Colonization for Windows - Review

Author: R8a Date: Mar 11 2006 - 20:38 Score: 35 points

Intro

Colonization... so many memories...

Games that recreate a historical time of mankind are always welcome. At first, colonization proved that Sid Meier was not a good game maker, but one of the greatest (including the developing teams he has worked with). And this time, it was not the whole mankind history like in civilization, but just the colonization process given in the Americas, and let's be honest, playing against any of the monarchies found in the game is fun hehe...

Gameplay

To begin with, the gameplay, is just smooth, a great turn based strategy game. If you are not into strategy games, you will have a rough time learning the many aspects seen in this game, but giving it some time, you will get hooked up. Seasoned strategy gamers will find it very similar to previous strategy games, and is not that difficult to get into it. There is a difficulty level option, and you can always choose the country you will represent from the start (the netherlands and spain seem to be the most powerful countries given their advantages, but that's for me hehe). There are many American native races also (use a scout as much as possible, it will help you, a lot!), and you can always trade with the natives or you country (if you haven't declared independence of course).The AI DOES KNOW about tactics hehe, and seems to develop strong armies faster than you can usually, so you have to use your diplomatic skills at first, and maintain a steady grow to think going to war with anyone. And the economics models is deep enough to amuse you for hours thinking about the best way to play a turn. It may sound a little hard at first, but once you get the idea, you will love this game.

Graphics

The graphics are well drawn, kind of what you would expect from a turn based strategy game of the 90's, and this windows port uses the same graphics the old colonization used. Every country has a unique color to id their units, and every native faction have their own buildings.

Sound/Music

Sounds, are somewhat dissapointing, but, let's face it, this genre does not need help of a great soundtrack to entertain.

Controls

Controls, well, a mouse driven interface, that worked very well for the DOS colonization, but this windows port seems to be a little buggy, and the mouse does not respond to your command... but that's something windows users should be used to... and the controls are not the only thing buggy about this game... if you are a win xp user, you better save often, otherwise, you will find yourself yelling at your PC (like I did) just before losing an afternoon's hard work.

Overal

A brilliant game, if you still use your old 486, try it... if not, try it too, just a brilliant game... gives civilization a run for itself being a deeper game, focusing in a great historical event, makes caesar series seem a little plain, and remind us that a good game is always about its gameplay, graphics are just the nice touch... an 8 for the windows port because of some annoying bugs...

	Title / Type	Submitter	Date
	Review	R8a	Mar 11 2006

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