"Sid Meier’s Civilization V," or "Civ 5" if you are lazy like I am, is a strategy game that is like "Settlers of Catan" meets the "Age of Empires" franchise. If you don’t know what either of those games are, go buy them! They’re a ton of fun, especially "Settlers of Catan," since it’s a board game that’s perfect for competing with friends.
So, I’m a little late to the "Civ 5" party, as the game itself came out in 2010, but I got my hands on a copy this week and decided to try it out. And by got my hands on a copy I mean I traded my boyfriend my copy of "Undertale" to use while I played his copy of "Civ." Honestly, two hours into this game, and I found myself understanding global politics much better than I had before, and I like to think that I have a fairly decent grasp on economics.
The premise of the game is simple: you play as a famous historical figure in charge of your nation of origin, for example George Washington is in charge of America and Queen Elizabeth is in charge of England, ect. In "Civ 5," your goal is to build your civilization from the ground up, and try to take over the world, or, in some cases, have the most money, or even be the most cultured. There are many ways to “win” here.
You begin by building one city and creating resources. These resources are used to fuel your economy, build your roads, feed your army, everything really. That’s the simple part of the game, though picking where you want to settle is an accomplishment in it of itself. The game is turn-based, which makes it much easier to keep track of all of your builders, although even with the tutorial pointing out to me the groups I’d missed, I still lost track of my army one or 12 times. The game ramps up from this point pretty fast, as you send out settlers to build cities to make armies and on and on. Within two hours I had five cities, a large army, and a grudge against Gandhi. That’s one of the more amusing portions of this game for me, as the historical figures you are up against don’t always act like their real life versions. For example, Gandhi had the biggest war machine in the entire game, and Genghis Khan was the peaceful trader.
All this fun historical stuff aside, the game really drives home the fact that political relations from country to country are not always straight forwards, and that you don’t have to take over a country to benefit from them. The game has a huge diplomacy mechanic, which really makes you debate over your choices, and think if they will benefit your country in the long run. For me, this game really drove home the concept that not everyone is against you, they’re just for themselves. I would recommend this game to both strategy aficionados and nerds like me who like laughing at militarized Gandhi alike.
