Civ Rev, mini review and guide

DeVore

Got this yesterday. Have almost all the achievements unlocked in it already because we sat down last night and basically dissected this game more comprehensively then any other that I can remember!

We took a civilisation from the start through to the very end of each possible way of winning (war, culture, finance and space race) along with developing every possible tech, researching and producing every single army unit and building expansion. So we can safely say we explored this game fully (and its been a looong night).

Firstly the review:
Graphically, its quite competent and easy on the eyes but its not a bleeding edge graphics game and thats fine by me.

Firstly, this is Civ but writ large. If you liked the accountancy of older Civ games you might be dissappointed in the bouncy happy approach they have taken to civ. This is a board game intended for a 3 hour game with mates over Live or single player challenge. "Fast and pared down" would be how I would describe it.

This is turn based and unashamedly follows the old school approach to board games which is just fine with me!

The game has 4 objectives, any one of which will end the game. War is the easiest to understand. Build up and wipe out your opponent. You have 4 main types of war units: Offensive land, defensive land, offensive ships and defensive ships. Land consists of archers/riflemen/artilery and warriors/legions/tanks with some optionals like cavalry etc. At sea you can either transport men or be offensive (later you can do both). We found sea battles to be uncommon enough though.

Finance is produced by each city based on how many people are there to be taxed on their work. Get to 20K in gold and build the central bank to win. Sounds easy but its probably the trickiest to do as you need to hobble your science research to generate gold and you cant spend it as you need to hoard it.

Cultural oppression. This is quite fun, you generate culture from the workers in your city and it attracts Great People who can be quite helpful. You can build Wonders of the World and more cities to get to to 20 in total and then build the UN and you win. This approach has the benefit of attracting Great People and thei bonuses, taking over culturally weak cities from a distance (and that can be a very long distance as we found out last night when we found ourselves in charge of a city half a world away and surrounded by rather miffed ex-colleagues.

Space race. Research up to space, build a few bits for your space ship and send it to Alpha Centauri. Pretty straightforward (except for the spaceship building, you have to build its parts as buildings in your cities), this is a long long route to win as you need to research almost everything to get there. Very pretty ending though

to be cont'd

DeV.

DeVore

Verdict: I can see myself playing a good deal of this though I am a bit dissappointed that its not a deeper tactical game in terms of warfare, but that does throw the spotlight on resource management and cultural development. Multiplayer online should be a bit of a laugh but its something that will probably need to be arranged in order to have the time to play rather then having a "quick knockabout".
The reviewer on IGN(?) who said he felt he couldnt win other then going military is a total fool of a Took. In fact I think most games will be won by culture as Military defense far outranks attack and so leads to stalemates a bit (until you get nukes and then its bye bye city).

I paid 55 euro for this and I wont be looking for my money back any time soon. I would have changed a few things with it but while its not perfect its pretty damned good. I can see this replacing Catan for my board games fix in future.

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Strategy Guide:
There are a dozen different valid strats for this game. I'll just outline a few that we used to great effect and a couple of key items you really need to know.

Firstly, before you even pick a race, decide what type of win you want this for the game. It makes a big difference to your game if you have a race which compliments your strat. If you want to go tech you might find the Japs quite useful, or the Indians for example. For military you will find the Romans ability to build roads for cheap to be a big advantage! The germans also are excellent military civs.

When you start, usually you simply build the city where it suggests. Put everything into producing one more citizen and build a warrior if you didnt start with one and you have to build some production. Once you increase the population you should build a warrior and go exploring looking for Redshirts, I mean Barbarians. Their sole purpose in the game is to die at your hands. Use them for quick money and increases to your military skill of your units (units have XP and upgrade as they are used).

We found that building Courthouses massively expanded our cities farming reach and is well worth it. If your city is poor in land, use Aquaducts and Harbours to add farming to the seas (the Japs get this to start with and so expand like bunnies).

Settlers. These things nearly broke my heart. DONT BUILD THEM AT THE START!! It takes 2 workers from your city and makes them into a city-building unit. Since you only start with 4 workers in the beginning, its a neat way to gut your economy at the start and cripple yourself for a while
When you have a few farmers and a research/production or two going, consider making settlers and founding a new city. If you are going tech/culture/finance you need sea areas for research/money, if military then you need forests and hills/mountains for production. Where you place your second city is critical to your strategy at this juncture.

TBC...

DeV.

DeVore

City production. Your city will invariably have more resource areas then people to farm them. You can decide yourself how you want your peons to harvest. Here's my number one tip: Manage them yourself. The default setups are ok but do look at them closely because sometimes the computer will keep a few peons back to harvest production or something when what you REALLY want is everyone to be farming instead!

When placing a settler as a city, ideally you want farms to grow it and production to build buildings near the city, if the outer "ring" of resources can be predominantly the resource you are intending to win by, then all the better. You'll understand when you expand a city with a courthouse.

