it's not. CivNet opens in one window, and Civ 1 from Chronicles opens in several different windows.

Civ Chronicles Civ 1

CivNet

DOS Civ 1


Both CivNet and Civ 1 (CH) are not comparable to DOS version, but Civ Net at least have something in common.

thats Civ 1 for 3.11

Personally I'd introduce on 4 it's the most complete version due to the number of expansions and it's age. In a couple of years though Civ 5 should catch up on features and surpase 4 just like every previous version has done

Thanks,

I was wondering about that, because it really looked like 3.11 from the Inferface of the game. However the Taskbar left me irritated. Some screenshot from someone using a addon for 3.11 to have a taskbar oder Civ for Win3.11 on 95... well whatever.

Still if this is really the included version it is rather stupid to not use Civnet at least.

First Civ Game I played properly was Civ 5 and Iove it. Would highly recomend going for that and the June/July patch is introducing hot seat multiplayer!

Get your mates and few cans in and have a bash!

civfanatics is the main site for civilization related discussions. There are some other, mostly language specific sites, but everything you need can be found at civfanatics.

The BAT mod is very good and I would recommend it especially to a beginner. It makes the game significantly more transparent and introduces many usability improvements. It does not alter gameplay in any way.
Note that the BAT also should come with the BUG (an unofficial patch, essentially). Your install order should be:
Civ IV -> Beyond the sword (by all means, buy that as well!) -> official patch -> BUG -> BAT.


[edit] In my opinion, Civ V is not that good to warrant installing steam. And not better than Civ IV.

It looks like the one included in Civ Chronicles.

Go with Alpha Centauri instead. ;)

As for Civ, I agree with most people here:

Civ IV + BtS if you want complexity and content (and a lot of awesome mods) for a good price,

Civ V if you want a more streamlined experience with better combat and oh so pretty graphics.

You need Steam for CiV, yes. But I wouldn't worry about it too much - it's the least offensive of all the DRM / online store solutions out there. I regularly use it for buying stuff from their offers though, so maybe I'm biased. :)

Sorry should have explained that one. The BAT Mod is a combination of BUG (Beyond the Sword Unaltered Gameplay), Varietas Delectat and Blue Marble.

BUG is strictly an interface modification that adds a few little extra buttons, a little more information to some panels (such as more precise combat odds) and an easier to use civilopedia. It doesn't change the game mechanics one bit, not does it change the interface into something unrecognizable. It's basically still pure Civ IV.

Varietas Delectat is a graphical mod that adds more variety to units and structures, so there is less are reuse between civilizations. Again, no gameplay tweaks.

Finally, Blue Marble is a beautiful terrain retexture. Here are a couple screens [url=http://civilized.worldserve.de/download/civ4/mods/images/BlueMarbleTerrain1024.jpg]2

The BUG Project The latest BAT Mod (Don't download Better BAT AI yet, it is in beta and still has bugs)

Or ya can skip it entirely :) As mentioned it doesn't change the gameplay at all so you're not missing anything on that front.


And finally, for other mods to check out, someone was inevitably going to link Fall from Heaven II, a fantasy-themed total conversion of Civilization IV that is likely the most popular mod for the game.

If that sounds appealing to you, you may want to check out Master of Mana. Still a little rough around the edges, but for me, even more fun.

I would rather that the June/July patch fix some occasionally game breaking memory issues.

This is definitely a good game to play. Other than that Civ 2, And Call To Power are fun. I've played Alpha Centauri, and it's definitely an interesting game.
Civ 2 didn't have network support. That was Civilization II: Multiplayer Gold Edition, which wasn't released until quite a bit later.

I never played that version, but I've heard it's good.

I've only two gripes with Alpha Centauri, and though they're big ones, I still have my disks.

1 - Depressing. Something about that monotonous voice and the "please don't go" everytime I quit. It gets to me. Does this happen to anyone else?

2 - Planet is an unremovable AI. I realize this has merit, and it makes the game interesting at times, but there will be little creating the perfect civilization when you have stacks of super-ultra-elite mind worms descending all over you despite your greenest civ to ever exist in the history of mankind.

Anyway, can't bring myself to part with the disks. The wonder videos are fantastic! And the unit customization is outrageous. A great game, but civ 4:BTS takes the lion's share of my civ time these days. AC comes in 2nd. There is no third.

I'd imagine it'll have a fair amount of fixes tbh but I can honestly say the only bugs I've experienced in the game are a few graphics glitches and some minor slow down towards the end of larger matches. Nothing game breaking per se, may have just been lucky though.

Well... by game breaking, I just mean CTDs...

But if the autosave is on, you can recover... but the game will keep crashing until you discover the thing that made it crash and you change that thing... And I honestly only have these issues happen late in the game on very large maps... so I just started playing smaller maps.

Civ 1 was the best, only had one flaw; Civ 2 corrected it and is still now the best. Civ 3,4,5 are nothing in comparison. My verdict: 21435 Whilst Alpha Centauri was an excellent alternative/spin off. Hope gog get the Civ series at some point.