whats the best civ game

[Bongo-Bongo]

What's 'engoying'?

Thats how someone with an inability to type spells enjoying

 

[Severus]

Civ IV.
Second Civ II closely followed by Civ I with Civ III a long long way behind.

I dont know how anyone can argue for Civ III being the best of the series, for me it nearly killed my addiction to the games.
Why? One word: corruption.
Easily the most badly thought out, unbalanced, tedious, annoying concept ever to be introduced into the series and so easily overcome by having a mass of workers plant forests only to rip them down again the next turn for the shields they gave. How monotonous. Ok it did introduce some great additions like culture, but corruption ruined it all for me.

Civ IV meanwhile just has a much better economic model with no gold cost per turn for your buildings but a much harsher maintenance penalty to help kill REX in the early game. For me its brought back the need to actually think closely about whether you should build that next city straight away rather than just dumping down as many as possible as fast as possible.

Civ II and Civ I are just classics as well. The days that i lost playing Civ II especially must run into the hundreds.

 

[Swedishguy]

Civ III easily beats all the others.

Severus, talk to SuperbeaverInc. about this, and see his arguments!

 

[Babbler]

SMAC isn't part of the civ-franchise. Play civII, the advisors are so funny!

Yes, but like Call to Power (never played, BTW), it is a close cousin to the "mainstream" civ games.

 

[Wlauzon]

I think civ3 was the worst overall.

It was so easy to exploit that it was rediculous. I used to spam settlers like crazy and get newer cities up to outrageous sizes in a hurry.

I think Civ2 had the best game play but it was so buggy in many ways it got old fast.

 

[Swedishguy]

I think civ3 was the worst overall.

It was so easy to exploit that it was rediculous. I used to spam settlers like crazy and get newer cities up to outrageous sizes in a hurry.

I think Civ2 had the best game play but it was so buggy in many ways it got old fast.

So the settler spam weren't fun at all? If you favor realism above gameplay, I pity you.

 

[Thedrin]

So the settler spam weren't fun at all?

Not in the slightest. I prefer to only build good cities. That left me at a distinct disadvantage in CivIII.

 

[Swedishguy]

Look in my ICS thread, and you'll see how to balance it.

 

[Mongolia]

but we really need to get those palace improvements back

I agree!

 

[Wodan]

SMAC is the best, IMO.

(Yes, Swedishguy, SMAC is indeed part of the Civ franchise.)

Wodan

 

[lbhhh]

SMAC is the best, IMO.

(Yes, Swedishguy, SMAC is indeed part of the Civ franchise.)

Wodan

SMAC was indeed great part of the civ series. It introduced several key civ3 features such as leader traits, borders, and a UN of sorts. Solid game, too bad I didn't play more of it.

EDIT: Palace improvements ruled! I wonder if that feature will ever come back?

 

[Olleus]

ive played every version and every expansion since Civ 2, and civ 4 is the best by a thousand miles. There are only 3 things which are worse in civ 4 than in previous civs:
1) The advisors just aren't as fun (remember civ 2 anyone?)
2) Bring back ranged bombardment! all you have to do is teach the AI to use it
3) The palace screen. As I understand it they are working on a civ 2 style of this for the next expansion.

But these things are a speck of dust compared to the improved AI, the new economic system, more Great People and, above all, combat.

 

[Vynd]

I've played all four Civ games and SMAC extensively (but not all of the expansions). And for me Civ IV is the best.

The others all had their strong points, mind you. For instance, I miss the huge variety of units from Civ II and SMAC sometimes. But more important than variety of units is the variety of gameplay, and Civ IV is the champ in that area I think. It has the most ways to win, the most civics/goverments, the most leader traits, etc. You can base an entire game of Civ IV around manipulating religion, culture, and great people, features that either didn't exist or were much less complicated and interesting in previous editions. Also very important is that Civ IV's economic and maintenance system is much, much better than any of the previous games.

 

[one_man_assault]

I played a little Civ 2 I liked the depth of it and the feel everything was great the mechanics the gameplay...its just the graphics really sucked

but Civ 3 - I liked the epic feel of it...the advisors...It would take me a week to finish a good game...and their always was drama...allainces world wars stuff u dont see often in Civ 4....I hated corruption though

Civ 4- I loved the religion system and graphics the bug fixes the whole new take on barbarians...now with warlords vassel states and all that goodstuff


truthfully I like Civ 4 but Civs 2-3 will always have a place in my heart lol

but to be honest SMAC still blows all theese games out the water


But the ultimate Civ game would have the best from every of the civs in one gameee!!!!!