The right buildings for the right city make huge huge differences and are the key to victory. We had a city producing 1800+ gold last night... when you play the game you will appreciate how insane that is
A well tricked out city will quadruple the output of a badly designed one.

For non-military wins, you need archers/riflemen. Their defence is astounding in cities. If possible run one or two units of them around killing barbarians to get their XP up and then defend your cities with them. They will own.

For military wins, dont try a Zerg-rush fast assault style of start unless you are playing Chieftain or Warlord level. You will be crushed by the dirty cheating computer who will have armies of archers already. Fast-tech up to tanks and legions and then assault. When you DO assault, it should be not with a trickle but with a downpour. Dont send armies in to attack computers in singles or pairs. half a dozen should do (unless you believe you have the evolutionary jump on him in which case harrass him all the time before he researches away your advantage).

Nearly done...

DeV.

DeVore

We rarely sent single units anywhere alone. Most of the time we used armies of them because the grouped power of 3 units in one is hard to resist. There are times when you have a moment to sneak an attack on an enemy at the start perhaps and by all means take it but we found it was worth waiting for an army of the unit most of the time.

Despite what I have written above, you cannot afford to neglect any of the routes (though it must be said that we rarely produced money, opting instead for science in almost every case). You need to favour one line of development without generally wrecking the others. Too little culture and your cities will defect. Too little tech and you will be left in the stone age (literally). Too little production and you will be an easy victim.

So, there you go. Its a complex game which can seem a little confusing at first but is definitely one to stick with if you like board games (and I do!).

DeV.

unklerosco

I take it you really really really like tis game.... nice write up

DeVore

I think I would say that I "really like" it but there are dissappointing things about it too. I think the combat is quite simplistic. Admittedly it keeps it nice and simple so that each game doesnt turn into a big mosh or a "resource and charge" approach of mainstream RTS's like Starcraft.
There is some limited strategy to the war system but dont expect anything sophisticated. The game is sooo broad in its scope that the depth cant be there really.

The UI is "quirky" but manages to remain acceptible. Its sometimes unclear why certain things are happening or what certain research will do for you. The civilopedia is something that was worked on by a separate team, it feels, and put in as a fete accompli. It could have been more integrated with the game in flow.

The movement cursor is sometimes quite confusing and leds to the occasional bout of shouting at the tv when a settler moves to somewhere out in the open war plains where you intended to move your tank army but by and large it works fine.

I cant wait to see how it plays in multiplayer against people here...

DeV.

Gorilla

Definetly picking this up now then. Sounds great, thanks for the thread.

silvine

Sounds good but I take it the PC version is still better?

FreeOSCAR

Great review devore. Helped make up my mind to buy it.

Got it for a nice 44.99 in smyths today (with the loyalty card) and have to stay its very very good. I love the civlopedia and the controls are great.

Ive played boht C&C3 and LOTR BFME on the 360 and I hated them because of the awkardness of it. Anybody thats having two minds about this should get it. Its a nice price for hands down the best console strategy on a console this gen.

Shiminay

Yes and it's got a control system that whilst not 100% there yet, is really, really good and works very well on a console.

However, these sorts of games are never ideal on a console - it's a games platform that lends itself to more casual and quick game play and this game will require an investment of time. That said, I didn't at any time feel like I was just going through the motions, there were always jobs to be done or cities to be defended or taken over.

quarryman

picked this up today. Couldn't decide whether to buy it as I have it on the PC but I always find it hard to invest the time required for a proper play.

I reckoned i needed a CIV 4 "lite" and this seems perfect.

Thanks for the mini review.

quarryman

Ok jumped right into this and selected Play Now!

I was thrown in with 4 other civs. Pretty quickly I took over the Japanese capital. 1/5 for domination victory.

Not long after that I captured another city by culture and then declared war on them and took their capital. I also had built another city so by this stage I was miles ahead of the remaining 2 civs.

Built up my military and by 1890 AD I captured the last capital.

Never even got near the end of the tech tree. Game over, credits rolling.

All over a bit quick. I think the skill level was chieftain but it all seemed a little too easy and I'm not too pushed about going through it all again at a higher skill level.

Is there anything interesting I can try now considering I've rushed through it and finished it in one sitting?

Shiminay

On Chieftan, you really should be able to win one-handed and with your eyes closed. Try the King difficulty level, it's a good, but not impossible challenge as your millitary always seem to be outnumbered and so you'll be defending hard and looking at culturally taking over a few cities etc.

Last night, DeV and I managed an Economic win on King difficulty with just 2 cities. We lost our "palace" city cause we left it undefended for a bit, but took it back with culture. Held oud against a lot of attacks until we could get Fighters and Bombers and then went on the offensive and wiped out all the many many miliatry units camped outside our bases. Once we had them, it was science be-damned and we were generating about 1000 gold per turn (with just 2 cities, I think that's fairly cool ). Then bam, World Bank Wonder and victory.

