Sid Meier's Civilization is an excellent franchise based on strategy at it's core element. The franchise was given birth by the release and launch of this first version within the franchise. in this game you assume the role as the endless leader for one of 14 unique Civilizations. As ruler, you have absolute control over most elements in the game including; Military, War, Building, Movement, Government, Science, Taxes and more. It's up to you to manage your Nation and lead your people to power. Unlike newer versions of the game, you can finish the game in 3 methods; Destroy enemy nations, Win the Space Race or run out of time. How will you conquer the world? Only the best games stand the Test of Time and Civilization is one of them.

Overall: 8.3
I love the Civilization franchise and even though I love the franchise in it's entirety, Civilization of the SNES is not one of the better versions of the game. There are many great things to appreciate from this game because it paved a road for success for future versions. What I liked most about the game is the ability to win the game in different ways. You can race to complete a spaceship, dominate your opponents or wait out til the end of the game, which I believe ends in 2020. Unfortunately, the graphics lacked quite a bit in the way of creativity. As much as I appreciate a good strategy game, I have enjoyed better music and sounds too. As you progress into the game, you have more cities to manage and more units to control. Knowing that it takes longer to control these aspects, you are listening to the sounds and music much longer. If these aspects were fixed, this could easily be higher on my list of great games.

Graphics: 6
Like previously stated, the graphics lack in many ways. The capabilities of the SNES well exceeded what could have been done on this console. Knowing that they made the game in DOS, didn't help Civilization stand out as a greater Strategy Game during it's time. What I disliked most about the graphics had more to do with the units. The units take on a square block, which lacks for creativity overall.. I didn't necessarily mind that the units were in a square format, but it doesn't make for much variety. Even the outer colors in the block would be changed to represent the differently colored Civilizations.

Another aspect of the graphics I disliked had more to do with the shape and size of the lands. Playing in Earth mode was generally the same outcome every time you played it but there were few slight changes that could make it feel different. It didn't actually make enough of a change to create unique "Earths". One thing that could have been done better was to change the layout of the land a lot more. In every Earth game, the rivers are always in the same locations and most mountains are generally the same. It doesn't change the shape of the land by much, a few squares if lucky. In custom world you're able to change the layout of the land but often times you might find yourself in crappy land layouts that aren't worth wasting your time on. Every now and then, in the less mountain age with plenty of rivers, you might find a good chunk of land and great city locations.

One thing I liked about the animation was the effort put into showing the buildings after they've been built. With that said, I can also say I liked the animation on the Riots / Thanksgiving festivals. but I disliked that there wasn't more to it. Some random events would occur and there was no animation to represent that event. They could have easily added a pirate attack, flooding, earthquake and volcano to represent that event.

Sound: 5
Even though I rated the sound a 7, I couldn't quite find myself caring for some of the effects and music. The last era (when the arrows turn red) has the best music associated with the game but that's probably not getting on your nerves because you've waited through hundreds of turns to get to that point. The other eras in the game get noisy at times and it doesn't really aid the overall gameplay. The sound effects are definitely one of the lesser aspects of this part. You will constantly hear the attacking effect or the moving effect (Very numerous) and it does seem to be a little much. When your turns take several minutes to play, you'll probably have many units to move. There was never any need to have that sound effect for each unit that moves. I could have easily done without that sound effect. I would recommend playing this game with your own music or none at all. Sound is easily disappointing.

Addictiveness: 9
Strategy gamers, like myself, should have no problem getting into a Civilization game, especially those of you who are familiar with Civilization. The game offers a lot to manage and you have some strategies (not many) that will change the way you play the game. Having different win methods encourages you to try to play the game differently. Like most strategy games, you will probably want to destroy the enemies because that's usually why strategy gamers play these types of games. These other methods to play just add to the overall enjoyment and experience.

One aspect that makes the game worth playing repeatedly is by using the custom world feature that Civilization designers are notorious for. This allows you to play many different worlds and in many different ways. Some worlds might be more island based, so you'll play more naval based. Other worlds might be Pangaea based and offer a single large multi continent land mass but with smaller islands. The differences in the options helps make up for the lack of creativity in the graphical and musical aspects of the game. You can easily find yourself repeatedly playing this game to best a high score or get more population or playing on a harder difficulty.

Story: 3
The Story gets a really low score due to the fact that there really isn't much of a story, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing either. Before you actually play the game, there is a story about the evolution of the planet. I count this toward the overall story even though it really isn't. It's somewhat informational based. When you actually play the game, your story is entirely based on what you as a leader do. Your history doesn't get written down or anything, but you can do things differently each time you play. In one sense you can imagine that if the people of your nation was real, you would make it into the history books. Who knows?



Depth: 10
In comparison to the Strategy element built on the SNES interface, there is a great attention to detail for the amount of depth presented in this game. Most Strategy based games focus on this aspect quite well. Considering your ability to manage your nation, you're able to choose many options to change how you play the game. First of all, you're able to change the design and layout of your world. This helps make the game feel like a different game every time you play. Second of all, you're able to choose between 14 nations to play as.

These nations are; English, Greek, Roman, Russian, Egyptian, Aztec, Babylon, Japan, American, Chinese, French, German, India and Mongolia.

