Civilization III
Encyclopedia
Sid Meier's Civilization III, commonly shortened to Civ III or Civ 3, is the third installment of the Sid Meier's Civilization turn-based strategy computer game series. It was preceded by Civilization II
and followed by Civilization IV
. The game offers very sophisticated gameplay in terms of both mechanics and strategy. Unlike the original game, Civ III was not designed by Sid Meier
, but by Jeff Briggs
, a game designer, and Soren Johnson
, a game programmer
.
Civilization III, like the other Civilization games, is based around building an empire, from the ground up, beginning in 4,000 BC and continuing slightly beyond the modern day. The player must construct and improve cities, train military and non-military units, improve terrain, research technologies, build Wonders of the World, make war or peace with neighboring civilizations, and so on. The player must balance a good infrastructure, resources, diplomatic and trading skills, technological advancement, city and empire management, culture, and military power to succeed.
The game map is made up of square tiles on a grid. Each city, terrain improvement, and unit is located in a specific tile, and each tile can host any number of units, land tiles can contain a transportation improvement (road
or railroad) and a land improvement (farm
or mine
)) or a city. Cities must be built a minimum of 2 tiles away from each other (no 2 cities can be touching). Each tile is made of a particular type of terrain that determines, among other things, how much food, production, and trade it produces when "worked". A tile can only be worked if it is one of the 20 tiles surrounding a city, a tile can only be worked by one city at a time, and each city can only work a number of tiles equal to or less than its population.
Food is used to grow the player's cities. Each population unit requires two food units per turn to survive, and excess food is stored. Once the food storage fills up, it is emptied, the city gains a population unit, and the size of the food storage is increased (i.e., a larger amount of food will be required for the city to grow again). Only half of a city's food storage is depleted if the city has a granary
.
Production, represented in the game as "shields", is used to build units, buildings, and wonders.
Commerce powers the player's economy. This commerce is split up as the player sees fit between technological research, tax revenue, and luxuries, each with a different purpose.
Each city's citizens have a certain mood (happy, content, unhappy, or resisting). If there are more unhappy than happy citizens in a city, the city falls into civil disorder
and all production ceases and no food is stored; if a city remains in civil disorder for too long, improvements may be destroyed by the unruly mob. On the other hand, if a city has more happy citizens than content ones, and no unhappy ones, the city will throw a celebration for the ruler called We Love the King Day and economic benefits ensue.
. Only one of each type of building can be constructed in each city.
Civilization III also added Small Wonders, which can be built once by each civilization. Small Wonders have, for the most part, a sociological requirement to construct them, as well as a technological requirement. Battlefield Medicine, for example, requires that five of the player's cities have hospital
s before building, and Wall Street
requires 5 banks in the player's cities in order to begin building.
When a civilization captures a city with a Small Wonder, it is automatically destroyed; World Wonders in captured cities are only destroyed if the city is razed
. If a World Wonder is destroyed, it can never be rebuilt. Some examples of wonders are the Pyramids
, The Great Wall
, and The Colossus
; examples of small wonders are Wall Street
, the Forbidden Palace and The Pentagon
.
The technology tree is divided into four ages (Ancient Age
, Middle Ages
, Industrial Age
, and Modern Age
); each age requires the research of specific technologies to advance to that age. Additionally, there are technologies that are not required to advance to the next age, but which provide useful boni that are often essential for good empire management, or may provide different alternatives to it.
A science slider
is used to allocate money from the economy to scientific research, and can be set at 10% increments. City improvements such as libraries, universities, and research labs also increase scientific research, as do some wonders (such as Newton's University).
Technologies can also be traded to and from other civilizations in return for money, resources, luxury goods or other technologies. Technologies acquired in this way can in turn be exchanged (also called 'technology brokering') for other new technologies by contacting one or more other civilizations. In this way civilizations may, in one turn, experience a considerable jump in their technological development, while others can be left out and disadvantaged.
. There are four kinds in Civ III: Laborers, Entertainers, Tax Collectors and Scientists. All citizens are created as Laborers. Laborers work the land tiles within the city radius to yield food, production, and commerce. A Laborer changed into a specialist reduces yield by removing a Laborer from working a city tile, but increases luxuries, science output, or tax revenue. If there are more citizens in a city than available tiles to work, the extra citizens automatically become Entertainers.
The second expansion, Conquests, adds two new types of citizens to the game: Policemen (reduce corruption) and Civil Engineers (enhance building and wonder production).
One of the primary distinctions between the difficulty levels is the ease with which cities fall into civil disorder. On a given difficulty level, a certain number of citizens are content by default, and all others produced in excess of that number become unhappy. As the difficulty level increases, the number of content citizens decreases from 6 to 1, making city management more difficult and forcing one to sacrifice resources to entertainment, either by having citizens specialize as entertainers (and thus producing no resources) or by detracting much-needed funding from scientific research.
is a feature of Civ III that was not present in previous installments of the franchise. Each city in Civilization III has a cultural rating, which is the city's influence over local terrain. Essentially, the culture's outer edge, or "border", acts as the boundary of each civilization's empire. When a city is created, it has a culture rating of 1, which allows influence over the closest 8 squares only (a sphere of influence 1 square in radius). As the city's culture rating increases, so does its sphere of influence, bringing more territory under the player's control.
In addition to influencing territorial borders, culture serves two other purposes. One is allowing the peaceful takeover, better known as 'culture flipping', of nearby foreign cities by influencing its citizens with another civilization's culture. This 'flipping' could happen in Civilization, but the process is clearer and easier to influence in Civ III. Conquest through culture is arguably preferable to military conquest as it does not affect a civilization's reputation in the global community, and also leaves all of the buildings in the city intact. In addition, a civilization can win the game by having a very strong culture total.
Culture score increases each turn, and is based on what city improvements and wonders, such as a temple or the Hanging Gardens, have been built in that city.
).
