Alpha Centauri

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Zoombie

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To kick off this subforum, lets talk about the best game...ever made.

Now, I don't make this claim lightly. And you are perfectly free to knock my block off.

But many people who have PLAYED this game, agree.

It is the best.

And I'm about to tell you why.

So, let me welcome you...to

alpha-centauri_box.jpg

We're boned


Here is the pitch! Its the 2060s and all those things that the doomsayers have been blither blathering about have come to pass. Massive overpopulation. Ecological devastation. Minor nuclear war. Massive popularity of Pauly Shore. The Dark Knight still hasn't gotten an Oscer.

And so, the UN builds a big space ship, names it the Unity, and stocks it with the best of the best, and sends them to our nearest solar system.

Then it all goes to shit. Someone shoots the cappy, the engine kaplooshes, and everyone runs for the escape pods. Course, they all run with their favorite leaders...on the ship, seven people managed to draw together a group of like minded individuals that share their ideal of what to DO with the Planet below.

This is the true geinus of the game: the factions. Each one is an ideology that has been taken to its unhealthy extreme. Reserch with no ethics. Fundamentalism without reason. Loving nature so much you put yourself and others at harm. Saftey without freedom. Economics without restraint. And, of course, the one faction that clings to the past Earth and the U.N charter with a dogmatic persistency that boarders on insane.

And whatever faction you choose, know that the others will most likely disagree with your choices...

The meat and the potatos of the game is familar to anyone who's played Civilizations 1-4: Build cities, upgrade the terrain around the cities to help, build units, dicker with enemy Factions, and try to acheive domination over the Planet.

What seperates this game from Civilization is that, well, for one it is a lot more serious. And for another, it has an odd philisophical depth provided by some steller voice acting and some amazing writing. Every reserch milestone, building, or special project has a short quote. Some are from antiquity (Socraties, Kant, Einstine), but others are "Written" by one of the faction members, and each reflects their social, political and moral views.

Some are insightful, some are intellegent, others are downright creepy. The vision of the future depicted in Alpha Centauri, is a quasi-nihilistic, grim and yet hopeful one, where new wonders are constantly avaliable...and yet with them comes new horrors.

Speaking of horrors, lets move on to the other thing that sets Alpha Centauri apart from Civ: The Planet.

The Planet is in a queer sense alive, and this becomes more and more apparent the further you get into the game. It is peppered with growths of bright red tubes called Xenofungas. This stuff slows down your movement speed and makes life unpleasent...cause the Xenofungas is home to the miiindworms!

Mindworms are units that rove around and attack anything in sight, usually by burrowing into your forehead and implanting their eggs in your brain. While you're still awake.

They do this by paralyzing people with their psychic powers (Hence the "mind" part of mind worms).

The neat thing is, the more ecological impact you have on Planet, the more it sends Mindworms at you.

Another kickass feature of Alpha Centuari is its difficulty system. Rather than just making the game HARDER, it does something more subtle and far more cool: It makes the game more *complex*.

Every increase in difficulty adds a new layer of complexity to the game, so that you have to handle more at the same time.

And it also makes it harder.

So, we have a combination of suprisingly deep and well written plotline, plus freeform and addictive gameplay that will easily eat up the hours, and a price tag that everyone can afford (The game is abandonware now, I belive), and it can run on a calculator if you over clock it right.



What are you waiting for? Buy the game!
 

Zoombie

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And then the Morganites cornered the market.

If only I had finished my Planet Buster, I could have turned their piffling island into a crater...

I'll get you next time, CEO Nebudika Morgannnnn!!
 

Phoebe H

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One of my very favorites. I could never go back to Civ -- any version -- after playing this. I tended to play the Greens.

Fortunately there's an (unofficial) OS X version out there so I can still play it every once in a while.
 
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Bartholomew

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I loved playing at the Gaians and building an army of native life forms. Yeah, they had some weaknesses -- but no matter what the AI did, tech wise, my soldiers were never out of date.
 

Sarpedon

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I certainly think it is the best of the civ series. All the ones after it seem humdrum and drab in comparison. I totally agree that the difference is the factions, with their excellently conceived leaders who are brilliantly sketched out in a handful of quotes and minifilms.

Am I the only one who's found himself quoting Chairman Yang?

ETA and I'm surprised that no one mentioned the design-your-own unit feature! I loved making Trance-tanks, Drop probe teams, skimship probe teams, Universal-hoverformers, special police units I called 'pig guards' and more!

I also liked the gaians, because it was easy to maximize efficiency with them, thus getting a lot of energy and bases.
 
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Zoombie

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I'm finally holding my own against the Believers.

The trick was a strong air force, supporting my infantry and tanks by striking their heavy/fast units and letting my artillery soften their cities up before I send in the marines.

Also, setting all my bases to Conquest gave me the sudden surge of units while letting me focus on the actual offensive.

Also, I was the University, so I've got Silksteel and they're still using old synthmetal

HA!

Who wants to see an Alpha Centauri 2?

But then again...its already perfect...what would you add to it?
 

Monkey

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I still have Alpha Centuari on my computer and still go back to it from time to time. I've long since forgotten the tech progression, so I have to play it with random tech break-throughs to win at the higher levels, but this oldie is definitely still a goodie. :)

I like playing as the Greens, dominating the secret projects aimed at mind warfare, and using Swarms of Chihiron (or whatever they're called...the telepathic flying insect hoards) to take over bases.
 
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