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The sections below cover everything you need, or want to know about Civilization IV. Click on one to begin, or
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Welcome to the Sid Meiers Civilization IV Information Center!
This information is meant to give anyone a deep, factual understanding of Sid Meier's Civilization IV (the sequel
Sid Meier's Civilization III) as well as Civilization IV: Warlords
(the first expansion pack of the base game). The article will keep up to the very last detail of information that is
currently available to us.
Material is gathered from all sources available (in a detailed manner) and
put into this article as one organized piece. This should make it very easy to find virtually everything you want to know,
without having to surf
through multiple places on the web to find what you need. You don't have to be a
Civilization III veteran to understand what we are talking about here,
since this is a brand new Civilization... a historical simulation/strategy game series which has won multiple game
awards, and which is
the world over as being the greatest, and finest turn-based strategy game series on the planet!
The game has been released, but it does not mean that this article will not
be updated with more news as it comes (patches, expansions, etc)!
This information is up to date as of Monday, July 3rd, 2006, and up to the latest available bit of information.
As information changes, or is released, I will be updating this as soon as
possible so it evolves to be factual. I recommend that you check out the updates
(when they are posted), so that you stay informed, and up-to-date as well.
Checking the "Miscellaneous Information" section
occasionally can also give you a heads-up on some other things either in regards
to this article, or other information. From what we have gathered so far, as
well as the great reviews the game has been receiving, I believe we can all form
our own opinions of it.
This is the most detailed and extensive, most viewed, and also the most
updated place for all things Civilization IV from around the web.
Currently, there are a total of 360+ gathered game details, with nine
new additions! Don't miss out, discuss the article!
This is the section for looking up all the current new updates on the go
from Monday, July 3rd. They are not organized in any way, so it is highly
recommended that you read through past this section and take a more in-depth
look at the rest.
Patch v1.61 has been released. There are many changes, fixes, and additions.
Its size is 45.7MB and can be downloaded here.
The SDK and PitBoss are also available. Get these here.
This is the first expansion to
the original
Civilization IV. It is due out this summer, in late July (2006).
Here we'll look at the very basics of the game, from its creators and the design elements they implement, to what
general game-play aspects
will contain.
Development & Producers: The new Sid Meier's
IV was
developed by Firaxis Games (based in Hunt Valley, Maryland, U.S.A.).
It is much more streamlined and full of personality. Unlike the Civilization III series, the publisher will not
be Atari, as they have sold off the Civilization Franchise to Take-Two Interactive. Take-Two confirmed this on January 26th, although it has been known that Atari sold
the Franchise since
November 24th, 2004. The game was published under Take-Twos publishing label 2K Games.
The senior producer of the game was Barry Caudill (he produced Sid Meier's Pirates!), and the producer Jesse Smith.
Jesse was the producer
Civilization III: Conquests as well (the last, and most commendable expansion of the
Civ3 series). The project lead, and lead designer
of the game was Soren Johnson, he programmed and co-designed Civ3 along with company CEO, Jeff Briggs. For more
information on Firaxis
staff, check out the Bios section on their
About 38 people have been dedicated to certain segments of Civ4 (terrain, cities, interface, etc). It will
take thousands of people
to complete the project. Firaxis also says that they have many (100+) active Civilization fans testing and giving
feedback to Firaxis.
This number is rising. However fans have been giving feedback since
June of 2004 in a private online forum.
News that Civilization IV was in the very early stages of development first came on December 4th, 2003.
Development of
Civ4 most
likely started around Spring time in 2003 (more than two years ago). At around the Fall time of the same year, Firaxis had
an early Multiplayer
up and playing. The basic game-play elements were established then. After that period (around May of 2005) much more
attention has been given to
improving the AI (or Artificial Intelligence).
The game hit Beta in August and from
then on, much more attention was given to polishing up the different
aspects of it. Civ4 went Gold on
October 19th, and shipped on the 25th, although most people got
their copy on October
Good news for Macintosh Gamers! Civilization IV
will be available for the Mac in early 2006 [source]. Aspyr Media
is bringing the game to the Mac. Civilization III: Complete
(featuring both expansions of Civ3: Play The World and
Conquests) will also be available for the Mac later this year, in December.
Firaxis Memo: Firaxis has updated their "Behind the Scenes" section on their
website with a new Winter-edition Memo. The
part below includes
content on
Civilization IV has been flying off the shelves and has received loads of
great reviews. We want to thank our fans for your unwavering support, and
particularly for your tremendous feedback that helped get us through some
initial technical issue right after the release of the game. Our team worked
tirelessly to fix the problems quickly and post a
patch to
help those folks experiencing difficulties in running the game. Civ fans are
truly extraordinary! And dont forget... Santa will be bringing another gem of
a gift in January... the Civ IV SDK! This is an unprecedented offering and we
cant wait to see what all of you budding Civ designers will create!
"Civilization is much more of collaboration between
our designers and our fans. We've had a lot of feedback over the years about what works and what doesn't in Civilization
and it's had a big
impact on the
game." - Sid Meier said in a GameSpy
Many conventions which have remained the same since Civilization I (which came out in 1991) have been
to ensure a quality new game.
The game was written entirely from scratch using flexible XML data files, as well
as the
Python scripting language. Boost.Python (this allows for seamless interoperability between C++ and the Python programming language)
was used as the
interface layer between the C++ game code and Python. Python is used in the game for map generation, interface screens,
game events, tools,
etc. If you want to see how this will affect customization of the game (or any other aspect relating to customization),
look under Customization Flexibility. The new 3D engine will also allow for greater possibilities (find
under A New Expression).
Firaxis main focus is aiming to keep the game true, simple, but mostly to lose
aspects which are not
fun (find
Controlling Your People... by Decree for aspects which have been removed because they are
not fun to the player),
to maintain a successful Civilization Franchise.
They also plan to break free of some bad habits from previous
Civilization titles. For more information on maintaining a successful Franchise, see the PowerPoint entitled
Dont Blow It!, by lead Civilization
designer, Soren Johnson. An article that relates to the PowerPoint is "Civ4: A Model in
Progression" where Soren talks about the challenges of improving on a
successful model while simultaneously keeping hardcore fans satisfied. That being said,
Civ4 will not be totally different in concept than
Civ3. Don't let this fool you into thinking that it will just be a small improvement over
Civ3, though! Remember, it is
rewritten from scratch, so there is a lot of change/alteration and major innovation.
In order to fight team fatigue, Firaxis will rotate its design responsibilities (with different lead
Firaxis will not be afraid to slightly change its target audience a bit, as keeping the same audience will lead
to the loss of a
percent of people per cycle. They will still, however, make base fans comfortable with the same fonts, icons, and map
placement, a similar number
units on the screen, etc
Civ4 being a maturation of the franchise (since it will focus on more multiplayer, and modability, unlike
Civ3, as it was
under a lot of pressure), they will keep adding more game-play/design innovation and not just adding more content or
"Stuff." Making everything a
little better will be much less compelling to the player than a significant improvement in just a few areas. Soren also
Electronic Art's (EA's) Bing Gordon that "1/3 old, 1/3 improved, and 1/3 new" is a good rule of thumb. Simplifying
old systems will leave
for new design elements.
Firaxis will also "borrow" useful elements mostly from Real-Time Strategy (RTS) games. An example with
Civ3 was the distinct
civilizations, unique units, abilities, and multi-unit forces or armies.
Civilization IV will continue on to what Civ3 has had --
The core game-play concept still remains the same. It is a turn-based, tile-based, historical simulation/strategy
empire building game. You
are put as the emperor of a powerful civilization, ruling your empire by decree, with one goal in mind: to stand the test
of time (which has been
appropriate slogan of Firaxis). You start out with a small tribe and lead them to greatness, to the post-nuclear age and
The game is even more about strategy than ever.
It is more about decision making and less about the established motions that have built up over the years.
Below is an exact quote of the official features of Civilization IV that the Publishers and Developers have released. Do not forget to go to Civ4.com
for much more information!!!
With over 6 million units sold and unprecedented critical acclaim from fans and press around the world, Sid Meier's
Civilization is recognized
as one of
greatest PC game franchises of all-time. Now, Sid Meier and Firaxis Games take this incredibly fun and addictive game to
new heights by adding
new ways to
and win, new tools to manage and expand your civilization, all-new easy to use mod capabilities and intense multiplayer
modes and options.
Civilization IV
to life like never before in a beautifully detailed, living 3D world that elevates the game-play experience to a whole new
level. Sid Meier's
Civilization IV
already been heralded as one of the top games of 2005, and a must-have for gamers around the globe!
Civ IV comes to life! - Beautiful 3D world with dozens of fully animated units (including culturally unique units)
and totally
customizable armies.
Detailed cities and wonders will appear on the map. Wonder movies are back!
Greater Accessibility and Ease of Play - An easy-to-use interface will be immediately familiar to RTS and action
game players, and
newcomers to the
series will be able to jump in and play.
Multiplayer -LAN, Internet, PBEM and Persistent Turn-Based Server (PTBS or PitBoss) offer players all-new strategies
and ways to play when
cooperating with live opponents.
Team Play - Whether playing multiplayer or single player, team play offers a new way of setting locked alliances
that result in shared
wonder effects,
visibility, unit trading and shared territory that delivers a plethora of new strategic and tactical options.
Mods and Community Tools - Designed from the ground up for modability, the game contains a powerful map editor with
XML and Python
Choose Your Leader - Many Civs now have 2 leaders from which to choose, with each Leader having traits that provide
various bonuses to the
player and
of replayability.
Civics - With the discovery of new techs, civic options can become available. Freedom of speech or slavery?
Hereditary rule or open
This creates endless government choices and possibilities!
Religion - Now there are 7 religions in the game that are unlocked through researching. When unlocked, the
religion spreads through a
allowing them to use the religion to help manage happiness, gain gold and create Great Prophets.
Great People - As the player uses specialists they gain Great People points in the city that is utilizing the
specialists. Great
People include
Artist, Tycoon, Prophet, Engineer, & Scientist. They can be used to get free techs, start Golden Ages, or join a city
to increase its
Promotions - Each unit has a promotion path that emphasizes specific unit traits. Promotions include bonuses to
Attack/Defend on
movement bonuses, sight/visibility bonuses and increased withdrawal chances.
Tech Tree - Flexible Tech tree allows players more strategic choices for developing their civilizations along
unique paths.
More Civs and all new Units and Improvements to enhance and grow your empire.
Faster-Paced Fun - Game-play has been streamlined for a tighter, faster and more compelling experience.
In-Game Movies - Civ IV will have over 70 in-game movies and animated sequences.
Perhaps this is the most important question to most people. When will the game actually be released?
