X-COM: Apocalypse is a sequel to X-COM: Terror from the Deep, and is the third entry in the X-COM series. It is a real-time / turn-based strategy game that features a mix of research, resource management, macro tactical combat, and micro tactical combat. Play X-COM: Apocalypse online!
X-COM: Apocalypse game description
At the city screen, the player controls vehicles to engage the threats (everything from rival factions to alien UFOs). If a UFO has landed or infiltration has been reported, the vehicles will land/dock at the infestation site and engage in tactical combat with the equipment at hand. Once the player managed to capture aliens and alien equipment, the scientists can research and perhaps even copy them for the player’s use.
Things have not gone well since the last Alien War. The world resources have been exhausted, and most of the population have been concentrated into the last hope: Mega-Primus, a self-sufficient city. Things are starting look good until a strange portal opened in the sky, and UFOs emerged from it. It seems that the X-COM is needed again.
The player will also need to balance the budget as everything costs money, from agents to equipment. The various human factions must be kept happy, otherwise they might turn against the X-COM. The player must hire recruits, buy weapons, ammo, and equipment to outfit his squads in the vehicles (including weapons on the vehicles and their ammo). The management mode for tracking down UFOs is called the Cityscape; combat takes place in a separate environment, the Battlescape, where the player engages the individual aliens that managed to escape.
Differences from the previous games in the series include reworked graphics, larger maps, a more complex world, and the possibility of choosing between real-time or turn-based tactical combat. Also, instead of just engaging aliens, the player will also have to deal with multiple human factions, from a cult that worships alien invaders to gangs, from industrial giants to security forces.
Play X-COM: Apocalypse online
You can play X-COM: Apocalypse online here, in web browser for free!
Castles II: Siege & Conquest
Master of Magic is a single-player, fantasy turn-based strategy4X[2] developed by Simtex and published by MicroProse for MS-DOS in 1994. The player plays as a wizard attempting to dominate two linked worlds. From a small settlement, the player manages resources, builds cities and armies, and researches spells, growing an empire and fighting the other wizards.
Master of Magic's early versions had many bugs, and were heavily criticized by reviewers. The last official patch version 1.31, released in March 1995, fixed many of the bugs and implemented updates to the AI. The patched version was received more positively by reviewers.[3] The game was re-released in 2010 with Windows support on GOG.com.
Gameplay[edit]
Players customize their characters with choices of portraits, spell books, abilities and race.
A world is randomly generated every time the player starts a new game, with the player being able to adjust land size, magic strength, game difficulty and other features. The player can customize the skills, spell choices and appearance of their wizard, choosing one of 14 races for the starting city.
The gameplay starts with units exploring their surroundings, pushing back the strategic map's fog of war. During exploration, the player defeats monsters that are guarding treasure, finds the best locations for new cities, discovers the Towers of Wizardry that link the game's two planes of Arcanus and Myrror and locates the cities of enemy wizards. Apart from the Player's first city, cities are established by settlers, then upgraded by adding buildings, which in turn improves the economy, availability and strength of units, city's growth rate, mana and economics. Cities produce food, gold and mana. Military units require at least food and often gold upkeep; spellcasters consume mana in combat. While the player is exploring and colonizing new territories, new magical spells are researched. Spells can be used during or outside of combat.
Master of Magic splits spells into six schools of magic: Life Magic, which heals and protects; its antithesis Death Magic, which drains life and creates undead; Chaos Magic, which warps targets and spews destructive energies; Nature Magic, which controls the weather and turns it against the enemy; Sorcery, which manipulates the air and subverts the effects of the other schools; and Arcane Magic, which is a general school and free for all. Players select spellbooks from desired schools, allowing them to research and cast spells from said schools. The number of spells a wizard can learn from each school is dependent on the number of books chosen for that school.
Additionally, the player can select traits in addition to spellbooks. Traits provide special bonuses throughout the game.
Yes, to control pets, when you're in the neighbourhood, type in 'boolprop testingcheatsenabled true' It's a myth that the cheats are case sensitive. I keep mine lowecase so it's false. Once you type that in, go into a house with pets. You should see a number in the right hand corner. How can the answer be improved? Dec 14, 2006 The Sims 2. In The Sims 2, you can control your Sims over an entire lifetime for the first time. With the addition of genetics, t. Allows the player to control pets in the same manner as other Sims. BoolProp disablePuppyKittenAging true/false Toggles aging for puppies and kittens. Does not work on adult animals; use the regular aging on/off cheat for this. BoolProp petsFreeWill true/false Toggles free will for pets. AddneighbortoFamilycheat on/off. Sims 2 control pets.
There are global spells that affect targets throughout the world. Unit or city enhancement spells can boost the potential of its target, such as increasing the movement and attack speed of units, enabling them to regenerate wounds and increasing the power of their attacks. Wizards can summon creatures related to their schools. The player can research combat spells, which include direct attacks, debuffs and traps. The final spell learned is the Arcane Spell of Mastery, which takes enormous resources to research and cast but instantly wins the game for the casting player.
Unlike strategic phase's top-down perspective, combat takes place in isometric view.
A tactical battle begins when two armies occupy the same square on the global map. The battle takes place in an isometric map that expands the contested square in detail (including fortifications and terrain aspects that affect movement and combat). The two forces are arrayed at opposite edges of the map and the battle is conducted in a series of turns. One side achieves victory by eliminating the other or forcing it to flee the combat; a draw occurs if both sides remain after 50 turns.
The player can recruit 86 unit types from the cities to build their armies. A few (such as swordsmen and archers) are generic, while others (such as troll shamans) feature racial bonuses (such as regeneration or flight) that make them more valuable or more powerful than generic units. Most city-recruited units are unique to the city's region or terrain and have special abilities like magic use, ranged attacks or an ability to always strike first in combat. Mercenaries can seek employment with famous wizards, allowing them to possibly recruit units which their cities are unable to produce. The player can even summon fantastic creatures, such as demon lords or enormous creatures like dragons. The variety of units with unique special abilities offer many options when building an army.
Many distinct heroes are available for players to hire or summon. Heroes have special abilities that boost the efficiency of other military units (like bestowing offensive or defensive bonuses) or allow the hero to perform special attacks, grant them immense strength or toughness, among other abilities.
Plot and setting[edit]
Animated slideshow showing the two worlds of Arcanus and Myrror
Master of Magic takes place across two worlds, Arcanus and Myrror. Arcanus is a land much like our Earth, with climatic zones and varied terrain like forests, oceans, grasslands and deserts. Myrror is a parallel world to Arcanus, featuring heavier magic use and fantastic flora, minerals and fauna not found on Arcanus. The two worlds are physically linked to each other by special portals called Towers of Wizardry, allowing units to travel between worlds.
Magic nodes - which are valuable sources of magical power - are scattered throughout both worlds. The worlds are populated by traditional fantasy races like elves and halflings, plus races which were introduced early to gaming via Simtex's games, like the insectoid Klackons.
