Mastering Civilization IV – Starting the Game - Part III – Climate and Sea Level

It is widely known and recognized that Sid Meier's Civilization had become THE computer game when it was introduced. It was first real turn-based strategy ever. The latest PC playable version of Civilization is "Civilization IV", launched in October 2005. 3 years is an eternity for a computer product - but not for Civilization series game. "Civ IV" is still very enjoyable today and poses quite a few challenges to the player. With game victory conditions described here, we are now going to continue the overview of pre-game selections – choosing the map, the climate and sea level.

There are two maps left uncovered by previous articles:

Pangaea

Named after a predecessor of modern continents – a huge land mass that was drifting along Earth big ocean millions of years ago before breaking into smaller continents – this option will generate a map with single continent, surrounded by sea. With land mass defined, you can still control the shoreline – it can be either natural, pressed ,or solid.

Terra

As the name suggests, the option will generate an "Earth-like" map with continents shapes resembling those of our planet. All the civilization start in the Old World – so discovering America has much importance here, as the land is rich with resources.

After selecting the map you are taken to the next screen, where you have to select climate and sea level – if they are not predefined by the map. The climate options are: Temperate - resembling the Earth climate, with various terrains exist more or less equally; tropical - warm map with more jungles and less tundra; arid - dry climate with few rivers and many deserts; rocky - many hills and mountains and resources but problematic in terms food and city growth; cold – more ice and tundra and less deserts. The sea level defines if you will have larger continents and generally more land (low sea level) or smaller islands and more ocean squares (high sea level).