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Better graphics but still a big disapointment.

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 11 / 16
Date: November 09, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Like other Civ players, I anticipated Civ 4 with great optimism. I am disapointed in the result however. After spending a few days with it, I can summarize that in my view the improvements over Civ 3 are the graphics, having fewer nuisance problems to consistently deal with such as corruption and pollution and the introduction of religion and civics into the game for a new dimension or two. That about exhausts the list for the positives. Among the negatives are the much documented bugs, the resource drain on your machine, the decreased usefulness of the main screen, the inability to easily track your units on the main screen and the downturn in the usefulness of the advisors. Its hard to argue with the November 7 review from the gentleman in Madrid. A beefed up "Civ 3 1/2" in the same mode would have been better, at least for me. Maybe Civ 5 will come soon, and hopefully will be more like Civ 3 Conquests.

A worthy upgrade to a great series, but some will be disapointed...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 13 / 21
Date: November 04, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I was frankly surprised by the number of negative views here towards this game, but I can see for the most part those flames are because of the installation and game crashes. I have a fairly decent 2ghz machine with 512megs of ram and a ATI Raedon 9600 card (128mb) and so far after playing through the game from start to finish at least three times, I've had no problems but the typical lag in later ages because with Windows you naturally have to restart the computer the more you play a high graphical game. I had no installation problems at all.

Now for the game. Where do I begin? If you enjoy high detailed graphics and colorful worlds, this is your game. Everything from swaying three and moving water from rivers and oceans are present in this game. The resources are animated too! You've got elephants roaming the fields, gems sparkling in the jungles, and even beavers playing around a rock cave. This really adds to the already beautiful worlds but it really starts to hurt the eyes after awhile. I had to take frequent breaks because my eyes were getting tired so quickly (a normal side effect for some really high animated games, that's why most of them warn of seizures and such). The map goes back to the Civ 1 days from default as you are looking straight down on your civilization, but of course you can rotate it by using the shift keys. It's rather cool to be looking down on them from the "heavens". But, I think I actually enjoy the Civilization 3 look a little better because it doesn't use up so many resources on my computer. But, there's no doubting that the graphics are a set up from previous Civ games. The opening movies and wonder movies are great too! Reminds me of Civ 2. Lastly, the civ leaders are even better done than in previous Civ's, and if you upset a Civ leader by trying to "rip them off" or constantly ignoring them, their overall expression will changed. Watch was happens when Isabella of Spain gets annoyed with you, she almost looks as though she ready to pout like a little school girl...in comparison to when she is pleased or cautious with you, when she is yawning and checking out her nails!

Music and Sound is pretty good.. The game has an excellent soundtrack from the opening theme "Baba Yet" (if you're a world beat/ new age freak like me, this song will be stuck in your head forever. There's even a remix of the classic Civ 1 theme! The classical tunes also are well done and many of them come from well-know composers like Bach. But perhaps the biggest disappointment for me was that music will not play until you zoom up really close to a little farther away from the action. With Civ 3 and all previous Civ games, music played regardless of your zoom (if you had a zoom of course). I liked the overall music better in Civ 3 though. Sounds effects are once again top notch in this game, but again, I prefer Civ 3's sounds. The speech for technology is a nice touch but you might find them annoying after a while. Don't worry, you can turn this feature off.

Gameplay is big for most, and for the most part it is fine enough here. However, with the intense graphic loads, it seems the units "dart" over to their positions faster than the first pitch in a baseball game. Previous Civ games had no problems with moving units and they were as smooth as silk (particular Civ 3). It also just seems like it takes forever to get something done and that the graphics mess with the overall planning of strategy. I am glad to see more automated options and less corruption and micromanagement in this version of Civilization, as having read the ending manual it seems that was a big topic to improve from Civ 3. Finally, you can use your units to explore and not have to track their every move. Combat is improved as you don't have to worry about stacking units like crazy, but it still seems a little out of balance. You only have a strength number this time around and I thought having a defense number in previous Civ games worked out fine. The unit upgrades are a nice touch and it's nice to know that your city won't go down in a puff of smoke from rushing because defending for more than one turn improves overall defense. Religion is a nice added bonus to as it can change your empire completely. Multiplayer is a bit more stable than in Civ3 and the thought of getting to play 18 civs at the same time is tempting, but it's still not perfect by any means.

There's a lot more I'd like to address on, but I really feel I've said too much already! If you're a Civilization fan, you owe it to yourself to pick up the next chapter of Sid Meier's Civilization series. I'll still be playing it, but, I may still play Civilization 3 even more because I devoted more of my life to that game than any other strategy game on the planet, so it's hard to just throw all that time away for a new game.

Don't waste your money yet.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 12 / 19
Date: November 11, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I can't believe they shipped the game in this condition. It constantly freezes or the screen turns blue and informs you of a severe memory leak. I have heard nothing but problems from others and there has been no online help pertaining to this from firaxis or 2kgames. When the patch comes out it may fix this but wait until it does before you buy.