Reception[edit]
Next Generation reviewed the PC version of the game, rating it three stars out of five, and stated that 'Beginner players may have some trouble with the game's high level of complexity and often hard-to-follow instructions, but veterans will be satisfied.'[4]
Master of Magic was a nominee for Computer Gaming World's 1994 'Strategy Game of the Year' award, which ultimately went to UFO: Enemy Unknown.[6]
Early versions of Master of Magic were riddled with bugs and had a terrible artificial intelligence (AI), frustrating a lot of reviewers with its crashes and ignorant enemies. Despite that, it was announced as the Runner-up Strategy Game of the Year by Strategy Plus magazine, coming in behind its older sibling Master of Orion.[7] A few patches later, version 1.2 corrected a lot of the bugs and added some tweaks, but there were still game-crashing moments. Bill Cranston of GameBytes also savaged other aspects of the game, constantly comparing it against the 1991 hit Civilization.[8] He said the gameplay was mostly repetitive clickings of the 'end turn' button throughout several hundred eventless turns. Other complaints on his list also include Master of Magic's magic not being as crucial to winning the game in a straightforward manner, as compared to Civilization's technology. The potential of racial strife was less than fulfilled as military units of different races can co-exist harmoniously even though subjugated cities of a different race can rise up in rebellion. Coming Soon Magazine! however reviewed the same version and called it a must-have for strategy fans with great gameplay and lots of spells.[9]
Master of Magic version 1.31 was released in March 1995. It rectified many more bugs and implemented a few changes to the AI. IGN reviewed this version of Master of Magic in 2002[3] and stated that the ability to customize the player's character, random maps and vast variety of spells and creatures give an immense replayability to the game. The dual planes concept and intense tactical battles spiced with spells, encouraged them to name the latest version of the game as the best fantasy strategy game ever made. Computer Gaming World called this version fantastic and named it as #141 of their '150 Best Games of All Time'.[10] Similarly, IGN placed the game as one of their 'Top 25 Games of All Time' in 2000 and 'Top 100 Games of All Time' in 2003,[11][12] praising it for its innovative simultaneous play of two worlds. Tracy Baker wrote in Computer Gaming Classics named it as a strategy game classic for its success in implementing the mechanics of Master of Orion in a fantasy setting.[13]
Master of Magic was inducted into GameSpy's Hall of Fame in 2000,[14] with the network describing it as a visually stunning game with 'enduring replayability', due to its randomness and large variety of spells. GameSpy also credited the game with being more popular than Master of Orion and responsible for making Steve Barcia and Simtex household names.[15]Computer Gaming World also inducted Master of Magic into its Hall of Fame in 2005.[16] The game has also been referenced as a representative product of MicroProse in gaming reviews.[17][18] The writer Alan Emrich, responsible for coining the '4X genre' term, has placed Master of Magic in the top position on his 'Games of All Time' list in 2001.[19]
In 2012, a retrospective review of Eurogamer concluded: 'It hasn't yet been surpassed by any other fantasy 4X game. Curiously enough, Master of Magic remains the best example of its kind'.[20]
Legacy[edit]
In 1997, the game was ported to PlayStation with various graphical improvements, retitled Civizard: Majutsu no Keifu (シヴィザード 魔術の系譜). This was a Japan-only release by Asmik (developed by Opera House).[citation needed]
Due to Master of Magic's impact on the fantasy 'turn-based strategy' genre, the Age of Wonders series, which some considered almost identical in terms of gameplay, has received comparisons in reviews of the latter.[21][22] However, Lennart Sas, the lead designer for Age of Wonders, argues against this.[23] Other series that have been also compared to Master of Magic, including Dominions series from Illwinter Game Design.[24]
After the closure of developer Simtex in 1997 and the end of official support the game's community took up the support with community patches to fix remaining bugs and unbalances.[25][26] As of 2018 there is patch v1.51 by the community available.[27]
As of 2017, a sequel to Master of Magic has yet to be produced.[28] In 1997, MicroProse released a Master of Magic 'Jr.' scenario, using the Civilization II engine, as part of the Civ II: Fantastic Worlds expansion for Civilization II. Steve Barcia stated that Master of Magic II would be complete by spring 1998, with new features, spells, monsters and a spell designer included;[29] however Simtex was closed down later that year. MicroProse revealed that it would be developing the sequel on its own, but this plan was canceled when the company's financial situation deteriorated in 2000.[30] Despite the later emergence of games that resemble Master of Magic (such as the Age of Wonders series), reviewers like Kyle Ackerman and GameSpot editor Andrew Park have stated that the game's essence has not yet been re-captured.[31][32]
Further prospects of a sequel surfaced with the announcement that companies Quicksilver Software and Stardock had obtained the rights to undertake such a venture.[33][34] These companies were unable to reach an accord with Atari, who had negotiated complete control of marketing the property. Game Informer reported in 2007 that Stardock aimed to release a remake of Master of Magic in 2009.[35] However, a Stardock employee, Aaron Rister, clarified in the company's own forums that Game Informer was a mistaken reference to a 2010 game Elemental: War of Magic.[36]
In April 2013, Wastelands Interactive launched a successful Kickstarter bid to fund the game Worlds of Magic which is meant as a spiritual successor to Master of Magic, and designer George Edward Purdy who worked on Master of Orion and Master of Magic joined the team.[37][38] Wastelands Interactive officially announced it had moved Worlds of Magic into late alpha testing on August 8, 2014.[39] According to the gaming news sites Gamasutra, Worlds of Magic then went into Early Access on September 11, 2014.[40] In February 21, 2015, it was announced that Worlds of Magic would be released for PlayStation 4 in the third quarter of 2015.[41] On March 19, 2015 Worlds of Magic officially launched at retail outlets and on Steam according to the gaming news site, Gamasutra.[42]
References[edit]
External links[edit]
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Master_of_Magic&oldid=904132256'
MicroProse Software Inc. was an American video game publisher and developer founded by Bill Stealey and Sid Meier in 1982. It developed and published numerous games, many of which are regarded as groundbreaking, classics and cult titles, including starting the Civilization and X-COM series. Most of their internally developed titles were vehicle simulation and strategy games.
In 1993, the company lost most of their UK-based personnel and became a subsidiary of Spectrum HoloByte. Subsequent cuts and corporate policies led to Sid Meier, Jeff Briggs and Brian Reynolds leaving and forming Firaxis Games in 1996, as MicroProse closed its ex-Simtex development studio in Austin, Texas. In 1998, following an unsuccessful buyout attempt by GT Interactive Software, the struggling MicroProse (Spectrum HoloByte) became a wholly owned subsidiary of Hasbro Interactive and its development studios in Alameda, California and Chapel Hill, North Carolina were closed the following year. In 2001, MicroProse ceased to exist as an entity and Hasbro Interactive sold the MicroProse intellectual properties to Infogrames Entertainment, SA. MicroProse UK's former main office in Chipping Sodbury was closed in 2002, followed by the company's former headquarters in Hunt Valley, Maryland in 2003.
The brand was revived in 2007 when Interactive Game Group acquired it from Atari Interactive, formerly Infogrames. The MicroProse brand was licensed to the Legacy Engineering Group for consumer electronics. Cybergun owned the MicroProse brand from 2010 to 2018, which was then acquired by David Lagettie working with Stealey.
