First Impressions

[RobC]

Ok, I've had civ3 two days now and have gotten an average of about 3-4 hrs sleep.

Some impressions:

1) The AI is noticably better than in civ2, but not great. For example, it is often possible to quickly overrun a nearby civ in the early game by just building a handful of warriors instead of settlers or workers (the gain of a city and captured workers more than compensates) -- the AI sometimes doesn't do a good enough job of protecting its cities early on, keeping only 1 or 2 warriors in its capital even when it can see your 3-4 warriors only two squares away. Plus, it seems like when you 'eradicate' a civ in the early game, it will come back somewhere else on the map, but strangely they maintain all their tech (can someone confirm this?). So you can just contact them and demand all their tech and gold, etc. to sue for peace, and you have a huge boost right off the bat. I've consistently won on Regent(Prince) level when I am lucky enough to start off close to another civ who hasn't discovered bronze working.

2) One thing the AI does well (annoyingly well) is expand. Not necessarily in the very early stages, but definitely in the latter part of the Ancient Era as civs are competing for space and they are sending settlers escorted by spearmen all over the map looking for the smallest spaces around AND IN BETWEEN your cities/culture- borders to build cities. This forces you to decide if you want to space out your cities to accomodate future growth and risk another civ plopping a city down in between, or crowding your cities too much. Of course if you are like me, you just jump on every settler that comes by and get two captured workers out of them.

3) Colonies DO have an important role, as both strategic and luxury resources will often be stuck in inconvenient places for cities (e.g. iron in mountains, dyes in a jungles, etc.) Be aware that if you put a distant colony near another civ, it will eventually get taken over by that civ's expanding culture-borders (it's still worth it if that's your only source -- at least you get it temporarily)

4) The interface is fine, although I think in the attempt to make it streamlined they added a lot of 'hidden' or at least hard to get at commands and key combinations (like the right-click on unhappy head or CTRL-SHFT-whatever to clear terrain improvements and cities from the map view). I guess it's a reasonable trade off rather than having HUGE menus but it took me a while to find out I could just SHFT-click on a city to change production rather than right click and select from the menu. Also, in the foreign advisor screen, it took a while to find I could double-click to talk to the leader (I kept single-clicking and getting the civlopedia page on that civ)

5) Speaking of the civlopedia, does anyone else think it takes way too long to load up? I don't have much of a speed problem in any other part of the game, but for some reason opening the civlopedia takes several seconds.

6) Can someone please tell me if there is ANY way to disband a city? It doesn't seem like the program will let me capture an enemy city and then turn it into a settler or worker. Maybe I'm missing something...

[Raion]

I like the game! Saving resources for the end game is what it's all about. Pikemen were great in olden days, they could defend very well and wood is all it takes.
Irrigation only can be done around fresh water, as in a lake, then you can do it diagonally to the city that needs it. Anyway, cities just have no culture in the beginning and that is reflected in the way the game plays.
Embassies can be establish as soon as Writing is done, but you have to click on the star on the main screen in the info screen underneath your capitol city.
Only playing on Warlord level yet, but I think the game has great possibilities.
Instead of making all those settlers, maybe a 'not as good leader's civilization cities' can be taken by culture or war.
Get a city started somewhere for a different type of gameplay!
I am sure there will be other things in the game also!

It does crash coming out of it and I have to really restart my computer, it just does not restore to Windows right.
I need something done about the sound since, I had to wait for a patch even when SMAC/Alien Crossfire was out, and it looks just about like the same sound file, 'sound.dll' which I have to rename to 'sound.dl_' so I can play the game.
A few minor glitches in the manual, I adjusted the graphic accerleration down on my video card, because it may crash the game, I think, although I am not sure yet!

A few glitches in the game, but I think it will be very enjoyable to play and surpasses anything else I have played. Call to Power's interface was terrible, even though they said it was streamlined, it wasn't to me, so I never got into the game and never really played it.
But with CIVIII, the interface gets you into the game, especially when you can right click on the city and change production and other things with a right click.
All in all, I think its a great game and much better for what it is called "Create a Civilization that Withstands the Test of Time"
and that what the game is!