Take-Two Games has pushed the release of
Civilization IV up by a few weeks. The game was released on October
25th, although most people didn't get the game by the 26th in North America. Click
here (from the official Take-Two
website) and
here to read more on this
2K Games had launched the Sid Meier's Civilization IV Pre-order program. Here is a quote from
Customers who pre-order Sid Meier's Civilization IV at participating retailers in North America will receive the
Pre-Order Edition of the game
at no
additional cost. Shipping on the same day as the regular version of the game, the Sid Meier's Civilization IV Pre-Order
Edition will feature: collector's
packaging, a CD soundtrack
of the game,
a keyboard template, a tech tree map and a spiral bound version of the manual. The Pre-Order Edition will be offered
through participating
retailers while
supplies last.
Click here to read the full
The regular version of the game in the US comes with two CDs. The
European version comes with a DVD. The tech tree poster comes standard with
Expansions are planned, and support for the game will
continue after its release so things are kept fresh.
A Mac version of the game is also planed by Aspyr Media.
It will be available in 2006.
This section will deal only with the Official System Requirements for the game, as well as the ESRB Rating.
The Minimum System Requirements for the game are: 1 GHz CPU, 256MB RAM, and a 32MB video card with hardware
transform and lighting
The recommended Specifications are: 512MB of ram, Pentium4 processor, and a recent graphics card (like the Radeon
The rating of the game is "E 10+" by the ESRB (the
Entertainment Software Rating Board).
The look and feel of a game are very important to most players; the description of these can be found here. For
screenshots, visit the "In-Game Visuals" section.
The Graphics Engine Civilization IV is using is
the NDL's Gamebryo 3D graphics engine. Firaxis' PC hit,
Sid Meier's Pirates! also uses it.
The engine will naturally provide an engaging 3D world with unparalleled scope and detail. Soren also mentions
in his PowerPoint
that the game has a "What-you-see-is-what-you-get," approach to it, meaning that the terrain does not lie in terms of
what it displays. An
example of this
Great Wonders. When they are built they will be displayed on the terrain near the city which built it.
Rivers and resources such as horses and elephants
are animated. You will also see different
animations as
the resources are being worked on, and of course, many other aspects which make the world more dynamic.
Due to the move to 3D, Barry Caudill (senior Civ4 producer) says that the largest maps in the game
are slightly smaller compared to those of
Civilization III.
The new 3D engine will allow for powerful, smooth zooming, from a global level, to a very local one. The tiles of
Civ4 are plain
squares, rather than the diamond view we had with Civilization III (when
viewing the game from the default position). The
Camera views are very flexible. You can spin it around any way you like.
There is a Civ3-Style Isometric view, and the classic
Civilization I top-down view. You may zoom in and out by using the Mouse-Wheel (speaking of Mice,
Civ4 will even have its
own specific
You'll see
Aqueducts go from the mountains or hills into your cities when they are
A Random Map Generator, like previous Civilization titles,
will form unique worlds reflecting the settings you put in. The Map Generator is one of Civilization's most
successful aspects, because
cannot play on the same map twice without wanting it, so replayability is very, very high.
Continents are the default world setting. "Standard Size" map you will have about five to ten cities. By that
time, your borders
are established and it is a race of who can advance through the tech tree faster. By that time, your oldest few cities will
also be the "core"
cities of you empire.
Here are the different map sizes: Duel, Tiny, Small, Standard, Large, Huge and
of course, Random. There are no restrictions on the number of Civilizations you
are allowed to play with on a certain map size. You can have all 18 Civs on a
Duel map. The map widths in Civ4 are about double than what they used to
be in Civ3.
The Mini-Map starts out zoomed in when the player starts a new
random game. As they explore, the Mini-Map will expand. This has been done so exploration is a lot more interesting each
What it means is that when one starts a game, he or she does not know exactly
where on the map they are. In
Civ3 the player always knew where they were exactly
in the beginning. Now this is not the case at all.
There is a Global View, in which
you see the whole planet. There, you can also use options to filter thing
such as resources, units, trade networks, cultural borders, religions and
more. Below are three
examples of the powerful new zoom. Details such as cloud cover can
also be seen in the Global View (first image):
Music for Civilization IV is also a major focus. Jeff Briggs (Firaxis' CEO) himself is taking charge
of this aspect of the
game (and
he is perfectly suited to do so as well, since this was his first career). Jeff anticipates that
Civ4 will have much more music than any
other game ever released. The game will include music from some of Jeff's original compositions, as well as licensed
performances by old greats
such as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, company, as well as contemporary greats like John Adams and Christopher Tin. Here is
opening soundtrack: Baba Yetu.
Jeff will also be composing the music for all 28 wonder movies included in the game as well as all of the game's
diplomacy music.
folk tunes are used to represent the character and attitude of each Civilization and each ruler. The music for Franklin D.
Roosevelt for instance
is the Marine Hymn. Jeff has also gone as far as to arrange each piece of music to fit the various time periods of the
game. If you meet with
Roosevelt in the early part of the game, you'll hear ancient instruments playing the theme. By the end of the game, the
tune will have swelled
taken on a more Sousa-like quality.
Firaxis is also hiring voice talent for various game parts. Ambient sounds can also be heard, when you are over
different terrains. For
if you are over the ocean or on its shore, you will hear waves splashing and breaking up. When you are
over desert closer up, you will naturally hear very dry winds.
When clicking on a unit, that unit will respond in the language
of your selected region or Civilization.
With each built improvement you'll hear a sound related to it
when it is accomplished.
Control is a very important aspect for any game. With Civ4's new interface, ruling you empire just got a whole lot
To start a Single-Player game: You must choose your map style (some
options are: Archipelago, Continents, Custom Continents, Highlands, Great Plains, Inland Sea, Lakes, Oasis,
Pangaea, and Terra) and size, climate and sea level and Civilization you want to play. You can also select whether you
want aggressive AIs,
Random Personalities, etc. Also, AI personalities are stored in XML data files.
In the "Custom Game" menu (there is also a "Play Now!" option which allows you
to start games quicker) there are a variety of options and combinations. In
regards to map scripts there are much more. The "Custom Continents" option
allows you to select exactly how many continents you want in the game. The
"Highlands" map scripts allows you to select everything from mountain density to
lake size. Of course, the most random map options you have are the classic
"Archipelago," the basic "Continents" setting, as well as the regular "Pangaea"
option which allows you to also set in different shore options.
There also the "Aggressive" AI setting where
AIs lean towards war instead of diplomacy.
While in the process of loading, the game
will display tips for certain things from Hot-Key commands to strategies during war-time. Here is a screenshot which shows some of
these. Note that when
the game
actually starts, you have a very similar Civilization introduction as in Civ3. You can see what I mean by clicking
At the start of the game, you do not start
with a Worker unit as in Civ3. You must build your first one at the time of your own choosing. Note that whenever
building a Settler or
Worker, these
units both use Hammers and Excess food to be built instead of Hammers only. The city also does not grow during this period,
and when either of
the units is
complete, the city size does not shrink like it used to in Civilization III.
The Civilopedia is now available from the
main menu of the game for easy access.
The general layout of the interface is this:
The Mini-Map is on the bottom-right corner, unit statistics are on the bottom-left side, unit control and buttons
are on the bottom
center of the screen. On the top-right, we see a "?" sign (which indicates the
Civilopedia. The Civilopedia is like the game's manual. It includes all
available information on the game) as well as the year and era. Technological
research are located on the top, in the center. And finally the scientific research rate buttons
are on the top-left side. On the same side,
you can also find your income and Gold Per Turn (or "GPT"). There also appear to be landscape
characteristics on the bottom-left side. This most likely appears as the
player rolls over the terrain with the mouse. Here is a screenshot of the
lower portion of the interface only. For City interface information, click
The classic unit controls such as Disband, Fortify, Explore and Sentry also appear to be on
the center of the
screen at
the bottom. There are a few more, but we do not know what they do at this point.
The main Interface can also be collapsed so the player only sees the unit buttons/controls/promotions on the
very bottom of your
screen. You can
this in the GameSpot Game-play
Footage 3 video.
Also in the same video you can see all the Civilopedia Sections. The sections are: Technologies, Units, Buildings, Resources, Improvements, Promotions, Unit Categories (such as Melee), Civilizations, Leaders, Religions, Civics, Projects, and finally Game
Civilization IV you can left click on a unit, and then right click on the tile youd like that unit to go.
This is very different compared to Civilization III.
Advisor screens: depending on which you open, you can see where all of your units are on a global map, or look at
raw statistics like the
average life expectancy of your people (versus the world average), your gross national product or approval rating.
A more streamlined and intuitive interface should be familiar to any RTS player. This is one
feature that will make
franchise more accessible and in line with PC gaming trends. In general, the
interface and help screens are more modern, improved, and easier to use.
Many tool-tips and pop-up help features are available (such as the terrain characteristics I explained just above,
and the ones you can
see in
the screenshot). Firaxis feels you should be able to play from the main map, and use other screens only if you are a true
power user. All this is
at getting new players off and playing as quickly as possible. Again, this is
the "what-you-see-is-what-you-get" concept. Below, in the next section, you
will see that this concept is carried onto the Terrain Improvements as well.
They will basically animate if a citizen is working that tile.
Sid Meier's Tips on tool-tips (such as Units
and Technologies) are included. This option can of course be turned off via the preferences screen. The preferences screen
also allows the player
to enable
Single-Unit graphics instead of Multi-Unit graphics.
Numerous Advisor pop-ups also appear during the game which will recommend to you to build a certain building in a
particular city or
town. You can disable
these if they are unneeded to you or become too annoying.
The game will prompt you to construct
improvements if it sees an opportunity or it feels that you've missed an
Playing the game either with a keyboard only
or mouse only is easy (or you can of course use the two combined).
By default you'll be moving units with the
right mouse button. However in the preferences section, you can change that so you can move units with the left mouse
button and have a
right-click menu when
clicking the right.
Wide-Screen resolutions are supported (as well as any other
resolution you might be running your PC on. Civ4 also supports
Dual-Monitor play. The game has to be in windowed mode and you have to give it a
resolution which covers both screens.
Hot-Key commands: Just about 100.
City information such as its buildings, and workforce is now all accessible from the main screen. You
are able to see what a city is building as well, including what state of religion it is in
(although Cities can have more than one religion). To the right is an example of Shanghai building a Market. It is also Buddhist (as the icon above the city name displays).
Adjusting what you want to displayed on the map is easy. This includes city names and
sizes. You can limit everything to a maximum and allow only Units, Cities (with no names), and Roads
to be displayed. You can also turn on an option to display the properties of
different tiles, you will also be able to turn on a resource plot location
feature, mentioned here.
To expand your empire, first you would need as much detail about the terrain as possible.