HistoryIndependent company (1982–1993)1980s
In summer 1982, mutual friends who knew of their shared interest in aviation arranged for retired military pilot Bill Stealey and computer programmer Sid Meier to meet in Las Vegas. After Meier surprised Stealey by repeatedly defeating him when playing Red Baron, he explained that he had analyzed the game's programming to predict future actions and claimed that he could design a better home computer game in one week. Stealey promised to sell the game if Meier could develop it. Although Meier needed two months to produce Hellcat Ace, Stealey sold 50 copies in his first sales appointment and the game became the first product of their new company.[1] They planned to name it Smugger's Software, but chose MicroProse. (In 1987 the company agreed to change its name to avoid confusion with MicroPro International, but MicroPro decided to rename itself after its WordStar word processor).[2] MicroProse became profitable in its second month and had $10 million in sales by 1986.[3]
MicroProse advertised its first batch of games in 1982, under the headline 'Experience the MicroProse Challenge!!!' All three were written by Sid Meier for the Atari 8-bit family of home computers: platformer Floyd of the Jungle,[4] 2D shooter Chopper Rescue,[5] and first-person airplane combat game Hellcat Ace.[6]Hellcat Ace began a series of increasingly sophisticated 8-bit flight simulation games, including Spitfire Ace (1982) and Solo Flight (1983), that defined the company.
Gregg Tavares's Gunship Design Team flight jacket
In 1983, MicroProse ported Floyd of the Jungle to the Commodore 64, their first product for that machine. By 1984, the company had begun supporting the Apple II and IBM compatibles. MicroProse released the air traffic control game Kennedy Approach, written by Andy Hollis, in 1985.[7]Conflict in Vietnam (1986) was the final MicroProse title for the Atari 8-bit line.
By 1987, Computer Gaming World considered MicroProse one of the top five computer game companies, alongside likes of Activision and Electronic Arts. The PC market was, along with the Commodore 64, the company's top priority. By 1989, support for 8-bit machines was dropped. MicroProse supported the Amiga and developed for that machine its entire nine years on the market (Amiga development was outsourced to MicroProse UK in 1991).
That’s enough to get the entire population of Roswell or Sandy Springs high. Washing meth with acetone.
MicroProse also started a branch in the United Kingdom to cross-publish titles in Europe,[3] and to import some European titles to be published in the United States. Notable products from this period include simulation games F-15 Strike Eagle, F-19 Stealth Fighter, Gunship, Project Stealth Fighter, Red Storm Rising and Silent Service, and action-strategy games such as Sid Meier's Pirates! and Sword of the Samurai. Several games from different developers were also distributed by MicroProse under the labels 'Firebird' and 'Rainbird' (acquired after buying Telecomsoft in 1989), including Carrier Command, Midwinter and Savage.
1990s
In the early 1990s, MicroProse released the hit strategy games Sid Meier's Railroad Tycoon and Sid Meier's Civilization, designed by Meier and developed by its internal division, MPS Labs, on multiple platforms. Critically acclaimed, both of them quickly became two of the best-selling strategy games of all time and spawned multiple sequels. Some of MicroProse's simulation games from the 1980s received remakes in the early 1990s, such as Night Hawk: F-117A Stealth Fighter 2.0, Silent Service II and Gunship 2000, and made some first cautious attempts to expand into the console market with F-117A Stealth Fighter and Super Strike Eagle (MicroProse also ported several their titles to the 16- and 32-bit consoles during the mid-1990s). Brand new simulation and strategy titles included 1942: The Pacific Air War, Dogfight, Fields of Glory, Formula One Grand Prix, Harrier Jump Jet, Knights of the Sky, Starlord, Subwar 2050 and Task Force 1942.
At the same time, MicroProse attempted to diversify beyond its niche roots as a sim and strategy game company. Encouraged by the success of Pirates!, MicroProse designed further action-strategy titles such as Covert Action (also designed by Sid Meier) and Hyperspeed, and experimented with the role-playing genre by developing BloodNet and Darklands (in addition to publishing The Legacy: Realm of Terror). The company invested (and subsequently effectively lost) a large sum of money to create its arcade game division as well as their own graphic adventuregame engine. However, the arcade division was canceled after making only two games: F-15 Strike Eagle: The Arcade Game and Battle of the Solar System (both of which featured high-end 3D graphics but failed to become popular as they were too different from existing machines), while the adventure game engine was used for just three games: Rex Nebular and the Cosmic Gender Bender, Return of the Phantom and Dragonsphere, before it was sold off to Sanctuary Woods.
In August 1991, MicroProse filed for an Initial Public Offering. The company hoped to raise $18 million to help repay debts from its unsuccessful arcade games.[8] During the same period, MicroProse created two labels: MicroStyle (UK), and MicroPlay Software (US), using them for publishing a variety of externally developed games, such as Challenge of the Five Realms, Command HQ, Global Conquest, Elite Plus, Flames of Freedom, Rick Dangerous, Stunt Car Racer, Xenophobe and XF5700 Mantis.[9][10] In 1992 MicroProse acquired Paragon Software.[11] It also acquired Leeds-based flight simulation developer Vektor Grafix,[12] which had already developed titles for them (such as B-17 Flying Fortress), turning it into a satellite development studio named MicroProse Leeds.
Under Spectrum HoloByte (1993–1998)
In December 1993, following Black Wednesday in the UK, MicroProse Software Inc. merged with Spectrum HoloByte, another game company that specialized in simulation games, to form MicroProse Inc.[13] Bill Stealey, who was good friends with Spectrum HoloByte president Gilman Louie, convinced Louie to help MicroProse as Stealey was afraid that some bank would not understand the company culture. MicroProse UK was forced to close its two satellite studios of MicroProse in northern England and dispose of over 40 staff at its Chipping Sodbury head office (Microprose Chipping Sodbury). A core group of artists, designers, and programmers left MicroProse UK to join Psygnosis, which opened an office in Stroud specifically to attract ex-MicroProse employees. In 1994, Stealey departed MicroProse and Spectrum HoloByte agreed to buy out his shares. He later commented, 'Spectrum Holobyte had a lot of cash and very few products. Microprose had a lot of products and no cash. It was a great marriage, but the new company only needed one chairman, so I resigned.'[14] Stealey went on to found an independent game company Interactive Magic (also specializing in vehicle simulators and strategy games), while Andy Hollis departed for Origin Systems, and Sandy Petersen joined id Software.
