The game that started the long running series is monumental in so many ways.
Until now, Civilization has been one of best strategy games ever created with multiple sequels spanning everything from the Super Nintendo to the latest generation of consoles. For it's humble beginnings, Civilization puts you to the task of choosing a group of people like the Chinese or the Russians, and building a civilization that can stand the test of time. Every game has been the same in this regard from the first, to the latest version and it doesn't get boring.
At the start, you pick a group of people to start with. Each civilization has a different leader from Stalin of Russia to George Washington of the Americans. None of the civilizations really have anything different from each other except the colors but what can you expect from a game made in 1991? After choosing the difficulty, you can choose whether or not you want the world to be randomized or having more water or having more mountains. These little bits of customization makes each foray into each new world more mysterious and challenging. By playing on the real world template, the game does become much less mysterious simply because you know where the other civilizations start and some of them are clumped together, giving some choices more benefits than others.
The game is turn based, and at the beginning it goes really quickly. You move a few units, and you can end your turn. As the game advances, you'll have more units and cities to manage, making each turn usually harder and it will take you longer to take care of everything. Civilization's turn based addictiveness began here and it's easy to see why as you won't want to move away from the keyboard and mouse!
There's a few ways to win the scenario. You can either play it out until the end of the time of your difficulty level, which is predetermined by which level you choose. In reality, you don't really win, as the game just says there will be no more point calculation but you can still play further but the game will not rate your further accomplishments as the time has already passed. The second way to win the scenario is to build a spaceship to go to Alpha Centuri. Once you have done that, you have won the space race and are declared the winner. The last, and in my opinion most fun, is to conquer all the other civilizations until they are all under your banner.
The game play involves you having to tax your people, build structures, towns, units and roads to increase the influence of your society. Towns are your greatest asset as they are the only things that can produce further units. To keep the towns running smoothly, you need to do things like build mines and roads and irrigate fertile areas so the town can get more food and grow faster. After you get your first town going, you can build more units from the town like militias, or settlers or other units to do things like battle other enemies or build roads.
It is essential to keep your game balanced because by building too many settlers, your towns will be largely undefended and as such, easy for enemies to capture them. If you build too many military units, the costs of supporting the units every turn will put a large cost on your economy.
There are far too many different types of units to list. There are militias, riflemen, nukes, armors, knights, catapults, musketeers and the list goes on and on. Suffice to say, the game gives players a large array of units to select from. Some are stronger offensively, while others are used mainly to transport units or to explore. Advancing up the tech tree is important because if the enemy has gunpowder, their musketeers will crush your phalanxes. What's even worse, if they have flight and they begin using bombers to destroy your cities as your knights are easily dispatched. Following too far behind in technology will render your army useless. Going too fast up the tech tree, and the enemy may have a force that can crush yours and steal the technology for their own use anyways.
Don't worry too much, because you do have advisors covering every aspect from the food supply to the army. They will give you tips as to what to do next or what is most important to focus on.
Realistically, the game doesn't make the space race an easy route to take because technologies in the game take a long time to develop. While all of this is occurring, other civilizations are constantly banging at your door looking to trade or beat your head down until you submit. You can send spies to attempt to influence your opponents or even steal resources.
In the end, the computer AI is constantly advancing farther than you unless you are completely ruthless. If you do not attack your enemies, they will get so many new technologies and cities, that it is virtually impossible for you to catch up. Even though the AI does attack each other, they seem to focus on the human player much more so. Every time one civilization takes over a city from another, they can get a technology if the other civilization is more advanced. It is very important to protect your towns simply because everyone, including barbarians, nameless enemies who randomly spawn in area with fog of war, are looking to destroy your civilization.
I personally tried beating the game through the space race but in higher difficulties, it's basically impossible and the only way is to beat your enemies into a bloody pulp. This is the first game in the monolithic Civilization series. If you're harking for a nostalgic return or just curious to see what the first installation of this game was, you'll still see all the basics that make all civilizations great. You build, destroy, trade, talk, and build some more, until you are the best, or last civilization.