Review: Civilization Revolution DS
He’s got a whole world in his hands
As someone who’s been pining for a DS version of Civilization for a couple of years, I wonder whether the realisation of such a product could ever have been anything other than a disappointment. Unfortunately, after a few weeks’ play, ‘disappointment’ pretty much sums up my opinion regarding the DS port of the latest game in the famous turn-based strategy series.
To be fair to Firaxis and Sid Meier, it’s actually the DS itself that causes some of the problems with this game, and the Civilization core remains largely intact. You get to take a civilization from prehistory to modern times, building and moving units, researching technology, and aiming to become the greatest in the world via various means (domination, economics, technology, or by building the UN). However, with Civ basically being a strategy title, it’s problematic when that aspect of the game is hampered.
First and foremost, the DS screen is too small to provide you with a decent overview of the world. Although the team wisely ditched the 3D graphics from the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions, opting instead for an iconic approach similar to the original Civilization, the map still feels cramped, and moving around it is a chore. This problem could have been alleviated somewhat by providing the option to allow the map to appear—at least optionally—on both screens; unfortunately, one screen is mostly reserved for pointless battle animations.
Elsewhere, the streamlining of the original concept to hammer it into consoles rather than PCs and Macs has neutered it. Although the game is faster, it’s become more of an overt race than a game of chess. Instead of investing in technology and thinking of long-term plans, a war-obsessed AI largely forces games into tending towards moving units, protracted wars and conquest. The technology tree is very basic, and random events are frequent and absurdly powerful. It’s not uncommon to end up with tanks in 200 AD, especially if you stumble across Atlantis, which always spews forth a number of technological advances.
It’s not all bad news—the game is quite fun, and gives you a quick Civ-style fix for when you’re away from your PC. However, rather than being captivating in a ‘total addiction’ sense, this game instead feels ‘annoyingly’ compelling in the same way as Puzzle Quest: you can’t put the game down, but in your heart of hearts you know it’s actually a somewhat tedious slog that could have been a lot better.
Civilization Revolution is already out in the US, and comes to Europe towards the end of August.
Sadly, Civilization Revolution doesn’t have a whale unit—it’s just a resource icon.
I just put up my take on this exact same game here –
http://savygamer.co.uk/2008/07/civilisation-revolution-ds-review.html
I guess we don’t feel exactly the same.
“Opinions lol” I guess, or something like that.
<3
I think a lot of people who’ve not played Civ before (or at least haven’t played a lot of Civ) might like Civ Rev. However, even compared to the original Civ (from 1991), Rev is lightweight, and the war-obsessed AI just becomes irritating after a while, prompting a race for tanks, rather than long-term strategic goals.
Like I said, I still find the game somewhat fun and quite compelling, but I’d be hard-pressed to really recommend it, and I certainly think existing Civ fans should think long and hard about paying 25 quid for such a neutered version.
Correction, 19 quid for such a neutered version. ;P
Yeah, I have not played a lot of Civ before. Is Civ4 probably the best one to play these days? I might pick it up for comparison, and I am pretty sure it’ll run on my pc…
They really ought to just stop pretending the DS is good for anything other than puzzle games.
It just ruins everything put on it and will continue to do so until someone does a port of Split Personalities.
@LewieP—If you can find it, grab Sid Meier’s Civilization Chronicles for PC. I got it from Amazon for about 10 quid (although it’s now out of stock there) and it contains the first four games. Being an old fart and retro head, I’ll clearly argue with anyone until blue in the face that Civ II is the series highlight.
@Bluce—The DS only good for puzzle games? Tsk. Go wash your mouth out with a copy of Space Invaders Extreme, young man.
My own view is that they’ve taken the brilliant idea that is Civ and wrapped it in a cheap engine. After something like Anno 1701 showed that strategy games could work on a DS this seems a massive step back.
Civ Rev should be like 42 all time classics. Core mechanics that have been lavished with attention and polished to a shine, but instead Friaxis have knocked out a cheap SEGA casino instead.
If that makes sense.