I really should be sleeping right now, but I've been busy and, due to Fictionvision's generosity, I also may have nightmares, so instead I'm around doing stuff like asking you people about games.

Alpha Centauri + expansion is on sale, $1.5, which is extra-cheap. It's obviously a very popular strategy/management game around here, lots of people have praised and bought it already, and I've watched a WTF video about a new 4x sci-fi game named Pandora (developed by a different company), with TB making several references and comparisons to Centauri, while also pointing how great the old one was. For the sounds of it, I should like many things about them, and the future Beyond Earth.

BUT my most recent experience with Sid Meier's games is Civ III and for the looks of it, they seem quite similar. Well, in Civ III I started great, then I realized that winning was beyond my capabilities. I don't know if it was the big amount of factors, the bad luck when spawing surrounded by deserts, how quick the other civs forged alliances against mine, or just me not paying enough attention to what was happening around. I read the manual several times to understand the hows, I tried different ways in order to achieve victory, but no matter what it always ended with the other leaders making fun of mine.

The thing is, even though I couldn't win, I somewhat enjoyed the game while playing, managing the resources, discovering and conquering other lands, defeating a few enemies... I'm no expert in these kind of games but they still attract me and I usually have fun with them. Now I guess my question is... are Centauri and Civ III similar in their playability? I'm probably gonna get Centauri anyway, but if they play the same, it'll go to the back of the backlog until I know what I did wrong in Civ. I would thank any help in that regard too.

Sorry for the way-too-many words, and excuse me if I don't respond right away but the bed is calling me. Thanks again.

What kind of curious?

Yes they have a lot of similarities since Alpha Centauri was built on the Civ engine. Any fan of any version of Civ should try Alpha Centauri, especially at $1.50. It's a great game.

I'm curious, were you playing on the easiest mode? If not I suggest you start there and when your bored with winning consistently then you up the level. You might also try changing the size of the map and the number of players.

Alpha Centauri is generally allot easier than civ3, however if you spawn on the same continent as one or more of the more powerful races in Alpha -hive, Gaian or believers, believers especially, then your in for a hard time early game.

In alpha centauri, you can save your game at the first turn, then open the scinario editor and use it to see the whole map. If your happy with what you see, you can load the saved game and begin as normal.

Or you could simply play as the race Gaian, in which case you will be pretty much unstoppable, even with enemy on same continent..... especially once you fully understand the power of unsupported captured mind worms!

Edit: oh and the easy way to play civ3 is to learn to use the map editor, then put a mountain and water barrier around your territory except at the one access area where you will be able to focus your forces.

Interesting, while I never played Gaian (always intrigued, never did) I WAS a big Hive fan. Good luck Rodroll!

*edit* Oh and edit to add, ya I always played a difficulty level or so below what I thought I "should" initially, if only to get the gist and fun out of those first few playthroughs... you KNOW by game 87 you'll be trying to be "Emperor" anyway! ;) And yes Civ / Alpha Centauri were games where even when I'd quit out a game early without a prospect of winning, they were always fun to restart again.

I'm not sure if a lengthy grand strat would scratch that itch today, but I know FTL sure does. Totally different game type, but similar in that I may sink many hours into it only to die / pin myself into a corner... just to start it up all over again ;)

I think Civilization III and Alpha Centauri are similar in this respect; however, Alpha Centurai's expansion Alien Crossfire struck me as easier than the core AC or Civilation III game because of the crazy powerful aliens.

These aren't game you're suppose to win, are they?

You can always start at some low difficulty level. After a couple of games you'll get the hang of it and can try your luck on higher levels. Usually the key is expanding quickly in the beginning without overextending yourself...

Thanks for answers, people. I normally started at medium-low difficultiies because I was afraid of not learning enough from the experience. But I should probably go with lower levels, not the lowest but something near, and less rivals. I understand that growing the civ may depend on how lucky I am with the terrain, and if I'm not I at least should think on the best way to overcome that before restarting or editing, but I'll focus on building near and then expand, instead of uncovering new terrain fast and then sending settlers, or the equivalent.

@Ixamyakxim, yeah I enjoyed FTL a lot the last year, managed to finish it three times. Problem with it was, I tried to replay it with no guides to discover stuff by myself and got no new ships (except the basics) by the time I reached the final scenario. Then I looked up what I had to do to unlock them, and it seemed that those heavily relied on pure luck: you can go through the maps searching for the right encounter but it may never happen in that game, and you can miss others for focusing on just one. Anyway, I still have to replay for the new content.

I certainly recommend this game, though there is always a chance you may not like it for several reasons, if you do like it however it might be the best Civ experience out there.
On the other hand, Firaxis has been going down the creative hill since Civ IV and are only able to provide shallow and watered down experiences from their previous games so my hopes for Beyond Earth aren't high.

The game is awesome :) I was a big fan of civ when it was released so it was a no brainer for me. I probably even preferred it due to the setting. I purchased it yesterday mainly because it was one fidday but i probably wont get around to replaying it, but if you haven't played it before its definitely worth a go.

edit: deleted a load of stuff that i said which is already in the thread about beyond earth

I tried playing Alpha Centauri a few months ago, but I found myself completely lost in the amount of options the game offers. I have some experience with other 4X games like MoO2, MoM and the likes of HoMM2-3 and King's Bounty, but none of those games even come close to the amount of content in AC. The tutorial wasn't really helpful, I still wasn't sure what to build first even after playing it. I even tried looking at some LP's on Youtube, but I couldn't find a good, step by step guide on how to properly start the game.

Anyone got any tips for players in this situation? I don't have a lot of time to explore every option of the game like I used to years ago (adult life and all that, unfortunately) and I can see it's a great game, but there must be a good line of thought to follow in this game that you guys can recommend. As an example, consider MoM: build Granary first, then Marketplace, Farmer's Market, Smithy, Shrine, Library,...it was quite intuitive. And in AC that's only the beginning - there's terraforming and plenty of other stuff to consider.

Like the normal Civ games there isn't much that you can do right or wrong as long as you survive.
What I would start with is getting a few scouts to scavenge pods and research the tech that lets you build terraformers if you aren't playing as the Gaians and build one for every new city you build as you get some resource bonus for the first thing you build in a new city and then set it to autoimprove the city.

They are similar, but far from identical. Alpha Centauri is closer to Civ 2 than Civ 3. Personally I found Alpha Centauri to be a lot better than Civ 3 (which is the Civ game that I like the least), so even if you struggled with Civ 3, I would recommend getting Alpha Centauri and play that instead.

Alpha Centauri has a lot of flavour. There is a story unravelling, if you survive, that is. You will get the most of this game if you read the novel it largely draws inspiration from: The Jesus Incident, by Frank Herbert (of Dune fame) and poet Bill Ransom. Actually it is a sequel of Destination: Void, but it is possible to read it as a standalone novel.

If you like Civ games, Alpha Centauri is a must. I played most games without the expansion. The expansion adds more factions, but then you cannot play with all of them at once, I think. I would suggest to play first with the original factions only. If you want to try the aliens as NPC later, you may want to add both ot them at once (as non-player factions).