Citizens have a nationality based upon the civilization under which they were 'born.' Citizens have a 'memory' of their nationality and will consider themselves members of their previous civilization until they are assimilated
into their new civilization. The time it takes for this change to occur is based upon the relative cultures of both civilizations, taking less time the more the culture of the new civilization is stronger than the previous civilization's. For example, if Persia captures a French
city, its citizens will retain their French nationality until they are assimilated into the Persian culture, although they will live and work under Persian control. Foreign citizens become unhappy if their ruling country is at war with their country of birth and may remain so for some time afterward. This gives recently-captured cities a high potential for rebellion. Otherwise, they are equally productive. Units that are captured, such as workers and artillery, also retain their nationality. Workers are less efficient than 'native' units; they have no upkeep cost, however.
to produce conscript units at the cost of some of the city population. Above regular is "veteran" (with 4 hit points) and finally "elite" (with 5 hit points). If a city has a barracks (or harbor for naval units, or airport for air units), it will produce veteran units instead of regulars.
Each unit has an attack and defense value that is compared against another unit's appropriate value (attack vs defense) to determine the winner of each battle. Certain terrain types, as well as large cities, defending across a river, and fortifying a unit provide additional defensive bonuses (e.g. a mountain has a 100% defensive bonus, so a unit with 3 defense will be considered to have 6 defense when defending on a mountain). Ultimately, a random number generator (RNG) determines the outcome of each battle, so it is therefore possible (although rare) for a Bronze Age Spearman to defeat a Modern Age Modern Armor. This issue was supposedly dealt with in Civilization II
with the addition of firepower and hit points.
Another important aspect of combat is bombardment, which can be done by artillery
units (catapult, trebuchet, cannon, artillery and radar artillery), air units, and more advanced naval units (such as destroyers and battleships). Bombardment can soften a target before it is attacked, and, if attacking a city, may kill some of the population or destroy certain city improvements. Certain units have the ability to kill other units through bombardment (known as "lethal bombardment").
There are also expendable missiles that can only hit a target once but deal greater damage than bombardment:
When an elite unit wins a battle against an enemy unit, there is a small chance that it will produce a Great Leader. A Great Leader has the ability to create an Army
, which has the ability to "load" up to three units (four if the player has built The Pentagon
). An Army fights as one unit and combines the hit points of all the individual units loaded into it. Once units have been loaded into the Army, however, they cannot be removed or upgraded, but they do gain additional battle experience - however, an elite unit in an army cannot generate leaders. A Great Leader can also be used to hurry the building of a project; this is the only way to hurry production of a Great Wonder.
Luxury resources contribute to a civilization's overall happiness; each luxury makes at least one content citizen happy per city. The effects of multiple luxuries of one type do not stack, for example, if a civilization has two wines connected, only one will provide a bonus; the other is available for trading. Building a marketplace greatly increases the effect of luxuries on that city beyond the second luxury. Keeping citizens happy is important and prevents the city from falling into civil disorder
.
Strategic resources are resources required to train certain units or construct certain city improvements or wonders. A certain technology is required to unlock these resources, and they are often necessary for good empire management. Perhaps the most important resource is iron, which is useful from the moment it first appears on the map until the end, as it is a prerequisite for constructing railroads along with coal. Like luxuries, strategic resources do not stack and can be traded.
existed in Civilization I and II, it has been made much more severe in Civilization III. In addition to the commerce-decreasing corruption, Civilization III includes waste (Note: Civ II includes waste as well, but it is considerably less severe), which decreases a city's productivity. The productivity of a city, measured in 'shields', is used to build units, city improvements and wonders, with each unit or structure costing a certain number of shields. Shields can have two colors: blue or red. The blue shields represent actual production, while red ones represent production lost to waste. In general, the farther a city is from the capital, the greater the waste will be. It is not uncommon for far-flung cities to have red shields that far outnumber the blue ones. The levels of corruption and waste are dependent on the system of government of a civilization and the distance the city is away from the civilization's capital city. Uniquely, in the communist system, corruption and waste are essentially spread equally amongst all cities. Also, depending on the map size and difficulty level, each civilization has an "optimal city limit." Once a civilization exceeds this limit, it will also gain corruption and waste overall for every new city it possesses.
There are a number of ways to combat corruption which include building city improvements, such as the courthouse
and the police station
, connecting each city to the civilization's trade network (e.g. roads, a harbor or an airport) and by building two Small Wonders, the Forbidden Palace
and the Secret Police Headquarters
(Communist governments only). Originally these wonders functioned as second palaces in the cities in which they were built, but subsequent patches removed that function for corruption and merely made them reduce overall corruption in every city. Corruption will never reduce shield production to zero.
s and some civilian units) have technology requirements that need to be met before they can be built. Spearmen, for example, need Bronze Working technology.
to Alpha Centauri
to win the game. Unlike the previous two games, however, the player does not decide how many of several different types of components to build, but rather, builds ten specific spaceship parts ranging from Thrusters to the Stasis Chamber to the Interplanetary Party Lounge. The parts may be built in any order the player desires, but the player must first research the required technologies associated with each part. This method of victory favors a player with several powerful cities as the parts cost many shields to produce, and each city can only produce one at a time.
While the previous games had incorporated elements of speed and survival chance (a player could build fewer parts and thus launch sooner, although at increased risk of it not making it to Alpha Centauri), the game is won immediately once the colony ship is launched, the ultimate success of the colony either being assumed or irrelevant.
had but were not included in Civilization III (at least initially) included elevation, a working UN system, a social engineering
system and a 'group movement' command to simplify managing units on the map.
The first patch
came very soon after the game's initial release and other patches were released subsequently, improving gameplay significantly. The patches also managed added certain features, such as the group movement command noted above. There were complaints about the addition of features and bug fixes after initial release. As with all games, the designers of Civilization III had to strike a balance between prompt release on the one hand and optimization of gameplay and the elimination of defects on the other.
Upon release, the reaction to Civilization III was very positive. It won several "Game of the Year" awards such as the Interactive Achievement Awards 2002 Computer Strategy Game of the Year.
Play the World added multiplayer capabilities, eight new civilizations and some new units to the original release.
Conquests offers nine more historical scenarios, ranging from Mesopotamia
to WWII
in the Pacific
. Many of these scenarios have resources, improvements, wonders, music, and even government types that are specific to the scenario, especially the Mesoamerica
n and Sengoku
Japan
campaigns.
The stand-alone version is Civilization III: Complete Edition, which includes the two expansions and several patches. (This version came after Civilization III: Gold Edition and Civilization III: Game of the Year Edition.)
