OT - Civ 3 anybody?

[Menschenfresser]

I agree, the AI does some pretty cool things. My first game is on the easiest level, with max amount of civs. I started on what seems to be a narrow but long (north to south) continent. Germans to the north, French to the south. Their borders extend across the continent so I cannot expand any further.

I noticed that as I moved fighting units near to another civs borders, they would immediately mass a group of units just inside their border.

And I cannot get a fair trade out of these bastard AIs. They always want about 150% the value of what I am requesting.

Yes, if you still play 2 occasionally, get 3. Think of it as an expensive and worthy upgrade. If you have no real use for 2 anymore, then keep weighing the consequences. It is definitely (so far) not worse than its predecessors...question is, is it better?

[chewy027]

ok now that i've played a few games i have a better feel for it. along with what i posted before here are some other things. The AI is a lot better than i thought. It expands so fast and builds up real quickly. It uses every diplomatic feature available effectively like making mutual protection pacts and embargoes and trades frequently. Very tough. And thats just on the easiest level. Plus it will build up a large army and attack all out if it declares war on you. You can sometimes catch em off guard but expect a huge retaliatory offensive in return unless of course you have lots of allies to attack simultaneously. Likewise, expect your enemies to grow very quickly as the AI will seek out allies to attack you. Very smart. Again this is all on the easiest level. As of right now my only gripe is that once you get into a game the turns can take a while to process. Of course i have been playing on a huge map with all 16 civs so thats part of the problem.

All in all I say get this game

[Atrocities]

How would you rate the game on a scale of 1 to 10?

Assuming that SEIV is a solid 10

[Puke]

i dont think thats a fair rating system. C3 falls into a brutally over-done genre. it should be measured against games of the same type, such as civ 1, 2, call to power, SMAC, etc, etc, etc, ad nausium. while you can compare features and game play with those other titles, you also begin to realize that the biggest failing of C3, no matter how good it is, is that its basically more of the same.

that entire line needs a genre-breaking title, and they have not had one since the original civ.

in my oppinion, the same is true of RTS games, from dune-2 all the way through C&C-25 (or whatever the hell they are up to now). the 3D space RTS games (homeworld and friends) were neat for a while, until you realize that the gameplay is EXACTLY the same. harvest, build, kill, repeat.

------------------
"...the green, sticky spawn of the stars"
(with apologies to H.P.L.)

[chewy027]

Puke's right, not the same kind of game, but i will say i haven't played se4 the past few days and thats a first in about 5 months .

It's better than the call to powers. IMO has a better diplomatic model and the AI is a lot smarter. Also it has some cool features like culture, resources, and great leaders (which are hard to come buy). Anyway in this genre i give it a 9.5. Why the .5 lacking you ask. Well as puke said there is a lot of the same, but the aforementioned features make up for that. They probably could have added some more techs and wonders, but then it would have gotten to much like call to power II. Anyone else have an opinion? I've rambled enough

[Cyrien]

I tend to like it. I havn't played SE4 for a couple of days either.

My biggest gripes are smaller things. The way nukes (as far as I have noticed with the tacticals I used) don't seem to harm units at all. Though they do massive damage to the surrounding tiles.

The way smaller units still seem to have little enough trouble taking out obviously better units. I have had nuclear subs taken out by frigates and ironclads... That just isn't realistic at all.

The AI is the games strongest point. In my first game I wound up being responsible for WWI because of several failed spy operations on a neighboring empire (the aztecs).

To give a bit of a feel for the game I will do a small story of how it went.

See the attachement. It got too large.


The way air units and cruise missiles work is also much better. As is the way that nukes are used and the level of customizability when making your world in the game.

I would say it's a good buy if you liked Civ2.

[This message has been edited by Cyrien (edited 09 November 2001).]

Correction to statement above about nukes. They don't suck as much as I thought. I checked a saved game just before I launched the nuke again and about 9 out of the 20 cavalry where killed, while the rest seem to have taken some damage. Hard to tell since the least damaged goes to the top of the stack and he didn't take any damage it seems.

[This message has been edited by Cyrien (edited 09 November 2001).]

[Phoenix-D]

"They don't suck as much as I thought. I checked a saved game just before I launched the nuke again and about 9 out of the 20 cavalry where killed, while the rest seem to have taken some damage."

Please tell me that wasn't horse-mounted calvary.

Phoenix-D