More tile/terrain improvements are
included (each resource has its own specific improvement). Pastures, Wineries, Watermills, Windmills, Lumber Mills, Mines,
Fishing Nets, Offshore
and Factories
are all represented in detail on
the terrain. 20 improvements in all are going to be included. Improvements being worked on with citizens will animate,
which makes it convenient
to see
where your citizens are working. For example, if a Mine is being worked on by
a citizen, you will see smoke coming out of its chimney.
Details such as mine carts being pushed out of a mine are also available.
This interface feature even helps you during war time, allowing the player
to see which tile an enemy is using. Certain Technologies will make some
improvements more productive as well.
Roads and Rail-Roads will only provide a movement bonus
to your units and nothing else. This has been done so the player does not have Roads and Rail-Roads on every tile later on
(unlike in Civilization III).
There are many new resources. When you are zoomed out to
the Global View, resources are
clearly marked for easy identification if you choose to mark them.
There is less restriction when it comes to resources. Firaxis will probably give players something to
synthesize Oil, and Gunpowder
no longer
require saltpeter.
All resources, including food ones are tradable. Food resources will help your city's health status.
Securing the seven types of food resources can also lead your
cities to become more healthy, as they represent nutritional variety. Each
different food resource decreases your unhealthy population by one.
Better resource balance: Since Python Scripts are used to generate random maps, resource placement can be
fine-tuned. This means
that a
resource of
one group cannot be a certain distance from a resource from the same group (comparing
luxury with luxury, food with food, strategic with strategic).
The Civ3 dilemma where one faction gets more resources than another seems to be gone. Resource migration will also
not happen
Trading is established automatically when you make deals. Rivers are like roads in
Civ4 (in terms of their trade potential), so if two cities are on one river, they are
connected and no road is needed to establish the particular trade network.
Due to the expanded aspect of trading
involving Rivers (making them like roads in terms of connectivity), City placement in
Civ4 is made much more strategic. If a
river connects to a lake, then a worker is able to build a road to the lake and expand the Civilization's Trade
Defensive bonuses will now only be generated on Forests, Hills, and Jungles.
Since this also relates to the combat system, click here to go to that
section of the article.
Here are the known terrain types, as well as other information
regarding the terrain:
It all comes down to this: Achieving it against the AI earns you ego. Achieving it against another player earns you
There are a lot more difficulty levels than in previous Civilization games.
Settler, Chieftain, Warlord, Noble, Prince, Monarch, Emperor, Immortal, and
Deity are the available difficulties now.
The length of games is reduced from 540 turns (as in
Civilization III) to 430. You are able to start in any era you wish
(Ancient, Classical, Medieval, Industrial, Modern, Future. You start with a
different amounts of units in each era, you will have more population in
newly founded cities, as well as a few more buildings). Later era starts will give you larger starting cities, more
settlers, and of course
more techs. They will also have some limitation - earlier wonders and buildings may not be available. The developers
are also constantly working to even out the pace of the game, hence the speed options described below.
There are four game speeds: Quick (mostly for Multiplayer, in Single Player mode (or
SP) it is equal to
Civ3's Accelerated Production mode), Medium (a bit faster than Civ3,
15-20 hours of game-play), Epic (around 600 turns) and Marathon (introduced
in patch v1.52). All of the game speeds (Quick, Normal, and Epic) retain all the flavor of Civ itself. So even
though the speed is different, the feel will not change.
The different speeds of the game (Quick, Normal, and Epic) will
have their Technology costs, Unit production costs, and Building appropriately tuned for the appropriate speed of the
The game still spans from 4000BC to 2050AD. That means you have 6,050 years to achieve one of the victories
Civilization IV seems to have struck the balance between explored land and years passed. What this means
is that no longer will
you have the entire world explored by 400AD. This, by the way, is the same for all three speeds (Quick, Medium, &
Most of the victory conditions have not changed from Civ3.
Here they are:
There are a lot of opportunities in the game to form allies, and that is necessary to fend off enemies.
18 playable Civilizations are featured in Civilization IV.
There are 26 world leaders. Choosing between two leaders for a
Civilization is a possibility. You can choose from two leaders from each Civilization, however not every Civilization
two leaders.
You can name the leaders after yourself, and
pretty much name everything else throughout the game...
Unique Units for each Civilization are still in the game. Some of
the known Unique Units (or "UUs") are below in the Civilization Chart.
You are able to see more of the leaders bodies, unlike in
Civilization III, where one could not see them make hand and finger movements. An
example of this can be seen when watching the "Game-Play
Footage 2" video at GameSpot. Leader animations will also reflect their mood and natural personality.
offer in
the favor of Louis XIV or Hatshepsut will show animations of the leaders that suggest their happiness with the deal. They
will simply act
However some rulers are a bit more inscrutable. The only difference in personality you will see in the Chinese ruler, Qin
Shi Haug is the
of his eyebrows... the same as the Mongol leader Genghis Khan. Rulers like
Alexander the Great of the Greeks and Julius Caesar of the Romans are much
more expressive in their emotions. Julius will give you a gladiatorial
thumbs-up or thumbs-down in reaction to your proposal. Gandhi is generous
to weaker nations, while Genghis Khan will shy away from any diplomacy at all.
Basically, there are a variety of unique personalities, some warlike,
peaceful, trustworthy, etc. You can also select Random Personalities at the
start of the game so every leader acts differently than what they usually do.
Units of different nationalities can now share tiles. If you have open borders with a Civilization, your units can
literally go to any
tile (even in Cities!).
All the known
Civilization properties have been listed below. Each
Leader has two Traits. Each of these grants them a unique bonus and cuts the
cost of two city improvements by half. Here are the statistics, and both of
the following charts are brand new:
Washington, New York
Camel Archer;
replaces the Knight
Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, Teotihuacan
Canton, Shanghai, Tientsin, Tsingtao, Xinjian, Turfan
Memphis, Alexandria, Elephantine, Pi-Ramesses, Byblos
Hastings, Warwick, Newcastle
Paris, Orleans
Cologne, Munich, Dusseldorf
(Creative & Philosophical; favors Universal
Athens, Thermopylae
Bangalore, Bombay, Calcutta, Madras, Jaipur
Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Edo
Djenne, Gao, Kumbi Saleh, Niani, Tadmekka, Walata
Karakorum, Herat, Khanbalik, Old Sarai,
Persepolis, Susa, Pasargadae, Arbela, Bactria,
Gordium, Tarsus
(Expansive & Creative; favors Representation)
Antium, Cumae, Neapolis, Pisae
Novgorod, St. Petersburg, Rostov
Madrid, Barcelona, Toledo, Salamanca, Santiago, Murcia,
Cordoba, Seville, Zaragoza
Cherokee, Phoenicians
Barbarians in Civilization IV are not able to develop a full culture
like the main 18 competing Civilizations, however you will see them forming
independent cities and small militias. They are like a "mini-Civ" that can cause trouble at any time.
Barbarians may also capture and control your
cities as well as the obvious pillaging of your improvements if you find them in your territory.
Animal attackers (which pose a similar threat as Barbarians do), such as Lions, Bears, Jaguars and wolves
are present early on in the
Perhaps a significant component of good game-play is a good AI. The AI is much improved in the new game...
Improving the AI has been a large priority. For months now, much focus has been dedicated to it.
The AI now seems to be blind. It does not know where certain things appear (unlike in Civilization III. On
higher levels, the AI
receives production bonuses. In the end, rest assured, you are playing against a smarter AI, not a more cheating
The AI is more interactive and it will contact you much more often for various things in its interest.
The AI will no longer attack in a few huge stacks of units. Instead you will now see the AI attacking in steady
waves of units that just
keep coming!
The AI attitudes toward you can be either Friendly, Pleased, Cautious, Annoyed, or Furious). This the reasons for
this are, again, very
clearly laid out in the diplomacy window.
Selecting AI Random Personalities is also a possibility at the start of the game. This way, you do not know
how the AI will behave
(Gandhi may not always be
polite, and Genghis Khan may not be warlike!).
The City Governor AI will also be more improved to assist you better. And that is an important part, because
it naturally allows
you to
micro-manage less. And another main goal of Firaxis is to kill player micro-management.
When in the
Bargaining Table, you can now see why the leader's
attitude is the way it is. Here is a positive point in the relationship and attitude: "+1 Years of peace have
strengthened our
relationship." Here are also a few negative
points which may occur: "-1 Our close borders spark tension," "-3 We are upset that you have fallen
under the sway of a
heathen religion," "-1
You have traded with our worst enemies!" These can be seen here.
Basically, the positive points are: If you have the same religion with that
Civ, similar Civics, resource trading, fair trade relations, years of peace.
The negative points may be: If you have a different religion than that Civ, if
you have traded with an enemy of that Civ, closed borders (they spark
tension), refuse to stop trading with a certain Civ. Different leaders will place different weights on these factors.
There are true hard feelings in this system, and it is much harder to simply
bribe an AI in diplomacy in order to make it do what you want it to do.
The game is sped up thanks to faster AI moves during the
Middle and Late stages of the game. Some features tended to slow down the late game.
They have been removed (for example: pollution cleanup, city riots, and units disbanding due to money issues). This means
the late game
is just as
to play as the rest of the game.
Above, the AI and Diplomacy virtually go hand in hand. Both are also improved... which means a much more
The AI must respect your borders or declare war in
Civilization IV. AI's did not have to respect your border at all in
previous Civilization titles. Look back at any game and most players will see frustration of how the AI
kept wondering around in your own border, without you being able to do anything
about it.
If you have a Defensive Pact with someone, and they get attacked, you will have the option to back down and
not get involved in
that war. This will
of course damage your reputation, but remember that in Civ3 you absolutely had to get into a war
no matter what.
Negotiating peace in diplomacy is now possible between two Civilizations which are at war with each other.
On the other hand, it
is also
possible to make two other Civilizations go to war, even if you do not wish to get involved at all.
Your military still plays a large role in Civ4 however it has been balanced out with other options,
such as diplomacy. A
lot of
emphasis has been put in in balancing different aspects of the game so the player does not focus on one
aspect more than on another.
Trading made easy: There is a new screen that explains
what other Civilizations have to offer and what they want to trade for (it also
tells you what technologies and resources the AIs have). This is all in the
foreign advisor screen. This screen also tells you the AI relations toward
you, current ongoing deals, etc.
The player may gift units to the AI by moving a unit in their territory and pressing the "Gift" button which
automatically makes that unit
The diplomatic victory condition is triggered by construction of the United Nations
great wonder. When it is
first constructed, a Secretary General is
elected (every Civilization gets a vote during this. The builder of this does
not automatically get to be the secretary General). If you get elected, you can get various resolutions passed.