Civilization II
Sid Meier's Civilization II is a turn-based strategy computer game designed by Brian Reynolds, Douglas Caspian-Kaufman and Jeff Briggs. Although it is a sequel to Sid Meier's Civilization, neither Sid Meier nor Bruce Shelley was involved in its development.Civilization II was first released in...
and followed by Civilization IV
Civilization IV
Sid Meier's Civilization IV is a turn-based strategy, 4X computer game released in 2005 and developed by lead designer Soren Johnson under the direction of Sid Meier and Meier's studio Firaxis Games. It is the fourth installment of the Civilization series...
. The game offers very sophisticated gameplay in terms of both mechanics and strategy. Unlike the original game, Civ III was not designed by Sid Meier
Sid Meier
Sidney K. "Sid" Meier is a Canadian programmer and designer of several popular computer strategy games, most notably Civilization. He has won accolades for his contributions to the computer games industry...
, but by Jeff Briggs
Jeff Briggs
Dr. Jeffery L. Briggs is founder and former President and CEO of Firaxis Games, a video game developer based in Hunt Valley, Maryland, United States...
, a game designer, and Soren Johnson
Soren Johnson
Soren Johnson is a video game designer and programmer. He was employed by Firaxis Games from 2000 to 2007, where he co-designed several of their most popular games. Prior to his work at Firaxis, he obtained a BA in history and a master's degree in computer science from Stanford University...
, a game programmer
Game programmer
A game programmer is a software engineer, programmer, or computer scientist who primarily develops codebase for video games or related software, such as game development tools. Game programming has many specialized disciplines all of which fall under the umbrella term of "game programmer"...
.
Civilization III, like the other Civilization games, is based around building an empire, from the ground up, beginning in 4,000 BC and continuing slightly beyond the modern day. The player must construct and improve cities, train military and non-military units, improve terrain, research technologies, build Wonders of the World, make war or peace with neighboring civilizations, and so on. The player must balance a good infrastructure, resources, diplomatic and trading skills, technological advancement, city and empire management, culture, and military power to succeed.
Empire management
Road
A road is a thoroughfare, route, or way on land between two places, which typically has been paved or otherwise improved to allow travel by some conveyance, including a horse, cart, or motor vehicle. Roads consist of one, or sometimes two, roadways each with one or more lanes and also any...
or railroad) and a land improvement (farm
Farm
A farm is an area of land, or, for aquaculture, lake, river or sea, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food , fibres and, increasingly, fuel. It is the basic production facility in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single...
or mine
Mining
Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...
)) or a city. Cities must be built a minimum of 2 tiles away from each other (no 2 cities can be touching). Each tile is made of a particular type of terrain that determines, among other things, how much food, production, and trade it produces when "worked". A tile can only be worked if it is one of the 20 tiles surrounding a city, a tile can only be worked by one city at a time, and each city can only work a number of tiles equal to or less than its population.
Food is used to grow the player's cities. Each population unit requires two food units per turn to survive, and excess food is stored. Once the food storage fills up, it is emptied, the city gains a population unit, and the size of the food storage is increased (i.e., a larger amount of food will be required for the city to grow again). Only half of a city's food storage is depleted if the city has a granary
Granary
A granary is a storehouse for threshed grain or animal feed. In ancient or primitive granaries, pottery is the most common use of storage in these buildings. Granaries are often built above the ground to keep the stored food away from mice and other animals.-Early origins:From ancient times grain...
.
Production, represented in the game as "shields", is used to build units, buildings, and wonders.
Commerce powers the player's economy. This commerce is split up as the player sees fit between technological research, tax revenue, and luxuries, each with a different purpose.
Each city's citizens have a certain mood (happy, content, unhappy, or resisting). If there are more unhappy than happy citizens in a city, the city falls into civil disorder
Civil disorder
Civil disorder, also known as civil unrest or civil strife, is a broad term that is typically used by law enforcement to describe one or more forms of disturbance caused by a group of people. Civil disturbance is typically a symptom of, and a form of protest against, major socio-political problems;...
and all production ceases and no food is stored; if a city remains in civil disorder for too long, improvements may be destroyed by the unruly mob. On the other hand, if a city has more happy citizens than content ones, and no unhappy ones, the city will throw a celebration for the ruler called We Love the King Day and economic benefits ensue.
Improvements
Terrain improvements are built by Worker units. Irrigation increases food, mines increase production, and roads increase commerce and reduce movement costs (to 1/3 of a point) for all allied land units using them. Two civilizations must have Right of passage treaty signed to benefit from each other's roads. Later in the game, the player can build railroads, which provide almost unlimited movement for all allied land units as well as increasing the commerce output of the same tile.Buildings
Buildings enhance a city in some way. Like units and Wonders, each one can only be built when the requisite technology has been acquired. Buildings require financial maintenance each turn, and can be destroyed by many means, including bombardment. Buildings types include granary, barracks, temple, harbor, university, bank, hospital, factory, recycling center, and SAM missile batterySurface-to-air missile
A surface-to-air missile or ground-to-air missile is a missile designed to be launched from the ground to destroy aircraft or other missiles...
. Only one of each type of building can be constructed in each city.
Wonders of the World
As in previous instalments of Civilization, there are unique Wonders of the World that can only be built once per game. Wonders provide a variety of major benefits to a specific city, all cities on a continent or to an entire empire.Civilization III also added Small Wonders, which can be built once by each civilization. Small Wonders have, for the most part, a sociological requirement to construct them, as well as a technological requirement. Battlefield Medicine, for example, requires that five of the player's cities have hospital
Hospital
A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment by specialized staff and equipment. Hospitals often, but not always, provide for inpatient care or longer-term patient stays....
s before building, and Wall Street
Wall Street
Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or...
requires 5 banks in the player's cities in order to begin building.
When a civilization captures a city with a Small Wonder, it is automatically destroyed; World Wonders in captured cities are only destroyed if the city is razed
Demolition
Demolition is the tearing-down of buildings and other structures, the opposite of construction. Demolition contrasts with deconstruction, which involves taking a building apart while carefully preserving valuable elements for re-use....
