Sid Meier's Civilization® IV

still better customizability than its successor, esp. 6.

some mods can really go a long way

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https://youtu.be/60oQwt5iU6Y

Doubtlessly one of the great entries in the Civilization franchise, this nearly twenty year old game has been functionally superseded by numerous sequels since it's original release.

One of the all-time great strategy games. Playing this again in 2024 when the game is almost 20 years old and it absolutely has stood the test of time. Aside from the graphics and a lack of UI scaling, Civ IV feels incredibly up to date.

If you've not heard of Civilization, it is a series of turn-based games in which the player brings a civilization from the ancient world all the way into the near future. Considering how ambitious the theme is, the games are remarkably accessible. Civilization IV is one of the easiest in the series to get into.

Civ IV is a tight and cohesive game. Every mechanic has a clear unique purpose. Every building or unit you create has impact. The civics are significant. There is very little excess.

The AI is also very competent compared with typical AIs in these kinds of games.

10/10 classic for good reason.

its got a better fighting style then the newer ones

Coming in ascending order, this one is a good evolution from III. Several things got modified, others added and some removed, but I do think it goes in a good way.
I still have to try the improvements to this version, but overall, vanilla version is good.

Great game

Oh, c'mon! Who doesn't know that Sid Meiers' Civilization franchise is the GOAT of role-playing games by now?

The last of the "classic" Civilization games, recommend skipping Civ3 and going straight to this one.

Better than civ 5 in my opinion. Different from civ 6 but about equally fun mostly.

Very engaging, great music, cool maps, Leonard Nimoy, runs great on old hardware.

one of my favorite civilization games, fun and interactive

It is Civ, so pretty much guaranteed to be entertaining. Plus -- it is narrated by Leonard Nimoy!

Game as good as it was when it first came out

This is the best example of Civilization series. I've played them all since 1 and 4 is the best one.

Much better than Civ 6 and I doubt Civ 7 will do any better. I will keep playing Civ 4 and Civ 5. The best Civ games I.P.O.

This is an amazing iteration of the Civilization franchise! I played it and loved it long ago; now in 2024 getting my family into it too!

Your Tank died trying to attack an enemy Longbowman!

I love this one, I made friendships with it.

Don't know how anyone plays this game when you can't see anything among the clutter of the terrible, hideous 3D terrain. Everything blends in! You can barely see what improvements are already there or what unit is where. Not to mention that the interface is horrible with tool tips/menu titles appearing always on the bottom left corner for some reason even if you hovering the mouse elsewhere. Whenever you're prompted to select a new building to construct, science to research or make some kind of decision the whole game locks up within that menu to prevent you from checking anything else that might help you make a selection. Just play Civ 3 or 5 instead which look much better, are more legible and have much fewer annoying issues.

One of the best old ones!

The game is fun to play, detailed but straight forward to follow...best time spent on a computer. Unbelievable animation and loads of fun start to finish.

its good.

The GOAT Civ game perfect blend of simple, but packed with great stuff and just fun.

Good classic simulation type game, a damn sight better than modern civ

Just one more turn...

Nostalgic

Really Nice Game I prefered the Style of Civ4 and Civ6

Civ5 changed Civilization to a point where going back just isn't an option. If you can, do yourself the favor and get the latest Civilization.

It worked, it was good, at its time it was the best. Then Civ5 came out, then 6, soon 7... With each iteration you can't go back without something feeling wrong, and Civ4 is far too in the past go feel any sort of right.

excellent game, one version of several I have used over the years. Love playing it off line

I have been playing a version of this game since 1993

The game is fine. Steam sucks.

good strategy game without multiplayer tho you can hotseat mainly meant for solo play

Broadly a good game (note that I have played a lot more of this than the hours on record on Steam).

Pros

It's basically a very good game with a good tech tree, building options, cities etc and I think it is nicely presented - I still love that Civ feeling of starting a new game, looking at all the great resources and city locations and thinking about where my early cities are going to go.

