Civilization IV
Civilization IV (also known as Sid Meier's Civilization IV) is a 4X turn-based strategy computer game and the fourth installment of the Civilization series, and developed by Firaxis Games. It was designed by Soren Johnson. It was released in North America, Europe, and Australia, between October 25 and November 4, 2005, and followed by Civilization V.
Civilization IV
Civilization IV uses the 4X empire-building model for turn-based strategy gameplay, in which the player's main objective is to construct a civilization from limited initial resources. Most standard full-length games start the player with a settler unit and/or a city unit in the year 4000 BC. As with other games in the series, there are by default five objectives the player can pursue in order to finish the game: conquering all other civilizations, controlling a supermajority of the game world's land and population, building and sending the first sleeper ship to the Alpha Centauri star system, increasing the "Culture ratings" of at least three different cities to "legendary" levels, or winning a "World Leader" popularity contest by the United Nations. If the time limit for the game is reached and none of the previous goals has been fulfilled by any players including game AI players, the civilization with the highest total game score is declared winner. A large departure from earlier Civilization games is a new graphics engine created from scratch, based on the Gamebryo engine by Numerical Design Limited (NDL).
The game has received critical acclaim and was hailed as an exemplary product of one of the leading video game producers in the turn-based strategy genre, and has been listed as one of the best video games of all time. Civilization IV sold over 3 million copies by 2008 and won multiple awards, including several Game of the Year awards. Its title song, "Baba Yetu", was the first piece of video game music to win a Grammy Award. Two major expansions were released, Civilization IV: Warlords and Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword, as well as the stand-alone expansion pack Civilization IV: Colonization, which were all combined in 2009 into one release edition titled Sid Meier's Civilization IV: The Complete Edition.
Production[edit]
Production and development[edit]
The game engine for Civilization IV was built entirely from scratch,[12] with some help from NDL's Gamebryo engine.[2] This decision resulted in a full 3D immersion of the game, which was the first in the series,[13] and which allowed easier readability[5] and smoother, more in-depth zooming capabilities.[4] Some of the quotes relating to the technology tree and narration for the game were provided by Leonard Nimoy.[5][7] The soundtrack for the game features compositions of Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque origin,[1] and design for the title music was influenced by The Lion King.[1][7] Composer Christopher Tin wrote the opening theme song "Baba Yetu" (Swahili "Our Father"), a rendition of the Lord's Prayer, which was performed by Stanford University's Talisman A Cappella. The song, when rereleased, became the first piece of video game music to be nominated for and to win a Grammy Award.[14]
Mods[edit]
Sid Meier's Civilization IV also released some bonus content, mainly to show modding capabilities:
Reception[edit]
Sales[edit]
Civilization IV was a commercial success, and sold more than 1 million units by mid-March 2006. By that time, it had held a top-10 position on every weekly computer game sales chart released by The NPD Group since the game's launch.[32] NPD declared Civilization IV the 11th-best-selling computer game of 2005,[33] and it rose to ninth place on the firm's annual computer game sales chart for the following year.[34] It returned to NPD's year-end top 20 in 2008 with a 13th-place finish.[35] The game also received a "Silver" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA),[36] indicating sales of at least 100,000 copies in the United Kingdom.[37] According to Take-Two Interactive, sales of Civilization IV surpassed 3 million units by March 2008.[38]