Friday, November 2, 2012

Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution

Prepare to re-write the history books everyone as you take on the role of some of the most prominent historical figures to ever walk the Earth in Sid Meier’s turn based strategy game “Civilization Revolution”. When you start out on the main game mode you are allowed to choose from famous people from all around the world such as Germany, Japan, India, America and so on, each of these nations are represented by a prominent figure from anywhere in time to that respected nation. Players will recognize characters such as President Abraham Lincoln for America, Mahatma Gandhi for India, Otto Van Bismarck for Germany, Napoleon Bonaparte for France and the list goes on with 11 other nations and famous figures for each of them. As an added ability players gain an extra perk dependent on which nation they choose, abilities range from nation to nation but some allow your troops to move extra spaces, allow your soldiers to be healed in areas you control or give you extra gold to start off with and so on. Once you’ve made your decision on who you want to be you are placed in an unexplored randomly generated world and are given one lonely settler unit in the year 4000 BC, this settler unit is used to found your very first city. Strategically picking the area where you settle your first city comes in handy with the mix of geographical elements around you your city could begin harvesting food or have access to land that allows for greater production and much much more. From there the skies the limit, players can continue to improve their city by building a wide variety of building such as banks, granaries, and other unique building such as modern wonders of today like the United Nations and Stone Henge. As your city/cities become more prominent they’re visited by “Great People” who have made great strides in history and have effectively shaped the world we know today, these people can perform various acts to help your city become even greater. Players also can build and send out troops on each of their respective “turns”, in turn finding uncivilized barbarians as well as other nations, controlled by the game, that are beginning to explore and develop their own cities. The overall objective to the main game mode is to achieve a victory; victories can be achieved one of four ways, domination acquired through conquering the other nations, cultural where players collect 20 great people, cities or wonders to their home city and build a United Nations, technological where you successfully launch a space program and travel to a new planet to colonize or economical where you collect 20,000 gold and build a World Bank. Additionally “Civilization Revolution” adds even more to do with a multiplayer element, where up to four players or friends can play against each other in one on one, two on two or free for all matches to conquer and destroy your best friends.


Sid Meier’s “Civilization Revolution” strikes gold with the ability to take on the role of some of history greatest figures and completely change what the history books wrote, the ability to turn Gandhi into a military badass is always an enjoyable twist in my book. The gameplay provides for a very enjoyable experience although if you are not a fan of turn based strategy game or history you will not want to pick up this game. Those who do enjoy a great strategy game along with loads of prominent figures and culture throughout our history then this is the game for you, providing plenty of lasting appeal as you play through and build your very own empire to rule.

Good:
-Provides many hours of enjoyable gameplay
-Easy to pick up and learn, you’ll be creating empires in no time
-You’ll actually learn a little bit of history

Bad:
-Multiplayer is a little laggy and sometimes jams up on you and your friends

(Game Reviewed on Xbox 360)

Scully Rating: 9 out of 10