as its immediate predecessor. They did away with pollution and civil disorder-- high time too, if you asked me. But I think they overcomplicated what you can build in any given city. There are more wonders than you can shake a stick at, more city improvements than you'll know what to do with, and even more options for improving the land around your cities with your workers. More choices does not equal more fun, and I'm not sure that Soren Johnson and company at Firaxis fully realized that.

Speaking of wonders, most of your favorites are gone and inexplicably replaced by a bunch of new stuff, some of which I've never even heard of. Also, some of the wonders seem like throwbacks to Civ I; for example, I've become quite used to (and dependent upon) the Pyramids providing you with a granary in every city, but they're back to allowing different government types.

I don't feel that the coverage of religion they've provided really adds anything to the game except complexity. Let's face it, the Civ series already has enough complexity.

The new civics screen, where you build your own government, is pretty nice, but I could live without it. Again, it's added complexity, though not too much.

The new interface-- I hate it. I play some amount of RTS games, so I can appreciate Firaxis trying to make the game have broader appeal, but I really don't like having icons for all the choices I have to make. Late in the game, there are so many options for improvements and wonders to build in a city that you get row upon row of icons. I won't know what all those pictures are for the first several games, so I'm stuck with having to mouse over everything until I find the item I'm looking for.

As for science and the tech tree-- I'm making advances pretty quickly (every 3-5 turns through the whole game) but I always feel like I'm behind. In the last game of Civ III I played, I launched my colony ship in 1545 AD. In my current game of Civ IV, I'm just getting into satellites in about 1860. Sure, that's earlier than historically accurate, but I'm playing on the easiest game setting! So, I make quick progress, but I don't feel like it's as quick as it used to be, and that makes it feel like I'm being artificially slowed down. I do, however, appreciate the humor of developing technologies in strange orders; again, using my satellites example, I just developed that before I ever had industrialization. I guess my satellites are all hand-built. I could see though how not everyone might appreciate historical improbabilities like that.

I like too how the special resources carried over from Civ III-- I always thought those were the single best aspect of the best game in the series. Now however, you only need one of anything ever, even if you want to trade a resource or luxury with another civ. I'll miss having the ability to corner various luxury markets and getting my neighbors to pay high per-turn costs in order to get what I've got. Also, they've again added complexity to this game by increasing the number and type of special resources.

The concept of health versus unhealth is probably the single best aspect of this iteration of the game. No more will you be constrained in city size until you build an aqueduct or hospital. Those two improvements do increase the size your cities can reach, but there's no more hard limit to population size. The addition of food resources out in the world helps greatly.

Graphically, this game looks REALLY nice.

So, since I've had mostly minor gripes in this review, why give this game 4 stars? Simply because the same addiction of "just a few more turns" is still here in spades, much to my wife's chagrin. it's still a solid game and has a lot of the same feel as the rest of the series-- though long-time fans will know that each game has felt a little out of place at first, then grows on you. I also think this game would be approachable by anyone who hasn't played any of its predecessors, though the high complexity may be off-putting for some.

In the end, I recommend this game, though I don't think it's as fun as it should have been.

still mainly strategic appeal

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 11
Date: November 11, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Earlier versions of Civilization have proved incredibly addictive for many players. Perhaps for some of you, the only thing better than Civilization i is Civilization i+1.

Version 4 encompasses numerous changes. Maybe the most visible is the animations of battle scenes. A far cry from what are now the pathetically limited animations in Civilization 2 of such things as settlers founding a new city, or an enemy leader negotiating with you. The new animations will appeal to those who are into the visuals of small unit combat.

Yet I daresay that others of you might turn this off, and revert to the strategic grid representations. A substantial appeal of earlier versions has been the complex strategising, over a huge terrain. With effectively a combinatorially infinite number of choices. In version 4, the choices have grown.

Another very neat feature of version 4 is the greater automation of unit commands. Remember how tedious it could get in earlier versions, when you had a lot of units to move in each turn? And it got worse as the game progressed?