. If a World Wonder is destroyed, it can never be rebuilt. Some examples of wonders are the Pyramids
Egyptian pyramids
The Egyptian pyramids are ancient pyramid-shaped masonry structures located in Egypt.There are 138 pyramids discovered in Egypt as of 2008. Most were built as tombs for the country's Pharaohs and their consorts during the Old and Middle Kingdom periods.The earliest known Egyptian pyramids are found...
, The Great Wall
Great Wall of China
The Great Wall of China is a series of stone and earthen fortifications in northern China, built originally to protect the northern borders of the Chinese Empire against intrusions by various nomadic groups...
, and The Colossus
Colossus of Rhodes
The Colossus of Rhodes was a statue of the Greek Titan Helios, erected in the city of Rhodes on the Greek island of Rhodes by Chares of Lindos between 292 and 280 BC. It is considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It was constructed to celebrate Rhodes' victory over the ruler of...
; examples of small wonders are Wall Street
Wall Street
Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or...
, the Forbidden Palace and The Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
.
Scientific research
One of the major features of gameplay is scientific research. Completing the research of a new technology will make available new units, city improvements and wonders of the world, as well as special boni and abilities that are related to the technology.The technology tree is divided into four ages (Ancient Age
Ancient history
Ancient history is the study of the written past from the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, with Cuneiform script, the oldest discovered form of coherent writing, from the protoliterate period around the 30th century BC...
, Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, Industrial Age
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...
, and Modern Age
Modern Age
Modern Age is an American conservative academic quarterly journal, founded in 1957 by Russell Kirk in close collaboration with Henry Regnery...
); each age requires the research of specific technologies to advance to that age. Additionally, there are technologies that are not required to advance to the next age, but which provide useful boni that are often essential for good empire management, or may provide different alternatives to it.
A science slider
Slider (computing)
A slider, also known as track bar in Microsoft literature, is an object in a GUI with which a user may set a value by moving an indicator, usually in a horizontal fashion. In some cases the user may also click on a point on the slider to change the setting...
is used to allocate money from the economy to scientific research, and can be set at 10% increments. City improvements such as libraries, universities, and research labs also increase scientific research, as do some wonders (such as Newton's University).
Technologies can also be traded to and from other civilizations in return for money, resources, luxury goods or other technologies. Technologies acquired in this way can in turn be exchanged (also called 'technology brokering') for other new technologies by contacting one or more other civilizations. In this way civilizations may, in one turn, experience a considerable jump in their technological development, while others can be left out and disadvantaged.
Citizens
Citizens are the people who work in a cityCity
A city is a relatively large and permanent settlement. Although there is no agreement on how a city is distinguished from a town within general English language meanings, many cities have a particular administrative, legal, or historical status based on local law.For example, in the U.S...
. There are four kinds in Civ III: Laborers, Entertainers, Tax Collectors and Scientists. All citizens are created as Laborers. Laborers work the land tiles within the city radius to yield food, production, and commerce. A Laborer changed into a specialist reduces yield by removing a Laborer from working a city tile, but increases luxuries, science output, or tax revenue. If there are more citizens in a city than available tiles to work, the extra citizens automatically become Entertainers.
The second expansion, Conquests, adds two new types of citizens to the game: Policemen (reduce corruption) and Civil Engineers (enhance building and wonder production).
Civil Disorder
Civil disorder is caused when more citizens are unhappy than are happy. During Civil Disorder, the city does not create any commerce or production, but food-harvesting continues. Civil Disorder continues until additional sources of happiness are added to the city, or the riots are subdued by reinforcing the military garrison in the cities.One of the primary distinctions between the difficulty levels is the ease with which cities fall into civil disorder. On a given difficulty level, a certain number of citizens are content by default, and all others produced in excess of that number become unhappy. As the difficulty level increases, the number of content citizens decreases from 6 to 1, making city management more difficult and forcing one to sacrifice resources to entertainment, either by having citizens specialize as entertainers (and thus producing no resources) or by detracting much-needed funding from scientific research.
Culture
CultureCulture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
is a feature of Civ III that was not present in previous installments of the franchise. Each city in Civilization III has a cultural rating, which is the city's influence over local terrain. Essentially, the culture's outer edge, or "border", acts as the boundary of each civilization's empire. When a city is created, it has a culture rating of 1, which allows influence over the closest 8 squares only (a sphere of influence 1 square in radius). As the city's culture rating increases, so does its sphere of influence, bringing more territory under the player's control.
In addition to influencing territorial borders, culture serves two other purposes. One is allowing the peaceful takeover, better known as 'culture flipping', of nearby foreign cities by influencing its citizens with another civilization's culture. This 'flipping' could happen in Civilization, but the process is clearer and easier to influence in Civ III. Conquest through culture is arguably preferable to military conquest as it does not affect a civilization's reputation in the global community, and also leaves all of the buildings in the city intact. In addition, a civilization can win the game by having a very strong culture total.
Culture score increases each turn, and is based on what city improvements and wonders, such as a temple or the Hanging Gardens, have been built in that city.
Civilizations
Every civilization starts with certain special abilities, specifically two traits that give them bonuses that help in corresponding areas of gameplay; they also determine what two technologies the civilization begins the game with. Each civilization has a special unit that is unique to their civilization and is typically a slightly improved replacement of a standard unit; these units usually have a historical basis (for example: the Japanese unique unit, which replaces the standard knight, is the samuraiSamurai
is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...
).
