The "game" has the power to change your world view and the ability to affect your intellectual development. I played in (a lot) in my 20's, and I still think about it all these later. There are notions, ideas and issues from this game that have come up and become prominent in society decades after the game was made. It is truly a work of High Science Fiction.
Hank Murphy agreed. I return to it again and again and find myself contemplating the game design decisions eg. Why does democracy increase reproductive rates? Or why would a planned economic model not (as free market in the game does) cause ecological damage? And on and on. So many concepts.
It is a politics economics science and philosophy intro course like few others, because your ideas, beliefs and projects have consequences, economic, military and moral. They make an old Aristotle or Nietzsche quote suddenly relevant, urgently so.
I perfectly agree, those ideas seems Science Fiction back in 1999, now they are coming in our life... One of the best games to enahnce your intelligence and culture.
@@tozmom615 My theory why a planned economy doesn't cause a eco damage but a free market does, or why democracy increases reproductive rates is probably a mix of biases of the developers themselves mixed with the need to create a game mechanics balance. Chances are they made the free market policy first and the planned economy as an after-thought and thus needed to create some balancing features to make it viable compared to free market. Probably same deal with democracy (they might've made it last and wanted a way to recreate the concept of people in a democratic society feeling more representated with a stabler form of succession, then they figured growth rates represented that close enough without touching too much on the effects of other governmental systems that they made first)
@@tozmom615 The funny bit is, that we were way more polluted in Soviet Union, than in western countries. Soviets had a slogan: "We don't expect alms from nature, we take what we want." Pollution was crazy and nature was treated like trash.
I forgot which technology it was but my favorite quote was "Beware the person that denies you information. In their heart they dream themselves your master"
Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he believes himself your master. I still remember that quote over 20 years later.
This game was one of the first games I ever played. I was no older than 8. This game fucked with me on a level no game since has even hoped to approach. I still get shivers when I hear the intro. This game carpet bombed my young mind with philosophical problems that I couldn't even hope to understand at the time, but somehow it had an incredible impression on me. I still come back to this game today, and even at 22, am still amazed at how deep this game was.
Some of the secret project cutscenes still creep me out now, at 33. When I was younger, I was downright terrified of some of them ("The Dream Twister" was the worst, followed by "The Self-Aware Colony", and "The Living Refinery").
Try my mod. The AI performance does improve some, when given enough land to expand on, and changing its few input parameters. alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=20959.0
Cities have been conquered unopposed before in history. If you make all cities auto-defended you remove this as a scenario in gameplay. Not all big cities should be hard to capture, just because they have a high population. Auto city garrison is just dumbing down the gameplay.
I won by global warming one time. I played as the Pirates, kept doctrine flexibility to myself for as long as possible. I colonized a continent and built pressure domes at every costal base. then I built as many thermal boreholes as I could and sat back while the tide rose. I called for an election of planetary governor. I controlled 3/4 of the population and won by default. I felt like a total bastard.
I usually play as the University. I out-tech everyone. I make alliances, and Probe Team the heck out of them, all while making sure I scoop up every single secret project. I usually win by transcendence, but I currently disabled that victory condition, and am working on military domination.
@Warafare48 Pretty much every climate scientist on Earth says climate change is caused by humans. What is it with the anti-science conspiracy theories these days trying to tell people climate change isn't real? This head in the sand approach isn't going to help.
@@JoshuaRellick False. There are plentiful scientists against the notion of global warming (sheepishly renamed into meaningless "climate change"). And anyway, it takes a single scientist to disprove what is false. The data fed to you is cherry-picked and politically loaded. No scientist would ever bite the hand that feeds them, they're on a tight budget as is. Watch Tony Heller (geologist) here on youtube for clarification
The sound design in this game is still the best in any game I've ever played. I loved the cut-scenes, and that fantastic voice acting. It was so unique when it came out, and I'm glad I found it on GoG. The only thing is, I started playing and skipped right through all the research tech, etc, because I can still remember it! Apparently it made such an impact on my psyche, it all came back as almost muscle memory. Wow. That's an accomplishment, in my opinion. I ALWAYS played to win by diplomacy, and I found that so satisfying.
