Do you remember when you first got civ 3?
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timerover51
Deity
I got in in the summer of 2002 shortly after getting my then-new Imac. I have played it off and on since, but considerably more once I was able to do some editing on it with first the very buggy editor that came with my MacSoft version of the game, and then the Windows editor for Civ3 Complete on my son's high school Windows laptop. I no longer play the unedited game except for the Age of Discovery scenario included with the game.
I think he forgot the whole game when he got Rome: Total War. 
I was at Microcenter, having just got a g/c for my birthday. I was wandering around the store and saw that Civ3 was out. It went right into the basket.
This was in Feb '02.
This was in Feb '02.
Maimonides
Emperor
I don't remember exactly when I got Civ3, but I played & loved Civs 1 & 2 & probably got 3 soon after it came out. I lurked here at CFC for a long time before joining & got C3C shortly after my join date.
There are so many great mods & scenarios available that I've never gotten bored with the game after all these years.
There are so many great mods & scenarios available that I've never gotten bored with the game after all these years.
bob rulz
Prince
I think I got it around my birthday in 2002, but at first it was too complicated for my simple 12 year old mind. 
I really didn't understand it at all and quickly put it back on the shelf, wishing that I had gotten Empire Earth instead. I even remember my first ever game. I remember loading up the save later and just laughing at how bad it was.
I picked it up off the shelf about a year later and gave it another shot. I picked up on the mechanics better this time and was hooked instantly. I got Civ IV for Christmas in 2005, played it for about 6-8 months, and went back to Civ III.
The only game I've spent more time on is Starcraft. No other game even comes close to those 2.
I really didn't understand it at all and quickly put it back on the shelf, wishing that I had gotten Empire Earth instead. I even remember my first ever game. I remember loading up the save later and just laughing at how bad it was.I picked it up off the shelf about a year later and gave it another shot. I picked up on the mechanics better this time and was hooked instantly. I got Civ IV for Christmas in 2005, played it for about 6-8 months, and went back to Civ III.
The only game I've spent more time on is Starcraft. No other game even comes close to those 2.
TheOverseer714
Overseer
Starcraft kicked butt! I remember many a game as the Zerg with the acid spitting flying critters wreaking havoc. Got Civ after I wore my CD drive out, but didn't like vanilla that much. Once I got Conquests, I liked Civ 3 much better, and have played it ever since.
CaesarCS
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 9, 2005
- Messages
- 75
I bought Civ3 within the first month of it coming out, I'm sure. I had no idea they were making another Civ but had bought and played Call to Power (and was tremendously disappointed).
When I saw Civ3 on the shelves in Nov. of 2001 I went home and looked up info on it and sure enough- it was a true successor to Civ II! So I bought it, got home AND- couldn't play it. My roommate had a computer that could play it and let me, but his computer just barely met the specs so... the... .... game was.... ... ... .. .... ...... .... rea... lly... .... slow.
Nevertheless, I played it for like three days straight. Then I saved money for a good computer so I could play it nonstop. My girlfried at the time hated the game because I was always playing it, so of course that made the game that much better.
I haven't stopped playing since then, and now my computer can handle huge maps!
When I saw Civ3 on the shelves in Nov. of 2001 I went home and looked up info on it and sure enough- it was a true successor to Civ II! So I bought it, got home AND- couldn't play it. My roommate had a computer that could play it and let me, but his computer just barely met the specs so... the... .... game was.... ... ... .. .... ...... .... rea... lly... .... slow.
Nevertheless, I played it for like three days straight. Then I saved money for a good computer so I could play it nonstop. My girlfried at the time hated the game because I was always playing it, so of course that made the game that much better.
I haven't stopped playing since then, and now my computer can handle huge maps!
