Score
✰94%✰

Strategy game where you can choose to conquer the world in various ways. Incredibly detailed – and you can steal other nation's wonders. Because why not. Recommended with expansions for the best experience.

Pros

Addictive
Fun Single player or with friends

Cons

You need the expansions, basic game isn't worth it
A lot of time is spent researching
Addictive – “Just one more turn.”


There is so many details and methods of strategy in this game. Guides alone for Civ have so many pages from basic to advance plays, that listing everything here would be impossible. And that fact alone is just amazing. The fun about this game is not to do with the graphics or the music – but the sheer amount of strategy and planning that goes in with building up your nation, and adapting against other nations, depending on how they choose to play – and whether you want to back-stab your friends or not in multiplayer games.

Before I start with anything else, I would recommend for those planning to try Civ for the first time to get the expansion packs. Without them, the game simply doesn't have its full potential. This is one of the most negative things I can probably say about it. You can wait for a sale, but I would not play this game without them. After you have them, you'll find your time well spent, as you can commit hundreds of hours through everything it has to offer. As a note, I have played this game for hundreds of hours in offline mode, so what you see is not the true amount of hours I've put into it.

So I would … prepare some time for this game. A lot of time. And possibly marathon runs.

First off, Civ 5 is turn based, and the campaigns and difficulties are adjustable. There are eight altogether, from really easy to insanely hard. If you feel particularly brave you can choose the hardest difficulty: Deity. And then weep. Unless of course, you are fabulous and have that rare ability to be able to wipe out most of the world's nations before 100 turns have even passed. You can choose single player campaign mode, customise your own game, or play against friends and opponents online. You can also choose if you want battles animated and your movements animated. I would personally, for a smoother gaming experience, select everything as fast – so it's more like board piece placement, rather than watching them move. Why? Because Civ games can take ages. And with the animations, they take even longer. Also as well, you can choose what “era” your civilisation starts in. The longest games come from starting from the ancient era.

And you'll be wanting to spend a lot of time on this game. Single player will go a lot faster since you're not waiting around for other people's choices. The only problem is being able to check yourself before your whole night has gone on that turn you were so convinced was going to be the last turn before saving and going to bed.

So, lets say you chose to play a custom game. Here, you select your nation. Each nation has different strengths for different play-styles. Some are built for war. Some are built for sea travel and trade, others are for advancing technology and culture, and others again for promoting faith and religion. Lets say you have one opponent, and you chose to start in the ancient era.

When your game starts, you'll have two units. You'll have “Settlers” and “Warriors”. Your “Settlers” are what you use to found cities. Each Settler unit you obtain is the chance for another city that you can place down. Once you make a city, you then have options to produce something from a city. Now this can be another unit, or a building. And depending on how built up your city is, depends on how many turns it will take before something is produced. The more resources you have in your city/cities and around it/them, the better off you will be – if you produce Workers to extract them, and research the necessary Technology needed to extract the resource. Your Warriors in the meanwhile will be exploring the land nearby, to see if there is any enemies or potential allies and resources.

From here on, it all boils down to finding your own play style, and working with or against the opponents you find on board. You can research technologies to become better at war or better at producing food. You can see that maybe there are Barbarian encampments near you, so you produce military units early on to contest them. You can choose “Policies” that your nation follows to focus on the play style that you want. If you like having lots of cities, then choosing the Liberty Policy tree is your best bet. If you like killing everything, then choosing the Honour Policy will be your best friend, and so on.

Above all, you need to make sure your people are “happy”, throughout whatever path you choose. Since an unhappy nation means little production, and happy means more production in less turns. There are many different ways to do that – but hopefully you get the gist. Found city. Produce stuff. Harvest stuff. Explore stuff. Trade stuff. Adopt Policy stuff. Research Stuff. Fight stuff. And let people be happy and stuff. Eventually you will advance to a point where World Congresses will happen, or you'll be building super Death Robots, nuking cities, and exploring space.

The sheer amount of thought that can go into one game is great, which is why I find this game so addictive. You will have to do research, and spend time coming up with good strategies if you want to succeed well at this game.

The historical accuracy in this game is slightly questionable, but it does make for some hilarious games in context. Although the actual information given with the objects, wonders, and civilisations in this game is great – you will have some moments where you sit back and think: Well. So I built the Great wall of China in Germany. And I started a world war in 1150 AD … with tanks. And my allies at this time are Alexander the Great and ... Queen Elizabeth.

Still pretty fun.

Last but not least, the community have done some great mods in the Steam Workshop to help enhance your playing experience. People like to play as their own nations in the game, and not every nation is represented. The Workshop helps resolves those with some clever creations by the community – so once you're off your training wheels, it's well worth a browse around to see what extra things are there to be offered.

Want moar? Click here to join my steam group and Click here to follow my curator page!