The game gets more prophetic every year: "As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master." - Comissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Declaration of Rights" Hello tyranny, goodbye Earth. 😬
In 2016, the People's Republic of China became the first country to attempt to edit the genome of human embryos. "We hold life to be sacred, but we also know the foundation of life consists in a stream of codes not so different from the successive frames of a watchvid. Why then cannot we cut one code short here, and start another there? Is life so fragile that it can withstand no tampering? Does the sacred brook no improvement?"
"Men in their arrogance claim to understand the nature of creation, and devise elaborate theories to describe its behavior. But always they discover in the end that God was quite a bit more clever than they thought." Sister Miriam Godwinson, "We must Dissent" One of the revelations on this masterpiece of a game is how, as technology advances and becomes more frightening and harder to control, it start dawning on you that Sister Miriam, the aggressive, fanatical enemy of science, might have been right all along.
vazquezb2011 "it start dawning on you that Sister Miriam, the aggressive, fanatical enemy of science, might have been right all along." Yeah that was the craziest thing for me. I went to a Catholic school. I was very much anti-religious because of it. But then you have this character who is in a situation where she might be a little fanatical, but she's also more and more _right._ That was rather unsettling, and probably contributed to the fact that I am a staunch supporter of freedom of speech and allowing for a diversity of ideas in public discourse. It's necessary, because the person who looks alarmist now might in reality be one of the few who can see what's coming. (Churchill comes to mind as one guy who saw how much of a threat Hitler was many years before others in the British government did.)
@@SteamvilleQuintet But we won't. China will not be granted a monopoly in advanced genetic manipulation. It is not just the characters' quotes that are eye openers, it's the pressure you feel, as a player, when you compromise, seek balance and are overtaken by a more ruthless rival.
Gaia's Stepdaughters will always be my favorite faction. That chance of capturing mind worms early game really takes the load off of defense AND offense, making those early node hookups way more possible. Then add the sea variant for a transport ship that actually defends itself! Add green economics and attacks by Planet will grow your army, navy, and air force, for sure! If you get Yang and Miriam popped, things are a breeze. Morgon will hate you to feeble conflict but by then in my playthroughs I had marines and drop units already waging total war on the aforementioned pair of planet-wrecking whackos. You can tell I love the game yes? Finally a civ type I could play!
Human race cannot ever re-create such pinnacle of gaming as this. We had already reached the limits of our collective capacity and it is called: Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
@@Black2overlord It was an ironic post. Seeing the garbage being produced these days, I seldom see better games being produced. For example, Total War Medieval 2 was the best game in entire Total War series. I tried their WH3 recently and it is bloody awful. Just an auto-resolve simulator in a corridor. A lot of games are like that. Still never seen better Call of Duty than Modern Warfare. Still did not seen a decent modern Civs game. I still did not seen better modern Fallout game than New Vegas. If you are someone with an acquired taste and are seasoned gamer, you will easily understand what I mean. To create a good game takes talent. Passion and talent for creating good games already had peaked. Now we are seeing mediocre developers producing endless sea of drivel. At least back then, our bad games still had a lot of passion, care and love put into them. Even a bad game was often a rough gem. Nowadays games are just bad and in a bad way bad.
Played it for the first time 2000 on my friend's computer. I was 13. Since then, I had it installed on all of my PC's together with the Dungeon Keeper 2. There hasn't been a year since then that I haven't played it. And I am still learning new things and having a-ha! moments. I'm going to show it to my kids when they get older a bit, but I am not really sure when or really... why. It's just something about it I think is ultimately important. Sometimes, when I get angry with the world, my way is "free planet buster" for everyone. Research marine stuff as fast as possible, watch the sea rise and swallow the rest. Colonel Santiago salutes you. Off you go. Or the Pirates. Feeling like a piece of sshh... I then go with Gaia's crew to be able to sleep that night with my conscience clear. I barely skip slipping into mind-worm/locust infestation mod seeing all the wrong things in humanity's development on the Planet. Then I settle with nerdy feelings, sitting quietly on peaceful mornings at my computer, researching stuff, just being mindful... with the University. But. One thing I know. I'll never play with the f...king Chairman. Not in this lifetime.