Here they are:
Free Trade - Free Trade removes all trading restrictions in the world between all
Civilizations. It
basically functions as if all Civilizations have open borders - No matter what their real diplomatic relationship may
Nuclear Non-Proliferation - As Thunderfall's article has mentioned already, adopting this means that no nukes may be built, however
existing nuclear weapons
are not destroyed. Note that if this resolution passes before any nuke is built in the world, it means that the game itself
will proceed without
nukes appearing. This may be a benefit to you if you're playing against aggressive Civilizations.
Universal Suffrage - All Civilization's civics are changed to Universal Suffrage (+1
Hammer from Town; Can
spend gold to finish production) no matter if they have the required technology for that specific Civic (this counts for
all UN Resolutions
relating to Civics).
Free Speech - All Civilizations adopt the Free Speech Civic (100% culture
in all cities; +2 gold from Town).
Emancipation - All Civilizations switch to the Emancipation Civic ((100%
Growth for Cottage, Hamlet, Village; Unhappiness for civs without that civic).
Environmentalism - All Civilizations adopt the Environmentalism Civic
((+6 health in all cities; +1 happiness from jungle, forest).
And finally, Free Religion - All Civilizations Adopt this Civic (No
non-state religion spread; +1 happiness per non-state religion in a city, +10%
science in all cities).
Building Spy units is possible just like in Civilization II (they
now have a movement of two and cost 80 Hammers).
The player is limited to the number of Spies you can have in the game. Before
construction the player must have the following: Communism and the Scotland Yard
National Wonder, meaning every Civilization may build its own (500 Hammers; +1
Great People Points; More likely to generate a Great Scientist). You are allowed
to have a maximum of four spies at any one time. They are invisible to other
Civilizations just like Submarines. These units cannot be attacked or interacted
with, however they can be exposed by rival Spies (you are able to expose enemy
Spies as well). Other abilities of the Spy unit include:
Investigate City - This is rather basic. It allows you to have a peek inside an
enemy city and see all
its properties (what it is producing, Culture
amount, what unit it has, etc, etc).
Destroy Production - If you order your Spy to destroy the production of whatever a city
is producing (and if
successful), half of whatever is being produced
is destroyed (therefore slowing down dramatically production of, say, a Great Wonder). However, if the Spy fails, it is
Sabotage Improvement - If a Spy is ordered to do so, and if successful, a terrain
improvement will be
destroyed (such as a valuable Oil Well). If
unsuccessful, the Spy will be destroyed.
Steal Plans - First of all, the Spy has a much better chance of having success at this
if the action is
taking place in a City which contains either a
Palace (therefore the capitol of that Civilization), a Forbidden Palace, or the Versailles Great Wonder (Requires Divine
Right; Reduces
Maintenance in nearby
cities; City in which it is built in is more likely to generate a Great Merchant; Doubled Production speed with the Marble
Other Civilizations have different
favored Government and Religious settings, and they will try to pressure players into changing to their favored religion or government to suit their
desires in return for better relations with your Civilization.
They can even ask you to stop using a Civics option you have set.
Leaders will appreciate other leaders that share
their traits and civic or religious choices (as stated above), and they will tend to form blocs. If you find leaders that
share your tendencies,
it will be
possible to form lasting
(even permanent) alliances.
What you choose might affect other Civilizations as well. If you have already introduced Emancipation, it sometimes
may lead to
unhappiness and
within other nations without Emancipation, but to you, it does not give a direct benefit (so it provides a negative aspect
to other Civs, if they
don't have
Also, if your Civilization is the first to outlaw slavery, that will create discontent in societies that have
In diplomacy you can try to make another civ adopt a certain Civic or a Religion that you have. However the AIs are
much more focused on
their own agenda.
Some Civs care more of your type of religion, others care more about your Civics, others follow whoever has the most money.
AI Civilizations can
even call up
the human player and ask him/her to stop trading with a Civilization they hate. This make the player make decisions which
impact relations a
great deal.
Filling in the blanks: You can put a deal on the table and then ask the AI
leader to fill in the blanks, no matter what combination is out there. You can also tell when a deal would never happen
because the choices will
show up in
red on
the list. On a related AI note, Soren Johnson (the Lead Designer for the game) is now totally focused on tweaking the
All the power is in your hands. What you do with it can lead to your Empire's victory or your utter demise.
Religion, Civics and Great People are things many people have suggested be put into the game, Soren has described these
"killer" features in his PowerPoint. These are in Civ4, and they will have an influence on your whole
empire. The factors
which have
domestic affect are described below...
Factors which are not fun in the game such as corruption/waste, rioting, pollution, and maintenance
are started from scratch or removed
(this means that they are replaced by a much better concept that maintains game
balance better). Pollution is most affected. It was dumped,
although not completely removed. A more extensive health system is something new, although no details about it have
surfaced yet. Annoying
micromanagement tasks will also be decreasing dramatically, and more high-level control
is provided.
The concept of corruption has been
replaced with
maintenance costs. This time instead of Courthouses being able to reduce corruption (since it is gone) they will actually
maintenance costs.
You will have to develop your culture or risk being enveloped by a larger neighbor (so a nation
can be completely
engulfed by another's
The luxury slider is now a culture slider. The more culture you give, the happier your people will be, as well as
producing more culture
your entire Civilization, meaning it can also expand your borders more, the more
you increase it (but at the expense of Commerce and Science Research).
Culture basically modifies your borders in relation to the culture of your neighbors, so you can overwhelm your
neighbors with a
Culture now also increases a citys defensive value, and it helps smaller cities with more culture feel safer. Since
it restarts when you
capture a city, your top priority is to maximize culture in that city.
There is no more Cultural Dominance in flipping Cities. Instead, as your nation expands, foreign cities will begin
to become more and more
awe with your Civilization as a whole. This will cause the people in those foreign cities to get unhappy, and therefore
their Civilization will
have to
spend money to keep them happy. As this burden gets heavier, that Civilization might just offer to give you their Cities
via diplomacy.
One easy way to counter unrest in your cities due to your neighbors having
superior culture is to station more units into that city.
Culture essentially represents a "Soft Power." This means that nations can defeat other nations through more
Health is just as important as maintaining your treasury and the happiness of your people. Health
is tied to available food and
resources to simulate Epidemics. However, if you have Fresh Water near you, it will give you a health
There is a lot of built-in automation in the game (also aimed at reducing micromanagement). Setting units such as
the Warrior to "Auto
Explore" and find
"Goody Huts" (which give you free bonuses such as a Settler, or something else) is a great idea.
Thanks to automation, when a Worker is available, the player is able to automate the worker and let the artificial
intelligence take
control of it. The
worker will then build the best available option on each square, as well as link your cities together by roads.
This improves the pace of the game immensely and is a very efficient process, since you don't have to worry about manually
moving the worker (you
can do that
still, however).
Variety in food can improve your citizens moods making them happier. Entertainers are also available,
spending tax dollars to
buy their
happiness and city improvements.
In total, there are 25 Civics options. There are five categories and five options per each category. The five
categories are:
Legal, Labor, Economy, and Religion. Some of the known Civics options are: Free Market, Environment, Slavery, Free Speech,
Religious Tolerance and the Nationhood (it magnifies culture accumulation). Below is a table of how you will see your
Government system in the
game. Having all these choices means that you will not have "fixed" governments
anymore (simply known as Democracy, Communism, etc in Civ3). Note
that Civics choices have an upkeep cost (depending on the Civic).
Changing to new Civic forms will have a dramatic effect on the character and success of your civilization.
You'll be able to boost
or cut
productivity, wealth, and happiness, make choices to increase/decrease the spread of religion, and even affect your
ability to produce and
maintain a
large standing army. It is also never as simple as choosing the only the
highest levels in the Civics section. "...You could end up with a really
great government that puts you in the poorhouse," says
When you are at peace,
Free Markets, Emancipation, and Representation are fine choices as Civic options. During war, you can select Civic choices
which are
better suited for that situation (which may mean that your units are not as expensive to maintain, and therefore you can
have a larger army). Of
course, to
prevent you from switching back and fourth, there will be a temporary anarchy period between Civic choices if
religions in the game are equal. However they also have an impact on diplomacy.
"It's like culture without borders," as Jesse Smith Puts it.
State Religions can be declared by any Civilization. You can also switch this, but you will go through a
period of anarchy,
just like when
switching the state of your government. Declaring a State Religion means that all cities in the Civilization with the same
religion get extra
happiness and produce more gold. The default to no-state religion is Paganism,
which means there is no organized religion.
Founding a Religion is done when a Civilization discovers a
technology that is linked to a certain religion. Afterwards, a Holy City is
established. When a Religion is established in a city, it will gradually spread from there.
When a City has a religion which
differs from the State Religion of the Civilization, the citizens in that city may become unhappy and eager to
adapt the state religion.
Since cities which are not in the Civilization's state religion do not share the happiness and commerce bonus,
it is a good strategy
for you
spread an unofficial religion. However, spreading too many religions to one Civilization is not always a wise tactic, The
Freedom of Religion
Civics option grants bonuses to civilizations which have many different religions.
You can see which State Religion of another Civilization you have made contact with by checking the small leader
board in the
corner of
the game screen.
Like what has already been mentioned before in prior updates, the first Civilization to discover a
technology that enables a religion will be
assigned a Holy City. Owning a Holy City gives you a line of sight for all cities in the world that share that religion,
and therefore
you to spread to spread your faith even more around the world. In the Holy City you can also build Great Wonders that have
the ability to improve
the happiness of people throughout your empire. Holy Cities are assigned to the AI by random, but most likely near the
center of the empire, or
capitol of the empire.
Not only will you see Wonder Movies (CGI Cutscenes showing the construction of a wonder), but you will also
see a movie each time
you discover a religion. Winning the game also gives you a wonder movie (no matter how you chose to win it).
Every temple in the world dedicated to
a religion
will generate gold which will go to that religion's Holy City. This makes it
even more worth it to try and convert other cities around the world to your
State Religion.
Conquered people who have a different religion than your state religion will naturally be pretty unhappy. In
later eras you can
technology to mitigate these effects, but religion now has to factor into your overall strategy.
Seven real-world Religions are available in the game. There is also a special unit
for all Religions: the Missionary. Below is a helpful chart of the religions in the game, and their
real-life significance:
The Missionary may be sent out to try to convert other cities to your religion. Just like Civics, AIs will try
to convert you to their
religion the same way.
If you are successful in a city, you will also receive a line of
sight bonus and if you capture or control the main holy city of each
religion, you get line of sights in each city in the world that has that
To keep your civilization's religion strong, you must constantly be building religious buildings and pushing
your own Missionaries to
convert foreign cities. If you do not want foreign Missionaries to enter your lands, simply do not sign open borders.
The only other time Missionaries can enter your borders are when a
Civilization declares war on you.
While Closed Borders mean that other missionaries cannot enter your lands and spread their religion, it also
means that you
will not be able to trade with other Civilizations.
Success in spreading your State Religion to the AI will lead to
better relations.