Zearo
Part Time Revolutionary
I was given civ as a birthday present from one of my parents friends when I was around 9 years old. I was pretty pyched, I barely ever got computer games for my brithday. Being 9 I kinda neglected the massive rule book, and didn't really grasp the basic concepts of the game. Didn't really understand the whole "settler thing" and kept leaving my cities (more like city actually) unguarded took me about a year for my first chieften win 
. First game was with the aztecs on an island. Indian warrior captured my unguarded city within around 20 turns 
took me about a year for my first chieften win . First game was with the aztecs on an island. Indian warrior captured my unguarded city within around 20 turns Fiddlin Nero
Prince
I don't remember when, but I definitely remember hesitating leaving Civ2 behind. Eventually the Gold edition came out, tried it, still have the Civ2 disk, no chance of going back.
I got it shortly after it came out, as an early birthday present in 2001.
El Justo
Deity
used to play civ2, got away from it for many years (madden and other ps 1&2 games) and then picked it back up in 2002, not even knowing that there was a civ3 
browsing through Best Buy one day in early 2003 and i spotted civ3 and bought it. the one thing i remember distinctly was that i was a little befuddled over some of the changes (arty, espionage, and the caravan thingies). a few weeks later, i got over all the changes. shot time later, i went out and bought PTW and then bought Conquests when it came out in oct '03. haven't looked back since
browsing through Best Buy one day in early 2003 and i spotted civ3 and bought it. the one thing i remember distinctly was that i was a little befuddled over some of the changes (arty, espionage, and the caravan thingies). a few weeks later, i got over all the changes. shot time later, i went out and bought PTW and then bought Conquests when it came out in oct '03. haven't looked back since 
- Joined
- Mar 17, 2007
- Messages
- 9,312
It was June, 2003 for me. I'd never heard of Civilization at the time, and was 14. I was at CompUSA with my dad looking for a new game for the summer. I'd been planning to get Age of Mythology, but its video card requirements were slightly higher than what our computer supported (16 MB VRAM instead of 8 MB... bummer). So I looked around some more and saw Civilization III, the vanilla version. It looked really interesting. I wasn't a big history student then (my first really good history teacher was that autumn), but the concept and game both sounded fun, and the game would run on our computer, so into the cart it went! $30 at the time.
Unfortunately, it didn't actually run on our computer at the time. My guess now is it was outdated drivers - the game started up fine, but anytime you saw a city on the screen, it crashed (whether it was yours or someone else's). So I could explore, but that was it - and then only until I encountered an enemy city. Kind of disappointing.
Fortunately, my dad had known our computer was getting long in the tooth for a year or so, and it was over 4 years old then, so he decided it was as good a time as any to get a new one. The next weekend we went out to Circuit City and bought a new desktop. Fast, 512 MB of memory, and 128 MB of video memory - if we'd already bought that the week before, I probably would have bought Age of Mythology. Who knows if I'd have ever tried Civ?
Unfortunately, the setup at home didn't go so well. A scanner not working with Windows XP and causing infinite reboots was minor enough, but Partition Magic managed to mess up the entire partition table (my dad had always divided up the hard drive into OS/Programs/Data before), and HP conveniently put the backup of Windows on the hard drive rather than on CDs. So now we had a nice, shiny, fast computer with no operating system. My dad called HP and they send out some disks, but it would take a week for them to arrive.
So I spent much of the next week reading Civ3's 300 page manual. I read pretty much the whole thing, although I did skip some of the later units' statistics so I'd have something to discover as I played. What I could garner from the manual and what little our old computer could play told me this would be a really fun game.
Finally the discs arrived, XP was re-installed, Civ was installed, and I was able to play it! I played Earth (Huge).bic as the Americans first, and played most of the day, until by mid-afternoon I realized victory was beyond hope and saved the game. I still have the save, and a couple years later reloaded it and managed to pull back to a somewhat competitive state by 2200 AD or so. But it wasn't long before I was playing another game, and doing a little better, and Civ quickly became the game of the summer.
Unfortunately, it didn't actually run on our computer at the time. My guess now is it was outdated drivers - the game started up fine, but anytime you saw a city on the screen, it crashed (whether it was yours or someone else's). So I could explore, but that was it - and then only until I encountered an enemy city. Kind of disappointing.
