Stands the test of time
The story picks up where Civ II leaves off: Humanity has launched a spaceship to Alpha Centauri. Along the way, the colonists fragment into seven ideologically distinct factions. One (my favorite) believes in economically exploiting the new world, another in militarily conquering it. Each ideology is well thought out and embodied in a faction leader. The leaders take turns providing voiceovers for major game events. CG cut scenes and tech descriptions (reminiscent of the blurbs that headline each chapter in the Dune series) further flesh out the game's characters and the world they fight over.
Gameplay is both broad and complex. At its most basic level you manage cities and move units around the map. Cities are your production centers, cranking out military units or city improvements. However, it can only produce one thing at a time, so there's an opportunity cost: a bank will put more money in your treasury, but you forego the military unit that might save the city from an invasion. Build a state of the art helicopter and you miss out on that colony pod that would grab more land. Cities passively make money every turn, but this can sacrificed to speed up production.
Units normally project military power (though some can be used to build infrastructure.) These, too, can be tweaked: weapons, armor and movement speed can be upgraded at the cost of the turns it takes to build it.
Since the game is turn based, you can take time to consider the consequences of each choice. In practice, you don't have to think too hard. Your choices are naturally directed by the faction you chose to play. It's also directed by the victory you're working toward. You can win militarily by conquering everyone else, diplomatically by convincing everyone agree to follow you, economically by buying everyone out from under them, or you can build a game ending project.
Negotiating with other factions, selecting social alignments, and chosing which new technology to research all add even more layers to the gameplay.
It's not just breadth of choices, but the tension and interplay between them that makes Alpha Centauri so engrossing. You're trying to grab as much land, make as much money, race up the tech tree as quickly and produce the strongest and most prolific military units as possible. But since you can't have it all, you need to make tough choices. The trade-offs between these goals introduces a level of tension that keeps you rivited from turn to turn. Will your rival take advantage of your weak economy by subverting your cities? Will that land grab open a weak spot that an invasion force can smash through?
A game this complex presents a steep learning curve. The tutorial kinda sucks so the best way to learn it is to jump in. You can adjust the difficulty level but you should be prepared to have your ass handed to you for the first few sessions.
After over a decade, I still find myself playing this game. In my last session, I found myself staring down the barrel of the militant environmentalist's guns. I allied myself with the neighboring communist faction. His poorly equipped but plentiful troops (think human wave) bought me enough time to repulse the initial attack, and sue (bribe) for peace. However, I "forgot" to broker a peace deal between my former enemy and my new ally. When the communists asked for my help in his defense, I left him to his fate. The resulting war gave me a weakened neighbor (one less threat to deal with) and, more importantly, time to develop into an economic juggernaught. Money can be used to rush a city's production and since I was rolling in the dough, I could raise an army in a few turns capable of fighting a multi-front war. It was the first time I had tried that strategy and it's new experiences like this that keep me coming back every six months. A must have for strategy fans or anyone interested in rock solid strategy gaming.