Religions will not have bonuses (most likely the developers like to keep everything perfectly balanced
because it is a touchy
subject), but
they will impact diplomacy. If you ally yourself with a Civilization with the same religion as
yours, it will enable
you to curry favor with other like-minded peoples. However, they come
with a memory, if you suddenly switch to their religion, they will not
be as inclined to cooperate with you. You will need to be in their
religion for a significant amount of time.
People also add a great deal of variety to the game. Some offer extremely great benefits as we'll cover below...
There are five categories of Great People:
Great Artist, Great Merchantman, Great Prophet, Great Engineer, and Great Scientists. All of them have a movement of
two, and are invisible
to other
units. These will probably
be triggered by City performance, therefore, they cannot be built. Each will also have three to four benefits, including
culture boost,
(created by Great Scientists),
Golden Ages (when having two different Great People), and free techs, as well as wonder construction and city output.
Please look at the first chart below for more details on their ability and
historic figure.
Great People are easier to get in
Civilization IV, and they
will also be the only way a player can spark a Golden Age other than by constructing a particular Great Wonder.
(Please see the chart below for more information on what exactly is required
for a Golden Age when having available Great People.)
A Golden Age means that you get a boost in production and happiness (a
Golden Age also lasts for eight (8) turns). Again, you can also have multiple Golden Ages (each subsequent golden age
require more Great People) unlike in Civilization
III, where you were allowed only one.
You can get great leaders by specialized cities. You can customize each city to fit a specific purpose such
as science or culture.
engineers will allow you to rush production on a wonder,
or other building and naturally, they may only be used once, so it shouldn't come as a surprise.
A Great Merchant may let you establish an extremely
lucrative trade deal (meaning you will get a large boost in your treasury), or a
Great Scientist will significantly boost your research
or create an Academy. Look below in the chart for much more details on this.
Also you may want to check out the Cities section for more information on
You can generate more "Great People" points
by taking city population away from working the land and turning them into specialists. Also, certain civics choices are
able to make your
specialists more
productive and that can also have a positive effect on your "Great People" point production.
For all but one (the Great Prophet), there are ancient and modern representations of the unit.
Great People can be turned into "Super Citizens" where they can give a city an ongoing bonus
for a period of time, or they can be used to give your Civilization
a large one-time bonus. Below is a detailed list of the Great People, how they can be used, and the historic figures they
might represent:
(Emphasis on Culture)
(Emphasis on Production)
(Emphasis on Wealth)
(Emphasis on Religion)
(Emphasis on Science)
Cities are like the many hearts of your Civilization. If you take care of them, they are bound to take care of
Instead of shields, youll see hammers. The more you have, the
faster you build units, buildings, etc. The amount you have is determined by
the terrain, and improvements
There is some sort of Hammer/Beaker rollover (Hammers mean production,
and Beakers mean Technology research as said before).
When viewing the City Screen, a bag of
money = 5 gold,
an anvil = 5 hammers, and a loaf of bread = 5 food.
City Specialists: The number of city specialists are limited.
However, with the "Caste System" civic you may have unlimited city
specialists. Even though specialists provide bonuses to your cities, they do
consume food (just like unhappy citizens, which don't provide any bonuses at
all). The total number of specialists are five. They are: Scientists,
Priests, Engineers, Merchants, Artists. Citizens are the ones who actually
work on the land and give you benefits such as food, hammers, and
Drafting can occur with either spending gold, or city population.
Naturally, this depends on your Civics choices and it will also create
unhappiness if you do draft.
Before founding your first City, the User-Friendliness of the game will immediately highlight attractive tiles to
establish your first
city, and later on,
other cities. This feature takes into account nearby resources, terrain features and the proximity to other
GameSpot says
that "Once you've
settled down into your
first city, the game bends over backward to be user-friendly." Your first task after building a city
is to select a list of offered and available
technologies. Some of these are recommended to you before choosing them (it is very possible to ignore these
recommendations). After selecting
what you want
to research, you will have to select what you want your city to build. Two of the options are recommended (just like some
of the Technology
Choices are). The
recommendations are, of course, sound choices. But again, you can feel free to follow your own path.
Founding a second city quickly can be immensely helpful in solidifying a lead against your
neighbor or neighbors.
To get more culture, in addition to the slider already described, Entertainment Specialists also help with
culture generation.
Building still
matter, but they will just serve as cultural multipliers than producers.
A single city can sometimes be found with more than one religion. This usually happens when a foreign Missionary
establishes its own
religion in a city with
a different established religion.
are not guaranteed the nine-square territory when you first build a city
in Civilization IV. You may find a city that owns only its base tile,
and is completely engulfed in another Civilization's borders. To the right is an
example of this...
Cities do require a maintenance amount, and with
each city that will increase (therefore one can't just start building Settlers and Cities right away like crazy). Even
though this is a
significant change,
ability to build very large empires is still there. The difference is that it requires more strategy to do so. As cities
grow, they
are able to sustain
themselves better without putting too much weight on the overall economy. Naturally, using diplomacy, religion, trade
networks, and improvements
income (and that will help fight increasing maintenance costs).
Cities on the outer-most fringe of your empire will still build
relatively quickly (as there is no corruption anymore). However their maintenance cost will be higher to
compensate for that.
The game is more balanced towards not having as many cities. You
will, however, still have a broad area. The focus is to have fewer but more specialized cities.
Also note that there is no city limit. You may build as many as you wish
however keep note of the previous comment in the last sentence.
The city
maintenance cost puts pressure on rapidly expanding
Civilizations, when rapid expansion might not be the best choice at the time. The AI will recognize this too, and they will
not keep throwing
towards your
Balancing out your priorities is the key. If you build cities too often, they will be very vulnerable.
However, if you don't build
cities and expand fast enough, you will be left in the dust. Prioritizing between expansion, research, building military
units, and
improving your core cities is really essential. Reading the landscape for resources, and good city positions is also very
Building cities on hills or on rivers will help them survive longer, and make them less vulnerable.
Civic improvements/buildings are shown off on the terrain, as
well as wonders. Basically, everything that you build (other than units) is
shown on the terrain near the city.
Right-Clicking on a city will bring
up contextual menus, which will show the player options such as build orders, and governor settings.
Having said that, the city governor provides much more control over
Information in the city itself is much clearer as well, for the players who do wish to get a more detailed
picture. Each improvement
in the
has the specific benefits it offers to the city itself. Contentment and culture are also present in more detail. This means
that the player will
longer have to keep looking through the Civilopedia for what certain buildings or aspects add to the game-play.
In order to simplify your building choice in cities, you are able to Shift-Click on a city in order to select what
you want it to build,
this even without entering the main city interface. It will all be on the main interface. You will also be able to set
Build Queue orders so you
select which things you want to build in a particular order (so if you select the Archer then Temple and then the Pyramids
in this order,
will automatically switch each time a unit/building is done).
Selecting multiple cities makes
management even easier. Jesse Smith states in this Developer
Interview at GameSpot that the goal is to make everything as easy for the player as possible. This allows the player to
set the same building
orders to a few cities at once. These features (the Build Queue and the city selection method) along with the flexibility
of options from the
Governor make managing cities extremely easy. There are six governor options
which will make it easy for you to customize what you want from that city.
Emphasize food, production, commerce, science, great people, and "Stop growth."
These can be mixed, matched, etc, etc.
Setting common Rally Points to cities (or multiple
cities via the Shift-Click method) is also possible. This allows units that have just been built to go to that selected
spot automatically
without the
player's input.
When entering the city menu itself, you will see that older-style
text-based menus have all been replaced with graphical icons instead. The
uppermost part of the screen includes Scientific Research (center), Income and
current gold amount (left), and the date (right). Also in the upper part is the
current production (units, buildings, etc), growth rate, City name, as well as
the defensive bonus of the city (determined by improvements as well as culture),
health status (healthy to unhealthy citizens) as well as happiness (happy to
unhappy citizens, this also includes the reasons the citizens are happy or
unhappy). The top-left includes Scientific Rate,
Culture Rate (as well as the happiness it generates), and Tax Rate (these three
are determined as a percentage). We also can see a Maintenance Cost. On the left
side of the City Interface is a Trade Route Bonus display (these provide gold),
as well as what your current Buildings are. Also visible is the percentage of
your nationality and Culture rate per turn. The bottom part is the build queue
(Units, Improvements, or Wonders -- all represented as icons), the lower-right
part are the City Governor options as well as the Mini-Map. The Right Side of the screen we can see the current city
religion; Luxury, Strategic, and Food resources; the city specialists are also
on the right side, as well as the Great People accumulation points. The middle,
of course, is the City Display. The Circled tiles represent worked tiles by your
citizens Since a
picture can speak a thousand words, here is a perfect example of the city
Just moving the mouse over the city will
produce results such as how fast the city is growing, building status, resources collected, as well as culture and Great
No longer will you be able to transfer production from one project
to another. This exploit has remained for a long time, and it has been addressed.
An example of the above bullet point is that when you lose a wonder to
another Civilization by a few turns, you will also lose all the production made on it, therefore you will no longer be able
to transfer it to
another project
however you will be
refunded a certain amount of gold. This rule is for units and other buildings as well. For example, if you switch
production from a Settler to an
Archer, the
production will
not shift to the Archer, however it will be saved for the Settler when you come back to it, and you will pick up from where
you left
If someone beats you to a World Wonder, you will get a refund, mot likely in the hundreds of gold, depending on how
much time you've spent
on that wonder.
This has been mentioned just above.
This (the fact that you can no longer simply transfer production) makes it much harder for you to "monopolize" the Great
Wonders. This is even
more evident
on the harder levels.
Cities will no longer riot, but unhappy workers will not work. Until you address the problem, it will remain
City names can also be changed by the player, as in Civ3.
The bigger your city gets, the unhealthier it becomes. And
that can take a toll on the population, as the city will eventually begin to starve
(unhealthy citizens are not able to do as much work). You can combat this by building certain types of buildings, such
aqueducts and
hospitals. However improvements such as Factories tend to decrease the city's health status.
Strategy comes to play even more here... there are a total of 102 buildings, and each has its own benefits. It is up
to you to be the
There are a total of 102 buildings in Civilization IV,
as mentioned above.
Each religion has its own improvements and mini-wonders associated with it.
These benefits of the wonders will still exist in cities that have switched
away from that religion.
The known buildings are below... note that this section has
building costs which were played at the "Normal" game speed:
Religious Buildings
Even greater buildings, however, are the ones which build up your civilization as a culture, and put it along other
major powers: The
Wonders of
the World
In total, there are about 28 Great Wonders (Great Wonders may
be built by only one Civilization), and about 12 Small Wonders (every Civilization
is allowed to build these, and they are more city-specific. For example, a
benefit of +100% science.
