Cheap Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (Mac) (Software) (Macintosh) Price
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Alpha Centauri employs the same basic game play, rules, and concept as Civilization 2, but features enhanced diplomacy and a new, slicker interface. Players begin by assuming leadership of one of seven colony factions, establishing a base on the unexplored world. Conquering territory, developing technology, expanding the faction's population, and dealing with native life forms are critical priorities that must be correctly balanced for survival. If a faction's military output is low, it may be vulnerable to attacks by others or by dangerous mind worms that roam the landscape. On the other hand, building war machines at the expense of scientific research may result in trying to manage a massive but obsolete war machine or a rebellious population.
Within the game, you can now automate tasks that--in the earlier game--were repetitive and dull. The factions also have a better mix of leaders; three of the seven factions are headed by women. The computer AI for the other groups does a good job of making decisions in accordance with each faction's particular philosophy and world view, and will often surprise a human player with an offer of strategic alliance or a sudden double-cross.
This easy-to-learn and thoroughly absorbing game takes the best features of the original classic and sets them in a brave new world. --Alyx Dellamonica
| PLATFORM: | Macintosh |
| AGE GROUP: | 5 years and up |
| CATEGORY: | Software |
| MANUFACTURER: | Aspyr Media |
| ESRB RATING: | Everyone |
| TYPE: | centuri |
| MEDIA: | CD-ROM |
| ACCESSORIES: | |
| UPC: | 618870100333 |
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Customer Reviews of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (Mac)
Brilliant yet boring? I think Sid Meier games are fantastic, and honestly, I like Alpha Centauri more than Civ 2. Like the Civs, your goal is to nurture a complex civilization that dominates the world by political, military, economic, or scientific means, facing the strategic tradeoff between outward expansion and inward development. The technology tree is really outstanding, not just for the fun of the new, totally customizable military hardware you can build but because of how they really do seem like plausible advances for a future society-truly mind-blowing. The interaction of the human factions with Planet itself forms a very interesting dimension-do you essentially declare ecological war on Planet (and face its semi-sentient response), or do you try to cooperate with it in search of global dominance? Each faction is truly unique in its strengths and weaknesses and in the way the AI uses it as your opponent. And the diplomatic dimension, while not brilliant, is adequate. <
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>However, it does suffer the same problems as the Civs. It is so detailed, it is easy, especially if you're an automation-eschewing perfectionist like me, to get bogged down in the details. Furthermore, like the others, you get to a point in the game in which the winning faction becomes a foregone conclusion. If that faction is yours, you have a choice. Do you keep playing for many hours to actually see it through (keeping in mind that the further the game goes the more complex it gets, which takes yet more real-life minutes per turn), or do you drop the boredom and start a new game? I've usually done the latter, which means, I'm sure, that there are many more cool technologies that I have not witnessed because there's scant motivation to take it that far. And also, the ceaseless red earth, blue water, and black displays hurt the eyes after a while.
great
I wrote the wrong review of Master of Orion II; I'll need to fix that as soon as possible. This game is better than Master of Orion II -- constantly changing yet requiring some planning. I like strategy games but I hate the ones the ones that require so much backtracking and micromanaging. This one can be fun just running around exploring or you can get very political. I prefer to be the Spartans because they get off to a faster start with their exploration vehicles and are frankly fairly flexible in terms of research.
This is a computer game worth getting
I admit that I have never played any of the Civilization games, so I don't know if this is big step down, or not. What I do know is that this is a great game, and I love playing it. The plot is that there is something wrong with the plant Earth, so a colonization ship is sent out to find themselves a new planet. Something goes wrong and the captain is killed and the survivors split into 7 factions that land on the surface of a plant in the Alpha Centuri system. The factions then battle for the dominance of the planet. You get to pick to be the leader of one of the factions, and then it is up to you to lead you faction to victory. You build cities and discover new technology. The graphics are good and this is a great strategy game. I would recommend it to anyone.