Rating: 
Summary: ***Set Your Expectations***
Review: I've only been playing this expansion for a few days, but I'm disappointed. Mostly by one thing: there's some misleadin' goin' on. For one thing, this expansion includes both the features from Play the World and the new items. This is OK; this was explicit in the product description. Unfortunately, it didn't differentiate between what is from PtW and what is in Conquests, so "five new Wonders" means "four new wonders--oh, and the one from PtW."Fair enough. It isn't that big of a deal. But it also lists all kinds of things: you can trade salt! And exotic birds! And you can switch to the Tribal Council government! Except for one thing--whoops!--these are only available in the specific campaigns in the game. They do not show up on the normal game. This infuriates me, because quite frankly what's left ain't worth the thirty bucks I knew I'd regret putting down for this. The non-campaign specific features that are added aren't even close to being anything more than what should show up on a patch. Firaxis has done this to me before, and I'm starting to feel like a punching bag. They do put out an excellent product, but they rake you over the coals with crap like this. (The Civilization III Gold pack--which had Civ III + PtW, but not this product--conveniently came out about a week before Conquests was announced. Thanks, guys!) I'll be the first to admit that there's a handful of good things to come out of this. Two new government types (Feudalism and Fascism) are nice, though they don't seem to be much of an alteration of existing governments. New civilizations keep things interesting but are by no means all that impressive. The new civilization attributes (Agricultural and Seafaring) are kind of cool. I think the new specialists (Policeman and Civil Engineer) will be helpful, but I haven't been able to use them to their full potential yet. But that's it. Everything else that's new are just refinements and settings. The few things that are wrong with Civilization III are still wrong (lousy alliance AI, dragging end game, impossible-to-please diplomacy, inherent bias against any type of victory except bloodlust). I like the new additions. I don't like being fooled.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't buy Play the World!!!!
Review: This expansion to the CIV3 world is 'okay'. I say 'okay' because in essence it is the Play the World add-on with a few extras and scenarios. I don't like paying for scenarios. There are entirely too many available online for free, some even better than those being sold in this package to justify the 30 dollar price tag. (I am incredibly grateful to Amazon for selling this mess to me on sale for $9.99) I've been duped by firaxis 3 times now. First I got the collector's edition tin, which was supposed to have all these great goodies, and in essence had a cd of sid meier saying how great he is. I then bought Play-the-World and for the price, was REALLY disappointed with the product. I had to download 3 patches for it. Finally I get this, and even though I got it cheap, I STILL feel ripped off. Firaxis knows that civ fans are devoted, but they don't even justify multiplayer experiences like Blizzard does with Battle.Net. ::sigh:: Its a shame this product has been marketed this way. Had this been offered instead of Play-the-World, adding both multiplayer and the combined civs/units/wonders, I would have bumped this rating to 4 stars. Shame on Sid M. for letting Firaxis run amok with the franchise. I miss Microprose.
Rating: 
Summary: Civ 3 redeemed
Review: This game has got me back interested interested in the Civ series, after a long year of waiting, the make or break game in the series came out, and it made it.
I first got interested in the series when I bought Civ 2. This game was awsome (the best strategy game of the century). It wasn't like anything I had ever seen before, with nearly unliminted and addictive game play, and the coolest scenarios I have ever played.
When I heard that Civ 3 was coming out I got excited. Once I bought the game, I was initialy unenthused with some of the features, the bugs, the lack of any scenarios, and the lack of a cheat menu (was the best thing to cut down a learning curve). Once I got the patch I got excited again, with bugs fixed and I got an aquired taste (the cheating problem went away once I got past the learning curve). I still had a problem with the no scenarios, but I downloaded some online that were alright but noting compaired to the other games.
Then came a disaster that could have ended the series, Play the World. This game compounded the problems with Civ 3, including adding a laundry list of new bugs, and a silly multiplayer that was seriously lacking playableity. They did make some gameplay adjustments but all together it hurt the game more then it helped it.
With the anouncements of Conquests, Civ 3 would either become the greatist game of this century, or end the series. It was the former. They totaly reamped game play and added in a ton of new features, and made the multiplayer very good.
But I was most happy to see the biggest thing Civ 3 was lacking, scenarios. Not just 2 like civ 2 but 9. And these wern't just regular average joe scenarios, these where true historic scenarios done in perfect detail with the objectives shifting from map to map. You can play (the most memerable scenario in Civ 2) World war 2 on a gigantic map totaly realistic with riged deplomicy and focusing completly on military. Or you can play the constantly shifting alliences in the napolianic wars that consentrate on depolmacy. Or even the famed rule changes in the Mesoamerican Scenario.