 

[King Flevance]

ive played every version and every expansion since Civ 2, and civ 4 is the best by a thousand miles. There are only 3 things which are worse in civ 4 than in previous civs:
1) The advisors just aren't as fun (remember civ 2 anyone?)
2) Bring back ranged bombardment! all you have to do is teach the AI to use it
3) The palace screen. As I understand it they are working on a civ 2 style of this for the next expansion.

But these things are a speck of dust compared to the improved AI, the new economic system, more Great People and, above all, combat.

Well put Olleus.

My own addition to the topic:

I have played all the versions listed so far - even the cousins. And I have to say that 3 and 4 tie for me. With the vanilla versions. I think the vanilla version of a game defines the game then expansions being merely optional add-ons should be viewed differently. Yes, 3 had things that were a "pain in the butt" and easy to manipulate AI, but if you did not do these things, it was fun. Yes you had to use ICS but only to a certain point.I didn't go as extreme as some people did using it as their main strategy. Also, the AI in III - my Lord, it was stupid. But if you didn't take advantage of it, it was fine. Like working out the price of a tech coin by coin. I brought an offer, if they refused - I gave 1 more offer. Then if no, I ended negotiations.

Just because you can (and probably always will be able to) rip off an AI doesn't mean you have to. If you are wanting to disrepect your opponent that much just put it on the easiest level of difficulty and ream them that way. It's really no different. These are the main problems people have with three and is nothing I see that can't be worked around. I couldn't agree more with Olleus and bombardment. The system wasn't broken, it just needed attention focused on it. Suicide artillery is not only boring and ******ed, but it's also not creative in the least. Seems more like a "quick fix" to me. Which is fine if you ignore they just pitched a great combat idea in the toilet.

 

[Smidlee]

Just because you can (and probably always will be able to) rip off an AI doesn't mean you have to. If you are wanting to disrepect your opponent that much just put it on the easiest level of difficulty and ream them that way. It's really no different.

Civ3 AI couldn't/didn't take advantage of the many options the player had. For example: Armies, artillery,etc. So adding a butch of options which the AI couldn't handle kind of hurt both SMAC and Civ 3 for me. There were just too many options to totally cream the AI.
The best civ game I've played which gives the player a lot of options plus a good AI has to be Gal Civ 2. Yeah I know that's not in the Sid's civ series so I guess it will be civ4 for balance.

 

[ThERat]

I think it is almost pointless to discuss this. I found out that people who really liked C3C (like mysef) do not really get into CIV.
However, people that liked Civ2 and didn't like Civ3 really like CIV. It's a pattern that has something to do with personal preference and will always exist.

Now, I would love if someone would rework C3C and improve it as TA Jones mentioned, most importantly
- teach the AI how to use armies (man I love armies, without them Civ is not Civ)
- rework the 'reputation' model as you can thrash your reputation unwillingly

However, C3C has such an epic feel that CIV will never be able to recreate. The mere size of empires makes a game so fun.

 

[Swedishguy]

Uh, a mad smiley?

 

[nullspace]

However, C3C has such an epic feel that CIV will never be able to recreate. The mere size of empires makes a game so fun.

Yeah, hundreds of cities that you developed in exactly the same way. Civ 4 lets you make meaningful decisions about the development of your cities (cottage or farm, heroic epic or national epic), but Civ 3 was mostly repeating the same build order in all your cities. This was a major improvement for Civ 4.

And I prefer promotions and great generals over armies. More options, more balanced.

 

[ThERat]

Yeah, hundreds of cities that you developed in exactly the same way. Civ 4 lets you make meaningful decisions about the development of your cities (cottage or farm, heroic epic or national epic), but Civ 3 was mostly repeating the same build order in all your cities.

well, that's personal preference. I say that CIV is only more diverse only a superficial level. I would wish that CIV would really play different and that every game would turn out to be unique and all. However, I have played enough SG's to know that in the end, it's not the HE/NE and 'what not wonders' that count.
You can play without cottages and win (we did on immortal), key is slavery and wars, plenty of them. The AI can't handle the human. Get city raider axes, combine them with suicide cats, get city raider maces, get cannons. The variety is as I mentioned not that deep.
In the end, it's the lags and annoying graphics that turn me off.