[RobC]

double post...

[Talenn]

Overall, my first impression is pretty favorable. I like many of the new concepts and ideas, but think that the implementation is going to take some more work.

I pretty much share the opinion of many of the people here about the corruption, the need to 'over expand' early in the game, the very random combat and the absolutism of resources. I think all of the above concepts (except maybe the overly random combat) are good ones and given time and tweaking, could be a real asset to the game system.

I'm very curious to see what Firaxis' take is on these issues in light of the players' comments.

[Raion]

If I remember right, stop the growth of the city, and make settlers or workers, then you will not use the disband. As I remember in Civ II, it was the only way to keep or make a settler out of a size 1 city. But first one has to stop the growth or the city may grow before the settler is built. Anyway, with changing the scenery later in the game, I just do not know if I will even go the work of 'dissolving a city' even if it's in the wrong place, depends on how you grow both cities near one another.

[Twig]

Originally posted by LaRusso

[...]

twig: you can do irrigation only near fresh water, until you get electricty

[...]

MY BUST! I now note that fact in the manual.

Well, I reckon that 'strategicly-located' city of mine is SOL...

In addition, my previous post was perhaps a bit too harsh regarding quality/bugs. New software has 'em. It's a fact of life. On a positive note, I reiterate my 'thumbs-up' regarding AI and the interface, adding that the new diplomatic options are neat too.

I'd have to sum up my first impression of Civ3 as it being evolutionary to the genre in a positive way.

Regards, Twig

[macrae]

Three days into my first full game...

...I still feel that I am playing a Beta...an extremely GOOD beta, but a beta nonetheless.

There is a slow memory leak, which consistently locks my system up after about 12 hours of gameplay (I had the last days off, and spent the last 3 playing Civ3). My system is high-end...Athlon 1.4, 512 RAM, with cards to match, I doubt seriously if it is my hardware...:-)

Not being able to upgrade units in armies is silly, as is not being able to remove units from them (even if only to upgrade them).

The timing for the appearance of military academies is too late in the game. Late Middle Ages makes more sense than Late Industrial Era, though I think that Early to Mid Industrial Era makes the most sense (adjust the tech tree a bit, perhaps?).

Cruise missiles need more range than Cannons.

Armies of pure Modern Tanks should keep their ability to attack multiple times.

Naval vessels should be faster...how much I'm not sure, as I'm a continental power, but as is there is no way to fight a holding action until your Marine Expeditionary Force arrives...the fight is long over by the time they get there.

It is very silly for Carriers to move more slowly than Destroyers...check out a Jane's Fighting Ships if you doubt me. This is just mistaken physics.

I love the way resources appear randomly (and regenerate randomly). I used up my only coal, and had to go to war to secure enough to finish my rail grid (my trade supply dried up). After finishing this bloodbath (just kept pouring the Cavalry in until I had the cities I wanted), another one grew in my old territories, so I ended up making money selling the surplus to the AI...:-)

The best part was that after having to scrabble for Iron, Salt-Petre, and Coal, I ended up with plenty of rubber, most of the aluminum, and ALL of the Uranium within my borders. The French paid me a Tech, their world/territory maps, and 300 gold per turn for some...:-)

This game is not for the light-hearted.

The combat model needs major tweaking. As is, you can easily have warriors killing off multiple units after the advent of gunpowder. I had Longbowmen take out Mech Infantry (Regular Longbowmen against Veteran MI, to boot).

The corruption seems a bit excessive. So much so, that I don't even depend upon the production capacity of cities outside of a certain radius from my capital/FP. I like the Mod v.1.5 idea of adding corrupption reduction to Police Stations, and will play with it next game. One hint for rushing production is bringing surplus tanks, etc., from the core cities and disbanding them in your new territory ones. One Modern Tank will bring the price of a Library or Temple WAY down.