Great video, you really did the game justice. It's a bit sad however that such a great game is gated to so many due to the outdated graphics - if any game deserve a HD remake this is it!
@didrik mortensen you're right if you're comparing between those two, but unless I'm completely wrong these two didn't come out that wrong between each other and being able to customize a unit in a 4x was still revolutionary. I know it was for me.
This may be my favorite TBS of all time. This game opened my mind to philosophy as a kid, and grounded my obsession with the story of a game over much anything else. So many things said in this video mirror my thoughts of yesteryear... I'm so glad I found this video. Thank you for making it.
I've been playing this game since I was 7 and my dad booted it up on his E-Machine and it's still one of my favorites 23 years later. It didn't just influence my expectation for games and scifi; it also taught me a ton of impressive words for a child (like "Insufficient") and got me thinking about the hard questions about authoritarianism, freedom, war, and surviving in a hostile environment.
Definately the best strategy game so far. The interface is now quite dated but the game is so complex and deep that I played thousands of hours since 2000. Even in 2020 I started few new beginnings. I also think -it is the one of the most overlooked strategy PC game! Thousands of hours of sheer joy for the selected ones!
Blew my mind when I was 11, absolutely blew my mind. I also read these books called Alpha Centauri at the time, they had pictures of futuristic concepts, can't find them anymore.
Personally, for me the best game ever. Played it countless times, still play it, buyed it three times and will buy it a fourth time if it comes to steam just to run it on my current computer. Why no one ever tried to do a remake? Civ: Beyond Earth is a joke against SMAC/SMAX and they didn´t even try to bring it closer to it. Why no one does the customizable units in another game (well, Pandora tried it)? The Weather/Climate system? Terraforming (tell me another game where you could build a hill and the guy on the other side of the border gets a crop failure)? The brilliant faction selection? The Social Engineering? and and and Great review!!!
SMAC and Warzone 2100 are, respectively, my favorite turn-based strategy game and my third-favorite RTS game (The original "Homeworld" being number 1, and "C&C Red Alert 2" being number 2). Both have customizable units (though WZ 2100 is less complex in that department).
People we should tweet @TheGameChief this man was responsible for Alpha Centauri development his name Brian Reynolds, we should demand and propose for creating new Alpha Centauri game.
Alpha Centauri is on the edge, if not already, of a horror game. Baffles me how they haven't done a graphical remake for this game like they are with Diablo 2, it would make huge bank compared to the newer civ games.
just because the game was made during a time of relative epace and prosperity doesnt mean they couldn't at least suspect that times of hardship couldnt come again. fiction writers are great at spotting the rot and corruption that threatens their society early and write about it while any scientists or politicians trying to discuss it seriously and openly would be dismissed. the cyberpunk genre for example did a great job at predicting the undemocratic forces of corporate finance undermining and conquering democracy
A true masterpiece, ahead of its time and our time it seems. No other game has done what Alpha Centauri did since: excellent, balanced strategy game both single and multiplayer. Insane replay value that the unit design mechanics increase even further. I have done colony pod airplanes for rapid expansion, stealthy espionage submarines to execute framing operations to start wars, nerve gas helicopters and so forth. I still remember the debates with my friends after weekend session of Alpha Centauri. All the conspiracies and backstabbing that happened when some took a pause and went to kitchen or to balcony. But the the most unique part is the philosophical aspect of the game. This game has shaped how I see the universe, life and its meaning on a profound basis. Even more than my university studies in philosophy.
Totally agree... For me, SMAC was and still is the best Strategy game ever played on a PC...Sid may have his name on it but lets give most of the praise to "Brian Reynolds", who was the lead designer on both SMAC and Civ 2... both were masterpieces...
