Overview:
Soon after the new millennium begins, human tragedies engulf the Earth. Conflict, disease, and famine threaten the Human Race's very existence. Despite the chaos, the United Nations manages to organize, build and launch the space ship "Unity". It's purpose is to colonize the planet Chiron in the Alpha Centauri System with enough people and technology to give the human race a new chance.

Trouble brews on the journey to Chiron. A reactor failure damages the ship and communication is permanently lost with Earth. After being awakened early from cyro-sleep, disagreement flares among the travelers on how to proceed. The Captain of Unity is suddenly assassinated by an unknown assailant! *Think Different* takes on a new meaning as the members split into seven ideological factions. Each group grabs a colony pod and stakes out a piece of Chiron. The struggle for domination of the planet has begun. This is the prologue of the new turn-based strategy game, Alpha Centauri. From such a grim beginning, it's your challenge to build a glorious civilization on an alien world.

Hardware Demands:
Aspyr recommends a PowerPC 603e 150 MHz of faster processor, with 16 MB RAM ((32 MB recommended), a 4x CD ROM, color monitor, and Quick Time 4.0 (included). Alpha Centauri takes approximately 140 MB of hard drive space. The RAM requirements are a blessing for anyone who is RAM challenged. Based on my experience with this type of game, I believe (but not verified) that adequate performance will be achieved at the minimum settings.

Background:
This game's roots go back to the Civilization board game that was published by Avalon Hill in the 1980s. At different times, both Microprose and Activision purchased and continue to have rights to the Civilization name. Microprose with Sid Meier published the first Civilization classic. Since then, the Civilization formula has received a lot of attention. Microprose released Civilization II and Civilization II Multiplayer Gold Edition (Mac versions by MacSoft). Activision's efforts resulted in Civilization: Call to Power (MacSoft). And a unverified rumor has it that Microprose is working on Civilization III. So, what's all this Civilization talk about in a Alpha Centauri review?

Civilization was Sid Meier's baby. Sid split from Microprose and created Firaxis Games with Brian Reynolds and Jeff Briggs. You may remember that one of the victory conditions of Civilization II was the colonization of a distant star system. Alpha Centauri is that distant star system. And this is Firaxis Game's excellent follow-on to the Civilization franchise. For Civ II fans, you may wonder is this a totally new game, a polished refinement, or simply Civ II with a fresh coat of paint. Here's the scoop from Mac Gamer's Ledge. 

Game Synopsis:
Alpha Centauri is the turned based game that challenges you not only to survive, but flourish in an alien world. Chiron is new, exotic, and at times dangerous. Despite ample technology and eager colonists, creating a new civilization is no cake walk. The game paints a broad canvas, with many choices covering all aspects of colony life. Make no mistake, the burden of leadership falls directly in your lap. Ironically, in this new world, the biggest threat to your colony is from the competing factions who accompanied you on the Unity. Depending on your diplomatic skills, and in some cases, despite them, unruly factions will present a direct challenge to your leadership. This atmosphere forces you to weigh social needs against military defense. Would your research efforts be best spent on scientific knowledge to create a higher standard of living or to build a better war machine? In the end, it's your abilities as supreme leader (and some luck) that will either lead your faction to glory, to mediocrity, or to absorption as your bases are defeated one by one.

Since Alpha Centauri is a direct descendant of Civilization II, I'll be making comparisons between them. For strategy novices, I wasn't kidding when I referred to you as the supreme leader. Your vested with an incredible amount of power to direct and shape the direction of your colony. Be prepared for micromanagement. But improvements in game play and the interface can reduce some of the mundane tasks.

The Game:
The game comes with several tutorial scenarios that will get you going. Make sure you have the Alpha Centauri 1.4.1 update installed. And there are several in-game tours that I found very helpful.

As you know, the mission to Chiron ends quite differently than the United Nations intended. Don't bother wondering how a group with such radically opposed politics could be sent out on a mission of this magnitude. That's the United Nations for you. And this premise gives the game it's spice! There's every flavor of political doctrine- survivalists, capitalists, secular, scientists, authoritarian, humanitarians and environmentalists! I can't imagine a better mix for conflict.

The first step is to customize your planet or use the "standard" planet of Chiron and pick your favorite cult, ah, I mean faction. In Civ II, all of the civilizations could develop in an identical manner, with the same political doctrine and technical capabilities. In Alpha Centauri, each group has it's own advantages and restrictions.

I'll profile Gias's Stepdaughters. Lady Deirdre Skye is a babe. But that's not the only reason the Gaians are one of my favorites. They seek to live in harmony with the planet and not repeat the environmental mistakes of old Earth. Gaians start the game with Centauri Ecology technology. They are able to move freely through and gather extra nutrients from fungus squares. Because of their harmony with the planet, they can control Mind Worms! Their bases are more efficient because they recycle and are restricted from Free Market economics. Their pacifist leanings tend to undermine their military units. Don't let that scare you though. I used green units to kick the Human Hive right off the map. This profile gives you a good taste of how individual a faction can be.

Game play starts right after you pod reaches the planet and a base is established. A mobile unit is at your disposal, ready to explore the countryside. Now, decisions need to be made. Your scientists immediately begin researching technologies. Research breakthroughs allow you to climb the technology tree, enhancing your colonies with technical improvements and/or better weapons. Alpha Centauri, has a default "blind" research preference. Individual or combinations of general research priorities are selected. If preferred, you can deselect this option and like Civ II, pick specific technologies.