| Color | Civilization | Qualities | Starting Advances | Special Unit | Leader | Capital |
| Aztecs | Militaristic, Religious (in Conquests, Agricultural) |
Warrior code, Ceremonial Burial Funeral A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor... |
Jaguar Warrior Jaguar warrior Jaguar Warriors or Jaguar Knights were members of the Aztec military. They were an elite military unit similar to the Eagle warriors. The jaguar motif was used due to the belief that the jaguar represented Tezcatlipoca, god of the night sky. Aztecs also wore these dresses at war because they... (replaces Warrior) |
Moctezuma II Moctezuma II Moctezuma , also known by a number of variant spellings including Montezuma, Moteuczoma, Motecuhzoma and referred to in full by early Nahuatl texts as Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin, was the ninth tlatoani or ruler of Tenochtitlan, reigning from 1502 to 1520... |
Tenochtitlan | |
| Babylon Babylonia Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia , with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as a major power when Hammurabi Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as... |
Religious, Scientific |
Ceremonial Burial Funeral A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor... , Bronze Working Bronze Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal... |
Bowman Archery Archery is the art, practice, or skill of propelling arrows with the use of a bow, from Latin arcus. Archery has historically been used for hunting and combat; in modern times, however, its main use is that of a recreational activity... (replaces Archer) |
Hammurabi Hammurabi Hammurabi Hammurabi Hammurabi (Akkadian from Amorite ʻAmmurāpi, "the kinsman is a healer", from ʻAmmu, "paternal kinsman", and Rāpi, "healer"; (died c... |
Babylon Babylon Babylon was an Akkadian city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad... |
|
| China China Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture... |
Militaristic, Industrious |
Warrior code, Masonry Masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units laid in and bound together by mortar; the term masonry can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are brick, stone, marble, granite, travertine, limestone; concrete block, glass block, stucco, and... |
Rider Horse The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today... (replaces Knight Knight A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior.... ) |
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution... (in the Chinese version of the game- Taizong Emperor Taizong of Tang Emperor Taizong of Tang , personal name Lǐ Shìmín , was the second emperor of the Tang Dynasty of China, ruling from 626 to 649... ) |
Beijing Beijing Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's... |
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| Egypt Ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh... |
Industrious, Religious |
Masonry Masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units laid in and bound together by mortar; the term masonry can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are brick, stone, marble, granite, travertine, limestone; concrete block, glass block, stucco, and... , Ceremonial burial Funeral A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor... |
War Chariot Chariot The chariot is a type of horse carriage used in both peace and war as the chief vehicle of many ancient peoples. Ox carts, proto-chariots, were built by the Proto-Indo-Europeans and also built in Mesopotamia as early as 3000 BC. The original horse chariot was a fast, light, open, two wheeled... (replaces Chariot) |
Cleopatra VII | Thebes | |
| England England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental... |
Expansionist (in Conquests, Seafaring), Commercial |
Warrior code, Alphabet Alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic... |
Man-o-war (replaces Frigate Frigate A frigate is any of several types of warship, the term having been used for ships of various sizes and roles over the last few centuries.In the 17th century, the term was used for any warship built for speed and maneuverability, the description often used being "frigate-built"... ) |
Elizabeth I Elizabeth I of England Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty... |
London London London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its... |
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| France France The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France... |
Industrious, Commercial |
Masonry Masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units laid in and bound together by mortar; the term masonry can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are brick, stone, marble, granite, travertine, limestone; concrete block, glass block, stucco, and... , Alphabet Alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic... |
Musketeer Musketeers of the Guard The Musketeers of the Guard were a fighting company of the military branch of the Maison du Roi, the Royal Household of the French monarchy.-History:... (replaces Musketman) |
Joan of Arc Joan of Arc Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the... |
Paris Paris Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region... |
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| Germany Germany Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate... |
Militaristic, Scientific |
Warrior code, Bronze Working Bronze Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal... |
Panzer Panzer A Panzer is a German language word that, when used as a noun, means "tank". When it is used as an adjective, it means either tank or "armoured" .- Etymology :... (replaces Tank Tank A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities... ) |
Otto von Bismarck Otto von Bismarck Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg , simply known as Otto von Bismarck, was a Prussian-German statesman whose actions unified Germany, made it a major player in world affairs, and created a balance of power that kept Europe at peace after 1871.As Minister President of... |
Berlin Berlin Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union... |
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| Greece Ancient Greece Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the... |
Scientific, Commercial |
Bronze working Bronze Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal... , Alphabet Alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic... |
Hoplite Hoplite A hoplite was a citizen-soldier of the Ancient Greek city-states. Hoplites were primarily armed as spearmen and fought in a phalanx formation. The word "hoplite" derives from "hoplon" , the type of the shield used by the soldiers, although, as a word, "hopla" could also denote weapons held or even... (replaces Spearman) |
Alexander the Great | Athens Athens Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state... |
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| India India India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world... |
Religious, Commercial |
Ceremonial burial Funeral A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor... , Alphabet Alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic... |
War Elephant War elephant A war elephant was an elephant trained and guided by humans for combat. Their main use was to charge the enemy, trampling them and breaking their ranks. A division of war elephants is known as elephantry.... (replaces Knight Knight A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior.... ) |
Mahatma Gandhi | Delhi Delhi Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census... |
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| Iroquois Iroquois The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America... |
Expansionist (in Conquests, Agricultural) Religious (in Conquests, Commercial) |
Pottery Pottery Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery... , Ceremonial Burial Funeral A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor... |
Mounted Warrior (replaces Horseman) | Hiawatha Hiawatha Hiawatha was a legendary Native American leader and founder of the Iroquois confederacy... |
Salamanca Salamanca (city), New York Salamanca is a city in Cattaraugus County, New York, United States, located inside the Allegany Indian Reservation. The population was 6,097 at the 2000 census.-Geography:... |
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| Japan Japan Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south... |
Militaristic, Religious |
The Wheel Wheel A wheel is a device that allows heavy objects to be moved easily through rotating on an axle through its center, facilitating movement or transportation while supporting a load, or performing labor in machines. Common examples found in transport applications. A wheel, together with an axle,... , Ceremonial Burial Funeral A funeral is a ceremony for celebrating, sanctifying, or remembering the life of a person who has died. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead, from interment itself, to various monuments, prayers, and rituals undertaken in their honor... |
Samurai Samurai is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau... (replaces Knight Knight A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior.... ) |
