THE HUB

OMG!!!

FEATURED MEMBER

DoctorIrish

DoctorIrish

The Doctor is in.

QUICK POLL

Grand Theft Auto IV: does it live up to the hype?

ASK THE PROS

THE GAMEPROS

FREE NEWSLETTERS

Sign up now to receive weekly or daily updates on your favorite games, stories, and more!



PC | Strategy | Civilization: Call to Power

There is no Boxart for - Civilization: Call to Power
  • GRAPHICS: 3.0
  • SOUND: 2.0
  • CONTROL: 2.0
  • FUN FACTOR 2.5
  • AVG USER SCORE n/a
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 2.8

Review: Civilization: Call to Power

Review by Barry Brenesal | 01/01/2000 | 00:00:00 AM PST

Not Ready for Prime Time

Civilization: Call to Power is a new broom that clears away some of the cobwebs that have haunted turn-based strategy games.

Regrettably, in the process, it clears away much of the good with the bad.

Activision's first Civilization game, by turns engaging and frustrating, belongs to the classic world domination genre that starts in the "prehistoric past" and ends somewhere in a futuristic techno-apotheosis. It involves equal parts research, exploration, exploitation, diplomacy and battle. You can win by out-performing your opponents and achieving the final breakthrough technology first, or just beat them bloody.

Now, graphically, there's no contest: Civ: CTP represents a step forward over the likes of Civ II or Alpha Centauri. Its attractive 3D maps are covered with animated units and resources. (That said, individual civilizations in the game look and feel boringly alike, and the soundtrack doesn't lend itself to cultural distinctions.) And the "Wonders" on the new technological tree are generally better balanced than those in Civ II.

On the other hand, the combat system is a melange of interesting concepts and poor execution.

Too many "dirty tricks" unit types are provided in Civ:CTP. For instance, Ecoterrorists can instantly destroy all of a city's advancements and Wonders. And guess what? They are completely invisible to nearly everything else. Yet these units' attacks aren't even considered war provocations by the AI, so computer-driven players use them frequently and with impunity.

Kudos to Activision for supporting combat stacks (unlike Alpha Centauri). But unit balance, too, is way off. The game is overly weighted in favor of stacks built from units with multiple attack types, so a group of Archers and Cavalry can decimate a small squadron of futuristic militia.

Then there's the AI. Time and again I've watched all the computer players go from a position of very favorable reactions to me on one turn to declarations of war or negative stances on the next, and all without without cause.

The AI cheats, too, and blatantly. Once you get beyond the introductory training level, you'll find that computer-controlled societies start with more gold than human-controlled ones, and receive a number of free cities.

Imperialism II reduced required player input for any task to one or two clicks. Not so, Civ: CTP. Its building queues, trade and diplomatic screens each require a lengthy series of clicks to achieve a desired goal. Some actions in the game are hotkeyed, but many are not.

No doubt future bugfixes will take care of many minor glitches, like combats hidden beneath research completion screens and the frequent, mystifying game crashes. But Civ: CTP has several major problems no amount of bug spray can address. Who's going to clean up after the cleaner?