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In the first era of your game you really don't get what all the complaints were about the graphics -- why, for instance, some players can hate a mountain that you find perfectly mountain-esque -- and you did not want to read the manual so trying to queue your first production does make you think the user interface yields some of its best secrets rather stubornly -- You remember a poem by ee cummings: "If you and I have lips and mouth with which to kiss and sing with / Who gives a damn if some one-eyed son of a ***** invents an instrument to measure spring with?"
You open the manual to the shortcuts page and you discover that many of the early reviewers are missing great stuff -- and Firaxis have themselves to thank for not giving them a simple shortcuts card. Soon you discover workers can be instructed to build roads to any destination -- and they do -- they can be told to network your resources together -- and they will. Your queue not only exists it can be saved and loaded but you also quickly discover that there isn't much need for saving queue's because this is not a rubber stamp game, it changes in new ways throughout the Ancient Era. At some point you become enamored of the new unit ranks -- it's fun to see an elite unit be born (harder to see a leader created, MUCH harder) and you briefly wonder if in Civ 4 units can be made to literally GROW as they increase in rank and that's when you know you like Civ 3, because it begins to inspire you to want to change it the way Civ 2 inspired you -- It's called ICS: Infinite Creativity Surge, and it quickly overwhelms any locked computer algorhythms they can throw at you.
You love the unique units -- and Firaxis, for putting them in over our objections. And you are intrigued by your first discovery of iron. You build a colony on them and wonder if it's possible for that little colony to revolt (it's not -- stunning disappointment?) Is this really Civ 2.5??? Oh my GOD!!! Sid, you've ruined my HOUSE! Oh, wait a minute -- that's right -- I'm N*U*T*S. YOu decide that resources alone are enough to debunk all the jump-the-gunners who call Civ 3 a facelift on Civ 2 -- You admit to a sense of thrill that you might be sitting on the uranium equivalent of a real-world gold mine and now, stone sober, you wonder what the hell all the early critics were talking about? Did they think the game would be better off departing from Civ 2 altogether? And departing for exactly what destination?
There are over 500 pages in the List 2 -- Was there some specific vision in there that Firaxis missed? You have read some players and critics declaring Civ 3 a makeover. You think it must be like declaring the world would be better off without lawyers -- everybody will rush to agree with you, but nobody admits how truly awful that would world be. You bide your time and play the game for a week, concentrating on just the Ancient Era. You wonder why you are enjoying the game so much. The editor and the multi-player shortcomings have engendered some wrath. You cannot speak to those issues, you never really used the Civ 2 editor and from the two occasions you did play multi-player Civ 2 you learned that even God doesn't have that much time.
End of Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate 30 Second Review Part 2.
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 1 (Intro)
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 3 (Middle Ages)
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 4 (Industrial Age)
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 5 (Modern Age/The End Game)
Last Word & Final Score
(to be continued...)
P.S. You edit your post to say that one zoom level closer would've been nice.
You open the manual to the shortcuts page and you discover that many of the early reviewers are missing great stuff -- and Firaxis have themselves to thank for not giving them a simple shortcuts card. Soon you discover workers can be instructed to build roads to any destination -- and they do -- they can be told to network your resources together -- and they will. Your queue not only exists it can be saved and loaded but you also quickly discover that there isn't much need for saving queue's because this is not a rubber stamp game, it changes in new ways throughout the Ancient Era. At some point you become enamored of the new unit ranks -- it's fun to see an elite unit be born (harder to see a leader created, MUCH harder) and you briefly wonder if in Civ 4 units can be made to literally GROW as they increase in rank and that's when you know you like Civ 3, because it begins to inspire you to want to change it the way Civ 2 inspired you -- It's called ICS: Infinite Creativity Surge, and it quickly overwhelms any locked computer algorhythms they can throw at you.
You love the unique units -- and Firaxis, for putting them in over our objections. And you are intrigued by your first discovery of iron. You build a colony on them and wonder if it's possible for that little colony to revolt (it's not -- stunning disappointment?) Is this really Civ 2.5??? Oh my GOD!!! Sid, you've ruined my HOUSE! Oh, wait a minute -- that's right -- I'm N*U*T*S. YOu decide that resources alone are enough to debunk all the jump-the-gunners who call Civ 3 a facelift on Civ 2 -- You admit to a sense of thrill that you might be sitting on the uranium equivalent of a real-world gold mine and now, stone sober, you wonder what the hell all the early critics were talking about? Did they think the game would be better off departing from Civ 2 altogether? And departing for exactly what destination?
There are over 500 pages in the List 2 -- Was there some specific vision in there that Firaxis missed? You have read some players and critics declaring Civ 3 a makeover. You think it must be like declaring the world would be better off without lawyers -- everybody will rush to agree with you, but nobody admits how truly awful that would world be. You bide your time and play the game for a week, concentrating on just the Ancient Era. You wonder why you are enjoying the game so much. The editor and the multi-player shortcomings have engendered some wrath. You cannot speak to those issues, you never really used the Civ 2 editor and from the two occasions you did play multi-player Civ 2 you learned that even God doesn't have that much time.
End of Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate 30 Second Review Part 2.
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 1 (Intro)
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 3 (Middle Ages)
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 4 (Industrial Age)
Raingoon's Unusable-but-Totally-Accurate Review Part 5 (Modern Age/The End Game)
Last Word & Final Score
(to be continued...)
P.S. You edit your post to say that one zoom level closer would've been nice.
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