by Rick Bushie - April 8, 2006

Porting Civilization to the N-Gage could have been a widely successful move. It could have brought attention from all the die-hard Civ fans, renewed in their bloodlust by the recent release of Civilization 4, to the commonly overlooked hand held system that is the N-Gage. Not only would it have improved the sales of the N-Gage, but it would have brought a new level of enjoyment to all those Civ-craving fans out there by including a multiplayer feature, even a hot-seat mode would have been fantastic. Instead, they took an old game that only a fraction of the current fan base has any interest in and ported to a game system that has the capacity for much more.

Oh! So When You Tell Him to Go Left, He Goes Left...

This is game is the epitome of simple when it comes to the world of turn based strategy games. This may not be a bad thing, mind you. When I look for a handheld game, I look for something I can pick up and play at any point, only to save and turn it off when the waiter brings me my food. I was fairly pleased with the playability of this game, and I only have two major complaints with the game play on a whole.

The first is the complete and utter lack of any form of multiplayer feature. This is the bigger of the two complaints. When I was handed this game, the first few thoughts that went through my mind were images of sitting in a bus station of in the emergency room with my friends waiting for whatever services I was expecting, and sharing an enjoyable session of hot-seat Civilization. I thought it was brilliant to bring the normally difficult to enjoy multiplayer mode to a system that you can simply hand off to your friend on their turn. It would completely negate any possibility of your friend looking over your shoulder and watching you move your units into a perfect striking position, and eliminate the troublesome it's-my-turn-so-get-out-of-the-comfy-computer-chair issue of the old hot-seat modes. Alas, not only is this game devoid of a hot-seat mode, it has no form of multiplayer what so-ever. Which is a shame really.

The second issue was the problem that I'm sure a new comer to the series would suffer if they ever had a reason to buy and/or play the game. It has very little to no tolerance for new players. The manual is 66 pages long, only because they translated the actual manual into four languages. There is a tutorial mode, but it really doesn't go as far as it should to really explain the game to someone who has never experienced the Civilization world for themselves.

Despite those two problems, the game played well enough and was simple enough to not interfere with the experience. There is a Civilopedia to assist in the comprehension of the many game features, and the game gives you advice for new technologies to research. The build queue could be a little more innovative, but it works. Moving your units and making them fight has been a consistent pillar of simplicity that still exists in even the most recent Civilization game. No need to fix what's not broken right?

Is That a Sword or a Fork?

There really isn't much to say here. The game looks like the versions that came out years ago. No improvements were made, nothing new or flashy to help make the game easier to swallow, simply the same old graphics. Now, don't get me wrong… some of my favorite games are old eight bit games that only require the processing power that my mouse has to play, but when you are trying to sell me a game on a system I know can produce smooth 3D graphics, I expect a little more.

I'm not asking for a fully three-dimensional Civilization game on the N-Gage. What I'm asking for is to take the simple 2D sprites that compose this game, improve on them, increase the resolution so that my warrior has more than six pixels for his face, and perhaps include some sort of smoothing for the fog of war effect to make it a little more pleasing to the eye.

This is probably the field in which this game will loose most of its potential customers.

Wait, I Think I Heard Something... False Alarm

There really isn't any sound. It's that simple. Sure there is a little sound when you move your warrior, some clashing sounds during combat, and a simple fanfare for when you research something new… but other than that, there is nothing. I mean I have literally forgot that the game was on because the N-Gage wasn't making any sound. Sure my putting the game off to the side to enjoy a nice round of twiddling my thumbs helped that along, but the point still stands. Something could have been done here to give fans of the title a little something in return for their well-earned dough.

Granted, audio isn't one of the bright shining features of most civilization games (Civilization 4 excluded) but silence never really earns you many points in the sound section of a review. I give it a five only because what little sound there was didn't drive me to commit myself to becoming a mime and forsaking sound completely.

The Shallow End is Fun...

The game is, indisputably, a fun game. As I said before, I can enjoy a game even if it doesn't swim in the deep end of the tech pool. Turn based strategy games have always been a genre I enjoyed, and this is no exception. Despite it's flaws, Civilization is a game that has the vast amount of re-playability and enjoy-ability which has kept it's name as one of the more predominant titles on shelves since I was a kid.

There is nothing like forging a peace treaty with your neighbors, only to amass a huge army and wipe them from the face of the earth. It really puts real world politics into perspective.

At any rate, I enjoyed playing the game, and it works on the portable platform. If only it had a multiplayer feature, that would make the game shine.

Hi, My Name is Rick, and I'm an Addict...

This game is undeniably addictive. It has that magical power of seduction that refuses to let you stop playing. I have been a long time member of Civ-Players Anonymous and have fallen off the wagon with this game. I imagine Civilization of the N-Gage is a bit like a gateway game that will cause me to spiral back into the dark, dank, enjoyable addiction that is the Civilization series.

They Could Have Done it Well, but Instead They Made This

Bringing Civilization to the N-Gage could have been a widely successful move. It could have brought attention from all the die-hard Civ fans, renewed in their bloodlust by the recent release of Civilization 4, to the commonly overlooked hand held system that is the N-Gage. Not only would it have improved the sales of the N-Gage, but it would have brought a new level of enjoyment to all those Civ-craving fans out there by including a multiplayer feature, even a hot-seat mode would have been fantastic. Instead, they provided us with a game that has little to no real character. Civilization for the N-Gage was a good idea that sorta deflated like a parade balloon the day after Thanksgiving.

If you're a fan of the genre, play it for the simple enjoyment alone. If you've never touched the series, try a different version of the game. If you like it, then maybe you'd like this one too.