Although you have the option to choose between these 14 nations, they are all paired with another nation which represent a single color. In other words, you might choose to play as the English so you're never see the Greek in your game. If you choose the English and Romans appear, you'll never see Russia. This prohibits certain nations from making an appearance. If you were to destroy a nation, the other color of that nation may appear elsewhere in the world. One time, I destroyed a nation and a new nation appeared in the same area multiple times. I obliterated 6 nations in 6 turns simply because settlers wouldn't cease to appear in the area.

Other aspects relate entirely to your management of your nation. You can collect taxes which can be used to purchase buildings and maintain them or you can collect science which is spent on technology. You have the ability to overthrow your government and choose other types of government that come with different abilities to help your nation grow. For example: Monarchy increases food outcome of select tiles by 1 but costs you 2 food per settler and more materials spent on your units. Democracy has zero rate of corruption, material spent per a turn per unit, 2 food spent per turn for a settler but increases every square with a trade symbol by 1. Essentially, you'll need to get familiar with each government to decide what is right for you and when.

You're also able to control your units, decide what to construct (Units, Buildings and Wonders) and negotiate peace with enemy nations. Depending on what your goals are, you'll need to balance everything, otherwise you'll fall behind in the competition and your enemy may overwhelm you. Having the ability to choose your difficulty makes the game interesting. The AI will often demand a tribute from you and surprise attack you when you choose a harder difficulty like King or Emperor. Knowing that it's war based, you'll want to be on top of your military to ensure you don't lose anything important. Last thing to note is the quantity of units, buildings and wonders. Unlike other SNES games, you don't have depth quite like you have in Civilization.

Difficulty: 8
I've played and completed the game on all difficulties. The easier difficulty, Chieftain, makes the game very easy to play, with little AI aggression. This is great for learning the game but the lack of pressure doesn't actually encourage growth. Warlord and Prince will sometimes remove the second settler you get in the beginning and add AI pressure. Some AI owned cities will often be built towards your civilization to prevent your expansion. They'll also tend to build extra troops and few buildings. They do like to declare war on each other from what I've seen. In King and Emperor difficulties, the AI will research technology at a greater speed and sometimes be quite difficult to contend with. Certain civilizations will often produce many units and surprise attack you often. Taking on this challenge will need you to play similar to the enemy due to their bonus tech research. The overall difficulty doesn't make the game ridiculous to play but it will present a well balanced learning curve when you take on the next challenge.

Conclusion
Fans of Civilization should appreciate this first part of the game's franchise. This birth paved a way to greater versions of the game. Civilization is an addictive addition to any strategy gamer's collection and should be played with caution against the graphics or sound. Certain aspects of the game could have been improved to really make this game stand out. Unfortunately, it's safe to say that no matter what drawback you find in Civilization, you'll enjoy the game nonetheless. I played this game many times as both a child and adult. I enjoy it and I always come back to every now and then to keep my skills sharp. Civilization is a must try if you're looking for something easy going that you can play at your pace.

I've played a lot of strategy games, and didn't like most of them, but somehow I was able to skip this game without ever knowing of its existence.
From what you said, this game looks really fun, aside from the graphics, which are never really that important, and the sound, which are adjustable through volume control. lol.
After reading your review, I watched some videos of it on Youtube, and you, as well as the videos, have persuaded my to test out this game.
It looks great

Wow, this is a really nice review. I fully agree with it.

Part 2 of the series was my first Civilization title, and it's depth was really impressive for a game of this period.
As far as I can read out of your review, it might be quite the same with the first Civilization, so I'll give it a try ...

Thx for picking such a great game, hehe ...

The game sounds like some fun. I'm not a big fan of Civilization in general, but this game sounds a bit promising. I'll check it out.

Awesome review, man. Keep it up

Not a bad review.
I personally only own 1 civilisations game, revolutions.
While that was good the fact it made you visit every territory and army on the start of your turns drove me crazy.
I did buy a 2 pack for pc but annoyingly the disk was damaged.
Im surprised at the average rating since the civilisation series is generally quite popular, if not for that i might have tried it in the hopes it was less annoying than revolutions.

The civilization series is really fun, providing you're a strategist and enjoy micromanaging your civilization in every way! It really surprises me how far technology advances the quality of sound, graphics and control but not so much game play. Civilization is one of those games that's always maintained the same game play despite technological advances. In other words, this game is just the simple version of Civ 5. Not too keen on the idea of spending $50 on every new release but it's worth it haha.

Thank you for the replies and ratings.

Personally, my favorite of the series is Civilization 2: Test of Time. On that PC game you had the ability to choose different worlds. You could play the normal mode where you have all regular technologies and troops similar to the first game "Civilization" or choose 1 of 3 other modes.

Original Mode: Normal Game
Extended Original: Normal Game + Alien Race and second world to explore
Fantasy Realm: Elves, Goblins, Humans, Mermaids, Infidels, Buteos (Race that lives in the clouds). 4 worlds to explore and some races have access to 2 at start.
Science Fiction: My favorite. You can play as the human race who crashed onto a world or alien race. You get 4 whole worlds to explore and it's a race to each one.

This game is very unique and I wish they remade Civ 2:Test of Time.

Civilization games in general are really similar to the Sims game. I mean yeah it has a big difference in some points, but in general they feel the same. Anyways, yeah the game isn't what I usually play, but its not bad, I guess.