Always space race victory at high levels ?

[Mister Max]

Hello,
I have played the game many times now and I seem to win most of them except the two highest levels. Somehow the PC players always snatch a space race victory before I can win one myself.
I always play epic games on huge maps with maximum players.
Is there a way to shut down space race victory like there was in civilisation III ? That option seems not available in Civ IV. Is there a patch that will fix it ?
I might try for another type of victory then ...

Greetings from the Netherlands

[Nacht]

Choose 'custom game' instead of 'Play now'.

[Diadem]

Yeah with the 'custom game' option you can pretty much configure everything there is to configure. Really nice.

[Jaybe]

Since space race is the only victory condition the AI is competent at, you will have a much easier time if you disallow it.

[foudres]

And even... the AI is not that good at space race before high difficulty lvl.

I think the only adventage the AI has with space race it's that it doesn't need any complex things to do... just go for the tech and construct the parts.

I would that an AI could send you a nuke on cities that are building space part, or just beeing able to go for a conquest victory without loose too much in tech and with attacling properly a city.

[snoopy369]

If I were you I'd pick up Blake's AI upgrades and then try again. Turning off the space race, as mentioned above, would pretty much make the game pointless, assuming you can survive the early to mid game military shenanigans of the AI. My nephew (4 months) could probably beat the AI in pure late-game military.

Try the AI upgrade, and then consider learning how to space race the upper level AI Or try for cultural victories. Those are harder to do before an AI space races you at prince and up.