Tokugawa Ieyasu Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan , which ruled from the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Ieyasu seized power in 1600, received appointment as shogun in 1603, abdicated from office in 1605, but... |
Kyoto Kyoto is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:... |
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| Persia | Scientific, Industrious |
Bronze working Bronze Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal... , Masonry Masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units laid in and bound together by mortar; the term masonry can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are brick, stone, marble, granite, travertine, limestone; concrete block, glass block, stucco, and... |
Immortals (replaces Swordsman) | Xerxes I Xerxes I of Persia Xerxes I of Persia , Ḫšayāršā, ), also known as Xerxes the Great, was the fifth king of kings of the Achaemenid Empire.-Youth and rise to power:... |
Persepolis Persepolis Perspolis was the ceremonial capital of the Achaemenid Empire . Persepolis is situated northeast of the modern city of Shiraz in the Fars Province of modern Iran. In contemporary Persian, the site is known as Takht-e Jamshid... |
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| Rome Ancient Rome Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world.... |
Commercial, Militaristic |
Alphabet Alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic... , Warrior code |
Legionary Roman legion A Roman legion normally indicates the basic ancient Roman army unit recruited specifically from Roman citizens. The organization of legions varied greatly over time but they were typically composed of perhaps 5,000 soldiers, divided into maniples and later into "cohorts"... (replaces Swordsman) |
Julius Caesar Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire.... |
Rome Rome Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half... |
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| Russia Russia Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects... |
Expansionist, Scientific |
Pottery Pottery Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery... , Bronze Working Bronze Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal... |
Cossack Cossack Cossacks are a group of predominantly East Slavic people who originally were members of democratic, semi-military communities in what is today Ukraine and Southern Russia inhabiting sparsely populated areas and islands in the lower Dnieper and Don basins and who played an important role in the... (replaces Cavalry Cavalry Cavalry or horsemen were soldiers or warriors who fought mounted on horseback. Cavalry were historically the third oldest and the most mobile of the combat arms... ) |
Catherine II the Great | Moscow Moscow Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent... |
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| United States United States The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district... |
Industrious, Expansionist |
Masonry Masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units laid in and bound together by mortar; the term masonry can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are brick, stone, marble, granite, travertine, limestone; concrete block, glass block, stucco, and... , Pottery Pottery Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery... |
F-15 F-15 Eagle The McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle is a twin-engine, all-weather tactical fighter designed by McDonnell Douglas to gain and maintain air superiority in aerial combat. It is considered among the most successful modern fighters with over 100 aerial combat victories with no losses in dogfights... (replaces Jet Fighter) |
Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and... |
Washington Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution.... |
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| Zululand Zulu Kingdom The Zulu Kingdom, sometimes referred to as the Zulu Empire or, rather imprecisely, Zululand, was a monarchy in Southern Africa that extended along the coast of the Indian Ocean from the Tugela River in the south to Pongola River in the north.... |
Militaristic, Expansionist |
Pottery Pottery Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery... , Warrior code |
Impi Impi An Impi is an isiZulu word for any armed body of men. However, in English it is often used to refer to a Zulu regiment, which is called an ibutho in Zulu. Its beginnings lie far back in historic tribal warfare customs, where groups of armed men called impis battled... (replaces Spearman) |
Shaka Zulu | Zimbabwe Great Zimbabwe Great Zimbabwe is a ruined city that was once the capital of the Kingdom of Zimbabwe, which existed from 1100 to 1450 C.E. during the country’s Late Iron Age. The monument, which first began to be constructed in the 11th century and which continued to be built until the 14th century, spanned an... |
Nationality
Cultural assimilation
Cultural assimilation is a socio-political response to demographic multi-ethnicity that supports or promotes the assimilation of ethnic minorities into the dominant culture. The term assimilation is often used with regard to immigrants and various ethnic groups who have settled in a new land. New...
into their new civilization. The time it takes for this change to occur is based upon the relative cultures of both civilizations, taking less time the more the culture of the new civilization is stronger than the previous civilization's. For example, if Persia captures a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
city, its citizens will retain their French nationality until they are assimilated into the Persian culture, although they will live and work under Persian control. Foreign citizens become unhappy if their ruling country is at war with their country of birth and may remain so for some time afterward. This gives recently-captured cities a high potential for rebellion. Otherwise, they are equally productive. Units that are captured, such as workers and artillery, also retain their nationality. Workers are less efficient than 'native' units; they have no upkeep cost, however.
Combat
Combat is an important aspect of the game, and, although not required to win, it is nearly impossible to go through a full game without experiencing warfare at least once. Each unit begins as a "regular" (with 3 hit points) and can gain experience and be promoted through battles. Below regular is "conscript" (with 2 hit points); barbarian tribes will occasionally generate conscript units, and a city may also institute a draftConscription
Conscription is the compulsory enlistment of people in some sort of national service, most often military service. Conscription dates back to antiquity and continues in some countries to the present day under various names...
to produce conscript units at the cost of some of the city population. Above regular is "veteran" (with 4 hit points) and finally "elite" (with 5 hit points). If a city has a barracks (or harbor for naval units, or airport for air units), it will produce veteran units instead of regulars.
Each unit has an attack and defense value that is compared against another unit's appropriate value (attack vs defense) to determine the winner of each battle. Certain terrain types, as well as large cities, defending across a river, and fortifying a unit provide additional defensive bonuses (e.g. a mountain has a 100% defensive bonus, so a unit with 3 defense will be considered to have 6 defense when defending on a mountain). Ultimately, a random number generator (RNG) determines the outcome of each battle, so it is therefore possible (although rare) for a Bronze Age Spearman to defeat a Modern Age Modern Armor. This issue was supposedly dealt with in Civilization II
Civilization II
Sid Meier's Civilization II is a turn-based strategy computer game designed by Brian Reynolds, Douglas Caspian-Kaufman and Jeff Briggs. Although it is a sequel to Sid Meier's Civilization, neither Sid Meier nor Bruce Shelley was involved in its development.Civilization II was first released in...
with the addition of firepower and hit points.
Another important aspect of combat is bombardment, which can be done by artillery
Artillery
Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons...
units (catapult, trebuchet, cannon, artillery and radar artillery), air units, and more advanced naval units (such as destroyers and battleships). Bombardment can soften a target before it is attacked, and, if attacking a city, may kill some of the population or destroy certain city improvements. Certain units have the ability to kill other units through bombardment (known as "lethal bombardment").
There are also expendable missiles that can only hit a target once but deal greater damage than bombardment:
- Cruise Missiles fire over a short range from land but can be invaluable tools to prevent enemy civilizations from docking or reinforcing. They can be moved across land or by transport ship.
- Tactical Nukes launch over a large range to oblitterate the target, severely reducing population of target cities and also create pollution, aswell as destroying roads and land improvements in the 8 surrounding squares and often turning some tiles into wasteland tiles, with significantly reduced shield, gold and food production. Tactical Nukes can only be moved by land and Nuclear Submarines. They are viewed negatively and their use can cause other civilizations to declare war against the user.
- Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM) are identical to Tactical Nukes but have no limited range can hit any target on the globe. They cannot be moved from the city they are built in unlike Tactical Nukes and Cruise Missiles.
When an elite unit wins a battle against an enemy unit, there is a small chance that it will produce a Great Leader. A Great Leader has the ability to create an Army
Army
An army An army An army (from Latin arma "arms, weapons" via Old French armée, "armed" (feminine), in the broadest sense, is the land-based military of a nation or state. It may also include other branches of the military such as the air force via means of aviation corps...
, which has the ability to "load" up to three units (four if the player has built The Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
). An Army fights as one unit and combines the hit points of all the individual units loaded into it. Once units have been loaded into the Army, however, they cannot be removed or upgraded, but they do gain additional battle experience - however, an elite unit in an army cannot generate leaders. A Great Leader can also be used to hurry the building of a project; this is the only way to hurry production of a Great Wonder.
Resources
In Civilization III, there are three types of resources. Each type of resource can be found only on certain types of terrain and can provide a bonus to food, production, or commerce if found within the city radius and worked by a citizen. Bonus resources exist specifically for this purpose, while luxury and strategic resources provide other benefits as well; luxury and strategic resources may be traded, while bonus resources may not. Resources must be 'connected' to a civilization's infrastructure (via a road or railroad) and must be within that civilization's cultural border to be utilized; a resource outside of the cultural border can still be utilized by connecting a road to it and building a colony (colonies are easily destroyed and are targeted by barbarians, so they must be defended).Luxury resources contribute to a civilization's overall happiness; each luxury makes at least one content citizen happy per city. The effects of multiple luxuries of one type do not stack, for example, if a civilization has two wines connected, only one will provide a bonus; the other is available for trading. Building a marketplace greatly increases the effect of luxuries on that city beyond the second luxury. Keeping citizens happy is important and prevents the city from falling into civil disorder
Civil disorder
Civil disorder, also known as civil unrest or civil strife, is a broad term that is typically used by law enforcement to describe one or more forms of disturbance caused by a group of people. Civil disturbance is typically a symptom of, and a form of protest against, major socio-political problems;...
.
Strategic resources are resources required to train certain units or construct certain city improvements or wonders. A certain technology is required to unlock these resources, and they are often necessary for good empire management. Perhaps the most important resource is iron, which is useful from the moment it first appears on the map until the end, as it is a prerequisite for constructing railroads along with coal. Like luxuries, strategic resources do not stack and can be traded.
Corruption
Though corruptionPolitical corruption
Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...
existed in Civilization I and II, it has been made much more severe in Civilization III. In addition to the commerce-decreasing corruption, Civilization III includes waste (Note: Civ II includes waste as well, but it is considerably less severe), which decreases a city's productivity. The productivity of a city, measured in 'shields', is used to build units, city improvements and wonders, with each unit or structure costing a certain number of shields. Shields can have two colors: blue or red. The blue shields represent actual production, while red ones represent production lost to waste. In general, the farther a city is from the capital, the greater the waste will be. It is not uncommon for far-flung cities to have red shields that far outnumber the blue ones. The levels of corruption and waste are dependent on the system of government of a civilization and the distance the city is away from the civilization's capital city. Uniquely, in the communist system, corruption and waste are essentially spread equally amongst all cities. Also, depending on the map size and difficulty level, each civilization has an "optimal city limit." Once a civilization exceeds this limit, it will also gain corruption and waste overall for every new city it possesses.
There are a number of ways to combat corruption which include building city improvements, such as the courthouse
Courthouse
A courthouse is a building that is home to a local court of law and often the regional county government as well, although this is not the case in some larger cities. The term is common in North America. In most other English speaking countries, buildings which house courts of law are simply...
and the police station
Police station
A police station or station house is a building which serves to accommodate police officers and other members of staff. These buildings often contain offices and accommodation for personnel and vehicles, along with locker rooms, temporary holding cells and interview/interrogation rooms.- Facilities...
, connecting each city to the civilization's trade network (e.g. roads, a harbor or an airport) and by building two Small Wonders, the Forbidden Palace
Forbidden City
The Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty. It is located in the middle of Beijing, China, and now houses the Palace Museum...
and the Secret Police Headquarters
Secret police
Secret police are a police agency which operates in secrecy and beyond the law to protect the political power of an individual dictator or an authoritarian political regime....
(Communist governments only). Originally these wonders functioned as second palaces in the cities in which they were built, but subsequent patches removed that function for corruption and merely made them reduce overall corruption in every city. Corruption will never reduce shield production to zero.
Units
Units can be soldiers or civilian units. Civilian units include workers, heroes, and settlers. All units (except for warriorWarrior
A warrior is a person skilled in combat or warfare, especially within the context of a tribal or clan-based society that recognizes a separate warrior class.-Warrior classes in tribal culture:...
s and some civilian units) have technology requirements that need to be met before they can be built. Spearmen, for example, need Bronze Working technology.
Attack and Defense Rating
All units have attack and defense ratings. The spearman, for example, has an attack rating of 1 and a defense rating of 2. This means that the spearman is better at defending than attacking.Unit Experience
All units have levels of experience, which affect the game in terms of their durability in combat. Each unit has a certain number of hit points appearing in its vertical health bar. When all of its points are lost, the unit dies; thus a unit with more hit points has a better chance of surviving any given battle. The different experience levels are listed below:- A conscript unit has the least experience. Only barbarians, either hostile ones or those that have joined a nation's army, and units drafted from cities are conscripts. Conscript units have two hit points.
- A regular unit is also not very experienced, but they are much better than conscripts. Regular is the default level of experience for all units produced by a civilization in the normal fashion. Regular units have three hit points.
- A veteran unit is moderately experienced. Veterans can be produced by either building the unit in a city that has built the Barracks improvement, or from regular units that are victorious in battle. Veteran units have four hit points.
- An elite unit is extremely experienced. Elite units are only formed from veteran units that are victorious in battle. An elite unit that produces a Leader (see Combat) may be renamed by the player and is thereafter designated as an "Elite*" unit (rather than merely "Elite"); however, this has no effect on the unit's competency in battle. Elite units have five hit points.
