Posted on 20/05/2014 Sergio Pennacchini
We do not know exactly how much time has passed from the Big Mistake. Nor do we know exactly what constitutes this Big Mistake. The fact is that, in Civilization Beyond Earth , the human race has committed it, the Big Mistake, putting an end to de facto life on our beloved planet. Imagine that it is something that has to do with pollution, exploitation of natural resources, too much time spent kittens to post on Facebook. But, despite our repeated requests to the team at Firaxis , which is watching us warily as we try the game for the first time in a hotel in Los Angeles, we can not discover what constitutes this bullshit Huge us condemned to exile. So, at the beginning of the game, we can not do anything but try to pick up the few remaining resources, load them on a ship, and go find another planet to start over. Hopefully, this time, not to err again.
Alpha Centauri
The beginning reminds clearly to Alpha Centauri , of which this game is the spiritual successor. Select the load of the ship is crucial because, as the board space is limited, requires immediately a strategic choice. Do you want to bring more troops to be immediately ready for battle? Fine, but you’ll probably have to give up some technology, maybe the Worker, Handyman unit that can build roads, farms, mines. Arriving on the planet itself, everything is familiar, in its place. At first, Civilization Beyond Earth is extremely similar to the last chapter of the saga. The map is still divided in hexagons, the basic mechanics are the usual: you build a city, gather resources, and develops a civilization, investing in research, technology, military supremacy. There are still Wonder, technological marvels and monuments that give bonuses of various kinds, but at the price of time and money needed to build. There Scout unit, which can go around to explore the planet in search of alien ruins or other human outposts. There is the main town, which develops slowly from a small cluster of a few settlers to megalopolis with skyscrapers and millions of inhabitants. The game is still turn-based, of course: you move your units on the map, you decide what to produce, what technological research done and then you press the “next turn”. Yet, after a few minutes, you realize that Civilization Beyond Earth is a new title that promises to radically innovate one of the sagas of the world’s oldest games. How? There are many answers to this question. Let’s start with the most important: the aliens.
Mi casa es tu casa no
Mica think you get to a new planet and find a nice welcoming committee, ready to party and leave you in the hands of the future ‘ heavenly body, right? The planet Civilization Beyond Earth is in fact populated by aliens. Aliens who are not good, but they are bad and do not take kindly to your stay in what is, after all, is their home. They are a race with which you will have to do without the possibility of establishing diplomatic relations. They are, at least according to what we have tried, the local wildlife. There are nests from which aliens come out of various kinds, which are strongly reminiscent of those Starship Troopers . There is the light infantry, kind of spiders that move quickly on any type of terrain. There is the heavy artillery in the form of cockroaches overgrown throwing energy balls from the queue. And lastly there are Vermona (which pay homage to those in the appearance of the film Dune by David Lynch), very powerful and very difficult to kill. The way in which the aliens will react to your presence can vary greatly over the course of a game. If at the beginning can be hostile but not too threatening, depending on your actions might decide to attack all your outposts (yes, they can also get to destroy your civilization if you defend yourself you will not know). Or, by developing appropriate technologies, it could be you to “domesticate” and to use them as a weapon against your enemies. The xenomorphs are a constant presence in Civilization Beyond Earth , an evolution of the barbarians of the previous games if we want to, but much more significant and “heavy” in terms of the game. Of course there are also other factions: Americans, South Americans, Asians, Europeans. A bit ‘of everything in short, too bad that we could try the version that did not have the new diplomatic system developed for Beyond Earth . According to the developers of Firaxis , diplomacy is one of the parts of the game that was more magazine. The drive light, in particular, will have a key role: you will infiltrate the opponent and the government will offer more ways to hit it: not least to attract a Vermona enemy in the city center, just as an example. There will be trade, new options for varying degrees of alliance, you will be able to share resources and technological research. Here, the technology is the other big news of Beyond Earth .
Welcome to TechWeb
Making a game set several years in the future means you have to imagine, predict how technology will evolve in the coming decades. Civilization has always been a title rather realistic, and this approach has been maintained in Beyond Earth . Technological research has been profoundly revised. Now discoveries are scattered on a spider web: each feed can unlock several roads and take you to different play styles and strategies. Once you have completed the main quest, Chemistry, for example, you can learn more about that matter, studying even more specialized applications. From ecology to robotics, from quantum physics to biology alien, each search gives you access to bonus, new buildings and new military units and civilians. There are also satellites, which send you into orbit and which may have different functions: on the advanced weapons of attack or defense satellites to be able to generate energy, to spy on the enemy, observe the area or give a valuable aid in the production of mineral and food. You can choose a satellite at the beginning to bring in your spaceship: there is also what allows you to immediately see the whole map of the planet. Whatever your choice, it is impossible, according to Firaxis , to discover all the available technologies within a single game: better then focus on what you need most in the objective you want to achieve. That, as usual in Civilization , do not have to be the annihilation of the opponent.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Purity, Harmony and Supremacy. What then would be three styles, three different types of behavior regarding the integration of the human race with the alien planet. And three ways to win the game and the triumph of your nation. Purity, despite the name that evokes beauty and goodness, is actually a military victory, the absolute conservation of the human race in order to not be contaminated in any way by alien world. In short, the Nazis. Harmony is the exact opposite alignment, what a little ‘more hippie, the “good volume”, where the man is integrated with the planet and alien creatures that inhabit it. It means that we can develop bio-technologies from overwork, mix aliens and humans, and create new types of units even more powerful. The ultimate goal is the total integration with the planet: type Avatar . Finally, there Supremacy, a sort of middle ground where you point all technological progress, the robots and the integration of the human race with mechanical and artificial intelligence. Choose an alignment means having access to different units and different technological developments, with the result ensures Firaxis , each game will be radically different. During the game, also depending on the alignment you choose, you can complete quests that give access to different extra: from new units to trade routes, to alien artifacts and other secrets to discover. Carrying them out will give you points which you can then spend on special abilities, each linked to a particular alignment. From the bonus culture or harvesting food, to free units or other immediate gifts (such as the completion of a research or construction of a building), these bonuses are a real help, which is essential to get stronger and gain the upper hand on opponents. Again, the skills related to Harmony, Purity and Supremacy are so many and it is impossible to get them all in one game. You can decide whether to bet everything on a single alignment, or if you do a mix of two or three different philosophies.
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