Fortunately, my dad had known our computer was getting long in the tooth for a year or so, and it was over 4 years old then, so he decided it was as good a time as any to get a new one. The next weekend we went out to Circuit City and bought a new desktop. Fast, 512 MB of memory, and 128 MB of video memory - if we'd already bought that the week before, I probably would have bought Age of Mythology. Who knows if I'd have ever tried Civ?
Unfortunately, the setup at home didn't go so well. A scanner not working with Windows XP and causing infinite reboots was minor enough, but Partition Magic managed to mess up the entire partition table (my dad had always divided up the hard drive into OS/Programs/Data before), and HP conveniently put the backup of Windows on the hard drive rather than on CDs. So now we had a nice, shiny, fast computer with no operating system. My dad called HP and they send out some disks, but it would take a week for them to arrive.
So I spent much of the next week reading Civ3's 300 page manual. I read pretty much the whole thing, although I did skip some of the later units' statistics so I'd have something to discover as I played. What I could garner from the manual and what little our old computer could play told me this would be a really fun game.
Finally the discs arrived, XP was re-installed, Civ was installed, and I was able to play it! I played Earth (Huge).bic as the Americans first, and played most of the day, until by mid-afternoon I realized victory was beyond hope and saved the game. I still have the save, and a couple years later reloaded it and managed to pull back to a somewhat competitive state by 2200 AD or so. But it wasn't long before I was playing another game, and doing a little better, and Civ quickly became the game of the summer.
t0mme
Great Red One
I bought it the week it came out, so that was back in 2001. I also bought both expansion packs the moment they came out. When I ditched my broken laptop, I forgot I had the Conquests disc in it. After some months playing with an illegal version, I bought Chronicles. Mainly for the Conquests and Civilization II (of which I had also lost my disc).
I remember when I got it and my first game very well.
It was in 2005 (I think) when I borrowed it from the library. At first I thought it was a movie or something. When I started my first game as the Greeks I was last place even though I was playing at the easiest difficulty! And I didn't get the settler thing either, I just had my capital and hoped that it'll expand eventually
.
When I finally understood the game, I was kinda hooked. But I never got to finish a game before I had to return the disc.
Then I started talking about it at school and one of my classmates told me about Civ IV, I got it in December that year.
I got my own copy of Civ III Complete in June this year,
It was in 2005 (I think) when I borrowed it from the library. At first I thought it was a movie or something. When I started my first game as the Greeks I was last place even though I was playing at the easiest difficulty! And I didn't get the settler thing either, I just had my capital and hoped that it'll expand eventually
.When I finally understood the game, I was kinda hooked. But I never got to finish a game before I had to return the disc.
Then I started talking about it at school and one of my classmates told me about Civ IV, I got it in December that year.
I got my own copy of Civ III Complete in June this year,
Sashie VII
Balance of Power
I started playing in 2002, got C3C from my aunt in 2004 (one of the CDs were broken eventually, and my story then was discontinued) and bought Civ 3 Complete myself last year.
eldar
ChiefTank
Got it as a Christmas present from my parents in 2001 (after requesting it - I got hooked on Sid Meier/Firaxis games the night my flatmate gave me a... dubiously acquired version of SMAC [which I later bought legitimately, I might add - I wanted the manual and I wanted the movies to work!!]).
I first installed Civ3 on my Dad's PC and briefly played the tutorial scenario - but as his PC is in a very cold room, I didn't play long! Once I got back home to my own PC in my warm living room, history etc. Other games have tempted me away now and again - notably Final Fantasy, GTA, Oblivion, Civ IV - but I always seem to gravitate back to Civ3.
I first installed Civ3 on my Dad's PC and briefly played the tutorial scenario - but as his PC is in a very cold room, I didn't play long! Once I got back home to my own PC in my warm living room, history etc. Other games have tempted me away now and again - notably Final Fantasy, GTA, Oblivion, Civ IV - but I always seem to gravitate back to Civ3.
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