CivNet

CivNet Review

For all intents and purposes, the game is Civilization with a slick new Windows interface. As in the original, each player selects a culture and attempts to mold the populace--through the development of science, the expansion of land holdings, and the improvement of the quality of city life--into the most powerful civilization of all time. A few new features have been added, including a king builder that enables players to create a visual representation of their alter ego, and a map editor to allow the creation of personalized landscapes, but for the most part these changes are superficial and don't affect gameplay.

CivNet's multi-player link-up capability, which could have made the game more than just a nice enough Windows version of Civilization, is probably its weakest feature. Each of the two different modes of play has specific disadvantages. If players select the turn-based play option, they are dooming themselves to a purgatory of 10-minute waits as each player takes a turn and the game updates. Simultaneous movement speeds up the whole process a bit, but adds the non-Civilization chance of enemy units attacking you in the middle of your turn. In a game with more than two human players, neither of these options is really acceptable, and gameplay can be pretty frustrating.

As a single- or two-player version of Civilization, CivNet is a solid play, but pales beneath the glory of Civilization 2. If Microprose had really wanted to grab the gamers, they should have spent a few more months figuring out how to speed up gameplay, and then incorporated the finished multi-player system into Civ 2. As it is, this game is only recommended for groups of two who want to test their skills in head-to-head competition.

Gamespot