Seems to be fun if its works

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: December 26, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I purchased a special edition at the same price as the regular version - alas I had the same problems as others - I updated, installed new drivers, downloaded the patches - to no avail. It seems like those who have a working copy love it - even though it crashes often - but the official website even suggests going into the game code to fix it - which to me - a non-techy video gamer - that is just ridiculous. Also very odd that every big gamer magazine got a "working" version . . . how come a lot of us didn't? Anyways - don't pay more for the special edition - it has a soundtrack of the game - other than that its the same game. Hope it works for you.

Disappointed Fan

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: November 22, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I love the CIV series, each CIV improved and provided another level of enjoyment. This CIV we also see a lot of improvements... even in places where I thought the game could not be improved. BUT.... this game software is very unstable and keeps crashing. If you don't have a high end computer with above the recommend hardware requirements DON'T BUY and stick with your CIV3

Thanks to this game, I no longer have a life

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 11
Date: November 27, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Of course, like 99% of the gaming world I'd heard about Civilization - the original Empire-building Turn-Based Strategy game, but I'd never really taken an interest in it. This time, I decided to give Civilization 4 a punt.

And I've been playing it non-stop for the last two weeks.

Being a complete and total newbie to the Civ genre, I was apprehensive about the high difficulty level. My concerns were allayed once I started playing the tutorial - which is the best I've ever seen for any game in any genre. It lays out all the basics in a friendly and simple manner - just enough to get you started, and pique your interest. Another major surprise was seeing and hearing Sid Meier in the tutorial. With the addition of the creator of Civ to the tutorial, it also becomes an opportunity to sell the charms of Civ to sceptical newbie gamers like myself. Sid, you can consider me sold.

The amazing paradox of Civ is that the user interface to this game is incredibly simple to use - anyone who's played an RTS (especially Sid Meier's Pirates) will have no trouble with the controls.

But the underlying game rules and features add an infinite amount of breathtaking strategic complexity to this game. There are so many different tactics you can use to build your empire, but in the end they boil down to effectively manipulating three important resources:

Productivity (Hammer icon)
Culture (Musical Note icon)
Gold (Gold coin icon)

Each civilization you choose will have the ability to maximise any two out of the three resources listed above. The game implements civilizations brilliantly - every civ has its advantages and disadvantages.

The other aspect of the game, which I haven't quite mastered yet, is how you interact with competing civilizations - and this is where the real challenge lies (at least for me). For instance, if you use a missionary to spread Judaism in a competing civ, you're also giving them access to more temples which they can use to generate more culture - thereby expanding their own borders more quickly and potentially swamping your own cities. A lesson which I learned much to my own cost in a recent game.

As you can see, playing Civilization is a strategically complex affair - and I haven't even scratched the surface yet! This game has already won critical acclaim from many different quarters, and I'm more than happy to add my praise (not to mention plunk down my hard-earned cash) and support this game. Here's hoping Firaxis (and Sid Meier) produce more games like it.

Thanks Sid!

PS. I have a very old Athlon 2000+ XP with 1GB RAM and a NVIDIA GEForce FX5700 Ultra videocard, and didn't have a single problem running this game. In fact, this is the most stable game that I have ever played.

In the grand tradition of its earlier mates,

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: March 28, 2006
Author: Amazon User

this game does take some getting used to. It has a completely different interface, but yet still holds many of the functions that made Civilization III so addicting. There are some problems with system stability that I have had, but for the most part, this game runs fairly well, especially after downloading the patch. It retains the flavor of previous versions, but adds new and interesting things to keep the player entertained.

Buggiest release I've ever seen.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 13 / 24
Date: November 11, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This is a great game when it works. Unfortunately I can only play for a few minutes at a time before being dropped to the desktop.

My specs are far superior than the required and yet it still doesn't work. I've been hung up on by their tech support 'hold queue' 12+ times and have been waiting 2 weeks for a reply to my email tech support request.

Don't buy this game until they release a patch (and hopefully it works) or simply don't purchase it at all. Had I not opened the box, it would already have been returned.

Video is horrible & sound is as choppy as a turntable playing on a tugboat.

This release is a disgrace to the Civilization name.

AMD Athlon 64
2 GB PC3200 DDR
256 MB FX5700
SBAudigy2 5.1

TOO early release

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 22 / 50
Date: October 31, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I enjoyed CIV 3. This new released promised to be an improvement. It wasn't. It has more bugs than a low rent apartment in South Omaha. I trien several times but was unable to play much more than 10 turns before it either slowed to an angonizing pace or totally tied up my computer requiring rebooting. I feel that I wasted my money. to be fair, I wuld have contacted the ortignating company to lodge a complaint or ask for help, but it was not clear how this could be done.

Check Your Hardware.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 27 / 67
Date: October 27, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Don't be fooled. Civilization used to be a great, low-needs game that could run on every system.

Bugs are galore, landscapes and leaders won't render, and wonder movies will crash the game.

Make sure you have a souped-up desktop and CHECK THE RECOMMENDED REQUIREMENTS. Horrible job educating people about this.

Other than that, the gameplay is immersive, soundtrack is sweet, and love the new features. If only the developers and distributors were a little more conscientious in educating the consumer about the system requirements...

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