Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri™ Planetary Pack

So, I just got my PhD, and I'd like to write about how SMAC helped me start on my way. When I got my first computer, SMAC was among the first games I played on it, and I returned to it again and again throughout the years. What I like best are the science quotes, which paint a believable picture of the struggle for survival and for ideological supremacy; they are from varied authors (real world or fictional), from varied points of view, and are presented without partisan framing from the game - one can interpret them, more or less, as they want. At first, I was interested in Yang's daring at "Looking God in the eye", then turned away from the careless brutality, and appreciated the wisdom in Zakharov's description of a scientist; I then added the cynical enjoyment at picturing the Academician's personal residence's bathtub full with retroviral weapons. While by no means comprehensive or even sufficient, the game's window into philosophy kept me interested - both in school and in private - and made learning the stuff in real life _fun_. Add to that the amazing way the AI behaves, pantomiming different personalities, gameplay that feels amazing both when eking out basic survival and when taking over the planet, and you get an amazing game. In my opinion, it is among the best; only Planescape: Torment and Homeworld (original + Quick Historical and Technical Briefing) hold, in my preferences, similar places. The expansion is, gameplay-wise, very fun. But the added quotes are far weaker than those in the original game. I advise playing the original a few times, and trying out the expansion in multiplayer. If you play on Windows, there are some .exe modifications which improve the gameplay, UI and AI (SMAX and Yitzi's patch, at the time of writing). It works on wine quite well, and the Linux binary runs quite well (although crashing with some display compositors, so wine is the way). Oh: my favourite poem is from this game.

The level of predictive programming and legitimate scientific and geopolitical insights in this game are stellar and stunning. The gameplay has always been a top ten for me.

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri allows you to do something future 4X games don't have: Terraforming. Not just changing land to forest, you can straight up raise mountains and lower lands. Your nukes will also shape the land. Your mines and boreholes will raise the sea level. The Planet itself will go hellbent against you and your (humanity's) destructive nature. Combine that with the freedom of modelling your units with VALUABLE choices instead of just numbers, then combine that with social engineering AND diplomacy that ties it with. Truly a 4X ahead of its time. The control and UI are dated. Simple control, such as left click to choose and right click to move, was novel and groundbreaking that unfortunately doesn't exist in this game. The graphics become very cluttered, stacked, and messy as the game goes on. You are constantly fighting against the UI and it hides several key information. But, those are just about it for the cons. Everything else in the game? Chef's kiss, 5 michelin stars, simply amazing. Oh, I don't forget about the lore alright. The characters are alive, well written with their ideologies fully fleshed out and are clashed together, forming natural and very human conflict. What technologies and predictions this game brings into the table very well reflects the current state of the world. Makes you think whether we will have to forcefully launch off from Earth in search of our own Planet in Alpha Centauri. DLC is... not as fully fleshed out. I play without them, but it is a bunch of new content that some people can enjoy.

SMAC is often, and rightly, considered one of the best 'Civilistion' games ever. I would go further and say it is one of the best games ever. If you can get your mind past the aging and slightly clunky controls (that are no-where near as bad as I remembered) there is a deep strategy game, with peerless enemy AI and some of the best lore and environmental storytelling of any 4X game. If you like hard sci-fi, Civ games or missiles that can double as terrain modifiers (amoungst many other horrendous war-crimes) you owe it to yourself to try this game.