Rating: 
Summary: Terrible-rewrite of info in manual-index incorrect
Review: awful--do not buy--simply rewrites the info in the manual. The index is worthless--it gives incorrect page numbers. Pretty fold-out map is next to useless.
Rating:
Summary: Not Necessary: And Now Packaged Free With Game
Review: Go to ZDNet: GameSpot: Game Guides for a free, downloadable and far superior guide to SMAC. We're (the reviewers) mostly in agreement here that this guide doesn't do enough "right" (like faction strategies, unit design, etc.) and does too much "wrong" (like trivial descriptions of already available game info with little or no explanations of how a player might best make use of the info). I would have appreciated a book half as thick but with opinions on the how and why for designing well-equipped armed forces, choosing government types, allocating research, and so on.
Rating:
Summary: Not Necessary: And Now Packaged Free With Game
Review: Go to ZDNet: GameSpot: Game Guides for a free, downloadable and far superior guide to SMAC. We're (the reviewers) mostly in agreement here that this guide doesn't do enough "right" (like faction strategies, unit design, etc.) and does too much "wrong" (like trivial descriptions of already available game info with little or no explanations of how a player might best make use of the info). I would have appreciated a book half as thick but with opinions on the how and why for designing well-equipped armed forces, choosing government types, allocating research, and so on.
Rating: 
Summary: An average strategy guide, at best
Review: I love the game, but am luke warm about this guide. While there is a fair amount of good advice early in the book, and some useful discussion of different strategic approaches to winning, most of the book is devoted to providing a catalogue of the units, facilities, technologies, and secret projects that are already adequately described in the manual that came with the game and the game's on-line help system. However, contained within this seemingly redundant exercise is a smattering of useful discussion about the strategic value of these items. Overall, the book is not excellent, but can aid game play somewhat.
Rating:
Summary: A simple data book rather than a strategy guide: Avoid
Review: It is pretty simple, I was disappointed in the book. For the most part the book is a nice looking data manual rather than a hint book or strategy guide. The book has a well written (short) section on a quick kill approach to the game, but the author lacked in his presentation of more complete hints and strategy concepts. At least the game is enjoyable.
Rating:
Summary: This isn't strategy
Review: It would be charitable to say that the book had more than twenty pages of useful information. Most of the materiol is taking the information within the games own rather good help files and rewriting them, and the tips they give are excrutiatingly obvious.Just don't bother.
Rating:
Summary: This isn't strategy
Review: It would be charitable to say that the book had more than twenty pages of useful information. Most of the materiol is taking the information within the games own rather good help files and rewriting them, and the tips they give are excrutiatingly obvious. Just don't bother.
Rating: 
Summary: Liked the Software, Liked the Book
Review: The book is a good reference when playing the game. The information in the strategy guide contains more information than the game's on-line help. The strategy guide has a cross reference to easily find information in the guide and in the software manual. For me, the quick reference makes the game play more enjoyable. I particularly liked Appendix C, which gives insight on how to modify the game play. Alpha Centauri has seven players. The computer players have certain personalities. Quite frankly, there is one personality I do not like to play with. By changing a file, I was able to change offending personality.
Rating:
Summary: Utterly Useless
Review: The manual contains much more useful information...and it's free! Since it was too late to return it, I put the guide in the recycle bin so it would cease taking up any space in my room, despite the fact that I'm still regularly playing the game.
Rating: 
Summary: Alternative manual - not strategy guide
Review: The official strategy guide to SMAC was a disappointment. In retrospect, I realize I should have heeded the warnings in the other reviews. The beginning is good, with nice tips on general gameplay and the various victory types, but then it reverts to nothing more than a rewrite of the game manual and online help. The Alpha Centauri strategy guide pales in comparison with the corresponding book for Civilization II, which is required reading for any Civ2 fan.
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