When did you first play Civ?

[Revenant]

I'm sure this question has been asked before but,
When was the first time you played Civilization? (Any of them)

For me it was in 1992.
I was seven at the time. We got a demo of it on a computer magazine which allowed you to play to 1AD.
However it just consisted of loading a saved game. (It was the same every time)
From then i was hooked!

Later we then got the full game of civilization for the Atari ST.
It took over my early years. But the game was too easy.

I'm beginning to think that it was easier on the ST than anywhere else because you guys keep saying that the ai was decent but they never proved a challenge to me.

 

[Angelscotboi]

The AI is always easy in the earlier levels such as chieftain, warlord and prince.
Currently i operate on prince level because i refuse to go higher until i have completed a game on that level.
Most of the people here when they say that the AI was decent they mean on the higher levels, King and Emperor, perhaps you were like me playing on the lower difficulty levels.

Also i started playing Civ 1 when i first got a PC when i was 12, that was 6 years ago, as i am 18 now. We got it as part of the "Strategy" pack with Frontier Elite, War in the Gulf and Wing Commander.
Same as you i was totally hooked. Altho once i got Civ 2 i never played it again, at least until i started visiting these forums, you all got me feeling nostalgic so i broke it out again, installed it on my new comp and i play away. hehe.

 

[stormerne]

My wife was the Civ aficionado who got me interested in 1997. I went on to Civ2 shortly after.

If you find the AI easy, please tell us you high score.

 

[Portuguese]

1995. I bought it in a Classics colection.

I was between CIV1 and Grand Prix 2
Just because I hadn't many options at the time (I have my birthday in August, on vacations and I was "forced" to choose in a bookshop between 5 or 6 and the others )

As GP2 asked too much from my comp at the time, I choose that funny and strange game... and my playing was never the same again...

 

[GenghisK]

In 1995... when I was preparing the university entrance... When I was still a young handsome guy, not wearing glasses. Then my life collapsed due to that damn Mac LCII I was given, with a poisonned gift, King's quest and Civ... Argh, woke up at 2am to play it till 7am, then school. Of course I slept during courses... After 2 months like that I gave up, I was too tired so I deleted the game and wore glasses and worked again...

 

[Zwelgje]

I only discovered Civ last year. I was looking for a job back then, had lots of time on my hands and found this old game but it looked quite nice to me. I started playing and never stopped!

 

[Revenant]

After i had a bit of experience i used to ALWAYS play on emperor but the ai still sucked for me. It was a rarity if they ever even got as far as conscription!

Although a funny thing happened to me once in my early days.

I was CRAP!
EVERYONE was advanced (except me)

So what do i do??
Bring a trireme half way across the world with two veteran catapults on board, park myself outside babylon and just kept rejecting peace.
Then they gave me ALL their tech (33)and gold (about 2000)!



But the chinese got their spaceship away and I still lost.

 

[Revenant]

Stormerne, I used to get about 1750 on average and about 2250 at a push.

If I was ever situated on a largish continent i would rarely go explore, and i would rarely ever meet anyone.

 

[Zwelgje]

Playing at emperor-level and not meeting AI?
That's strange, the AI explores the entire world extremely fast, especially with normal landmass and 7 civs. On emperor I never bother to build improvements, I just build units and conquer.

 

[Revenant]

The point i was making is that i think the version of civ that i have is easier than the one on the pc as i can get away with isolation.
Quite often other civs would only build about 2-3 cities which kinda sucked cause i was always lookinf for a chalenge.

 

[Portuguese]

Startplaying CIV1 for PC, DOS version for a challenge.

I think it will not disappoint you

 

[Revenant]

I would love to but i cannot buy it anywhere!
Do you know anywhere i could buy it?
Its been a long time since i played civ1.

 

[stormerne]

It's frequently included in game bundles, though right now apparently not. At times like these look on eBay - there's usually one copy for sale at any one time. At the time of writing this, there's one copy of Civ1 for sale, plus around ten each of Civ2 and 3, and a couple of CTPs.

 

[Cedric Greene]

I have two sealed copies of CivNET in my closet I be willing to part with for shipping cost alone but I think shipping to Ireland from US would be a killer.

 

[Juize]

It was on late, late -92... Of course, All I learnt to do was building catapults...
Played in chieftain, conquered Eurasia & Africa, moved to America with tririmes,
defended there with catapults and attacked with musketeers.

Well, I couldn't even read at that time of my life... Civ1 and MOO and some obscure LOTUS -game...
Those were the first games I played...

 

[voodoocat]

Was it '90 or '91 when this came out? Whenver it was is when I started playing. I asked for a computer game, for my b-day, for our 286 that we just got. I didn't know what was around or what type of game I wanted. My parents went to the computer store in the mall and asked what the guy would recommend. He said Civ but my parents didn't want to buy it until I tried it.

So I went in and I was hooked. I sucked really bad at first but I pulled the first all nighter of my life learning it with my friend. I stayed up for many nights after that. My friend and I would have Civ parties where we would make decisions together (usually it was "Kill em, kill em all" I bought Civ2 the first day it was out and Civ3 the first day it was out. I just bought PTW and I play every day about 3 hours or more.

 

[gonzo_for_civ]

Was it '90 or '91 when this came out? Whenver it was is when I started playing. I asked for a computer game, for my b-day, for our 286 that we just got. I didn't know what was around or what type of game I wanted. My parents went to the computer store in the mall and asked what the guy would recommend. He said Civ but my parents didn't want to buy it until I tried it.

So I went in and I was hooked. I sucked really bad at first but I pulled the first all nighter of my life learning it with my friend. I stayed up for many nights after that. My friend and I would have Civ parties where we would make decisions together (usually it was "Kill em, kill em all" I bought Civ2 the first day it was out and Civ3 the first day it was out. I just bought PTW and I play every day about 3 hours or more.

Wow! I almost had to pinch myself to make sure i didn't post that! And the fact that you live in AZ didn't help me differentiate either

I too have played civ1 since about it came out. Civnet the day it came out(although i parted w/it for a long while), civ2 the day is came out, all the expanisons for civ2 on the day they came out, civ3 when it first came out in stores and ptw the day it came out. SEVERAL hours a day, no exceptions. Still play all of them. Just recently re-installed civ1 for DOS.....it makes me so nostalgic...

I remember playing civ1 for DOS on a 286

 

[ProPain]

aaah, remembering the ancient era here, great. Starting playing 1992/1993, not quite sure. I had just moved from my first student appartment to my second and I had bought a brand new computer.

Trashed the old XT 9Mhz (which already got a 3,5 inch diskdrive, EGA color graphics and 20Mb HD! very advanced when my dad bought it in 1988 (soudns like the stone age)) and got myself a shiny new 486 DX2 66 Mhz.

Got civ1 from a friend. First I didn't know you could move your citizens around and went into civ(il) disorder time after time and quit. Then someone told me you actually order your citizens around and that was the end of my social life as I knew it. Start of the infamous 'one more turn syndrome'

And that was 10 years ago.....

ProPain

 

[Lucky]

Must have been 1993, when I got back from America. On an 286, which we upgraded to a 386 later that year.

Those were the times, I still had enough free time to actually play the games through in less than a week.

 

[voodoocat]

I remember for the first couple of games I didn't even think to fortify units inside a city. To prevent troops from taking my cities, I would sentry units on the squares surrounding the cities.