Single Malt

You never mentioned what naval units actually do. Most cities end up being coastal. If you go domination (or want to put a spanner in the works on another victory), attack coastal cities with support from an army(or two) of battleships, and see how much your attack power is boosted.

Shiminay

Yea, we always forget about that cause we just never seemed to be too stressed about naval battles, but a fleet of Battleships on the doorstep whilst a wing of bombers are attacking might yield interesting results...

NunianVonFuch

Thank you for this thread good sirs! You have persuaded me to try the Demo of this Civilization game! Does that count as a culture win?

Eh? Eh? GEDDIT??? :pac:

I'll go back in my box til I play the demo now...:p

DeVore

I think I may have created The Internet Wonder


Some interesting games lately and some fun things to do! Firstly, if you take a city or build a city, the very first thing you should build are archers (or their equivalent). Nothing says "Welcome to our city" like an arrow in the head.
Second, break down this approach by the judicious use of boats if you are going domination.
Also slurp up any crappy units or barbarians to boost your attacking army, do NOT feed the defending units crap or they will gain XP and be even harder to kill.

The period when you jump techs to something like gunpowder or tanks is when you should strike, not with a drizzle but with a downpour. Get a tank/cannon unit and two archer units (or one if you like) and walk them together over to his city, defend with the archers and go nuts with the tanks.

I've gone on a 3-4 city rampage this way just because the timing was right.

I'll post some suggested *fun* strats next

DeV.

DeVore

Hong Kong? Phooey!

You might not have noticed that the computer is very very relucatant to attack a city straight from the boat. He will always land first. But suppose there was no land??

To build this island fortress, play as they japanese. Start as usual but rush naval. Stick a settler on a boat and find an island exactly 1 square in size and surrounded by water ideally. Land and settle it. Since the japs get +1 food from water (like a harbout gives the others), they can live on the island and grow quite happily. Get a courthouse and watch the science roll in exponentially. I reckon you can break 2k in this city a turn by the end

You will need to ship over some archers for basic defence and a wall to avoid flipping but after that, its an island fortress for a mad scientist.

DeV.

DeVore

Tips:

Talk the other civs about the opponents, they give very detailed information about troop sizes and where great people are based which is gold!

Need Culture? Build a temple, it comes from Ceremonial Burial. (or upgrade it to cathedral after you get Religion).

Need Science? Build a University

Need food? Build a market if you are near plains (yellow squares which give only one food) or build an aquaduct which adds one food to all food squares. My personal favourite is harbour though, as it adds one food to all sea areas. No need to chose between science or population expansion now!

Need military? Here's the build sequence: Bronze working gives you Archers. Iron Working for pikemen. Produce what you can of those and go Pottery, masonry, mathematics (gives catapults for a quick attack), writing (spies) after that head towards gunpowder for riflemen and metalugy for cannon.

I suggest an attack as soon as you have a catapult army, resist the temptation to attack with just one.

Need Money? I found we used money only to get us out of a tight spot. If you do want to get a lot of money, use Banking but otherwise you can follow the strats for science as they expand money more or less the same way.



DeV.

Yo Mamma

Bought this game last week and have not been able to put it down !!

Really enjoying this one !

vasch_ro

The naval units are important to provide naval support for offence or defence,
I have found multiplayer a little dodgy, in that I cannot seem to get into any games or are there any out there ?
There is no doubt it is addictive , just not as deep as Civ PC, anyway if any would like to try CIV Rev multiplayer add me gamertag vaschro, I would love to get a few live games going !!!

DeVore

Will do, I'm DeVoreIE.

Boats are super important when playing the top difficultly, if you allow your big production city to be blockaded you will have to breach it from another city. You can yourself (and I have!) facing 15 boats in your harbour. Worse, if thats your only city, you cant produce boats and so you are fncked basically until you get bombers and thats a long time!

DeV.

Sir Oxman

Addictive as a very addictive thing. Loving it so far (on single player atm)

crazyFeet

does anyone still play this? have this game since it came out, and still play it sometimes but am really board as the computer is easy to beat (last level any strategy any nation). has anyone heard if there is something similar coming out? anything happening in this field of game type at all? you do need a change from shooting and driving sometimes...

Moiph

I have it! Only played it briefly when I picked it up last year though, but I would love to get back into it!

baby and crumble

I love this game, never find anyone online playing it or up for a game though...

monkeyfudge

I still play it a lot. But mostly on the neat little iPad version now.

duploelabs

yeah, my copy craps out on the xbox all the time so I play the iphone version alot

crazyFeet

my new ps3 slim 250 freezez at this game all the time, i mean everytime i play. it does that sometimes in other games but not as ofter, why

allanb49

i'll be up for a game tonight

DeVore

crazyFeet wrote: »

my new ps3 slim 250 freezez at this game all the time, i mean everytime i play. it does that sometimes in other games but not as ofter, why

Points at forum name. "You aint from 'round here, is ya?"


DeV.