Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword Reviews

ATTN: LEONARD NIMOY FANS!!! Leonard Nimoy does the narration... ...And the diplomacy is better than Civ V. The tech tree is more or less how it had always been in Civ, up until V. The various civilizations each have their own personalities, not just in diplomacy, but in how you can expect them to behave and expand (or not expand). The only problem is that there is no limit to how many units you can stack in one space. It's a problem because it makes battles mostly about who can produce more instead of about strategy. Production is much quicker than in Civ V. Landscape and unit experience go into determining outcomes of battles - but this could be appreciated more if production and space had limits. Whereas Civ V uses hex, Civ IV like its predecessors use a grid. You may like the extra emphasis on production, you may prefer the grid. It's a solid, quality game, as you would expect when Leonard Nimoy put his voice into it. There are many fascinating mods and scenarios. If you want to mod, then the world is at your fingertips. Because the game is one or one and a half generations old, and not too many generations old, it's in a kind of technological goldilocks zone where it runs more streamlined, tight and solid - easier to run and to mod, it lost nothing with time. The diplomacy and civics systems and AI are all arguably better than the later Civ's... One thing that makes the AI better is that civilizations' behaviors are determined by not one but two factors: 1) the particular civilization, AND 2) unlike Civ V the particular leader - which is one more level of complexity to add more variety to AI behavior. And don't even get me started on the fun and flexible civics system. Just go play it, study the techs to get what civics you want, and then experiment, revolutions galore! This game has elements which future games should incorporate (e.g., Paradox games of grand strategy could benefit from becoming more Civ-like). The only reasons Civ IV is not better than Civ V are not any complicated or technological reasons, it's just that Civ V uses a hex map and sets limits to production and to space for units. Civ IV's graphics are reminiscent of Civ VI. But Civ IV is cheaper and probably more stable. If you're tired of Civ V, play Civ IV while waiting for Civ VI's price to go down.

IMHO, the best of all the Civilization series is Civ IV: Beyond the Sword. I like it better than Civ V for both graphics and rules changes

If you like strategy games this one can be a bit addictive. Unfortunately, it is not supported by Big Sur mac os that I am aware :(

This game can be very addictive. Plan to spend multiple days on one game. Save your session and go to bed.

This *review* ONLY applies to the mac version of the game and its technical state - mostly. The game feels like a pile of abandonware: it uses twice the disk space it specifies, crashes to the desktop frequently, is buggy and has texture lags. Pro for this game is the great number of mods available that do away with some of its most infantile parts, however, over half of those mods do not load or make the game crash. The ones that do load run poorly at best. If you never change your underwear and if you like your pizza better with lots of cholesterol, your coke with extra sugar and you refuse to quit smoking because you know a really, really old smoker who's healthy as a fish: this is your game. Oh, and you have to think John Wayne (?!?) is a cool dude with a great sense of humor.

Great old game, just can't play anymore after I upgraded software.

Top 3 in the franchise and a must play for any fan of the series. If you started playing Civ with 6 then you might find it to feel outdated. But its the quintessential and most satisfying Civ experience imo.

best game ever. Can't get into Civ 5-6 I guess to many new concepts and I don't have time or patience to learn a new game. Civ 4 is the best IMO

More difficult than "vanilla" Civ IV, Beyond the Sword is a great expansion pack for people who enjoy Civ IV but find themselves wanting more. In "vanilla" Civ IV, espionage is very limited. For example, I mostly use spies in vanilla Civ IV to scout enemy territory and evade ambushes from their units. In BtS, espionage has been expanded with great attention to detail. I am still only scratching the surface of the possibilities of espionage in BtS because it's an entirely new and complex game concept that I'm having to navigate while also doing all the usual world building stuff in Civ. I welcome any comments and insights from other players, I know this game is practically antique now so the few of us still playing are becoming a little thin on the ground!

Sometimes new isn't better. This game is turn based so it's pretty relaxing to play. But the depth of it is seemly endless. Strategic fun while learning about history. My favorite game of all time. I feel civ 5 doesn't compare either.