Victory conditions
There are several ways to win the game, some of which recur from the previous Civilization games. A player needs to meet only one of the victory conditions to win a game. They can each be enabled or disabled when setting the game rules at the beginning of a new game (except for the histograph victory).Conquest
One of the most straightforward of the victory conditions, a Conquest victory is achieved when no civilizations besides the player's exist, a civilization being eliminated when its last city is captured or destroyed. Despite the simplicity of concept, Conquest can be difficult to achieve as other civilizations will, naturally, resist. Along these lines, there is the "settler on a boat" problem, in which the final conquered civilization places a settler unit on a boat and takes to the high seas. The player then spends centuries tracking this boat down. Another difficulty is that Domination (below) is almost always achieved long before Conquest could be achieved, unless the Domination option has been disabled, or if the player razes most of the opponent's cities rather than capturing them.Domination
A player wins a Domination victory by controlling two thirds of the world's land and population. 66% of the world's land area must be within the civilization's cultural borders, and 66% of the world's population must reside within the civilization's cities. Exactly how the player achieves these two conditions is irrelevant and largely open-ended; any method of achieving the two conditions triggers the victory.Cultural
By having a culture so powerful that its civilization controls the world through others' longing to be a part of it, a player can win a Cultural victory. The Cultural victory is achieved when either one city the player controls has 20,000 or more culture points, or if the entire civilization meets a certain threshold (100,000 on a Standard map) and has at least double that of any other culture. The latter is more difficult as it is unlikely that any of the other nations will have less than half of the player's total rating unless they have been weakened by war.Diplomatic
By building the United Nations wonder, a civilization opens the possibility of a Diplomatic victory. The civilization that built it will be periodically offered the opportunity to hold elections for U.N. Secretary General. To be eligible for election, a civilization must control 25% of either the world's population or its territory, although the civilization that actually built the UN is always automatically a candidate. If there are no qualified candidates other than the one who built the UN, the civilization with the next highest population is put on the ballot. The civilization with a majority of the possible votes wins the election, and therefore the game. Because the player's reputation matters a great deal to the voting AI civilizations, it is of paramount importance to a player seeking a Diplomatic victory to maintain a trustworthy status throughout the game.Space Race
Just as in the previous two games, a civilization not seeking domination through world conquest can build and send a colony spaceshipStarship
A starship or interstellar spacecraft is a theoretical spacecraft designed for traveling between the stars, as opposed to a vehicle designed for orbital spaceflight or interplanetary travel....
to Alpha Centauri
Alpha Centauri
Alpha Centauri is the brightest star in the southern constellation of Centaurus...
to win the game. Unlike the previous two games, however, the player does not decide how many of several different types of components to build, but rather, builds ten specific spaceship parts ranging from Thrusters to the Stasis Chamber to the Interplanetary Party Lounge. The parts may be built in any order the player desires, but the player must first research the required technologies associated with each part. This method of victory favors a player with several powerful cities as the parts cost many shields to produce, and each city can only produce one at a time.
While the previous games had incorporated elements of speed and survival chance (a player could build fewer parts and thus launch sooner, although at increased risk of it not making it to Alpha Centauri), the game is won immediately once the colony ship is launched, the ultimate success of the colony either being assumed or irrelevant.
Histograph
The histograph provides a relative indicator of each civilization's score, power, and culture at any given time. When the game timer runs out (at the year 2050 AD by default) if no civilization has met any of the other victory conditions, the civilization with the highest score wins the game. (The player may continue the game beyond this point, but no additional score is counted.) A civilization's score is calculated based on its number of happy citizens, its number of content and specialist citizens, its territory, and any future technology researched beyond the normal technology tree. Each of these factors is weighted, and the score is the sum of weighted numbers. A civilization's overall score (which is the one that matters for histographic victory) is the average of its scores for all the turns.Reception
The initial release of the game had some bugs and glitches. Some of the features that Sid Meier's Alpha CentauriSid Meier's Alpha Centauri
Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri is the critically acclaimed science fiction 4X turn-based strategy video game sequel to the Civilization series. Sid Meier, designer of Civilization, and Brian Reynolds, designer of Civilization II, developed Alpha Centauri after they left MicroProse to join the newly...
had but were not included in Civilization III (at least initially) included elevation, a working UN system, a social engineering
Social engineering (political science)
Social engineering is a discipline in political science that refers to efforts to influence popular attitudes and social behaviors on a large scale, whether by governments or private groups. In the political arena, the counterpart of social engineering is political engineering.For various reasons,...
system and a 'group movement' command to simplify managing units on the map.
The first patch
Patch (computing)
A patch is a piece of software designed to fix problems with, or update a computer program or its supporting data. This includes fixing security vulnerabilities and other bugs, and improving the usability or performance...
came very soon after the game's initial release and other patches were released subsequently, improving gameplay significantly. The patches also managed added certain features, such as the group movement command noted above. There were complaints about the addition of features and bug fixes after initial release. As with all games, the designers of Civilization III had to strike a balance between prompt release on the one hand and optimization of gameplay and the elimination of defects on the other.
Upon release, the reaction to Civilization III was very positive. It won several "Game of the Year" awards such as the Interactive Achievement Awards 2002 Computer Strategy Game of the Year.
Critics' scores
| Publication | Score |
|---|---|
| GameSpot GameSpot GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which... |
9.2/10 |
| IGN IGN IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment... |
9.3/10 |
| Game-Revolution | A- |
Expansions
Two expansion sets have been published for Sid Meier's Civilization III: Play the World, and Conquests.Play the World added multiplayer capabilities, eight new civilizations and some new units to the original release.
Conquests offers nine more historical scenarios, ranging from Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...
to WWII
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
in the Pacific
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
. Many of these scenarios have resources, improvements, wonders, music, and even government types that are specific to the scenario, especially the Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and...
n and Sengoku
Sengoku period
The or Warring States period in Japanese history was a time of social upheaval, political intrigue, and nearly constant military conflict that lasted roughly from the middle of the 15th century to the beginning of the 17th century. The name "Sengoku" was adopted by Japanese historians in reference...
Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
campaigns.
The stand-alone version is Civilization III: Complete Edition, which includes the two expansions and several patches. (This version came after Civilization III: Gold Edition and Civilization III: Game of the Year Edition.)
External links
- Official Civilization III website
- Civilization III on MobyGamesMobyGames-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...