Despite cuts, Spectrum Holobyte managed to line up several big name licenses, including Top Gun (Top Gun: Fire At Will), Magic: The Gathering (Magic: The Gathering), Star Trek: The Next Generation (A Final Unity, Birth of the Federation, Klingon Honor Guard) and MechWarrior (MechCommander, MechWarrior 3). Strategy game UFO: Enemy Unknown (X-COM: UFO Defense) proved to be an unanticipated hit in 1994, spawning multiple sequels. In 1996, Spectrum HoloByte/MicroProse bought out Simtex, earlier a developer of MicroProse-published bestsellers Master of Orion and Master of Magic. Simtex was re-branded as MicroProse Texas (Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares), based in Austin, Texas. Other MicroProse developed and/or published games during that period included 7th Legion, Addiction Pinball, AEGIS: Guardian of the Fleet, Civilization II, Dark Earth, F-15 Strike Eagle III, Fleet Defender, Grand Prix 2, Pizza Tycoon, Sid Meier's Colonization, Tinhead, Transport Tycoon, X-COM: Apocalypse, X-COM: Interceptor and X-COM: Terror from the Deep. Insufficient financial resources largely prevented MicroProse from developing games for other game platforms, therefore MicroProse concentrated on the PC game market.[15]
MicroProse Software continued as separate subsidiary company under Spectrum HoloByte until 1996. That year, Spectrum HoloByte started cutting a majority of the MicroProse staff to reduce costs. Soon after, it consolidated all of its titles under the MicroProse brand (essentially renaming itself MicroProse). MicroProse's remaining co-founder Sid Meier, along with Jeff Briggs and Brian Reynolds, departed the company after the staff cut, forming a new company named Firaxis Games.[16]
On October 5, 1997, GT Interactive Software announced that it had signed a definitive agreement to acquire MicroProse for $250 million in stock, the deal had even been unanimously approved by the Board of Directors of both companies. After the announcement MicroProse's stock price reached $7 a share. GT Interactive expected the deal to be completed by the end of that year.[17][18] But the acquisition was cancelled on December 5, as according to both CEOs 'the time is simply not right' for the deal. MicroProse's stock plummeted to just $2.31 after the announcement of the deal's cancellation.[19] According to Computer Gaming World, the merger was annulled due to a 'fundamental' disagreement over how the joint company would be writing off its research and development costs, as MicroProse insisted to keep their method of paying off the developer immediately.[20]
In November 1997, MicroProse was sued by both Avalon Hill (who had the U.S. publishing rights to the name Civilization)[21] and Activision for copyright infringement. MicroProse responded by buying Hartland Trefoil, which was the original designer and manufacturer of the Civilization board game, and then sued Avalon Hill and Activision for trademark infringement and unfair business practices as a result of Activision's decision to develop and publish Civilization video games.[22] Because Hasbro was negotiating the acquisition of both Avalon Hill and MicroProse, the lawsuits were settled in July 1998. Under the terms of the settlement MicroProse became the sole owner of the rights of the name Civilization and Activision acquired a license to publish a Civilization video game which was later titled Civilization: Call to Power.[21][23]
Under Hasbro Interactive (1998–2001)
In preparation for its sale, MicroProse closed down its studio in Austin in June 1998; as a result of the closure, 35 employees lost their jobs.[24] On August 14, 1998, Hasbro issued a $70 million cash tender offer to purchase all MicroProse's shares for $6 each.[25] This deal was completed on September 14, when Hasbro bought 91% of MicroProse's shares and announced that MicroProse had become a wholly owned subsidiary.[26][27] The remaining shares would also be acquired for $6 in cash. MicroProse was merged with Hasbro Interactive.[28] At the time of Hasbro's acquisition, MicroProse had 343 employees, including 135 at Alameda, California (MicroProse Alameda), with a total operating cost of $20 million per year.[29] Besides the development studio in Alameda, MicroProse had three other studios: Hunt Valley, Maryland (Microprose, Hunt Valley); Chapel Hill, North Carolina; and Chipping Sodbury, England.
In December 1998, MicroProse finally managed to publish Falcon 4.0 (in development by Spectrum HoloByte since 1992), to disappointing sales. In December 1999, Hasbro Interactive closed down former MicroProse studios in Alameda and Chapel Hill.[30][31] Among titles in development that got canceled during that period was X-COM: Genesis. The last MicroProse developed game under Hasbro, B-17 Flying Fortress: The Mighty 8th Personal watercraft impeller distributer. , was published in 2000.
Under Infogrames (2001–2003)
In January 2001, after French game publisher Infogrames Entertainment, SA (IESA) took over Hasbro Interactive for $100 million,[32] MicroProse ceased to exist and the long development of X-COM: Alliance was finally aborted. Their latest title in the U.S., European Air War, was reissued with Infogrames' logo instead of the MicroProse logo. The final 2 games published with the MicroProse name were Tactical Ops: Assault on Terror and the European version of Grand Prix 4. Infogrames shut down the former MicroProse studio in Chipping Sodbury in September 2002.[33] Hasbro Interactive was renamed to Infogrames Interactive and then to Atari Interactive.[34]
Infogrames intermittently used the Atari name as a brand name for selected titles before officially changing the U.S. subsidiary's name to Atari, Inc. in 2003.[35] In November 2003, Atari Inc. closed the last former MicroProse development studio in Hunt Valley,[36] which was MicroProse's original location and had just completed work on Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes. However, several game developers now exist in the area, including Firaxis Games and BreakAway Games, who all owe their origin to MicroProse.
Games
Some of the most notable (best-selling, critically acclaimed and/or regarded as revolutionary) games by MicroProse include Civilization (1991), Civilization II (1996), Darklands (1992), F-15 Strike Eagle (1985), F-19 Stealth Fighter (1988), Formula One Grand Prix (1992), Gunship (1986), M1 Tank Platoon (1989), Master of Magic (1994), Master of Orion (1993), Master of Orion II (1996), Midwinter (1989), Pirates! (1987), Project Stealth Fighter (1987), Railroad Tycoon (1990), Red Storm Rising (1988), Silent Service (1985), and UFO: Enemy Unknown (1994).
Legacy
Sid Meier, who now works at Firaxis Games, eventually got the rights of most of his games back under his control from Atari Inc. Railroad Tycoon series rights was sold to PopTop Software, who developed Railroad Tycoon II and Railroad Tycoon 3. Eventually, Poptop was acquired by Take-Two Interactive, which later also acquired Firaxis as well, thus returning the rights to the series to Meier, resulting in Sid Meier's Railroads!, released by Take-Two's 2K Games along with a new Sid Meier's Pirates! and the new Civilization games, including Sid Meier's Civilization III, Sid Meier's Civilization IV, Sid Meier's Civilization V, Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization and Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution. Firaxis Games also developed the X-COM series' reboot XCOM: Enemy Unknown, which was followed by 2K Marin's spin-off The Bureau: XCOM Declassified.
Master of Orion III was developed by Quicksilver Software and released under the Infogrames label. Falcon 4.0 rights were sold to Graphsim Entertainment, who developed Falcon 4.0: Allied Force.
Brand name
In 2007, Interactive Game Group acquired the MicroProse brand from Atari Interactive Inc, which filed for transfer of trademark protection on December 27, 2007.[38] Interactive Game Group then shared a percentage of the MicroProse brand to I-Drs At in January 2008.[39][40] Originally, claims as to what titles and other intellectual properties were also acquired by the Interactive Game Group from Infogrames were originally unverified, and the last verified owner of MicroProse properties was Infogrames.[41] Later on, however, MicroProse's IPs that remained with Atari/Infogrames were eventually included as part of asset sale and sold to Tommo, who have been republish the titles under their 'Retroism' brand.[42]
The Interactive Game Group also licensed the MicroProse brand to the Legacy Engineering Group (LEG), which used the license to form subsidiaries called Microprose Systems and Microprose Consumer Electronics Division, selling consumer electronics from February 2008 to the second half of 2008. In October 2008, the licensing agreement between LEG and Frederic Chesnais, owner of Interactive Game Group, was discontinued, forcing LEG to rebrand its subsidiaries to Legacy Consumer Electronics.[43]
In 2010, the Cybergun Group, manufacturer of airsoft gun products, merged with Interactive Game Group and MicroProse,[44] giving them access to officially licensed weapons. The name has been used by a video game studio Microprose (with no capital 'P' in the name).[45]
Since 2018, the MicroProse brand has been owned by David Lagettie, working with Bill Stealey's own company iEntertainment Network on the Warbirds series of combat flight simulators.[46]
References
External links
Civilization is a series of turn-based strategy video games, first released in 1991. Sid Meier developed the first game in the series and has had creative input for most of the rest, and his name is usually included in the formal title of these games, such as Sid Meier's Civilization. There are six main games in the series, a number of expansion packs and spin-off games, as well as board games inspired by the video game series. The series is considered a formulative example of the 4X genre, in which players achieve victory through four routes, 'eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, and eXterminate'.
