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The Original Civilization: Civ 1

Page last updated on 2011 / 12 / 08Civilization (Civ 1) A look at the original version of Sid Meier's Civilization as part of a Civilization 5 fansite.

The original civilization is a classic game for any strategy fan, released in 1991 and setting the design for all future turn-based games. You begin in an era that is considered the dawn of civilization, 4000 B.C., starting with one settlement, with the aim to technically, socially, diplomatically, economically and militarily expand and advance your civilization through the ages as well as repulsing your enemies.

Your goal is the govern the most successful civilization by the end of the game. This may sound simple, but it is the micro-managing of the game from the dawn of civilization to the space age that makes this game so inherently interesting, and the original of a number of successful sequels.

The definition of most successful is defined in three ways:

Game Setting

Beginning at the dawn of civilization, roughly upon the discovery and develpment of agriculture, you choose from one of 16 prominent civilizations who you will lead into an unknown future.

You can choose from a custom map or play the Earth map alongside a number of other customisations:

You will begin with one city or settler who is capable of creating a city, and found the cradle place of its future. Civilization is a turn based game, meaning you make all your decisions one after another and then end the turn when you are finished. Between your turns, leaders, units and cities not belonging to your empire perform their own tasks.

The map that you start on contains various kinds of terrain, much like that of Earth, ranging from ice caps, to grassland, to forests to desert.

Terrain

Terrain and map geography can play a pivotal role in how an instance of Civilization plays out. Having your cities on fertile land is a must for feeding your people and growing your cities, while controlling important bottlenecks on the map can have more political and military orientated ramifications.

Terrain (and transport improvements) also affect the speed at which your units can move through them.

Cities / Settlements

Cities are the home of your empire, and the basis for sustaining and expanding it. The people of your city have to be defended, fed and kept happy, and in return they generate scientific, monetary and production value.

Cities can generate new units and can create buildings and wonders that enhance the city of your entire empire. New buildings and units become available as your technology advances.

Game Units

A number of military and civilian units are available to you throughout the game, depending on the level of your technological advancement. To begin with, your primary units to use are settlers, to colonise new settlements; workers to improveme the nearby land of settlements and connect them with transport; and lastly military/scout units to discover new lands and rivals

As you discover new technologies, further units will be made available to you and make the more primitive units obsolete. It is a novelty of Civilization that a phalanx (spear) unit can go into battle against a tank.

Civ units can traverse either land, air or water, depending on the unit.

Technology

Your cities will generate technological scientific research 'points' that amass to technological discovery. Each technological discovery brings benefits to your civilization, while some grant you new units and buildings.

Keeping apace with your rivals technological achievements is a must to ensure survival, and critical in developing your own cities from small outputs to thriving metropolis.

Finances

Your cities generate money, for which you can devote a percentage of it to scientific research or luxuries to keep your citizens happy. Finances are also required to maintain buildings in the cities of your empire. A part of your role as leader is the manage your economy and balance these three requirements together.

You can also generate trade routes with other cities, further enhancing your economy, and gaining the economic advantage over your neighbours to fasten research and production.

Governance

A range of government types are available taht you can choose from, depending on availability that affect the way your civilization is run.

Diplomacy and Military

With all the above in hand, if you can manage your cities, units, technological research, finances and governance... you may find that a rival civilization finds it appealing and wants to take you over! In these cases, political relationships between civilizations come into play, as does your armies should you be required to defend your lands or even to attack others.

On top of the potential threat of rival civs, barbarians roam the lands and can ruffle the feathers of civilizations by killing units and looting cities. Any strategy you have for Civilization has to have a contingency for marauding barbarians.

Summary

Although the game is 20 years old as of writing, it formed the basis of many a turn-based strategy, including all the sequels to Civ. I have only briefly touched on the macro-economics of the game, which are surprisingly complex for a game that has to run on 640KB of memory.

If you are a serious strategy game player, or new to Civ, trying out the original is a must, even to simply get a grasp of that advancement through time and technological achievement.

Sid Meier's Civilization was warmly received at the time, and evident by the sequels it spawned, highly successful





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