The Civil War Reviews

The Civil War is an ancient game from 1995. It's a whopping 28 years old at the time of this review. The game runs in DOSBOX and lacks proper 4:3 aspect ratio and support for any modern gaming display resolutions, hasn't been modernised or updated to run smoothly on modern gaming PCs. Despite this lack of modernisation, it carries a pretty high price tag for such an ancient game. This seems to have been put on Steam as a nostalgia gouge for people who played the original DOS based turn based Civil War strategy game. If you can get it to work, you'll quickly find this is the kind of game that came with a printed manual, because the interfaces of the time were too low res to include deep interactive tutorials, tooltips and so on. Unfortunately, the publishers decided not to include the manual here, and without that, it's a cryptic mess of guesswork if you want to try to play it, and really not worth the bother. From a technical perspective, the game doesn't meet basic minimum requirements that most PC gamers expect as standard. The game only displays in 4:3 pillarboxed aspect ratio, the developers didn't bother maintaining or updating the game, so it will look bad on modern gaming displays. Also, the publisher couldn't work out how to make the DOSBOX version of the game display properly in fullscreen, it only runs in a window. Trying to push the game to fullscreen with alt+enter causes DOSBOX to become unresponsive, so it can't be played in that format. When it's not fullscreen, the game detail is too small to make out on most modern gaming displays. These technical defects push this game below acceptable standards for any modern PC game. The Civil War is relatively expensive for an abandonware nostalgia gouge, at $2 USD, and it's not worth it. The game is just too old, hasn't been modernised, but the publisher wants your money anyway. And as the old saying goes, you can't go home again.

Sadly, this game doesn't work. Some very serious glitches that make it unplayable. I use to love this game as a kid and I was so excited to have the opportunity to play it again, yet I cannot. Don't waste your money. Essentially this game uses the total war style interface a decade before total war was a thing.

Looks like an older game that might have come out in the 1990's in a box with a paper instruction manual. That is not the problem,the leaving out an instruction manual or a link to an on-line copy of it so I can figure out how to play is a big problem!

Really old-school game. Somewhat difficult to play. Might suggest getting only if you want to see how far games have come.

I bought it for 1.99 i think, The Game come out in the 90's, took a little bit to figure out how to play but its ok not as good as Ultimate Civil War General but ok, u command armies thats mostly battle flag armies u can build ships upgrade citys/towns etc. Only problem im still having is the Music/Sound get to play its on in game but no sound thats because its a Dos game and i think its missing a file to get it to work for windows 7-10, So if anyone figures this out please post it send me message on how to get the music to play Thank You Ps i haven't tried multiplayer if anyone else gets this old game i will play