On top of that, what makes Wonders so exciting is the fact that Wonder Movies are back! Each time you build a
wonder, you will be viewing
short clip of it. There are around 45 movies in all.
Below are all the known wonders and their Characteristics:
It is not the technology that matters It is how well you use it.
The Technology Tree, just like its technologies, is smart and flexible. You will have the ability to research
different things, but
they will
lead to the same level of technologies. It will offer unique paths to guide your empire along. There are no longer static
eras, as in
Civilization IIIs
case, that is, the tech tree is not split into eras at all (although, as
previously said, you can start in different eras). To put it simply, eras do
not restrict your Technology choices and progress.
Like buildings, the player is able to switch
from one technology to another, however that research will not get accumulated for the new technology you are switching to
(in "Beakers," the accumulation of technology. It is similar to "Hammers" when
talking about production). And when you switch to the technology
you were originally researching, you will get back where you left off. However this "banking" of resources or research is
limited in terms that
you will
start to lose production or research slowly over time. This change (production not carrying over to new buildings or
technologies) has not been a
balance issue
because both the AI and Human Players are "on a level playing field" (to quote Barry).
There are different ways to discover technologies, like the already
mentioned Great People and Goody Huts.
You will also be allowed to skip whole branches of the Tech-Tree if you wish.
The direction of your research will have an impact on the kind of Great People that are born. The player is free to
choose any path
whether it
be all-military,
all cultural, all-science, balanced, etc. You also dont need all the techs that connect to the one you want. A
connection to it is all that
Even with evenly spaced-out resources it can
happen that in the early game a player may not always have a resource such as iron or horses. The tech-tree also balances
that out should it
happen. It makes
easy for the player to switch strategies and head in the direction of Gunpowder (for example).
There is no longer a minimum amount of turns in
which you can discover a technology (in Civ3 it was four turns minimum). This makes it easier to come back and get
older technologies you
have not yet
There are 125 paths to Civ4's
Future Technology. This information has been gathered from grumbler's post here in the forums.
Check it out for more information.
Below are all 86 technologies in the game. This technology tree
has been put together by CivFanatics' Administrator, Thunderfall (taken from
several separate screenshots). Below it are details of what each technology
has to offer:
Future Technology research gives you extra health and happiness, as described above. In
Civ3 it is important to know that Future
Technology did not do much for the player, and it is nice that that has improved as well.
Every time a Technology is researched, the grandfatherly voice of Leonard Nimoy (Mr. Spock himself!) kicks in with
an appropriate quote
from history.
There are many different types of units, and all have different abilities. On top of that, there are special
promotions as well. This makes
military unit unique.
Civilization IV will ship with a total of 83 units (this
includes barbarian animal units, which the player cannot build in a regular
unedited [via the World Builder] game. This includes domestic units such as workers, military ones (of course)
and special units such as Great People.
Units can be upgraded by using your gold, as
they become outdated. This is similar to the Civilization III way.
Unique combat animations are a priority,
so you won't see the same old animation for different types of units.
Units will also give verbal confirmation when you select them
and give them orders, again, this will be a specific language to the
Civilization that is chosen.
When a unit is victorious, a short music clip plays confirming
the victory.
There are
Medallions on top of flags units are carrying to indicate how many units are in that tile. If there are 15 units in a
single tile, there will
be 15
Medallions above the flag on that tile.
Picking units out of a stack is easy so the player won't have to repeat the picking out of a unit many
different times
The longer a unit stays fortified, the more advantage it will have when defending against other units. For
example, being fortified
for five
turns gives the unit its maximum defense bonus of 25%. The unit does not get an instant bonus the moment it is
"First Strike" is a system which simulates the advantages of
ranged units such as archers. If a unit has this ability, it can make a
"First Strike" against another unit before the combat actually begins,
giving it an advantage.
Workers, when captured from another Civilization, build at the
same rate as your own workers. There is no "half-normal" effectiveness as
was the case with Civ3.
The game will also be using multi-unit graphics for individual units, they will also be carrying banners for
their countrys flag
and for
identification. The Multi-Units represent actual hit-points. If you do not like
to see multi units, you can turn this feature off so you see single-graphic
units only. Below is a table of all known facts about units:
A nuclear explosion can cause severe damage to the tile targeted and the eight adjacent tiles. You are not able to
attack your own
territory or cities with the ICBM. Everything goes through a "kill check" (buildings, units and terrain improvements).
Buildings are either
destroyed or come out unharmed if they pass. Units can be destroyed if the "kill check" fails or damaged or unharmed if
they pass. Wonders, roads
and railroads are not affected by a nuclear strike. In addition to these potential damages, radioactive fallout must be
cleared by workers when
the Ecology technology is researched. Otherwise the affected tiles are unworkable.
Each time a nuke is used, the attitude of a Civ nuked goes down by 2 points (read more).
Your relationship with
other Civilizations around the world will also be negatively affected.
The UN Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty bans the construction and use of all nuclear weapons, but existing nukes do
not disappear. If this
resolution passes before the Manhattan Project is complete, you will not even be able to finish that project and therefore
no nuclear weapons
will be built or used throughout that game.
You can, of course, defend yourself from nukes by building the SDI Project which has a 75% chance of intercepting
enemy nuclear weapons
throughout your territory. You may also build a Bomb Shelter in cities. This reduces damage from ICBMs by 75%. Without the
Bomb Shelter, the
City's population can be reduced as much as 50% by a single ICBM.
How will you wage war? What new systems are involved? This is the section for the warmonger.
battle system is something that has been ameliorated (it is like an RTS
"rock-paper-scissors" concept). It has been made to actually encourage players to use the array of forces they
Players are able to group units, as an interface change. For example, you can group a Settler and
Spearman, and they will always be together (unless you
decide to re-group). Workers can be grouped together as well, and then their actions
within that group can be queued. This has been changed so you will favor most different units, and not stick to your
most powerful, for instance.
Using mixed attacks such as ground and aerial bombardments and not just on a single overwhelming stack of units
(commonly known as the Stack of Doom) is highly encouraged. This brings more strategy to battles, and also makes them
more realistic.
The fact that
Artillery can attack all units in a stack forces players to spread out their forces to avoid damaging more units
(artillery units can damage all units in a tile because of the collateral
damage feature they have). Note that Artillery units such as catapults attack
like normal units, although they can bombard cities and reduce their defenses.
The terrain also takes a large part in Combat. However, it can also be said that it is more simplified.
The only time you will get a defensive bonus is when over hills, forests, or
Great Artists may also have a military-related use to them. If you capture a city and it is rioting,
dropping a Great Artist and
giving the
city a 1,000 point culture boost
should quickly suppress all rioting and change the mood of the citizens in the city. The only way you could
suppress rioting in Civ3 was to basically start building a lot of cultural buildings such as Temples and
Selecting any or all units in a given square has many shortcuts to
it. The game determines the best attacker when you give a
stack attack order or the best defender when your stack is attacked.
Stack attack works by stacking a bunch of units and giving them
the attack command. If you are using combined arms in that stack (a balance of defensive and offensive units), the game
will automatically look
at who you
are attacking
and who their defenders are.
The amount of damage a unit does to another unit is now
out of a scale of 100, even though that's more or less hidden from the user. The amount of damage a unit does is relative
to its different
strengths. So now
when a
spearman attacks a tank, he may hit three times, but that's only going to take off a quarter of the tank's hit points.
Meanwhile, a tank hitting
a spearman
only has to hit
him once or twice, and he's gone entirely.
To further explain the combat system: Two units of
the same relative power will do about 20% damage per hit, so it would take five hits to kill a unit. When one unit is much
more powerful (a tank
example), the
more powerful unit does a higher percentage of damage than the less powerful one (a Spearman for instance). In other words,
if both manage to hit
three times
in a
battle, the Spearman would have done only around 40% damage, while the more tank would have already killed the spearman.
However that is not all
to the
system. Many more calculations are going on behind the scenes that make for fewer lucky strikes, which further balance the
In the options screen, players can turn on an option
that will let them see bars over units so they can judge their chances of winning or losing before even entering the
In all, Civ4 will offer about 41 different promotions for
units (with 20 different promotion types. However some have more than one
level, as you will see below. Units may receive up to 20 promotions as well). This allows each unit to be extremely
flexible in its
abilities. So,
how do units get these promotions? Well, they might get them from a battle, depending on how difficult it has been. The
great thing about
promotions is
that they are not triggered by technology either. As they win, they will gather experience points.
You will make specialized units without changing any of their previous
specializations; you can also change their paths with certain
Auto Promoting units is also an option you have. However you can always promote them manually.
The numbers and types of available bonuses
differ per unit type and only land and sea military units can acquire them (air units are different).
There are no XPs (experience points) from bombarding
fortifications or if the opposing unit withdraws.
Units can also gain experience from a Barracks
(land units), a Drydock (sea units) or a goody hut.
Some wonders, civic choices, and leader traits can
give units extra experience or even certain promotions. As you might expect, the first promotion comes rather quickly,
while each subsequent
requires more
XP. Here are the different types of promotions and their abilities below:
Some Units might also have an invisible characteristic. Great People
(and possibly spies) are an example of this.
Infantry will have defensive bonuses in difficult terrain, while cavalry will have an advantage attacking
ranged units such as
Artillery/Siege units are stronger and will allow for damaging all of the units in a stack. Bombardment units are now like
a hybrid of previous
games. The damage a unit has is relative to their strength. Again, these changes were done to encourage use of combined
There are no longer separate attack or defense bonuses such as in Civ3. They will have only one base
strength that might or
might not
increase or decrease. Units also have advantages or disadvantages against certain units. Pikemen will have a decided
advantage over mounted units
Axmen are especially good against melee units.
Units strength is represented by the number of units. At full strength, a unit will have three units, and when it
takes damage it loses a
single unit until it is destroyed.
Armies have been eliminated (in Civ3 terms, now they will only serve as moving of units together), but
more customization
countering is available in return as describe above.
Surrounding and isolating a foreign city with your forces is now
a new strategy. This puts pressure on the foreign leader and he might
eventually offer it to you via diplomacy. If he or she does not want to trade the city to you, the city itself has a good
chance to riot because
city's population would want to join your Civilization.
You can
blockade cities, for example, by moving your naval units close to an enemy city (that means that city can no longer
work its water tiles).
resources can also be harvested (this has been known for a long time). If you're getting all your
Oil from the water, you are in trouble because another Civ can cut off your oil supply, unless
you can do something about it and defend your weak points.
The infamous "Spearman defeats Tank" phenomenon is now gone,
needless to say. This has caused a lot of headaches
for Civ fans in the past. This will mean that units that are inferior will not be able to win against more modern
Early on the best city defense unit is
no longer the Spearman, it is the Archer. Spearmen are more useful against other Cavalry units.
