Civilization II (Mac)

As you can see from the name, the game is completely free. It is very easy to find on the Internet. It's made to be able to play on Linux, Mac and Windows, and therefore open to a wide range of people. The game is modelled from the games Civ 1, Civ 2 and Civ Net the game series made by Sid Meier from Microprose. This game can also be played in single player offline, against the computer, as well as multi-player online, against human players.

Each players aim is to rule the land by destroying their opposition, in a turn based, Command and Conquer like strategy way. To do this the player would have to build up their armies with a limited amount of money. Also with the money in hand, research has to be done to enable the levels to advance and therefore become more powerful. If the money runs low then taxes can be made to bring in money however put them too high and your people will not be happy. A way round this is to offer them entertainment so that they feel better and enjoy life in your world. Another thing is to keep an eye on food levels so that the people can eat, different worlds will offer different food levels, so be aware as not to build towns close together as food will run low. A range of land, air and sea units have to be positioned in order to out manoeuvre your opponent(s) and gain a tactical advantage so that you have the upper hand to go in for the kill.

Okay so I have told you a bit about the game and it sounds really easy right? Wrong! I like games where I can turn them on and then play it, with this game you would have to read all the tutorials in order to understand what you where doing. Finding out what to do is really quite difficult because of all the variations in what you can do. EG Have low taxes, so the people like it but then this would make it more difficult to expand on your civilisation because minimal amounts of money would be available to you. Alternatively put the taxes up to a high price but people will not like it and then turn against you, but then you can put on entertainment to increase their happiness. On the other hand a good thing about this game is that there are many things you can do, and therefore people who like the game can really get involved as a leader of their civilisation.

Overall I can say that I don't like this game much, the reason is that you feel too much of a beginner, as there is massive amounts of information to take on board. However I would also say that for those people who like this sort of game, and could learn the different things to do would probably get deeply involved and enjoy it more.