All titles in the series share similar gameplay, centered on building a civilization on a macro-scale from prehistory up to the near future. Each turn allows the player to move their units on the map, build or improve new cities and units, and initiate negotiations with the human or computer-controlled players. The player will also choose technologies to research. These reflect the cultural, intellectual, and technical sophistication of the civilization, and usually allow the player to build new units or to improve their cities with new structures. In most games in the series, one may win by military conquest, achieving a certain level of culture, building an interstellar space ship, or achieving the highest score, among other means. Later games have introduced gameplay concepts and victories based on religion, economics, and diplomacy. Meier had adapted an approach for each new title so that it contains a third of existing features, another third that are improvements from the previous game, and the remaining third as introducing new features. Newer games often include extendable downloadable content that adds to that game, and often will become part of the new features in the next main game of the series.
The series was first developed by Meier while at MicroProse, the studio he co-founded. After MicroProse was acquired by Spectrum Holobyte, Meier left with other designers to form Firaxis Games in 1996, which has been the principal developer of the series since. Over the years, some of the crew involved in developing the series became successful in producing their own strategy games, such as Bruce Shelley (Civilization co-designer) of Age of Empires fame, Brian Reynolds (Civilization II lead designer and programmer), who went on to create Rise of Nations, and Soren Johnson (Civilization III co-designer and Civilization IV lead designer and programmer), who worked on Spore and Offworld Trading Company. Some issues associated with the Civilization name, due to the 1980 Civilization board game created by Francis Tresham, arose during the late 1990s but have been resolved through agreements, settlements, and publishing company acquisitions; presently Take-Two, the parent company of Firaxis, owns full rights to both the name and intellectual property for the series. As of February 2017, the series has shipped more than 40 million total units.
Civilization (video game)
Sid Meier's Civilization is a turn-based strategy 4X video game created by Sid Meier and Bruce Shelley for MicroProse in 1991. The game's objective is to 'Build an empire to stand the test of time': it begins in 4000 BC and the players attempt to expand and develop their empires through the ages from the ancient era until modern and near-future times.
Civilization was originally developed for MS-DOS running on a PC. It has undergone numerous revisions for various platforms (including Windows, Macintosh, Amiga, Atari ST, Super NES, Sega Saturn, PlayStation and N-Gage) and now exists in several versions. A multiplayer remake, Sid Meier's CivNet, was released for the PC in 1995.
Combat flight simulation game
Combat flight simulators are simulation video games (similar to amateur flight simulation software) used to simulate military aircraft and their operations. These are distinct from dedicated flight simulators used for professional pilot and military flight training which consist of realistic physical recreations of the actual aircraft cockpit, often with a full-motion platform.
Combat flight simulation titles are more numerous than civilian flight simulators due to the variety of subject matter available and market demand. Many free flight simulators, such as Digital Combat Simulator and War Thunder, can be downloaded for free off of the Internet.
Grand Prix 2
For the article about the GP2 racing series, see GP2 Series.Grand Prix 2, released in the American market as Grand Prix II, is a racing simulator released by MicroProse in 1996. It was made under an official FIA license that featured the Formula One 1994 season, with all of the circuits, teams, drivers and cars. The cars were painted with liveries reflecting the races that did not allow tobacco and alcohol sponsors (e.g. 1994 German Grand Prix).
It had 3D texture mapping and SVGA graphics, as well as an early 3D physics engine. A large community of GP2 enthusiasts formed following the game's release. Grand Prix 2 is recognized as one of the definitive racing simulations of its era.
Grand Prix 3
Grand Prix 3 is a computer racing simulator by MicroProse, released in 2000 by Hasbro Interactive.
Grand Prix 4
Grand Prix 4, commonly known as GP4, was released for the PC on June 21, 2002, is currently the last Formula One racing simulator released by the developer Geoff Crammond and the MicroProse label. Based on the 2001 Formula One season, GP4 essentially serves as a graphical and seasonal update of Grand Prix 3 which had been released in 2000. The game retained the series' legendary physics engine. However it entered the market at a far less hospitable time than its three predecessors, and the game faced stiff competition from an alternative Formula One simulation from studios such as ISI.
Master of Magic
Master of Magic is a single-player, fantasy turn-based strategy 4X developed by Simtex and published by MicroProse for MS-DOS in 1994. The player plays as a wizard attempting to dominate two linked worlds. From a small settlement, the player manages resources, builds cities and armies, and researches spells, growing an empire and fighting the other wizards.
Master of Magic's early versions had many bugs, and were heavily criticized by reviewers. The last official patch version 1.31, released in March 1995, fixed many of the bugs and implemented updates to the AI. The patched version was received more positively by reviewers. The game was re-released in 2010 with Windows support on GOG.com.
Master of Orion
Master of Orion is a turn-based, 4X science fiction strategy game released in 1993 by MicroProse on the MS-DOS and Mac OS operating systems. The game is the first in its franchise, and the rights are held by Wargaming. The player leads one of ten races to dominate the galaxy through a combination of diplomacy and conquest while developing technology, exploring and colonizing star systems.
Microprose Soccer
Microprose Soccer is a soccer videogame published by MicroProse in 1988. The original Commodore 64 version was developed by Sensible Software, with conversions carried out to other formats. It is the fore-runner of the 16-bit classic Sensible Soccer. In the United States the game was released under a title Keith Van Eron's Pro Soccer.
Nightdive Studios
Nightdive Studios, LLC (formerly Night Dive Studios, LLC) is an American video game company based in Vancouver, Washington. The company was founded in 2012 by video game artist Stephen Kick, formerly of Sony Online Entertainment. The company is best known for obtaining rights to classic video games that are no longer available, updating them for compatibility with modern platforms, and re-releasing them into digital distribution. Their first release was an updated version of System Shock 2, a first-person shooter from 1999 that influenced many later video games.
Return of the Phantom
Return of the Phantom is a point-and-click graphic adventure game developed and published by MicroProse in 1993. It was produced by Matt Gruson and designed/written by future James Bond novelist Raymond Benson. It is based on the book The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux.
The game was the second graphical adventure game developed by MicroProse, following Rex Nebular and preceding Dragonsphere. It was developed using the MicroProse Adventure Development system, and made use of 256-colour graphics. A CD version featuring full voices for the characters was also released.
Sid Meier
Sidney K. Meier ( MIRE; born February 24, 1954) is a Canadian-American programmer, designer, and producer of several strategy video games and simulation video games, including the Civilization series. Meier co-founded MicroProse in 1982 with Bill Stealey and is the Director of Creative Development of Firaxis Games, which he co-founded with Jeff Briggs and Brian Reynolds in 1996. For his contributions to the video game industry, Meier was inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame.
Sid Meier's Pirates!
Sid Meier’s Pirates! is a video game created by Sid Meier and developed and published by MicroProse in 1987. It was the first game to include the name 'Sid Meier' in its title as an effort by MicroProse to attract fans of Meier's earlier games, most of which were combat vehicle simulation video games. The game is a simulation of the life of a pirate, a privateer, or a pirate hunter in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.