Warriors are the weakest unit, however they are perfect for escorting Settlers and/or workers through danger zones (filled
with wild
animals as well as Barbarians).
Some people, of course, like to play with others online. How the multiplayer mode seems so far is promising.
This time, Civilization IV will have an integrated multiplayer so you won't have to wait for expansion
packs like we did
with the
Civ3 series. A new co-op feature allows for more satisfying game-play than before when playing with other people,
as you will form
alliances against
the AI, or other opponents. The map generator ensures that everyone starts equally as well, as the map is generated
randomly. Player in MP will
also be
able to form
permanent or temporary alliances with one or more players. Every game starts
out with the server host picking rules, players picking factions (and sides
if applicable) and then entering the game.
Youll be able to play a very quick online game with a friend or
play long, ruthless campaigns lasting months. In MP, you can start out early, and end up playing well into the modern age,
something which was
difficult to achieve with Civ3s MP. In MP, there are five speed
settings: Blazing, Fast, Normal, Slow, and Snail.
Even though, through PitBoss, players
can play as long as they like, there is a mode which also lets players to play shorter games (100
turns, from the Stone Age to the Bronze Age for example).
Right out of the box Civ4 supports up to 18
players online. This allows basically every Civilization to be played.
Players are able to compete in traditional turn-based or simultaneous move games either on a network or via
the Internet.
If and when a player or players are disconnected from the game, a screen (labeled "Democracy")
pops-up giving the other players still in the game to vote on what to do. The options are: Kick the player out of the game
and replace his
Civilization with
an AI player,
save the game and continue playing until the player can join back, or just wait for the player to re-connect and proceed
with the ongoing game.
Games are
easy to save, even if the circumstances are not so bright.
Team Play: Players can form alliances with each other in multiplayer games. Allied nations will put their
accomplishments together,
join forces
in combat and share all information, even line of sight, benefits of wonders, research (two players, for example, can
research one thing at the
time to discover it faster), unit trading, and sharing of territory. These additions deliver a plethora of new strategic
and tactical options to
players. Team-Play is available both in MP and SP (Single Player) modes.
In Multiplayer, the server browser will include buddy list
functionality to keep track of friends easier.
Timers are set in Multiplayer in order to make everything
move smoothly (and so people can't stand there doing nothing for a longer time).
Missionaries are very valuable in
Multiplayer. It's even possible to force another civilization to adopt your religion, which can potentially bring in a tidy
sum of money for you.
can become very unhappy
should their way of life change so dramatically, however.
Teams can
easily communicate with each other. Example: You are able to put signs
on tiles and draw lines on the terrain and other players are able to see that and know where to go
(if a specific location is your goal. This is available in Single-Player mode as
well). Players can even send little pings to alert teammates of important events happening around their map. Support for
voice over IP also allows players to talk while playing.
You can go in and protect your ally's cities unlike in Civ3.
There is also a new "Double City Elimination"
in Multiplayer which means that if you lose two cities, you lose the game. To go
into more detail, there are different modes of it. If you take one city it can
instantly burn to the ground, and therefore you are at an instant advantage.
You can also set it so the city does not get razed, and if your opponent takes
back that city, the score is leveled out. The "One City Challenge" option means that you can have only one city. There
the "Always War" and "Always Peace" options as well. For a game, you can chose one or the other (you are, obviously, unable
to select both at the
same time).
These features can be mixed to create the MP game you want.
A particularly hardcore game can be created
by playing with teams and handicaps. With two teams (one with one person, set the level to the easiest difficulty so that
player gets a bonus on
most all
areas of game-play) and one with several other people on a normal, or harder difficulty for a greater challenge.
In addition to the standard internet, Hot Seat, and LAN modes, Civ4
is playable by email (PBEM), or on a persistent turn-based
server, or PTBS (named PitBoss).
The Pit Boss
persistent turn-based server will allow for players to play as long as they like and leave when they like without
disrupting the game. Players
also fill in for AI players and join when they like
(so it is possible to jump in right in the middle of a game and take an AI's
role). The server will download the current game state, then a player takes their turn and the server
afterwards saves for the next player. It is like playing a streamlined version of play by e-mail or hot seat
Multiplayer pit boss, which will allow persistent multiplayer games of Civ4,
was released in December.
Firaxis will cull all sorts of statistics from multiplayer
matches, which will let it rank players, which is aimed to avoid some of the frustration when you find yourself in a
multiplayer match with
ruthless Civ
Protected copies of all original files will guarantee that everyone in a game
is playing by the same rules (be it in a casual MP game, or
in a
People do not lie when they tell you some like to customize the game just as much, or even more so than to actually
play it. What's new
View Section Notes
Civilization IV will set a new standard for user-modification allowing gamers to create their own
add-ons using Python and
XML. It
is the most customizable version of Civ to date! Basically, full mod support is offered here, and almost nothing
in the game is
(unlike in Civilization III. Firaxis has also said that a fully customizable Government system
will also be
among the many other things...Below are the four modding levels Firaxis games has released information on, ranging from the
easiest (the Map
to the most difficult (the Software Developer's Kit).
Map Editor: This will probably be like the Civ3 Map Editor. It is the easiest way to mod the game your
way, and yes, anyone
at all can
do it
with ease. Just open the editor and you'll see the ability for you to tweak and change everything from Cities,
Technologies, Units, and
Diplomacy. For cities, you
are able to add a specific population number (as the screenshot to the left illustrates), culture points, gold amounts and
even change that
city's religion.
Adding technologies to the ones you already have is also possible. For units, you are able to change the level and
promotion type of any
available unit as
well. Changing the terrain type is also another distinct possibility. Just like you are able to edit Technologies, Cities,
and Units for your own
Civilization, you are given the option to change these same aspects for the other available Civilizations in the game just
as easily. The World
Builder even
goes as far as letting you change diplomatic options and relations. The editor also opens the way for cheating. -
Quoted from CivFanatics' Hands-On preview. The World Builder can be
launched at any time during a game so players can add new cities as well as creating new starting conditions. The created
maps are stored in a
text-based format, which can
be opened in a text editor. What this does is basically make it easy for you to edit without even starting the
The Flexible XML (eXtensible Markup Language) Files: All values of the data for the aspects
of the game such as
units, terrain, texts,
camera controls, graphics scales, mouse and keyboard mapping, links to
Python, audio scripts, and so forth are stored here. Game
speed will also be Moddable through the XML files. A perfect example of this is that a player can make
some units get build
fast, while making other improvements get built at a slower rate. There are lots of tutorials on the Web for this, so you
may want to check out
sections notes and get prepared for it if you are enthusiastic about modding the game (as so many people are). Every art
asset has a scale value
is in
XML, and it can be modified
the way you like (these include buildings, trees, units, improvements, resources, etc).
You can also modify terrain-specific movement just by doing a change in the
XML file(s). An example is "Mountain Infantry". Also, through XML, players can add new unit or building
types, change the cost of
wonders, or add new civilizations. Players can also change the sounds played
at certain times or edit the play list for your soundtrack. NOTE: You can have custom soundtracks simply by adding music to
the custom folder.
You only need
to edit the XML in order to assign certain pieces to specific eras or remove certain pieces.
Python: Moving up to a more difficult modding level for most players, Python is a very powerful scripting
language that will allow
familiar with the scripting language to do things from changing and totally reorganizing the interface (as all of the
interface is written in
to changing more algorithmic parts of the game like map generation, combat, triggers/events
(there are, by the way, around 30 triggers including new unit, building, end
turn, unit move, etc), and even the AI.
A Python interpreter is also added to the game which makes it possible for
the player to open it during a game and generate code "on the fly" or check
other variables. Players will now have the ability to add scripted events to the game like automatically
generating units when a tile is reached, having specific situations trigger automatic war, or get this, bringing back Civil
Wars caused by
unrest, Civ II
AI Software Developers Kit (or SDK): For even more advanced modders, Firaxis is offering the entire AI and
Game Code of the game.
can change literally everything about the game they want. They can even create and write their own game types to pretty
much building their own
loosely based on Civilization. Literally everything can be changed
(including the camera position). It has been said that it is very, vary rare for such an amazing modding
level to be released for a strategy game. The AI SDK will be available shortly after the game ships,
in early 2006. Modders can do anything short of changing the basic graphics engine, the core Civ engine, or
the network code.
Some new modding tools are the: Unit Formation
Editor (this gives control of where units stand on a tile, how many units are in
a formation, and under what situations a certain formation is used), Hot-Swapping of Assets (meaning that the computer
detects any changes
and can load them "on the fly"), Python Scripting for the World Builder,
Python Interpreter Console, Python Editable UI, L-System (Lindenmayer System) City Building
(which makes the city graphics look random with each build, but it is also
used to generate terrain features such as trees),
Colored Map Overlays... The GameCore DLL is a "Pluggable Module," which
will make no assumptions about the underlying platform and hardware,
[and more].
The new Bitmap Converter lets you import BMP files and turn those into
Civ maps, letting you download a topographical map (or a picture of your
favorite celebrity) and have the game extract sea levels, mountain ranges and
other information straight from it. Giving the Bitmap Converter any BMP image
and it will make a Civilization IV map from it. Everything blue becomes water, everything green becomes grass - with
the proper image even
entire mountain formations can be achieved
(fives images: Terrain type, plot type (mountain, hills, flat, water), rivers,
features (jungle, forest) and resources..
This tool is already available. Click here to download it (it
did not ship with
the game).
A debugging mode is included, so you can switch off the FoW (otherwise known as the "Fog of War") and watch how the
AI behaves and
A number of pre-built scenarios will also be available with the
game as it ships that also have different victory conditions. The World War II scenario, for example, will start you with
all your cities and
military units
already built,
and instead of conquering the whole world, you may have a more focused goal, such as taking or defending Paris.
There will also be a World-Map included. An American Revolution scenario will be included in the game as well. Here is a
screenshot of it.
Greek World, Earth 1000 AD and Desert War are also some scenarios which have
been included in the game.
Even more Scenarios and a really top-notch tutorial (to help new players out) will also be included in
Civ4. There is also no doubt that
with the presented modding abilities, we will see some very exciting creations from all corners of the Civ
Here, you will be able to see all that the game has to offer for the eye. Movies, screenshots, and more! For all
known screenshots, go to
Screenshot section. For all videos, go to the
Videos section.
(Added November 6th) The Official
Civ4 Site has posted a new Trailer narrated by actor Martin Sheen, a Fansite Kit
(31.5MB in Size) containing audio, concept art, wallpapers, screenshots, and more! The site itself has Six
Wallpapers. Check all of these out in the Downloads
Section of that
(Added October 16th) GameSpy
and IGN
have posted various screenshots from October 8th to today (October 16th). We
have our own CivFanatics Screenshots as well from my Hands-On preview and
"Nuclear Weapons in Civilization IV"
preview. Here
are a few samples. Don't forget to go to our Gallery for all
the newest screenshots!
