Freeciv

The other day I was looking for a game and Freeciv caught my eye. There are a number of ways to get it for Ubuntu:

• Repositories (2.1.5)
• Playdeb (2.1.6)
• Getdeb (2.1.7)
• Source (2.1.8)

I tried the getdeb package, but had a strange problem with a disappearing main menu. So I thought I would give installing from source a try.

Installation

The source package is very simple to install. There is an INSTALL document in the package that gives good directions. You can compile and play the game right in the same directory, or you can install it to a directory of your choice, like /usr/games.

The only stumbling point I ran into was I didn’t have sound support at first. I installed libsdl-mixer1.2-dev and re-compiled and all was well.

Getting Started

Welcome to Freeciv!

There are a few gameplay modes: basic single-player, scenario, and networked multi-player. Once you kick off the single player game, you can also take a look at some of the options to tweak the game as you like:

A look at some options

Some of the options are self-evident, but some are not clear – I assume they are documented somewhere, but I couldn’t find in-game help for what they meant. There is also some strange white background to labels here and in game. The most important ones – number and skill of computer opponents – are right up front, so it’s easy to jump in.

Interface

If you have any familiarity with Civilization-type games, the interface will probably make a lot of sense right from the start. Basically, you click to select a unit and then give it an order or move it somewhere. You can right-click to move around the map. Moving units is a bit tedious because you either have to “drag” the path, or select the unit, press “g”, and then click on where you want to go. When moving a lot of units, the mouse+keyboard combination can be a bit tedious.

There are a lot of items: units, city upgrades, wonders, and technologies to research. There is good in-game help covering each one, although many are pretty obvious – at least the rough concept of what they do. One nice thing you can do is set a technology as a “goal” to research, and the game will handle researching the required dependencies.

Tech tree

Overall, the interface is perfectly suitable, but a little rough and spartan. You don’t give things like hover-over tool tips or a lot of integration with the online help. These things that aren’t really necessary, but are nice – especially when learning the game.

Gameplay

Freeciv has excellent gameplay. The computer on the easiest setting is still fun for a first timer, and the moves are very quick. There are two ways to win: destroy all your opponents or send a rocket into space. There is a bit of diplomacy, but I didn’t get much out of it – I couldn’t get much good negotiating done and some of the deals I would have had to made to get the computer to accept were ludicrous.

There is a rough mix of land- and sea- based combat. This was one area where I found myself scratching my head against the computer. It seemed like the computer knew which of my cities didn’t have a defender and would pop up and take over the city. I’m not sure if I could see the same thing or if this was just my imagination, but eventually I was too paranoid to have a city without at least one defender.  The larger issue is that it is hard to blockade or defend coastal regions. I lost a lot of workers/engineers on the coast to the computer popping up.

That being said I stayed up way too late playing Freeciv – it’s an immersive game and I sure was getting mad at those darned Venezuelans!

Summary

Freeciv is easy to install, quick to get started, and has deep gameplay. As I played the game, I was having fun and seeing where strategy could start be developed. I don’t usually play a rush-style game, so I like to really build up my civilizations – there’s enough going on that things stayed fairly interesting even in the endgame (which is where a lot of these sort of games really drag).

Freeciv endgame

If empire-building is your thing, why not give Freeciv a shot?