All in all this expansion not only elivates Civ 3 to the status of Civ2, it easly serpases it as best scenario game ever.
Rating: 
Summary: Solid upgrade for single player
Review: When I originally reviewed the Civilization III game it was a lying, cheating, money-stealing demon, this expansion fixes all of that. The game has received some very substantial interface, mechanic, and aesthetic improvements in this newest expansion. The new interface options, like advanced (formerly keyboard only) controls and renaming individual units, have made vast strides in relieving the original interface's crippling minimalism. As far as game mechanics go, the greatest increases in game playability have come from new science advances and new citizen abilities. The addition of the policeman/woman and civil engineers in the city screen has given the game vastly more flexibility in terms of building improvements and units. Most of all, the police powers of the policeman/woman allow the long-term use of governments like monarchy, despotism, and republic without the hobbling effect of corruption. The addition of new Civs and new special units also allows players who have become bored with the game to re-ignite their enthusiasm for the game by exploring new cultures, units, and advances. Aesthetically, the game's addition of unit naming, something originally added in the Play the World expansion, allows nerds like me to name each unit individually and create a sense of continuity in the advance and upgrade of units. There haven't been any major changes to the graphics, sounds, or system properties of the game so if that's all you want you'll have to wait for civ4. The inclusion of the Play the World expansion pack will allow people wanting the multiplayer experience to gain that without shelling out extra cash for two expansions. It is important to note that if you already have the PTW expansion, you need this expansion to get most of the upgraded features and all of the new techs and Civs. I'm not a fan of multiplayer games, so I'll leave that up to someone else to review, but if you're looking for a good way to squeeze more play time out of the Civ III you already have the Conquests expansion will do it. Oh, one more thing, the conquests and other miscellanea added with this expansion are essentially more scenarios. So, if that's your thing, well, it's there and it's new.
Rating:
Summary: How To Screw Up A Really Good Thing
Review: This is a GREAT expansion pack. Particularly if you skipped "Play The World" (as I did). There's more, more, MORE of everything, and enough interesting gameplay tweaks that it makes Civ 3 feel like a brand new game. What makes it so good? * New tribes to play. Or, perhaps more importantly, new tribes to play against. The Mayans can be a terror. * New tribe attributes. Seafaring! Agricultural! OK, that doesn't sound that exciting, but it definitely has an impact on gameplay and strategy. Agricultural favors the AI such that the new Killer AI tribes are almost always those with the Ag trait, like the Celts. * Boosted navy! Combined with the Seafaring, navy is still underpowered, but way better than before. On an archipelago map, seafaring can mean the difference between a breezy success and a slow slog. * Boosted airforce! Bombardment in general is boosted, so everything from catapults to stealth bombers feels a little more useful. * Fewer resources! Wait, fewer resources? Well, not fewer KINDS of resources. Just fewer all around. You either have to learn to play very nice with the AI or very mean. * Entertaining scenarios! From the cradle of civilization to the 20th century, you can have your turn (sorta) re-enacting historical events. These can be fun, fast, intense, changes of pace from the epic game. * New techs/wonders/governments! The unit-producing Statue of Zeus and Knights Templar are a hoot. The Temple of Artemis is amazingly powerful (but very short-lived). The Internet--well, like all the modern wonders, it seems a little too late. But it ain't bad. Fascism is a blast to play if you want to live out your Great Dictator fantasies, but you can see the AI self-destruct with it, too, unfortunately. So, how was this Really Good Thing screwed up? Bugs! Bugs o' plenty! If you're a casual player, playing particularly on Chieftain or Warlord levels (maybe even Regent), you might not notice the bugs. Not at first, anyway. There are patches, oh, yes, there are patches, unofficial though they may be. But the situation seems to have arisen because the game was yanked out of public beta toward release-time, then tweaked and re-tested internally. Unfortunately, this game is too deep and often too subtle to be effectively tested by any in-house crew. Result? They managed to break trade, corruption and resource-distribution in the final release. An official patch will eventually be released. Probably before the summer. Until then, you have the choice of living with bugs, or living with a beta patch (which might introduce its own bugs), or simply waiting to get the game. There's an even more serious problem, really, underlying these changes. Trade is absolutely vital with the resource reduction. Either you find a way to trade, or you find a way to conquer, which may not be a play style you want to be forced into Every Single Game. The problem is, the trade and diplomacy systems are not sophisticated enough to meet this increased need. If you need iron, but it's all being traded, you can't offer the AI any incentive to trade it to you when the current deal is up. Those deals get made in-between turns, so you often don't have a shot. So these fabulous changes are not only marred by bugs, the whole game creaks under them. And it's a long way to Civ 4.