Pirates! is set in the Caribbean. The Pirates! playing field includes the Spanish Main (namely the northern coast of South America), Central America and the Yucatán Peninsula, the entire Gulf of Mexico, Florida, and all Caribbean islands, plus Bermuda. The player is free to sail to any part of the above-mentioned lands, stopped by an invisible barrier southeast of Trinidad, all the way north to just northeast of Bermuda.
The game was widely ported from the original Commodore 64 version to numerous other systems. The Pirates! Gold remake, with minor improvements and better graphics, was released in 1993. An enhanced remake, also named Sid Meier's Pirates!, was released in 2004. Versions for mobile devices have also been released.
Spectrum HoloByte
Spectrum HoloByte, Inc. was a video game developer and publisher. The company, founded in 1983 in Boulder, Colorado by Jeff Sauter, Phil Adam and Mike Franklin, was best known for its simulation games, notably the Falcon series of combat flight simulators, and for publishing the first version of Tetris outside the Soviet Union (in 1987, for MS-DOS). Spectrum HoloByte also published games for various home computers and video game consoles.
The chairman of Spectrum HoloByte, Gilman Louie, also founded Nexa Corporation, a developer of entertainment software, which went on to merge with Spectrum HoloByte and company President Phil Adam prior to the company's move from Colorado to California. In 1992, HoloByte received an investment from Kleiner Perkins, which let the company repurchase shares formerly owned by Robert Maxwell's companies, ending its ties to their bankruptcies. In December 1993, Spectrum HoloByte merged with MicroProse to form MicroProse Inc. For the following years, games from both companies were published under their respective brands, but in 1996 all titles were consolidated under the MicroProse brand.Hasbro Interactive acquired the merged company in 1998, and what had been Spectrum HoloByte ceased to exist when the development studio in Alameda, California was closed in 1999. Hasbro subsequently sold all the assets of the various Hasbro Interactive studios to Infogrames, including the Atari brand itself.
Star Trek Generations (video game)
Star Trek Generations is a first person shooter with adventure game and strategy game elements by MicroProse, based on Star Trek Generations, the seventh film in the Star Trek film franchise.
The computer game includes voice-acting by actors Patrick Stewart and Malcolm McDowell, as well as footage from the film.
Civilization Microprose Cost Of Research PdfThe Punisher (1990 computer game)
The Punisher is a 1990 video game developed by Paragon Software and released by MicroProse, which stars the Marvel Comics antihero, the Punisher.
In the same year, there was also The Punisher game for NES, unrelated to this one and released by LJN.
X-COM
X-COM (sometimes stylized as X-Com) is a science fiction video game franchise featuring an elite international organization tasked with countering alien invasions of Earth. The series began with the strategy video game UFO: Enemy Unknown created by Julian Gollop's Mythos Games and MicroProse in 1994. The original lineup by MicroProse included six published and at least two canceled games, as well as two novels. The X-COM series, in particular its original entry, achieved a sizable cult following and has influenced many other video games; including the creation of a number of clones, spiritual successors, and unofficial remakes.
A reboot series entitled XCOM was published by 2K Games, beginning with the strategy video game XCOM: Enemy Unknown, developed by Firaxis Games and released in 2012 to critical and commercial success. It was followed by a prequel and a sequel.
This page is based on a Wikipedia article written by authors (here).
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
New to world domination? A Civilization VI guide may be handy. Even if you’re a Civilization veteran, it might be time to dust off your internal Civilopedia and reacquaint yourself with the old and swotting up on the new. Civilization VI brings plenty of new ideas to the table and freshens up some of the game’s most traditional mechanics, so you may need a little aid in getting started, no matter your experience with the series.
To help freshen up your brain, we’ve put together a beginner’s guide and a walkthrough of your first turns as the leader of a new empire. We guide you through where to place your first city, how the new Districts system works, where you invest your research points, how to begin trading, and – of course – how to declare war on your enemies.
Don’t stop declaring war: demolish your enemies in all of the best strategy games on PC.
We also cover all of the Civ 6 victory conditions, so you can decide what you overall goal will be, and offer a few general purpose tips to ensure your early game goes as smooth as possible, no matter the civilization you choose.
CitiesFirst city placement – where and when
When you start a game of Civilization VI, your first Settler will already be in a good spot for your capital city, but eventually you’ll be inspired to get a new Settler and spread your empire beyond its paltry beginnings. What you’re looking for is a place close to water with farmable land and a mix of resources nearby. You can see a tile’s properties, like how much food (for growth) or production (for building) it offers just by hovering over it. There is also a toggle to show all the resource yields for all tiles on the world map, letting you see at a glance the best city sites without spamming up the screen all of the time.
The farmable land will give you the food necessary to grow your city when a citizen works it. Once you construct a Builder unit and make it set up a farm, it will generate even more food, as well as houses, increasing growth again. It’s worth remembering that Builders have a specific number of uses before they disappear – initially just three, but this can be increased by new government policies.
Resources are split into three types. Bonus resources increase the yield of a tile, strategic resources are required for certain units, and luxury resources placate rabble-rousers, keeping your citizens nice and content. Specifically, wheat increases the amount of food on a tile, horses are required for cavalry units, and when people have access to silver, they are a bit more relaxed. Luxury and strategic resources may also be traded through the diplomacy screen.
The map biome determines the types of resources you’ll find, as well as how suitable the area is for a city. Even inhospitable areas, however, can be worth expanding into. The desert, for instance, provides little in the way of production or food, but you’ll need at least one desert tile if you want to build wonders like the Pyramids or Petra. Similarly, a mountain can’t be farmed or built on, but can provide an extra line of defence against enemies, while also giving bonuses to holy sites and buildings.
Districts explained
A city is split up into districts, but starts with just a city centre. There, the granary, mill, monument and an assortment of buildings that provide anything from food to culture can be constructed. They’re largely buildings that serve to get your city started. Eventually, you’ll be able to expand your city with specialised districts that not only generate more science, culture, faith, production and amenities that make everyone more content, they can be further improved when you add new buildings to them.
Let’s take a look at the holy site. It generates faith (more on that in the Religion section of this guide) when constructed, but the amount is based on the adjacent tiles. It generates +1 faith per turn from each adjacent mountain tile, +2 for each adjacent natural wonder and +1 for every two adjacent wood tiles. The wood tile bonus isn’t great and natural wonders are rare, so unless there’s one close by, you’ll want to build your holy site on a tile surrounded by mountains. These adjacency bonuses are vital, so have a look at our Civ 6 district guide for more.
With the district created, it’s ready to be built in. Religious buildings like shrines and temples generate more faith and unlock the use of different types of missionaries, who can then spread your custom religion to other cities, both domestically and internationally. While the holy site is the faith-based district, certain buildings can also confer bonuses that will help in other areas of the game. The meeting house, for example, generates +2 production and an extra citizen slot on top of the +3 faith.
Some buildings you’ll erect in these districts also generate points toward great people. These special units can be activated once a simple prerequisite is fulfilled, creating a special work of art that provides a culture bonus, immediately generating lots of production, founding a new religion – it depends on the great person in question. If they’re an artist, their project has to be stored in specific buildings, like an art museum, which can only be constructed in certain districts.