I like the changes to Marketplaces, and the addition of Luxury goods, plus the way you can supply them from imports. The amount of cash you can make from exports is very satisfying, too.

The AI ignores many of the movement constrictions human players work under...this wil hopefully be fixed soon.

That's it after 48 hours of play...your mileage may vary.

later...Stephen

P.S.: I'm playing on the second difficulty level, on a random huge map (with average settings).

[Fidel]

Re: Three days into my first full game...

Originally posted by macrae
There is a slow memory leak, which consistently locks my system up after about 12 hours of gameplay (I had the last days off, and spent the last 3 playing Civ3). My system is high-end...Athlon 1.4, 512 RAM, with cards to match, I doubt seriously if it is my hardware...:-)

not a single crash on my 600MZ laptop and Dell 500 in the office. Both played up to 12 hrs. Yes, I am playing at work

[macrae]

Kings of the Geeks

My roommate and I have both suffered from similar problems which arise somewhere between 12 and 20 hours of gameplay...but he is between jobs right now, and I was off for 5 days straight (did I mention a lack of a social life?)...

He's a software engineer, and agrees that something needs to be done by Firaxis, et al.

His Win2k laptop runs longer than my 98se desktop before the problem locks us up, but that makes sense. I had 2k on the desktop until it came out that Everquest runs best on 98se.

Here's a test (I've duplicated it several tims now)...leave the game up on your desktop before going to bed, etc. (whatever will leave it up for over 12 hours)...we keep coming back to blue screens about lost memory addresses, etc.

Later...Stephen

[dingdatou]

first impressions

My overall impression is very good.

At the first day I played the game, I lost very badly and quickly to the AIs on the regent level three times. Then I realized AIs' strategy of aggressive expansion so I adopted that strategy as well.

I am still playing at regent level as Chinese in the huge map with 16 AIs, this game has lasted seven days so far and I am getting average 3 hours sleep per night and the game still only at 1550 AD.

Compare to SMAC, I love civ3 much more. SMAC is a very polished game, it provides every little detail the gamer ever wants to know. However it is way too similar to civ2. I remembered when I played civ2 for the first time, I was just totally blown out by it. It was a total "WOW!!!" experience. It is such a big improvement over the original Civ! I do not experience that with SMAC, even the unit modification is disappointing, I was expecting something like in MOO or MOO2. But now the "WOW" effect is back for civ3!!!

I was very impressed by the AI. I still remembered in Civ2 all these poor AIs using tons of army tried to take down my phalanx at the top of the mountain inside a fortress. No more suicides missions in civ3! The AI is pretty smart at war. I have to build a 13 continuous grids of pikemans inside fortess to fend off the offense from Russian(a human great wall). No ZOC really make the fight more chanlleging and fun.

I also love culture! I have taken over about 6 cities now through culture. I no longer fear these little pesky citis AIs build inside my border. (Hmmm... more meat)

The diplomacy is also much better (except can not trade units). The AI is pretty reasonable at most times. And it is vital in the ancient time to gain the technologies. It is a real joy to see Russia is willing to give me all their cities except their captial for a peace treaty, I was desperate for that peace treaty as well since I am in democracy(I have to start the war since I have no coal.)

The new barbarian is also better. One time there are 24 horsemans attacking my city. The poor spearman after killed 13 of them. Died in honor!

The corruption is also cool. Although it gives me a lot of headaches. (Courthouse does not do a thing!) I think it is more realistic that way.

==============================================
But I do agree with a lot of other gamers here. It does feel like a beta!
My first surprise is that there is no world map. I know the arguments for not having one is valid since I played most of the civ, civ2, MOO, MOO2, SMAC with random maps. But it is a nice to have.

It is a little disappointment to see the wonder videos. Actually this does not bother me that much, not even compares to no world map.

No MP, no big deal for me. Just don't have time for that anyway.

