Sid Meier has a long-standing and dedicated following of gamers who know exactly what to expect from his games. In this respect, the fifth installment in the long enduring Civilization series is true to its roots. The fundamental game-play rules remains unchanged and so those familiar with the series will need little introduction to this game. For the uninitiated, let’s take a look at the games basic game-play mechanics.

Great powers

The single-player mode of Civilization V starts with the player choosing a civilization from an impressive list of 18. Each Civilization is represented by a leader, who also doubles up at the player’s avatar in the game. Also, each of these civilizations has unique characteristics that give them bonuses or access to exclusive structures and units. The game allows the player to customize their experience with options like difficulty level, number of opposing players, size and type of world map, and victory conditions. This makes Civilization V one of the most scalable strategy games in terms of challenge and difficulty.

After the game variables are selected, the system generates a map with randomly dispersed resources across the map. Cities remain central to game-play, so the first order of the day is to establish your civilization’s capital city. From this point on, the main objective of the game is to expand the civilization’s influence either through expansion, war, technology, culture or diplomacy, and ultimately achieve any one of the victory objectives.

Paths to domination

While the central objective of this game is no different from any other strategy game, what sets Civilization V apart from the rest is the multitude of options available to achieve this. Conquest is the most straight forward way of dominating a map, but there are other, more interesting ways of achieving the final objective. The player can focus on technological advances through research in an endeavor to win the game by being the first to build a spaceship. Alternatively, players can achieve cultural victory by adopting five different social policies and then undertaking the ‘utopian project’.