Civilization II is much like the first Civilization, with some changes to the various components, cultures, world wonders, tile “specials” and technologies. The images were altered from a top down perspective to an isometric representation. Rivers no longer occupy the whole of each tile along their length; instead, they are part of each topography square through which they flow, adding productive worth, defensive incentives and movement skill. The AI was improved as well, including the removal of most random occasions by now making the computer player go through the same generation conditions as the human player.
The game features completely new notions, such as firepower and hit points, and changes to some units’ skills and strengths. For example, engineers and settlers can be automated to improve surrounding places, but no longer ignore enemy zones of control. Some new units are added like stealth aircraft.
The player has the capacity to consult the ‘High Council’ for guidance (as long as the player still has the CD in the drive). The council contains film clips of celebrities portraying advisers in the areas of the military (a brawny man, often drunk, mad or both; he becomes a stereotypical American general when Modern Age is reached), economics (a smooth-speaking merchant, after a snooty and suave businessman), diplomacy (in the Modern Age, a saucy femme fatale with a vaguely Eastern European accent), technological progress (a nerdy scientist), and the people’s happiness (an Elvis Presley caricature, wearing shades even in the Early period). They commonly assert with and insult one another, as each adviser’s section needs a distinct set of priorities. The counsel’ costumes change with each new era. In many ways, the ‘High Council’ represents a little comic relief, especially from the expansionist military adviser, who’ll insist on more troops even when the player has 60 battleships, or during the Medieval Period will sing the last refrain from the 18th Century English traditional song “Down Among the Dead Men”, punctuated with a cordial “No grievances, sire!”. When the player is experiencing anarchy, the characters start discussing and yelling unintelligibly at exactly the same time, interrupting each other, and eventually starting to fight, with all counselor windows shutting down and turning into the “?” symbol of Anarchy.
There are two paths to victory (and bonus points to the score) in this match: to be the last civilization staying or to build a spaceship and reach Alpha Centauri before the other civilizations. The space race can be more challenging because there are a limited number of moves in the match, which ends in the year 2020. If the spaceship doesn’t reach Alpha Centauri by then, the game will only finish with the current score. The player can continue playing after all civilizations have been conquered, the spaceship has reached its destination, or the year 2020, but there will no longer be any scoring. The sooner a player conquers every other civilization, or the space ship arrives, the higher the player’s score will be. This allows a player to always play the game ceaselessly.[1]
The scoring system quantifies the player’s performance in the end of each game. Population is an important influence on scoring as each joyful citizen brings two points, each content citizen gives one point, and each unhappy citizen brings zero points. This implies that higher population gives better scores. Players may raise the luxury speed to the maximum (depending upon their government kind) right before the very ending of the game to be able to increase well-being, optimizing their scores. Furthermore, each wonder of the world owned by the player will even add 20 points to their score. Each square with pollution deducts ten points. The duration of time there’s been peace (no armed struggle or war) up to the ending of the game also adds three points per move, up to a maximum of 100 points, and if the player won using a spaceship, added points are rewarded, based on the number of individuals who reached Alpha Centauri living. The ultimate score will also give a civilization percent, based on the difficulty level the game was played at (picked at the very beginning of the game). The higher this percentage is, the better. Eventually, a title will be given to the player. Especially great ones contain “Lion Hearted”, “the Great” with the greatest obtainable title being “The Magnificent”.
There were two expansion packs that slowly added more features to the game. The first, Battles in Civilization, contained 20 new scenarios: 12 created by the makers of the game,[3] and eight “Best of the Net” by Enthusiasts. It also added an enhanced macro language for scenario scripting with advanced programming features like variable typing and network attributes, which was considered broadly unnecessary. Due to a programming bug, the Encarta-fashion Civilopedia was disabled from the game.
The second expansion was Civ II: Fantastic Worlds (a legal dispute originating from Sid Meier’s departure prevented the use of the full word “Civilization”). It also added new scenarios that had many unique settings such as one scenario dealing with colonization of Mars, and one scenario called Midgard that had Elven, Goblin, Merman, and other civilizations from fantasy. There are also some scenarios based on other MicroProse games such as X COM, Master of Orion and Master of Magic “Jr.” scenarios. Fantastic Worlds also contains a new scenario editor that allowed various units, city improvements, terrain, technology trees, putting causes, and other add-ons that accentuated the game.
Lorries Ideas 