Who here will give Civ IV a try?

[duke o' york]

Maybe, but I haven't even played ToT yet, and am hoping to get Spartan on the cheap too, so that'll be all my TBS time for the next couple of months. Well, at least until Civ IV goes down in price.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Well, that was interesting

I downloaded the Demo - or rather it downloaded while I was at work, took 2 hours

And played the tutorial. Takes a little getting used to, and I suspect I missed out on a lot, taking instruction from the virtual Sid. But it was intriguing.

First impressions:

Nice graphics and sounds, of course. Interesting gameplay concepts. Plenty of options - does that mean more strategic options, or does that just mean that it looks like there will be more strategic options.

I got a handle on workers vs settlers pretty fast. Good city sites seemed pretty rare in the tutorial.

I'll play the demo tomorrow. Probably won't buy it real soon, even if I like it (not at C$60), but it worked fine on my PC, anyway.

[duke o' york]

I didn't bother with the tutorial at all, and just dived straight in. It's been ages since I played Civ III, because I wasn't hooked, and have lent it to a friend so haven't seen it for months now.

I took my first city tonight!
Mind you, with so few turns to play with (in), then I had to go for it from the off. I chose the Romans, because their unique unit is so strong for what it is, and because I knew they had a source of iron only one culture upgrade from their starting position. I made a beeline for Iron Working, fortunately picked up The Wheel from a hut, and started with Mining, so it was a simple matter to build Praetorians. I also got a free worker from a hut, and built one with Rome, then founded a city not far from the Greek borders. Once my cities were roaded up, then I could send my newly-built Praetorians to settle in Cumae, and with the barracks I built first, converted them all to City Raider status. Sparta fell after the first attack, although I lost a unit of Praetorians, but the turns ran out before I could take any more cities or get any more troops to the front line.
I have enjoyed playing the demo though, and will have to buy the game once it comes down in price.

I might try with the Aztecs next, because with enough barracked warriors then I reckon I could take Gandhi out.

[DrSpike]

With Aztecs you can Jaguar rush, which is nice.

[duke o' york]

I prefer playing as Gandhi though, because I reckon I can bag all of the religions, and tonnes of extra techs too.
It's highly unlikely anyone will have the strength to attack me properly at Noble level in 90 whatever turns, so I win by points alone.

[DrSpike]

Get the game and play properly.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

I played the demo as the Indians. It's starting to make a lot more sense

Built 3 or 4 Wonders, provoked a war, kicked some Aztec ass, spread some religion around. I can see getting addicted, although it's taking me a while to get used to the interface.

[DaveV]

Actually, it's Incas, not Aztecs, in the demo. Quecha rushing works very nicely, too...

Duke - I'd suggest moving up to at least Prince difficulty. The game plays a lot differently when you give the AIs a little bit of a handicap. You can develop some sloppy habits at low levels.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Sorry - Incas. Civ2 memories.

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by DaveV
Actually, it's Incas, not Aztecs, in the demo. Quecha rushing works very nicely, too...

Ah incas. Yes Quechas are very good against the AI as they defend with archers a lot.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

Alright - I've played a couple more demo games. And spent some time drooling over the screenshots in the Civ4-General forum. I can feel myself getting pulled in.

Some additional questions (I looked in the Civ4 fora but didn't find the answers came easily to hand):

Is there a list of units, and a tech tree posted somewhere? The demo has a truncated version of both.

How powerful a PC is required for the maximum settings? I have a P4 2.66GHz, 1 GB RAM, independent 256 MB video, which seems like plenty for most purposes. Am I going to be disappointed when gigamap-sized games crash on me?

Thanks for the guidance

[DrSpike]

Almost certainly fine with those specs.

[gunkulator]

Originally posted by solo
Most of my own experience so far in Civ IV has been limited to OCC games, where a group of us have been experimenting with the different choices. So far, it appears that we are quite limited in the choices that will result in successful OCC games at the higher levels.

Judging Civ4 by how well it handles OCC seems to me to be a strange litmus test. The name of the game is Civilization, not SimCity. The fact that OCC was doable at all in Civ2 is more a testament to the game's weakness and exploitability rather than any sort of imagined flexability or depth. OCC is the ultimate "I can win with one hand tied behind my back, both eyes shut while standing on one leg." OCC was the final straw for me with Civ2. Once I could beat it consistently, I gave up the game for good.

[DrSpike]

I agree, playing OCC in Civ3 or Civ4 seems odd to me.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by DrSpike
I agree, playing OCC in Civ3 or Civ4 seems odd to me.

Watching tennis seems odd to me, but people still do it.

It's good to have different ways of playing (and winning). I haven't tried a cultural victory in Civ IV yet, but one of these days ...

RJM at Sleeper's