As with other Civ games, each civ comes with its own characteristics / unique unit to make it more interesting

I also have BTS and Warlords and I thought the expansions were good

Strategic resources and luxuries worked for me

I thought it was helpful that the diplomacy showed the modifiers (i.e. why the AI does / doesn't like you)

Cons

The stack of death. I just don't really enjoy this part of the game when the AI comes into view with a billion units, and even if I do have enough of an army to deal with it I wouldn't say that I enjoy it. Maybe it's because I'm just not that good at playing the game but I don't actually really see the interest in simply piling up endless units and for me at least it favours the AI which (unlike me) won't get bored of producing 100s of units.

I don't really like the thing where basically if you attack with your artillery first then you can cause a lot of damage to the opposing stack but if you are caught on the defensive then your artillery don't help at all until it is your turn to attack. Artillery should have a defensive value as well. It put way too much power on the side of whoever got to attack first and obviously in battles between 2 large stacks the total casualties could be very high.

The cultural borders thing is great in principle but in practice I found it quite a pain to be checking and making sure I'm not about to lose my borders + conquest becomes very challenging later in the game as taking a city means that city is often still completely surrounded by enemy territory, which is usually an intolerable situation to leave it in so you basically have to capture a whole set of enemy cities if you want new cities with some proper borders. Maybe it is less realistic but I found the Civ5 approach to be much more enjoyable from a gameplay point of view.

I used the hate the vassal / AI ganging up thing whereby I'm finally getting an advantage in a war against a key opponent and then suddenly their neighbour who they were unfriendly with before has now joined their side against me and there are 5 new stacks of death headed my way.

I think the idea of building cottages which you then have to wait to see them grow is a nice concept but I dislike the fact that the inevitable AI stack of death can pillage them back down to zero - maybe some would argue this is realistic but it's quite frustrating if you have reached the top level and then it gets destroyed completely and you are going to have to wait a really long time to get back to that top level - I'd have preferred if it just needed a worker repair action (even if it's quite a long one).

Neutral

I think the AI was pretty OK. Always felt like the diplomacy was a little bit biased against the human player (in single player) but I guess it was bearable.

In terms of the stuff the expansions added, I was always less keen on the espionage, not sure I ever felt like it added much to the gameplay for me.

I don't know whether it was just the way I played or the game itself but I always felt like I didn't make much use of naval units in Civ4 - felt like Civ5 did a better job of this to me.

Some units had modifiers against a specific type of enemy unit - in a couple of cases I felt like these were a bit overpowered (i.e. it made them way too strong vs that specific type but relatively a lot less useful against anything else - in particular when attacking a stack with multiple types of unit).

Overall

I do like this game but Civ5 improved on a lot of things which in hindsight were less great about Civ4. But I still think this is a very solid game and I still came back to play the occasional game of Civ4 after I got Civ5.

I hate this game

I WOULD recommend this amazing game to others if it didn't crash half the time it is trying to save game.

gandhicus nukitus

got this on sale, totally new to the civ series.

"well, I've got about 15 minutes before bed...that's enough time to check out the game mechanics before I have to sleep."

(6 hours later, as dawn is beginning to break)

"DAMMIT I WAS 2 TURNS AWAY FROM WINNING THE SPACE RACE!!!!!!!!!"

this game is very fun, and probably very bad for my health. two thumbs up!

good

dislike how limited playing time is - can't go as long as when we were able to use cd/dvd to install the game

I love how smooth it plays.

12345678910 good

launch game through Civ4: BTS more updated/revised version of Civ4, use this version for tutorial

Definitely a Civ game. Has some things you would not expect as a Civ 5 or 6 player. And I feel like it's a lot simpler in some ways, with less confusing mechanics, but still hard to master.

tough contol useage and graphic issues

sid is one of the biggest POS over-rated so-called game-makers ever. thank effing god I only wasted a few dollars on this garbage version.

I love modding this game! It's so easy to get into the assets and it's fun to just explore and customize every start. The simplicity compared to Civ 5 and 6 in graphics draws me in

Best game ever. I've been playing it for over 18 years now and still going. Deep strategy game with great mods over at civfanatics.com. Really the last of the great Civilization games.

Decent, but clunky and outdated. Just play Civ 6 (or Civ 7 when that comes out, assuming that it is as good or better than 6).

I've been playing Civ 5 for so long that this is a welcome blast of nostalgia and change of pace. Can you put the DLCs on sale please?