The wait time in between turns in way too long! This is my number one complain, especially during peaceful times. It is really a waste of time to see 20 persian workers just shuffling around. There should be an option to speed things up and an event log for things happened will be a great help.(One of the SMAC strengths)

Also I am very surprised to find out there are so many commands I can do when I was reading the other thread on interfaces. A lot of the commands are just not intuitive at all. Couple things I find out such as using Ctrl+Shift+M to see only the resources and units on the map. Or on the diplomacy screen, since there are 16 (or 15) AIs, I finally figured to Ctrl+Shift+right click mouse to change AI civilizations. Or I have to use Shift+e to use my embassy and investigate the cities that are competing with me on the wonders. All those things are not intuitive at all. I really hope that all the above info is in the manual since I have not read the manual thoroghly (I want to spend evey seconds I have on the game itself). I really enjoy the clean screen. I just wished Firaxis include a comprehensive short-cut keys list. The list in the manual is not bad. But it is not complete. Another thing bugs me is that there is no civilopedia link from the city screen, right click on the units or the city improvements to show the civilopedia will be nice.

The other thing is about terrain. I kinda of enjoying in civ2 to transform desert to plain to grassland. Could I do the same thing in Civ3? Actually this brings up another point. The game does not provide enough detail information to gamers. Oh, I start to miss SMAC. I have all those questions but I am having a difficult time to find answer. First is how to start a queue. The manual talks about save a queue or delete a queue but not how to add to queue! Also since there is no way to rush wonders except leaders, I am trying to use the harvest the forest trick, but there is no way to tell whether it is working or not since there is no details on how many shields is already there for the wonder. And there is no event log. It is really easy to miss that tiny message on "harvest 10 shields to Beijing". Other questions such as can I have 2 leaders at one time? Why can not I build military academy? Why I can not change my production from factory to J.S. Bach Church but I can change it to Shakespear's Theater? There is spy, is there counter-spy?

And about AI. If culture is that important, than why the AI is so stupid to build that little city inside my border so that I can nicely assimilate it. Also right now I almost have no army units except workers and the AIs have swarms of armies, why do they not attack me. Also I can easily please AI by giving them 1 or 2 gold.

Also why do they take out firepower, it works pretty well in civ2. I heard the swordmans slaying a tank senario is appearing again, although personally I have not experience that yet.

Also for the score, wonders do not count. Peaceful times do not count. It does not matter that much, even lower than wonder movies. But it is a nice-to-have. I can not remeber what game it is. But the score for that game counts every little things such as victories in combat. It is nice to see evey little thing I did in the game has an effect on the score.

Couple more comments about the general gameplay: it seems that it really force the early expansing strategy. For a civ game, the essential is to pick and choose your game style, to be forced to do it in certain way is not a good idea. (Forgot about building wonders in ancient time except leaders). Also after a while, the game became too peaceful. Once English elimates German in 880 AD. There is no war ever since! And there is still 14 civs left! Very unlikely from the history perspective. I guess once I became democratic, all the AI is taking the same route.

It is a lot of whining. I know Iknow. But I trully love the game and the civ series. The only reason I whined so much here is that it is a good game (even already great) but it has so much potential to be truly great, truly long lasting.

Would I perfer Firaxis release the game later? No way! I would prefer this way, absolutely yes. So I can play the game NOW!

I just hope Firaxis can clean up release in the patch(Not another edition for more of my money, of course I admits I am probably one of the first ones line up to buy it. )

Great work, Firaxis! But still can be improved in a great deal.

[MrNett]

First impressions...

I have a 600 MHz PIII Notebook (192 MB RAM, 8MB 3D-Graphic Card), Win2k, and up to now: NO reboot since now!

My first game was at chieftain level. I realized, that this is just challenging enough (In Civ2 I usually played at king level, sometimes higher)!