Rating:
Summary: wait 2 years for future titles to be sure of quality...
Review: Not to sound like a tight-wad, but I'm seriously disappointed in this franchise since CIV 3 came out. I have been an avid player of the CIV franchise since the first game, and bought the 3rd installment the day it shipped to stores for $60 in the overrated LIMITED EDITION tin. (it was all they had) I was throughly disappointed in the product. It was shipped incomplete, with numerous bugs that required several patches, no multiplayer as was originally promised, and a SORRY modding kit. Then came Play the World. Finally, multiplayer as promised... which required another $30 to have. So the game was up to $90. Bugs, problems, more patches. Then they released the GOLD Edition with CIV3 and PtW. $40. Then comes Conquests a few months later. Great, more stuff! With ANOTHER $30 price tag. I feel sorry for those who shelled out the $40 for Gold Edition, only to have Conquests arrive with PtW included. That brings the total to $120. Thanks Firaxis. I'll remember to buy your games a few years after they come out from now on. That way I get the quality promised when all the bugs are ironed out. Everything included in PtW could have been in a patch, INCLUDING multiplayer, and Conquests should NEVER have had a $30 price tag. Ridiculous.
Rating:
Summary: Conquer them all with Conquests
Review: This supplement goes a =long= way to addressing some of my complaints about the original Civilization III. Since Civilization I, this game has always been one of my favorite games to play on the computer, both against the computer and against others. When adding this expansion to Civilization III, Conquests becomes the game for others to beat again when it comes to world building games. First some bad news - if you already have the "Play the World" supplement, you already have some of the material that's on this expansion. The "Play the World" material is included with Conquests. Now the good news. This expansion adds a =lot= of new material to a game that sorely needed the boost. There are seven new Civilizations to use. Each civilization now has at least one unique unit - such as the Mayan Javelin Throwers, Portuguese Carracks, Swiss Mercenaries, and Sumerian Enkidu Warriors. There are a few new tech advances. There are a couple good disasters to avoid. The new "locked alliance" feature allows you to team up with another civilization more or less permanently. There are several new resources - a couple of which are pretty strange. There's a couple of new Wonders of the World to build. Several new government types. "Stealth Attack" is a cute way for you to start (or finish off!) wars. The two new civilization types (Agricultural and Seafaring) don't seem to add much at first, but try playing with them to see how much they really do change the outcome of games. Finally, the new levels of difficulty (including "Sid" - the hardest of all) add a couple new levels of complexity. But the best features of this expansion are the scenarios. There are many to try - each with its own challenges. Almost all of the scenarios have a basis in historical fact - a nice touch. From ancient almost prehistoric men to beyond the present. There's great game play in the World War Two scenario or the Napoleonic Wars. Or try the MesoAmerican scenario to see the most of what the rule changes in this edition did to improve the game. And the game has been fixed so that you can try to play by yourself. Instead of telling you "you have won" after the first turn, the game now allows you to develop a civilization from its infancy to the stars without any distractions. This is a great feature to try for learning the pluses and minuses for your chosen civilization, and makes for a great teach yourself the ropes mode before challenging online players. But do try to fight the computer first... Now some bad news again. If playing with the multiplayer option, you =must= trade with neighboring civilizations, or conquer them. This limitation subtracts from some of the luster of the game. But with that as a given, players of Civ III should get this disc. If you were dissatisfied with the limitations of Civ III, then this expansion will eliminate most of those complaints. This game is now the one to watch until Civ IV.
