YOUR REVIEW of Civ4

[MarkG]

there, we have the first review

http://apolyton.net/dir/index.php?id=4898&t=reviews&toprate=5.0000&tophits=5534&cat=3

ok, it could needs a bit more explaining what he wanted to say, but... it's a review

[Adagio]

Originally posted by Jaybe
My micro-review of Civ4 after just playing the tutorial and fooling around.
I am stunned, in a state of shock! I never imagined such a beautiful game. Preview vids never came CLOSE to giving it justice.

For those having difficulty with the tutorial: The tutorial did seem to freeze up on occasion, but that was because I hadn't figured out what I was supposed to do. Like end turn, or move units. Sometimes an item would be produced (icon right side of screen, below info areas at top) and you click on it to go to construction screen.

There's a tutorial?


And yes, I must admit that the game looks better when playing than what the screenshots shows, but I guess it can always get better

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by Adagio
There's a tutorial?

Yep. A CGI Sid Meier leads the player through a tutorial.

[BleedTheFreak]

I am really digging Civ IV, more so (out of the box) than any other title before it. Honestly, it's so easy to get absorbed this time around right away, where it felt like previous Civ games were really only very immersive once you knew what you were doing.

One thing I don't get is these people playing to the modern age in like an hour. Wow. I'm playing on an average size map with 7 civs and I have been for probably 2 hours now, and I just hit the mideval age but just maybe 15 min ago! I'm playing on the difficulty below the default "Noble" even, so I'm sure I'm blowing through technology at a faster pace.

There are ONLY two (minor) complaints I have so far, since I think most every other aspect of the game is super polished and very fun:

1) I do mis the people building me a throne room/building thing. That was always fun before. Though, I'd rather have a Hall of Fame, which we have now!

2) I liked that in Civ III things were hyperlinked to the Civlopedia entries, that was fun and handy, and things seemed to have more information in the Civlopedia, like a real world history explanation for something. I do enjoy the streamlined nature of the mouse-over details, no real world info, just in game stats and other important elements, like what units a new tech allows, etc. You probably don't even need to hyperlink anything, now that mouse-over has so much detail, but I still liked being able to jump right to the Civlopedia.

I won't give a final score or anything until I complete one full game, but I couldn't stop playing last night, and I'm exhausted this morning. Though, that won't make me go to bed early tonight!

[alva]

1) I do mis the people building me a throne room/building thing.

Should still be in.

One thing I don't get is these people playing to the modern age in like an hour.

I don't get that either, my games often last +20 hours (not even going to tell how Civ3 games lasted) , normal standard games...

[BleedTheFreak]

The throne room is still in? I'm sort of surprised I haven't seen it yet. Unless it's not unlocked until a certain tech is discovered, which seems to be the theme.

I'd like to touch on that, for a bit. I am really happy with how you have to unlock most every functionality we took for granted in Civ III before you can use it, such as worker abilities, being able to adjust your research down to generate more culture instead, being able to trade tech with other civs, etc. That's just awesome, and it makes each and every discovery much more interesting, since none of them are "do nothing but make an extra hurdle to something worhtwhile" as they ALL do MULTIPLE things for you. It's fantastic!

[doolally]

Well, just like Civ III, it feels a bit under-optimized, so bogs down once I get into the middle ages. and, just like Civ III, I expect it will be fixed in the first patch >.<

Apart from that, I'm loving it so far! Oddly, it has a lot of the feel of Civ I, it seems like it has less flab than the last two iterations. and some of the interface enhancements are RAWRsome; being able to mouseover the other leaders on the diplo screen and get a window that breaks down the way they feel about me, and why, is amazing.

Somehow, they've made the game more focused, but deeper. having to research worker activites - build mine, construct hamlet, etc - and having workers cost shields, er...hammers, and food, means the early game seemingly proceeds at a slower pace, except, the tech race has been boosted, so it feels like i'm ahead of where I used to be by 1000 A.D. but with fewer cities that are more fully developed. it feels much more meaningful to have a smaller empire that is 'more advanced'

[SSBLoveU]

I tend to enjoy very long games. Most of the ones I play will last several months. Amazon still has not sent my preordered copy to me. Still, I plan to use the largest map with four civilizations for my first game.

[Joseph]

Originally posted by notyoueither
I think that means that Joseph hates it.

Sorry, this is great .

[Malleus Dei]

I'll give you my review right here.

It's the best game ever.

[swiss42]

My review

The Good

1. Lots of new features like Units, Governments, AI Characters, and Religion bring a lot of fun.

2. I love the new unit promotion. This is my favorate part of the game. Allows you to promote in a few different directions and multiple promotions for each. Combine that with unit upgrades, and you literally have the same unit from beginning to end.

3. Character animation is beautiful.

4. The 3D look is pretty neat eye candy.

5. The game moves along much faster than before allowing you to achive your goals quicker.

6. Accesibility to all the in-game menus are a simple click away. Very easy to find.

7. Wonder movies are back and are pretty cool. A lot of different wonders.

8. I like how you can group units now with the shift button.

9. Resources seem more available and the A.I. seems to trade more as well as be a little smarter. This is good so you won't have to worry about not having a resource to build a particular unit.

10. I love the replayability. When you choose a random map or not, you'll never play the same way twice.

The Bad

1. Frequent crash to desktop bugs as well as a few graphical glitches.

2. Gameplay seems to be the same as Civ3 except for the eye candy and more of everything from choices to units.

3. The game seems to end too soon even on "Epic". Either the research tree goes too quickly or the game years or both. In any case, I has hoping it would take many more hours to get to Future tech so I can build more units and/or play a few wars. It seems the game was built so that you only have time to fight 1 or 2 wars before someone wins.

4. had several install issues. One required a download from the forums (unpacker). The other required an unload and reload of the game and graphic drivers.


Conclusion
I give it 6 out of 10. If it wasn't for the frequent Crash to Desktop, it would be 8 out of 10.

[Adagio]

Short review by me:

The good:

Too much to mention, I would never end if I started

The bad:

I'm missing the options to stop the auto-save and to hide units in cities
Also the AI demands too much. Friendly enemies with tech to trade always demands me to give them my tech, while they don't want to give me their techs

[alva]

I'm missing the options to stop the auto-save

I can get rid of one annoyance for you:

AutoSaveInterval = 0

No more autosaves

Why d they bother youn they only take a couple of seconds and always come in handy at some point or another.
If I have to go back and replay 20 turns, I usually quit.

As for the other thing:
[Civ2MilitaryAdvisor]
Build more units!!!

[Adagio]

Thank you, they should have that option in the game

On my machine it takes 5 sec to save, and those secs can be better used playing the game... and I have never had any need for an autosave, so those secs are wasted


And for the other thing: The enemies who dared to attack me all lost cities (with one exception, America was too far away for me to bother sending units up there), while I didn't lose anything...

[Malleus Dei]

Originally posted by swiss42
2. Gameplay seems to be the same as Civ3 except for the eye candy and more of everything from choices to units.

Think so? You must be playing a different game than I am.