ResearchTechnology treeCivilization Microprose Cost Of Research Technology
Each turn, your civ will be generating science – hopefully quite a lot if you’ve got a campus district and a few buildings in it – which can be invested in research that in turn unlocks new technologies, starting from the basics like animal husbandry, all the way to space flight. The more science you’re generating, the faster you progress through the tech tree. That means you’ll want that campus to be, just like the holy site, surrounded by mountains, and you’ll probably want to build the Great Library wonder early.
Getting fat on science isn’t the only way to speed up research in Civilization VI, however. The vast majority of techs (and civics, more on those in a moment) can be unlocked in half the time by fulfilling a special condition, which you can see in the tech tree. Say you’re keen to start shooting out some industrial-era cavalry, but military science is an agonising 16 turns away from unlocking: you can cut that in half that by killing a unit with a knight.
Everything from hunting Barbarians to setting up trade routes can contribute to boosting a tech, these ‘Eureka’ moments can also be found in other ways, like stealing boosts from other civs by using spies, or expending Great Scientists.
Civics tree
New civics can be researched alongside technology, though they are unlocked through culture, not science. Civics are equally as important, however, and in turn unlock new buildings, wonders and units, just like technology. What sets civics apart are the two other things they unlock: new forms of government and policies.
The first form of government, chiefdom, is useless and should be escaped as quickly as possible. You only need to unlock four other civics to begin working on political philosophy, which unlocks the first three proper governments: autocracy, oligarchy and classical republic. All of them have an inherent bonus and a legacy bonus that can be enhanced. Merchant republic (from a little further down the tree) for instance, has an inherent bonus of +2 trade routes and a legacy bonus of 15% off gold purchases. This means that when purchasing buildings or units rather than constructing them over time, it’s cheaper than normal. That 15% bonus can be increased, too. Every 15 turns on the standard speed, it increases by 1%. However much you increase it by, that bonus is retained and carried over when you switch governments.
Along with these bonuses, governments also have different configurations of policy slots, limiting them to a specific number and type of policies. Merchant republic has one military slot, two economic slots, one diplomatic slot and two wildcard slots, so it can hold six cards in total. The list of policy cards starts off small, but each new civic researched unlocks multiple cards, so they pile up quickly. They allow you to fine-tune your empire with a broad variety of bonuses, from reducing the maintenance cost of units to getting more resources from trade routes. You can spend gold to set up new policies, or wait until you’ve researched a new civic. In the early game, it’s best to try to time the unlocking of new civics with when you would want to switch them around – so, for example, finishing a settler with the Colonization civic active, and the next turn unlocking a new civic and switching to Ilkum for free, boosting Builder production.
Trade and diplomacyTrading with leaders
There are two types of trading in Civilization VI. The first and most simple is direct trade between leaders. In the diplomacy screen, you can trade with other empires for resources, treaties, cities, great works or cold, hard cash. Whether they agree or not depends on the game difficulty, how fair the deal is, and what they think about you.
How a leader feels about you depends on obvious factors. Whether you’re a warmonger, for example, threatening their borders or seducing city states that they’re also after. Basically, they don’t like it if you’re overtly flexing your muscles. But they do like fair deals, presents, seeing Barbarians getting killed off, and having their enemies embarrassed. They also have historical and less obvious randomly generated traits and ambitions which can also influence how they feel about you. Getting to the root of any relationship issues, just like in real life, relies on gossip and spying.
Traders, spies and diplomats that are in foreign lands as part of a trade route, espionage operation or embassy keep their eyes and ears open and pass information back to you, revealing not just key information on foreign movements and deals, but how they feel about you as well. The amount of information you have is readily apparently on the leader screen, and being more embedded in their empire will reveal exact relationship statistics as well as their Hidden Agenda – a randomised personality trait that you can exploit to make them like you (or hate you).
Establishing trade routesCivilization Microprose Cost Of Research System
Trade routes are the meat of Civilization VI’s trading system. You can construct a trader in any city, and then very simply make its target any other discovered city. In return, the route will generate a flow of resources that can be anything from pure gold to a mix of gold, science, faith, culture, food and production.
As the trader makes its way to its destination, it also creates a road. This is the only way roads can be constructed until you unlock the medieval-era military engineer, so gone are the days where you’d send out an army of workers to cover the continent in a complex transport network. It pays to set up routes between your own cities, as well. The roads will allow you to move troops across your empire faster, and more importantly these domestic routes can provide new cities with more food to help them grow. Trade routes are temporary, but when they end the road remains, and is even upgraded whenever the civilization makes it to the next era. It also leaves behind a trading post.
A trading post is established in cities that have had a trade route going to them and is designed to increase the gold yield of any active trade routes that go through that city. So if you create a route between Rome and Moscow, and then later establish another route from Rome to a city just east of Moscow, the value of the route will increase by one gold. Every trading post passed through adds another gold. It’s worth planning trade routes not solely based on the resources you can gain, then, but rather how profitable future routes will be.
Trading purely between your own cities is useful in different ways, allowing you to funnel new cities with food and production. Have a cart ready to go when you set up your latest outpost, and you can build it a road and give a not-insignificant growth boost right away.
Exploiting city states
City states are neutral, single-city nations played exclusively by the AI. Like other civs, they can be traded with and fought, but they aren’t competing or working their way down a victory path. Instead, they exist to be seduced into providing a broad array of buffs depending on the number of envoys sent to them.
Envoys are earned over time, increased by policies, and for the first, third and sixth envoy sent to a city state, a new bonus is received. City states also like to throw quests your way, which on completion immediately add a new envoy to the city. When you send three envoys and have more than any other civ, you become that city state’s suzerain, its sovereign.
As a city state’s suzerain, you share their resources, can get them to join you in wars, and finally you’ll get a unique city state bonus like Geneva’s +15 to the science of every city when the civ isn’t at war. You can steal city states from other civs just by sending more envoys, but competing over them will sour your relationship with that civ, potentially becoming a catalyst for war.
WarDeclaring war and warmonger penalties explainedKicking off a war is not as simple as just attacking a foreign unit or city; you’ve got to declare war first, and even then there are choices to make. The first type of declaration is for a surprise war, i.e. a war that you’ve not got a formal reason to start beyond your own lust for conquest. Surprise wars have a massive warmonger penalty, potential making other civs more than a little upset with you.
Wait long enough, and you’re sure to be given a good reason to go to war. The diplomacy menu has a casus belli option, which reveals all the formal war declarations. The simplest, ‘declare formal war’, can be used if you’ve denounced the civ in the last five turns, which essentially means you’ve already warned them that you’re pissed off with them. Since that’s easy to do, the penalties are still quite steep.
More specialised, reactive war declarations aren’t as severe. If your religions are competing, you can start up a holy war with all penalties halved. Declaring a war of liberation, where you’re taking back a city that’s been conquered, doesn’t have any penalties as all. Aspiring conquerors, however, will likely have to use formal wars more, particularly in the early game.
Dealing with Barbarians
Once a mere pest, in Civilization VI Barbarians have become an intelligent threat. They roam the map, spawning from camps, and explore the world with Scouts just like a regular civ. However, unlike other civs, they’re not looking for resources, new lands or potential allies – they just want to burn and kill and enslave. So when a Scout spots a city or a vulnerable unit – a Builder, say – it will report back to its camp and a more aggressive unit will spawn and attack or, in the case of a Builder, capture.