[h1]TL;DR[/h1] Score ✰94%✰ Strategy game where you can choose to conquer the world in various ways. Incredibly detailed – and you can steal other nation's wonders. Because why not. Recommended with expansions for the best experience. [b]Pros[/b] Addictive Fun Single player or with friends [b]Cons[/b] You need the expansions, basic game isn't worth it A lot of time is spent researching Addictive – “Just one more turn.” [h1]Gameplay[/h1] There is so many details and methods of strategy in this game. Guides alone for Civ have so many pages from basic to advance plays, that listing everything here would be impossible. And that fact alone is just amazing. The fun about this game is not to do with the graphics or the music – but the sheer amount of strategy and planning that goes in with building up your nation, and adapting against other nations, depending on how they choose to play – and whether you want to back-stab your friends or not in multiplayer games. Before I start with anything else, I would recommend for those planning to try Civ for the first time to get the expansion packs. Without them, the game simply doesn't have its full potential. This is one of the most negative things I can probably say about it. You can wait for a sale, but I would not play this game without them. After you have them, you'll find your time well spent, as you can commit hundreds of hours through everything it has to offer. As a note, I have played this game for hundreds of hours in offline mode, so what you see is not the true amount of hours I've put into it. So I would … prepare some time for this game. A lot of time. And possibly marathon runs. First off, Civ 5 is turn based, and the campaigns and difficulties are adjustable. There are eight altogether, from really easy to insanely hard. If you feel particularly brave you can choose the hardest difficulty: Deity. And then weep. Unless of course, you are fabulous and have that rare ability to be able to wipe out most of the world's nations before 100 turns have even passed. You can choose single player campaign mode, customise your own game, or play against friends and opponents online. You can also choose if you want battles animated and your movements animated. I would personally, for a smoother gaming experience, select everything as fast – so it's more like board piece placement, rather than watching them move. Why? Because Civ games can take ages. And with the animations, they take even longer. Also as well, you can choose what “era” your civilisation starts in. The longest games come from starting from the ancient era. And you'll be wanting to spend a lot of time on this game. Single player will go a lot faster since you're not waiting around for other people's choices. The only problem is being able to check yourself before your whole night has gone on that turn you were so convinced was going to be the last turn before saving and going to bed. So, lets say you chose to play a custom game. Here, you select your nation. Each nation has different strengths for different play-styles. Some are built for war. Some are built for sea travel and trade, others are for advancing technology and culture, and others again for promoting faith and religion. Lets say you have one opponent, and you chose to start in the ancient era. When your game starts, you'll have two units. You'll have “Settlers” and “Warriors”. Your “Settlers” are what you use to found cities. Each Settler unit you obtain is the chance for another city that you can place down. Once you make a city, you then have options to produce something from a city. Now this can be another unit, or a building. And depending on how built up your city is, depends on how many turns it will take before something is produced. The more resources you have in your city/cities and around it/them, the better off you will be – if you produce Workers to extract them, and research the necessary Technology needed to extract the resource. Your Warriors in the meanwhile will be exploring the land nearby, to see if there is any enemies or potential allies and resources. From here on, it all boils down to finding your own play style, and working with or against the opponents you find on board. You can research technologies to become better at war or better at producing food. You can see that maybe there are Barbarian encampments near you, so you produce military units early on to contest them. You can choose “Policies” that your nation follows to focus on the play style that you want. If you like having lots of cities, then choosing the Liberty Policy tree is your best bet. If you like killing everything, then choosing the Honour Policy will be your best friend, and so on. Above all, you need to make sure your people are “happy”, throughout whatever path you choose. Since an unhappy nation means little production, and happy means more production in less turns. There are many different ways to do that – but hopefully you get the gist. Found city. Produce stuff. Harvest stuff. Explore stuff. Trade stuff. Adopt Policy stuff. Research Stuff. Fight stuff. And let people be happy and stuff. Eventually you will advance to a point where World Congresses will happen, or you'll be building super Death Robots, nuking cities, and exploring space. The sheer amount of thought that can go into one game is great, which is why I find this game so addictive. You will have to do research, and spend time coming up with good strategies if you want to succeed well at this game. The historical accuracy in this game is slightly questionable, but it does make for some hilarious games in context. Although the actual information given with the objects, wonders, and civilisations in this game is great – you will have some moments where you sit back and think: Well. So I built the Great wall of China in Germany. And I started a world war in 1150 AD … with tanks. And my allies at this time are Alexander the Great and ... Queen Elizabeth. Still pretty fun. Last but not least, the community have done some great mods in the Steam Workshop to help enhance your playing experience. People like to play as their own nations in the game, and not every nation is represented. The Workshop helps resolves those with some clever creations by the community – so once you're off your training wheels, it's well worth a browse around to see what extra things are there to be offered. Want moar? [url=http://steamproxy.net/groups/jigglesandgiggles]Click here to join my steam group[/url] and [url=http://steamproxy.net/groups/jigglesandgiggles#curation]Click here to follow my curator page![/url]