I was given a copy if this game from a man at work. Started playing at 16, still playing in occasion two decades later. Alway appreciated the depth and philosophical differences of this game. It was revolutionary in military and tech development in game at the time
The best TBS game ever and my favorite 4X. A true masterpiece that sadly has had no real successor, spiritual or otherwise. No, Beyond Earth doesn't count. At all. I'd give my left arm for a sequel/remake/HD version/whatever of SMAC/X.
I wish they would remaster the game and let you have all the factions on one map during a single game since the expansion added more. Nothing beats the planet buster. Made me feel powerful when every faction contacted me to give me a warning
Such a masterpiece that sits just above its spiritual predecessor (Civilization II) as my favorite game of all time. It's a shame that Civ V and Beyond Earth had to shit on the legacy of such an incredible series of games.
I feel like I am in my own world when I play this game. I haven't played it much and only just found out about it this past year, but each time I do 8 hours pass by in 4 hours, and I have to come back to reality. It sucks that this series didn't continue like Civ did.
A friend of mine and I would have A BLAST with this game doing the direct connect version. God it was so fun. I miss it, like a lot. Hit me in the feels...
Best Firaxis game, best strategy and one of the best sci fi games I know. I actually begining to understand it better know, when I'm an adult, which makes it even more interesting.
When I first heard you speak, I thought you were the actual voice behind Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang, haha. Especially because of the tone when you said "strategy game".
As impressive as the game is, I would have preferred if each faction wasn't so quick to launch vendetta. Sometimes I played on huge planet size so that I wouldn't be engaged in almost continuous conflict and could instead concentrate on building, exploring and researching.
If anyone is to remake/update the game, the people behind the Masters of Orion remake would be suggested, along with maybe the people behind Halcyon 6 or another similar project.
I'd argue that "Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers" is the greatest story ever played - but SMAC is a pretty strong second place (with the C&C/Red Alert series close behind). PMD might be a totally different genre to SMAC, but it shares its philosophical depth. A story which can present so many different value systems and ways of life in an unbiased way is the best kind of story, as it opens our minds to ideas we might not have thought of ourselves. SMAC pulls this off better than any other game, but PMD does a good job of it as well, and goes more in-depth with the emotions and values which motivate characters to fight for their goal.
Correction: the game posits a crisis during the approach by the space ark to the Alpha Centauri system, and during the evacuation the people break up into factions. The competition you see during the game is between these factions.
Where he said the quotes are never shouted at you, you are never lectured to...he should hear Miriam's quote for tachyon weapons, Miriam's quote for nanorobotics, Lal's quote for Mind/Machine Interface, Zakharov's quote about the mindworms...
How is Bioshock an exception? The game is very heavy handed in delivering the ending, and you can just imagine Levine preening in the background about how "smart" that twist is and all the "questions" it poses about free-will. But the twist is not all that great and it's blatantly obvious 2 minutes in if you've ever played SS2.
I don't have the game currently installed, to check for myself, but maybe this will help forums.civfanatics.com/threads/playing-the-alpha-centauri-and-expansion-wve-videos.436455/
Tried those, still doesn't work properly. The audio is working, but the video is not I've been tinkering with the compatibility mode too Thanks for your input, though
Why don't they make a civ game where the first part is the civ we know it but when you launch your rocket you open up this part and you can switch between your space colonies and your earth map..
Civilisation 2: Test of Time: Extended original is exactly that, though I never liked it that much (I always went for the other game modes) and to be honest it isn't nearly as good as Alpha Centaurisorry if I'm being annoying for answering to a two month old post :D
The only other example of a story embedded in the gameplay of a strategy game that comes to my mind (albeit in a minor scale) is Star Wars : Rebellion, with Luke, Han, Vador and others having to deal with "quests" of their own. I would be interested to hear your opinion about that particular game :)
Even war is better in old games. I don't like the idea of cities "defending themselves" and the one unit per tile rule, they only create static games where nothing happens unless the player does. I love watching the AI steamrolling their neighbours and the dread that comes form thinking you are next, a feel that never happens in modern Civ games as you can defend your whole empire with a warrior and an archer, even in the highest difficulties. The only thing i don't like is that AI sucks at sea as in ALL Civ games (they can't handle transports).