Barbarians aren’t just mindlessly aggressive, however. They choose their battles. A single unit won’t just start attacking a city, and is more likely to pick a fight it can win. What inspires their choice of target isn’t always entirely clear, however. I’ve witnessed them killing a trader and thus halting a trade route in one instance, and ignoring an unprotected trader standing on a tile right next to them in another.
When you spot a Barbarian, you should attempt to kill it, even if it’s not threatening any cities or units. It might return later, possibly with several friends. The same goes for their camps, which constantly spawn more of them and hide big chests of gold. Getting rid of camps can sometimes impress other civs or city states.
Combat strategy
Battles in Civilization VI combine the combat of its predecessor with a dash of the stacked armies that came before it. Most units can only occupy empty tiles, so there are no stacks of doom, but military units can be linked to a support unit like a Builder or Settler where it shares the same tile and acts as an escort. Similarly, infantry can be linked to units like siege towers and anti-air guns, which give them benefits like ignoring a city’s wall during a siege and defending against air units.
You can see a unit’s health and attack rating, and combat largely follows a rock, paper, scissors formula, but success also depends on the terrain. Hills, for instance, have a defence modifier of +3, making them great places to make a stand, but tricky tiles to attack. Conversely, marshes have a modifier of -2, so you really don’t want to get caught by your enemy while walking through them.
If you want to conquer a city, you need to get to its juicy centre, but that’s also the best defended part of the city, usually protected by walls and a garrison. If you’re not confident you can take the city, you can still destroy its farms, mines and other districts, costing the enemy civ gold and resources. When taking on the city centre, you’ll do damage against its defences first, then the city’s health bar. Some units, starting with the siege tower, can bypass or help other units bypass these defences, however.
Victory conditions
Civilization VI’s victory conditions are split up into five sections, each with their own unique objectives. In cases where none of the civs achieve any of the five victory conditions, the winner is instead chosen based on their score, itself based on an amalgam of achievements from the number of civics and techs researched to how many wonders have been built and great people recruited.
Culture victory conditions
A culture victory is attained when a civilization contains more visiting tourists than any other civ has domestic ones. These visitors are seduced by civilizations that generate a lot of culture and tourism points. While culture is important during all parts of the game, as it unlocks new civics and expands city borders, tourism doesn’t really take off until the modern era when archaeology allows civs to unearth ancient artifacts and buildings like the seaside resort or national park can be constructed.
Science victory conditions
Being ahead of the curve in terms of research affects all aspects of the game, increasing military might, unlocking powerful buildings and districts before everyone else, introducing new methods of travel that make speeding across the globe that bit easier – winning through science isn’t a simple matter of being the biggest egg-head however. Three milestones have to be hit first: launching a satellite, putting a human on the moon, establishing a Martian colony. And you can’t even start doing that until you build a spaceport. Lots of campuses, research agreements and tech boosts will get you there a bit sooner though.
Domination victory conditions
Good old domination – nice and simple. For this victory, you must conquer the capital of every civilization. While straightforward, defeating every other civ takes a lot of work on all but small, pangaea maps. For others, we’re talking long treks across continents, naval warfare, invading other continents by air and sea, and of course finding all the gold and production to maintain a huge army. The real trick is starting wars without drawing every other civ into a global crusade against you. Even if your goal is to annihilate everyone, you’ll be spending a long time working on strategic alliances and keeping future enemies placated.
Religion victory conditions
The religious victory goal tasks you with creating a religion and making it the dominant belief system in the planet. That means 50% of the cities of every civ have to be converted. To go down this victory path, you’ve gotta have faith. No, really, loads and loads of the faith resource. It’s generated by holy sites and the buildings within them and trade routes. It can be used to found a religion as well as purchase different types of missionaries. Basic missionaries can spread your religion to other cities, while apostles can do the same while also fighting other religious units. The final unit, the inquisitor, can weaken opposing religions.
Early game guide – your first turns
So you’ve picked your civ and find yourself on a new world. Most civs start with a Settler and a warrior. First order of business: build a city. The game will start you in a good area for a city, and exploration can waste turns and risk roving Barbarians kidnapping your Settler and ending the game. If there’s an exceptional area right next to you, maybe it will be worth wasting a turn, but settling straight away is recommended.
Opening up the world through exploration should be next on the agenda. If there are no immediate Barbarian threats, use your warrior to start exploring. He’s not great at it, but don’t worry, you’ll have something better very soon. Get your city building a Scout straight away. It’ll take a few turns to build, so keep an eye on that warrior. He won’t be killed in one go by a Barbarian, but you don’t want to have to waste time healing him unless you’re attacking camps and getting gold out of it.
Your first research choices depend a lot on the resources around you. Pottery is good to start with as it unlocks the granary, a building that encourages early growth by generating +1 food and +2 housing, as well as leading to Irrigation which unlocks various resources. Next, animal husbandry is worthwhile if you’ve got animals nearby. It allows Builders to construct pastures and camps, generating +1 production and +1 gold respectively while also unlocking the resources they’re built on, like horses, fur or truffles. Alternatively, if you’re noticing a lot of stone and metal deposits nearby, mining will be a useful tech, opening up mines and quarries for construction. They provide production bonuses, while also unlocking iron, stone, copper etc. Whichever one you choose, you should research the other sooner rather than later, as you’ll soon be encountering a wider variety of resources as you establish new cities.
When your Scout’s ready, set him to auto-explore or just send him off wherever you want. Now you need to decide what to do with that warrior. You’ve likely noticed Barbarians at this point. If you don’t deal with them, they’ll only come back and harass you. Warriors can handle themselves in a fight, but a lone one taking on multiple Barbarians or a defended camp isn’t going to get very far. He needs a hand. A slinger is helpful at this point. He can finish off the Barbarians before they can retaliate against the warrior.
At this point your capital is probably at or near level two, the number that represents its size and how many citizens it contains. When you start establishing new cities, particularly in less hospitable locations, you’ll want to start reassigning citizens early on to either boost food or production, growth or manufacturing. A balance between the two is recommended in these early turns when you’ve only got one city, however.
That extra citizen isn’t going to be hanging around for a long time, anyway. Start working on a Settler as soon as you can. It will take enough time so that your Scout and your other units should have explored the surrounding area and revealed potential settlement sites. It’s tempting to get a Builder around this time, when you’re surrounded by untapped resources, but cities with low populations of one or two can’t really exploit the bonus yields provided by tile improvements.
The astrology tech is a good choice for your next research project. It unlocks your first district, the holy site, a shrine, and your first wonder: Stonehenge. You’ll need this tech to start a religion and accumulate faith points. The holy site generates faith based on where it’s built (remember, you want to place it near mountains), and the shrine can be built inside it, making missionaries available.
At first, you can only create a simple pantheon, but with a great prophet you can transform it into a religion with multiple bonuses that you can pick from a large list. The simplest way to get a great prophet is by embarking on the Stonehenge wonder. This is where you might consider reassigning your citizens. Stonehenge will be your longest construction project at this point, and making your capital specialise in production can speed it up by a few turns.
Of course, this is all adaptable. Got a civ with a great early combat unit? Pump a few out and go for some ancient warfare, which doesn’t carry warmonger penalties. Science focused? Head for writing before astrology and start researching, get an early great scientist and pull ahead. Alternatively, there might be a lot of barbarians nearby, particularly on higher difficulties, or other aggressive civs looking to sort you out early, meaning defense will be your highest priority.
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