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Civilization VI video game trailer

Launch trailer for video game Civilization VI, released on Windows last week. It’s the latest edition of the Civilization franchise, a series of turn-based strategy video games started in 1991.

Civilization II was one of the first PC games I played and I still like the series a lot. Besides its entertainment value, it’s also an educational game that I can recommend to my young nephews and nieces.

Gaming is always a tricky thing in parenthood. However, this is a game that I can safely introduce to parents (for their kids) because the knowledge part outweigh most of the probable negative issues. Good or bad we can’t stop children from playing video games these days, may as well find the right ones instead.

Players can learn about the basics of growing a civilisation, city and nation from the game. And if the player is willing to do some reading from the in-game “civilopedia”, they can learn quite a bit about global history and development at various points from 4000 B.C. to modern days.

I only played until Civilization IV though, didn’t get the fifth edition and no intention to get the new one. Although there are new stuff and improvements, the fundamental gameplay seems about the same.

The trailer is cool regardless, the franchise is also good at making these teasers and opening sequences. Actor Sean Bean provided the narration in the video, his voice will also feature in the game. Music by Christopher Tin who won a Grammy with the Civilization IV theme song in 2011.

Civilization: Beyond Earth video game trailer

Announce trailer for video game Civilization: Beyond Earth. It’s a futuristic spin-off of the Civilization series. The publisher also branded it as a spiritual successor to the 1999 video game Alpha Centauri.

Civilization is a series of turn-based strategy video games, first released in 1991. The gameplay centred on building a civilisation on a macro-scale from prehistory up to the near future. There are five main games to date, with a number of expansion packs, spin-offs and board games too.

Alpha Centauri was released in 1999, considered a spiritual sequel to the Civ series back then. The game is a science fiction depiction of the 22nd century as human race resettle on a new planet. It used the same game engine (of Civ II) but introduced many new features which made it a standout game.

Alpha was arguably the game of the year. Many fans considered it as better than the Civ game too. It’s been a while so I can’t remember why, but I seemed to prefer the original version. One of the reasons is perhaps I was more interested with the historical aspect than pure fiction instead.

Regardless, the Civ series continued to grow after that but there’s no follow-up to Alpha besides an expansion pack in 2000. Wiki article suggests that the project ended because the key staff had left the company. They integrated some ideas from Alpha into future Civ games though.

There’s not much info available on Beyond Earth at this stage. The trailer looks cool but teaser videos are so good these days that it can be misleading at times. It probably will not match the legacy of Alpha but the Civ series has been consistently good over the years, so I guess it will be a decent game.

SimCity (2013) announcement trailer

Trailer for the new SimCity, coming in March 2013. SimCity is a popular city-building video game series. Its last edition (excluding spin-offs) came out way back in 2003, so the fans must be happy with the news.

This latest instalment is using the franchise name as release title which is a bit confusing; they could have put something – e.g. SimCity 5 – to avoid that. Regardless, the video looks pretty awesome.

In the SimCity games, players develop a city by creating zones, and building infrastructures like roads, power plants, and public services like police stations and schools etc. Players also have to manage the financial and social aspects to grow the city. It’s both fun and educational.

I used to play the older version a lot, SimCity 3000 if not mistaken. I didn’t play the 2003 game though, I skipped many entertainment activities during that period because of life commitments.

I’ll probably give the new one a try if time permits. Hope it’s good, if not better than the old games.