Nuke Blast, My starting game, Sid's Tips, Civilopedia Entry, Modern Terrain
(Added October 16th) In Thunderfall's preview you can also see animated .gif
shots of an ICBM strike.
(Added October 30th) The official Civilization IV site is
Go there to see various unit animations, and MP3 soundtracks and lots more information!
(Added October 8th) GameSpot and IGN have posted a total of 54 new
screenshots. Here are only five
examples of them below:
Civics Screen, Incan Leader, Pyramid Construction, Bowman Attack, Strike.
(Added October 8th) The Hanging Gardens
Wonder movie has been
posted on FileShack.
(Added October 1st) GameSpot & IGN both have new screenshots posted
(GameSpot with 26, IGN with
Here are five of them:
Combat Odds Display, More Combat Odds, Mansa Musa, City Screen, Alexander of the
(Added October 1st) There are also a few more GamePlay Footage Videos at GameSpot.
Check them out
(#15 and #16 of the GamePlay Footage Series)!
(Added September 24th) During the past four days, about 58 new screenshots were posted
on GameSpot (from
Sept 20th-23rd). This is only scratching the surface, but here are five:
Large City Close-Up, Borders, Mountains & Resources, UN Resolutions, New York at 525BC.
(Added September 24th)GameSpot also has posted around 14 new Game-Play Videos
and one new Video Preview (spanning from September 20th-24th). Check them out!
(Added September 24th) If you missed the live interview from GameSHOUT (featuring
Sid Meier, Soren Johnson, & Jeff Briggs) on September 21st, don't get disappointed just yet! Not that there was no new
information (there was!)
but because you can download
the entire podcast (about one hour long). It is in two separate files, each
about 1/2 hours long. Part I and
Part II.
(Added September 17th) GameSpot has posted twelve new
screenshots, of
these, only five are new.
Here they are:
Inca, Lakes, Horses near a city, New York, Pigs.
(Added September 14th) PC IGN has posted twelve new
screenshots. Here are
five samples:
Kublai Khan, Genghis Khan, Washington City,
Forest & Cities, Mongolian Civilization.
There is also the Radio Interview with Sid Meier on PC Gamer Podcast. You can download the 47 minute file here.
(Added September 10th) GameSpot and IGN have each posted the same eight
new screenshots. Here they are:
Building Concept Art & Final, Leader Concept Art, Rostov, Horses, Terrain, & Cities,
Barcelona, Windmills, Workers, & City,
Interior Concept Art.
(Added August 31st) WorthPlaying has posted eight new
IV Screenshots. Here are
five of them:
Windmill, Low Camera Angle,
Throne Room Concept Art,
Church Concept Art.
(Added August 20th) GameSpot has posted
a new Developer Interview Video
as well as five new Civilization IV
screenshots. Here
are the screenshots:
Cities, Units, and Horses, Cultural
Borders, Large City Close-Up, River,
Galley at Sea.
(Added August 10th) Seven new screenshots added to Civ4's Screenshot Section at GameSpot!
Here are five of the seven samples:
Elvis (Great Artist),
Great Prophet.
(Added July 23rd) Here are a few of the new GameSpot Screenshots:
Close Up, Missionary, At an Angle, Hindu Missionary, Taoist Missionary.
(Added July 20th) GameSpot has posted a new Developer Interview Video with Jeff Briggs. It also includes game-play footage of Civilization
(Added July 12th) There is a new eight-minute long developer
interview with Producer Jesse Smith posted at IGN.
(Added June 29th) Watch the 1UP interview
with Jesse Smith.
(Added June 24th) You can listen to Civ4's opening movie soundtrack, Baba Yetu here as well.
(Added June 24th) There are four new videos you
can watch as
well on
(Added June 24th) These are just four of the fourteen new screenshots released
Leader Head, Landscape
Territory, Motown Zoomed
(Added June 16th) These are the five new screenshots from GameSpot:
Single-Tile City, Low Camera Angle, Desert Workers, Walled City, Qin Shi Haung.
(Added May 26th) New screenshots were just posted on Firaxis' Civ4 section. Here are a few samples:
Timbuktu, Knights, Spearmen, Julius Caesar.
(Added May 20th) There are four videos at GameSpot. Check them out!
(Added May 18th) More new screenshots have been posted at GameSpot. Here are five samples:
Mali, Tundra: Close-Up, Swordsman
Sketch, Civ Landscape: Close-Up.
(Added May 17th) The first online screenshots have been released! They are located at IGN. Here are a few samples:
Pyramids, Landscape, Globe, Camel Archer
(Added April 28th) This isnt an in-game image, but it is probably the official
Civ4 logo, first featured on the PC Zone
Magazine Cover here.
This section includes helpful links, from Tech Support, to helpful threads regarding Modding, etc.
The official Civilization IV website has their support
section up. Click here to check it out if you have
common problems with
installing and running the game.
Having an ATI
Radeon graphics issue? This thread
has a solution taken
from Civ4's
official website.
If you do discover a bug in the game, make sure you post about it in our Bug Reports forum!
Guidlines for posting bugs.
Need a place which compiles solutions to various problems? Here is a thread
which does just that!
Get your facts straight regarding graphics cards and T&L (Transform & Lighting) here.
Know what the latest Drivers for your ATI Graphics card are in this thread!
Unofficial Tech Support FAQs thread.
Planning to Mod Civ4? Make sure you post in this thread!
Modding: The Modders Guide to
Cheating - Learn how to enable it here!
World Builder - If you want to learn how to use this tool in
detail, read forum member Dale's manual. You
can check this helpful
Patch v1.61 has been released including many changes, fixes and
additions. You can get the patch from here, as well as
read what it brings to
the game. The SDK and PitBoss are also available. Get these here.
Some answers to your questions might get answered here, if you needed help. This section concerns the article
Credits: This information has been first
put together and maintained by Civrules
(posted on December 6th,
2004). The
article was also first transferred to its HTML version from the forum version
by Thunderfall on May 31st, 2005. Since much
more information has been
out just before the game's release, and therefore not all information could be
pin-pointed and added to the article, Ex Mudder
and Aks K had the task to
gather and insert
missing information (mainly in the
charts). The missed details were posted on the 61st and 62nd article updates.
"Customization Flexibility" -- Section Notes: If you want to learn how
to mod
Civ4 even
before it is released, through Python, check out Gingerbread
lessons, and tutorial on how to use the Python programming language. Click here to go to his thread, and here to enter his tutorial site. If you are interested in XML, click on the XML Tutorial for more information, on XML's official site. ^
Contact Information & Feedback: If you have any suggestions, know of more information that
could be added here,
or you
see that some of the current information is inaccurate or needs editing... or you simply need help, please let me
know either through the
Article's discussion thread,
Private Message (if you
are registered at the forums), or
E-mail. I will make sure to make additions/changes as soon as possible when need be,
and proper credit will
Article Usage: If anyone intends to use this information for similar purposes, please, you must put
this, or the site itself
(CivFanatics) as a source, just as I have done for other sites below,
in the Current Sources section.
This is the place where all updates -- past and present -- are kept. Each update also has a link to the exact
information source; be it
screenshots, previews or other source links.
Update Information: Items above marked as "" are from the most recent update. Smaller updates,
however, occur all the time as I do update this often for things that need
very minor improvements or changes. For reference, I have added all updates which I have posted up to
this point below:
Bold Text - An article change that does not
necessarily include an informational update.
Do you like Civilization related humor? If so, go to PlanetFargo:
A Civilization Movie Pitch!
This is the first update after the game's release.
Even though it has been a few weeks since the article has been
updated, the below information is all the information which came out
between October 16th and today. This article will continue to get
updated in the future as well. Just because the game has been
released, doesn't mean that I have finished with working on it!!!
The article has been renamed to the "Civilization
IV Info Center."
Added "Helpful Links" Section.
Reviews were gathered from
GameSpy, Times Online, Amped IGO, 2404.org, GameSpot, IGN, ActionTrip,
Computer Gaming World, Yahoo! Games,
1UP, EuroGamer, ToTheGame, and
Strategy Informer. The
average score of the
game is 94%.
The game has already been
(October 25th, although most people got it on October 26th)! It went Gold on October 19th.
Aspyr Media will be bringing Civ4 to the
Mac in 2006 [source].
Civilization III: Complete (featuring both Civ3
expansions: Play the World and Conquests will also be
available for the Mac in December.
Added info from the Official Site (Civ4.com). This
includes Wallpapers, A Fansite Kit, the new trailer, a support
section, and much more.
Added info from Chieftess' Multiplayer: Hands-On Preview. Also added
info from my last preview What We Still Don't Know:
Filling in the Gaps.
Added info from Apolyton's Part 2 and 3
Previews by Solver
(Apolyton Civ4 forums Moderator). Also added in info from Jesse "Friedrich Psitalon" Fletcher's
Multiplayer Review (Consultant to Firaxis Games and
admin of Civ4Players.
Added info from Bob
"Sirian" Thomas' Map Info Reference guide.
It includes both the technical specs (text) and thumbnail visuals of
real instances of the maps (screenshots). You may download the 6MB
Zipped file by clicking here.
This, however, is also available in our Reference section in HTML format.
Added info from the Slashdot Q&A Article with Soren
Added info from our own Question
& Answer session in
our IRC chatroom with Firaxis during CivFanatics' Civ4 release
party there.
All of the following deserve to be credited with the provided information above.
First off...
Thanks to the members of our very own Civilization Fanatics'
Center for providing
of the news.
Thanks to the Companies and their Members:
Firaxis Games, the developers of
Civilization IV.
Aspyr Media, bringing the game to the Mac
in 2006.
2K Games, the Publishers of
Civ4, under Take-Two's Publishing Label.
Take-Two Interactive, the new owner of the Civilization
Civilization IV's Official Site.
Also... Civilization Anonymous. Are you at risk? (2K Games
promotional site for
Other Gaming Sites and Magazines:
1UP | 2404.org | ActionTrip | Amped IGO | Apolyton.net | Christopher Tin.com | Computer Bild Spiele | Computer
Gaming World Magazine | Computer and
Videogames | Digital Entertainment | EuroGamer | FrictionlessInsight | GameDaily
| GameDeveloper Magazine | Game Developers Conference | GamesDomain | GameInformer | GamesRadar | GameReactor | GamesIndustry.biz | GameSpot | GameSpy | HardGame | HomeLAN | IC-Games | IGN.com | NextGeneration | Next Level Gaming | The magazines
PC Gamer/PC
Gamer UK | PC Games (Germany) | PC Zone Magazine | ShackNews | Strategy Game
Informer | Times Online | ToTheGame | UGO | WarGamer
| WorthPlaying | XGP Gaming | Yahoo! Games.