Game Does Not Live Up To Lofty Standards

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 4 / 11
Date: December 05, 2005
Author: Amazon User

After playing this I'm wondering if this is a Beta Test.

First of all the game is hard. There is too big an advantage given to defenses in this game. In the game I'm playing I have Marines and Modern Infantry losing in battle to Long Archers! I don't care what their defensive bonuses are it's not going to happen in real life. And this advantage given to defenses is going to make it very hard to expand especially in the early game. It's true that you can expand your bordres with culture, but don't count on using this approach to conquer to civilizations and you can lose cities especially newly conquered one's this way.

Another problem, is that with Air and Naval units you cannot defeat units you can only weaken them, which is stupid. Furthermore, there are wonder movies but not for all the wonders, especially the ones later in the game. And the wonder movies are a major step back from the ones in Civilization II. And there's a ton of wonders but they're not very fun. The ending movies aren't great. I was able to view them outside of the game and they're short and pretty dull.

Another problem is that the game is too automated, there is too much structure, there are not random events (like you see in the Civ II scenarious). The game just isn't that fun.

do yourself a favor and pass on this game

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 7 / 26
Date: December 17, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This version of Civilization isn't all that different from the last version, with two exceptions:

[1] they added lots of religion
[2] they made this version virtually unrunnable.

This version is so graphics top-heavy that you simply won't be able to play large maps all the way through without great difficulty. Fortunately a crude patch has been written that makes the game playable, but Firaxis seems to be ignoring the author. Not a good sign when a software company releases software that doesn't work and then refuses to talk with someone who can help.

Civ III is by far more enjoyable as the game can flow (no delays from lag and no crashing..). As for this version, wait until they clean up their act AND it's on the bargain rack. It's not worth the price or frustration to buy it any sooner.

Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 5 / 16
Date: November 04, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Having played Civ since Civ I, I can truly say this is the best edition yet. I was worried at first seeing the requirements, as my computer only met the minimum. However, it is playing just fine ie. no crashes or lock ups. The movies are a bit jitterish and the diplomacy screen show up only floating eyes and mouth (tech support right on that, helping me.)this is due to the 64 meg vidio card I'm running and setup of the card.
WOW the graffics and new fetures rock! The game therory is the same concept being Civ, but the level of detail in the play is advanced to a unbelivable new level, this is going to take some time to master. Don't think your walking into the "same ol game" you.ve been in the previous editions. Top to bottom changes. Die hard fans who would still be happy playing civ I/II/III are going to be thrilled. Thanks Sid you really out did yourself this time.

Awesome!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 8
Date: October 03, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This is the greatest strategy game I've played so far. The Graphics are great, the gameplay is great, its pretty much perfect

A Great Game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 13
Date: November 08, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I received my pre-sell edition of Civ4 this past Saturday, and have devoted my life to it ever since. It's a great game, and thus far I'm loving all of the changes made from its predecessor. I greatly enjoy the graphics especially, although I enjoyed those in Warcraft 3 as well, so I can see how some people might be disappointed that this looks fairly similar. Once you get used to them, though, they're quite amazing.

My system is roughly 3 months old (self-built AMD 64 3700+, 1gig RAM, ATI X800XL, etc.) and runs everything perfectly. There was a weird glitch with the videos immediately after installation; however, a reboot fixed that particular problem.

I'm not doubting that people are having issues with the game, but I just thought I'd chime in and say that it runs quite well for me. I'm loving everything about the game so far, but yes, it has become quite complicated. However, in my eyes, that's a good thing.

I just love Civilization

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 9
Date: November 28, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Hands down, no contest, the best computer game ever!!! I can't love this game enough or tell people enough good things about it!! The new version brings a few things I dislike (icons and no words for city improvements, units, etc. on the city window, a little annoying interface till I realized I can move units with the left button if I change options, no civil unrest? c'mon!!) but overall I was very well impressed with the changes... I'm in love all over again!

Best Game of the Year !

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 5 / 21
Date: December 05, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Definitely the Best Civilization Yet - buy it and prepare to be addicted.

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