I reached the diplomatic victory (well, first I had to convice most of the other civs to vote for me . First I did not know this and so Ghandi was voted for General-Secretary But thanks autosave function I repeat this turn and convinced most of the others to vote for me by giving them a couple of techs and money ).

Some people mentioned here several missing things, which I agree, too. But the game itselft is very good and funny!

Of course you can always improve some things, and of course there are bugs (which I did not noticed up to now ), but
generally speaking you will love this game!

[Deathwalker]

I must admight that after reading everyones opinion about the game I am a bit worried. We still dont get it here in England till the 16th.
But I would like to clear something up, in the past Fraxcis said there would be in the box scenarios and a world map. Have these really been dropped from the release
Also is it reallt worth bying it, I bougth CTP2 and hated it? So should I just skip Civ3 as so much is missing, even against what they said would be included?

[Grumbold]

There is a world map in normal and large formats, although many posters have been scathing about its accuracy. Apolyton posters are already producing alternatives. One major drawback is that starting location is random so the Americans may start in China, etc. There are no scenarios and the current game editor cannot be used to create them either becasue start locations, cities etc cannot be attached to the maps.

Can't answer whether you should buy the game since it is a personal choice. You might want to wait and see if Firaxis produce a patch before Christmas that seems to fix a lot of things, not just move the bugs around. That would be the most encouraging sign.

[Deathwalker]

You mean we dont have the ability to make scenarios any more. No Word War 2/Star Wars or any of the others I liked?
This sucks how the **** can they claim to listen to us yet lie about whats in it, and we dont even have tools equal to the scenarios tools we got in FW. Dont they want us to make scenarios anymore or what
This is ****, the tools first job should have been to make scenarios, this is because they gave us a beta release

[Casmyre]

Re: First Impressions

Hello,

I'm getting the game in about 2 hours (if there are any copies left), and I've been /really/ looking forward to it. Based on your post, my expectations haven't changed.

I've never stopped by Gamepen, but if Jonah's points were intended as "negative", I now know to avoid his reviews.

Regarding the points made:

- Installation size: The bigger, the better. That typically indicates better graphics, audio, and AI matrices. Besides, harddisk space is cheap and getting cheaper.

- Intro video: I won't be buying the game for the intro video!

- Windows friendly: Just about anything is, these days -- if a system is well configured with decent hardware.

- Excellent music: Nice to hear, but at only 700Mb for a full install, it's probably not varied enough to prevent me from eventually graduating back to WinAmp & my own collection.

- Manual is big: The bigger, the better. Hopefully it includes tables, statistics, and other useful reference information. Or is that, as per modern doctrine, only available in the strategy guide?

- Saved games at 2.5Mb: And? Again, HD space is cheap. High RPM drives aren't much more expensive, and ultimately, a cleanly-configured machine means save-times will be unnoticeable anyway.

- Interface not 100% like Civ2: I hope not!

- Crash after 2 hours: Irrelevant. Could have been any number of things, most of which don't involve the game itself.

Anyway, I'm not trying to slam anyone or anything -- just decidedly frustrated with the number of negative remarks I've been reading, now that some people have their hands on it. Especially those comments based on hardware [requirements] that are all too subjective anymore.

I'm looking forward to this. And if the worst offending mark against the game is a 3Mb savefile, I know Civ3 will be the best thing since sliced bread.

- James

Originally posted by MarkG
Jonah Falcon (yes he is one and the same with the Gamepen reviewer), has given us some first impressions on Civ3:

- Typical(full) installation: 700MB
- Intro video is exactly the same as the one posted on Gamespot
- Extremely windows friendly(we have been chating on icq for over 2 hours while he was playing civ3!)
- Excellent music, amazing world setup screen
- Manual is really big, do read it before starting a game
- Saved games start at 2.5MB!!!
- Interface is not 100% like civ2, you will need some time to learn it
- After more than 2 hours of playing along with icq chating and screenshot grabbing, civ3 did crash. Not a serious issue though due to very smooth autosave feature, which goes unnoticed