The new base will automatically start building a colony module. An important key to success is to get several bases going early. Successful colonies should be placed on prime real estate. Fertile, wet land, with some minerals, near the coast is always a good choice early in the game.

Click on your base and take a look. Defense is so important, so you'll want your second unit to be a defensive military type. Military units, are used for defense/offense and exploration. Soon you'll want to improve the colony. Terraforming units are used to build roads, farms, solar collectors, etc. Colonies mostly run themselves but you make the important decisions. In Alpha Centauri, you have total control over every unit the base makes or trains. Pick each one yourself, or set some general guidelines and let the base's Governor take over and manage them for you. Even when the Governor is managing affairs, you can intervene and change unit production. And there is a queue, where a list of units-to-build can be specified.

The social and political attitudes of your society are represented and can be modified in the Social Engineering window. At the beginning of the game, only default values are available (Frontier politics,Simple economics, Survival values, and None for Future Society ). With technology advancements, new choices appear. Each change in Social Engineering effects your society in positive and negative ways which are summarized in a list under the Society window. Each faction has their limitations. For example, the "big corporation" faction, the Morganites, can't pick the "Planned Economics" social choice. This is a significant enhancement over Civ II's politics-only choices.

As your colony expands, eventually one of your units will cross a mysterious dashed line laid across the landscape. It's the border of another faction's territory. Soon after, their leader will come a calling via Comm Link. One of most entertaining parts of the game is diplomacy and dealing with those inflated egos. Sometimes they call you names! Compared to Civ II, dialog choices have been expanded including the ability to coordinate attacking a common enemy.

 Speaking of attack, eventually, clashing with a neighbor is enevitable. They'll either try to dominate you, or get in your way. It's wise to pick and choose who you befriend. It's really cool if you make friends with one of the more powerful factions. Don't be shy, start trading technologies as soon as possible. Sometimes you must kick butt. You know when your doing good when the leader comes to you sniveling. With the hard-core factions such as the Spartans pay close attention to their attitude in negotiations. Sneak attacks have been known to happen.

Alpha Centauri has four paths to victory. Scenaros may have different victory conditons. The game starts in 2100. You have either have 400 or 500 years to achieve victory depending on the difficulty level. Then you must retire. Each turn is 1 year.

• Conquest- Takeover all factions, either conquer or they surrender to you.
• Diplomatic- Convince all faction leaders to declare you Supreme Leader of the Planet.
• Economic- Corner the Global Energy Market.
• Transcedence- The highest form of victory is when you ascend to the next level in the evolution of humanity.

Misc Alpha Centauri features

• When dragging a unit to a new spot a line appears to indicate the path the it will take.
• Waypoints for unit movement can be set.
• V- selects the next active unit.
• Data MFD- displays recent messages or important faction info showing relative standings.
• Help Menu- displays a comprehensive data base of rules, mechanics, and units.
• AutoSaves
• Autoforward Routes- Automatically move units from one base to another.
• Automate Unit chores
• Extensive TerraForm Menu- includes Drill to Aquifer, Construct Thermal Borehole, & Combo commands.
• Ecological Damage- The planet reacts when you pollute.
• Random Natural Phenomena
• Secret Projects (Wonders of the World in Civ II)
• Design Workshop- Allows you to design custom units.
• Unit Upgrades- Old units don't need to be tossed. Upgrade them for a fee.
• Combat Modifiers- Terrain effects the offensive/defensive effectiveness of units.
• Ranged Artillery Attacks.
• Ocean based colonies

The Interface:
The interface works well once your familiar with it. All the info is there but strategy novices with no Civ II experience may find it daunting. I think the tutorials will be very valuable when they are fixed. I played Civ II a bunch, but I still need to refer to the manual a lot. I think it could be organized better because I end up jumping all over the place.

Bug Report:

• Six listed in Alpha Centauri readme.
• I had no music or intro movie on the ibook.
• The tutorial Scenarios don't work.
• When you use Command-Save to save a game, the game thinks you're telling a unit to build a Solar installation, but it does save the game correctly anyway. Same thing with some of the other commands.

Conclusion:
Let me be blunt. Alpha Centauri is one of the best strategy games out there. If you like strategy games and never played Civilization, you'll be blown away and happily have your hands full.

If your a Civ II veteran, your going to see lots of new sights, an entirely new technology tree, and you will appreciate the new enhancements to the Civilization formula and graphics. But once you start playing, you may swear your playing Civilization III! Game play, granted, with nice enhancements, is nearly identical to the Civ II you know and love. From the mechanics of combat (invading an enemy's square), to putting your units to sleep to board the next transport, to the little "G" icon that appears over a unit when it's ordered somewhere, the sense of deja vu will be powerful. Based on your expectations, you'll have to decide whether that's good or bad. After all, how do you improve upon near perfection? Alpha Centauri makes a good stab at it. Once I started playing, I was pulled right in.

On the "PLUS" side:

• Entriquing Premise
• Nice enhancements of a popular well established formula
• Addicting game may keep you up too late

On the "MINUS" side:

• Continuation of long established formula
• Manual could be better
• Multiplayer takes too long (strictly my opinion)
• Bugs

*Individual category scoring is for reference only and is not necessarily calculated into the "Worthiness" score.

2/25/00

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