Sid Meier's Civilization Series

Published: 31 Aug 2024
Last updated: 1 Sep 2024

Sid Meier’s Alpha Centauri

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri Steam banner

Quite often checking out games without having the benefit of growing up with them/nostalgia can be very difficult, games evolve in both raw mechanics and in presentation - and what was standard or even groundbreaking back then… often don’t survive 20+ years of age. That’s not unique to games, but given the relative newness of computers as a whole it certainly affects them more than most. Old Civilization games certainly do suffer in their clunkiness, and Alpha Centauri is no exception - however to point out an old game is, in fact old and clunky nowadays, feels like missing the point.

The real reason to check this out, and why this game remains a cult classic to this day is the beautiful exploration of hard science fiction. Very few games have so whole-heartedly created a vision for the future of mankind as ambitious as Alpha Centauri has. This is not so much a statement of “Alpha Centauri is all style over substance”, its that the style is presents is both ridiculously good and totally inseparable from Alpha Centauri’s substance.

The 7 distinct factions all split with distinct political ideologies and with their own philosophical ideas on how to run civilisation. The initial battle of survival, grappling with the very alien nature of “Planet” and the horrible Mind Worms. Unlocking near-future technology to begin thriving and exploiting the Planet for resources, research and military. Engaging diplomatically with other factions that align with your ways of thinking, and waging conflict with those that politically oppose you. Fighting Planet itself as you continue to exploit and terraform causing ecological damage, leading to increased and aggressive alien activity. Perhaps even an atrocity such as nerve stapling on the way to keep the people in check. All in the pursuit in transcendence.

Its all wrapped up in some superb flavour, with great writing and voice acting and music to bring everything to life, be it the good, the bad or the horrifying. Its a game worthy of its high praise because of its ambition and unique themes that really have yet to be matched elsewhere in a 4X game, and judging by the reputation of Civilization: Beyond Earth, one doesn’t hold out much hope of another Alpha Centauri suddenly emerging from the shadows - so one feels compelled to sing the praises of this game to anyone and everyone willing to listen.

Sid Meier’s Civilization 4

Sid Meier's Civilization 4 Steam banner

No question my favourite and the best mainline Civilization game in the series - and a accumulation of all the good ideas generated from Civ 1 thru 3 (whilst culling quite a lot of the bad ones!) distilled into one excellent package. Subsequent sequels 5 and 6 do their own interesting thing, and I certainly admire attempts to mine new depths, but I have personal disagreements (mainly 1UPT to be fair) that prevent my from sinking too much time into them. Civ 4 ends up sitting in the perfect goldilocks zone for me.

Pretty much all of the overarching mechanics work well and are surprisingly un-wonky for how complex they all are (compare to Civ 3, where nonsensical game rules are strewn throughout), and the “Cities cost maintenance, Buildings are free” approach to limiting endless expansion should never have been abandoned in subsequent games. That combined with a serviceable AI (doomstacks, love ’em or hate ’em, do a lot to help AI’s out with conquering), nicely transparent diplomacy and a really well constructed tech tree make this game still fun to play after thousands of hours into the game.

Its certainly not perfect, there are weak points/‘one right plays’ present (e.g. Slavery Civic being mandatory for high-level play, Great Lighthouse busted on high-water maps, mass tech trading if enabled etc.) and games can still be a slog to end due to some lacking automation and too-high victory requirements - but honestly? These complaints are not new to the 4X genre, and with the game old enough to have abundant modding effort poured into it, the game has never been in a better state than now.