Reviews for 2K Games Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Gold Edition

Compared to III - a great improvement!

Strengths: more realistic, more wonders

Weakness: online updates

I find that the improvements outweigh the negatives in Civ IV. I've played Civ III for a while, and was always frustrated with the unrealistic means of making it more difficult at higher levels - such as warriors defeating Knights in battle, other Civs building wonders in record turns, things like that. In Civ IV, those issues seem to be repaired. I've found that the rules they give us for combat movements, cost, etc., are not bypassed to make the game more difficult at higher levels.

I like the added variety of leaders and their abilities, seems more realistic and helpful for long term strategy. I also like the addition of more wonders, though they have changed some of the benefits of certain wonders so I needed to get used to the same thing being different.

I also am enjoying the new "Permanent Alliance" option. I just finally used that and really liked the dimension it added to game play.

The graphics do bother me a bit - too bouncy. I've changed settings as much as I can to get away from it, but it is still a bit bouncy and makes me dizzy.

I'm also not pleased with the bug that makes the game not work with my graphics card - which I have yet to find a fix for. I am playing it on another computer. One of my son-in-laws also can't use the game since his graphics card doesn't seem to be supported. He has a much bigger, badder, multimedia computer.

It also has a problem with the online updates. I updated and had serious issues which I had to call the manufacturer to fix - couldn't start the game, couldn't uninstall the game, couldn't reinstall the game - totally useless. A Direct X fix repaired that, but I don't think I even got the update after all the work! I'm quite leary of trying again. Then my son, who also has the game, updated his and it caused serious corruption for him too. I told him what my fix was, and it didn't work for his. He has to call and see what to do now. Updates aren't supposed to break the game, they are supposed to fix it. The game works fine without the updates, so I'm going to forego any future attempts to update.

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Sid Meiers Civilization 4: Colonization

Testseek.com has collected 21 expert reviews for Sid Meiers Civilization 4: Colonization and the average expert rating is 83 of 100. The average score reflects the expert community’s view on this product. Click below and use Testseek.com to see all ratings, product awards and conclusions.

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