Rating:
Summary: Civ III Conquests: A Big Improvement
Review: When the original Civ III came out, I was a little bit down on it. There were a number of features that I thought should have been carried over from the old Civ II game, and I also thought that there were a lot of cool features that could have been used from Alien Crossfire as well. The thing I hated most, however, was the ridiculous "cultural conversion" feature that, in my opinion, detracted from gameplay. Civ III: Play the World corrected most of these problems, added new units and tribes, and was a much better game overall. Civ III: Conquests has continued this upward path. I love the new tribes (especially the Incas) and techs, as well as the new wonders (such as the Temple of Zeus and Knights Templar) and the wide variety of new units, including the more numerous barbarians. These new features improve the regular game, making it both more enjoyable and harder to win. I was a little sad to see a couple of my favorite tricks go by the board, particularly the ability of a militaristic civilization to build Great Wonders easily by sacrificing a military great leader. The new rules, and the advent of the scientific great leader, make the whole Wonder-building thing a lot harder. I also still think that the AI Civs are cheating too much. Their trade deals are almost always one-sided, unless you are about to wipe them out, and they have total knowledge of the world map, something that the human player cannot achieve until he has discovered navigation. They also seem to have an almost magical ability to manufacture combat units without the necessary resources, to trade techs with each other but not the human player, and to complete Wonders just before the human player does. Of course, this is counterbalanced by the fact that the AI is still capable of immense tactical stupidities. AI development still has a long way to go, and I hope we won't have to wait for the invention of the positronic brain to get there. Finally, even though I am more comfortable playing a militaristic expansionist civ like the Zulus, I do agree with other reviewers that one problem with the game still is that the royal road to victory lies through conquering one's opponents, not outdeveloping them. This is particularly true at the higher levels, where the AI civs seem to be a lot more aggressive. All in all, though, I'm pretty happy with the game and would highly recommend it to veteran Civ III players. I have just begun to explore the game, but am looking forward to discovering all its new secrets on my own -- at least until I break down and buy the newest strategy book. Sid level, here I come.
Rating:
Summary: How To Screw Up A Really Good Thing
Review: This is a GREAT expansion pack. Particularly if you skipped "Play The World" (as I did). There's more, more, MORE of everything, and enough interesting gameplay tweaks that it makes Civ 3 feel like a brand new game. What makes it so good? * New tribes to play. Or, perhaps more importantly, new tribes to play against. The Mayans can be a terror. * New tribe attributes. Seafaring! Agricultural! OK, that doesn't sound that exciting, but it definitely has an impact on gameplay and strategy. Agricultural favors the AI such that the new Killer AI tribes are almost always those with the Ag trait, like the Celts. * Boosted navy! Combined with the Seafaring, navy is still underpowered, but way better than before. On an archipelago map, seafaring can mean the difference between a breezy success and a slow slog. * Boosted airforce! Bombardment in general is boosted, so everything from catapults to stealth bombers feels a little more useful. * Fewer resources! Wait, fewer resources? Well, not fewer KINDS of resources. Just fewer all around. You either have to learn to play very nice with the AI or very mean. * Entertaining scenarios! From the cradle of civilization to the 20th century, you can have your turn (sorta) re-enacting historical events. These can be fun, fast, intense, changes of pace from the epic game. * New techs/wonders/governments! The unit-producing Statue of Zeus and Knights Templar are a hoot. The Temple of Artemis is amazingly powerful (but very short-lived). The Internet--well, like all the modern wonders, it seems a little too late. But it ain't bad. Fascism is a blast to play if you want to live out your Great Dictator fantasies, but you can see the AI self-destruct with it, too, unfortunately. So, how was this Really Good Thing screwed up? Bugs! Bugs o' plenty! If you're a casual player, playing particularly on Chieftain or Warlord levels (maybe even Regent), you might not notice the bugs. Not at first, anyway. There are patches, oh, yes, there are patches, unofficial though they may be. But the situation seems to have arisen because the game was yanked out of public beta toward release-time, then tweaked and re-tested internally. Unfortunately, this game is too deep and often too subtle to be effectively tested by any in-house crew. Result? They managed to break trade, corruption and resource-distribution in the final release. An official patch will eventually be released. Probably before the summer. Until then, you have the choice of living with bugs, or living with a beta patch (which might introduce its own bugs), or simply waiting to get the game. There's an even more serious problem, really, underlying these changes. Trade is absolutely vital with the resource reduction. Either you find a way to trade, or you find a way to conquer, which may not be a play style you want to be forced into Every Single Game. The problem is, the trade and diplomacy systems are not sophisticated enough to meet this increased need. If you need iron, but it's all being traded, you can't offer the AI any incentive to trade it to you when the current deal is up. Those deals get made in-between turns, so you often don't have a shot. So these fabulous changes are not only marred by bugs, the whole game creaks under them. And it's a long way to Civ 4.
Rating:
Summary: Good, but kind of boring
Review: I'd say it was better than the original with new civilizations, units, wonders, conditions for victory, and city improvements. There are 15 new civilizations each with a special unit. The best thing in my opinion is now in this expansion you can customize your victory conditions, but not for the conquests. My favorite conquest map is the on in Japan where there is a almost constant action. So in conclusion this game is pretty darn good.
(If only there was a four and a half.)
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