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Can't honestly remember, I've had the game installed for years. But they have some patches over here that should help you: www.gog.com/forum/sid_meier_s_alpha_centauri_/unofficial_patches/page1
Alpha Centauri is the most perfect example of political and philosophical discourse in games, and how deeply connected those themes can be to gameplay elements, and every game dev should be obligated under threat of firing to play it a few dozen hours to understand what it does right (and the few things it does wrong). It doesnt hti you over the ead with discourse, it shows you the possible consequences of the ideological extremities, it is a condemnation of collectivism in Sheng Ji-Yang in a way that that is not preachy, because it is also a condemnation of individualism in Nwabudike Morgan. In a time of an oceanic shallowness of gaming experiences, this game is a beacon of hope.
@Orthodox_Serb-x4u uh? What do you mean by if you encounter an enemy unit? Are you ONLY allowed to perform blockades when encountering enemy units? Does the game not allow you to do blockades anytime that you decide to do them?
@Orthodox_Serb-x4u um? when you use the word orbital defense, are you referring to my blockade? or are you referring to the planet that I am blockading HAVING an orbital defense?
Unique masterpiece of a game - But instead of my own praise to add to the chorus , I will say this - I READ SOMEWERE THAT A REMAKE IS BEING MADE RIGHT NOW AND IS IN VERSION V0.2 STAGE. THIS REMAKE WILL HAVE MULTIPLAYER AND UPDATED GRAPHICS AND CLAIMS TO BE FAITHFUL TO ORIGINAL \0/
I have had dreams that were influenced by this game. I have gotten admonished not to peel the layers of a planet like that of an onion, standing between beast and overman, and sitting together with the mountain until only the mountain remains. Also, there's this Nikomachawhatever Ethics which I refuse to bother with.
@@WarDaft Wrong. _Nicomachean Ethics_ is Aristotle's best-known work on ethics, dedicated to his son Nicomachus. It was written nearly 2000 years before Niccolo Machiavelli was born.
Thanks for making this extensive review. Much of this game holds up well even in the modern day! I've also made a "SMACX AI Growth mod" to goose it further. Please try! alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=20959.0
"Anything you do to the environment, you affect it, this may anger it and it may become hostile" - Coronavirus, Biodiveristy Crisis, Climate Crisis anyone?!
The remake (beyond earth) is so boring that it is leftist identitarian politics instead of faction based on different philisophies. I love SMAC original. Call to Power is also awesome with great depth that far surpasses all civilization games, especially civ 5-6.
Sorry, but I'm a leftist, and I was utterly disgusted by beyond earth's presentation. You don't really get to pin that one on "leftism". It was just shitty design.
Though the thing is, CivBE's whole idea is that humanity has 3 diverging paths for the future, namely Purity, Harmony and Supremacy. The narrative there is more of picking the future you want to head to, no matter how you start off your journey.
If you're looking at strategy games that tell a story and don't have the original Homeworld at or near the top, I conclude that you never played it. It came out the same year as Alpha Centauri and rightfully eclipsed it. (SMAC was great for its mature content, not being afraid to be intelligent and possibly leave some people behind for that) Still, thanks for the video.
TortugaPower In Homeworld you go on missions. At the very start of the video he stated he wasn't talking about strategy games that tell a story through missions.
The "game" has the power to change your world view and the ability to affect your intellectual development. I played in (a lot) in my 20's, and I still think about it all these later. There are notions, ideas and issues from this game that have come up and become prominent in society decades after the game was made. It is truly a work of High Science Fiction.
Hank Murphy agreed. I return to it again and again and find myself contemplating the game design decisions eg. Why does democracy increase reproductive rates? Or why would a planned economic model not (as free market in the game does) cause ecological damage? And on and on. So many concepts.
It is a politics economics science and philosophy intro course like few others, because your ideas, beliefs and projects have consequences, economic, military and moral. They make an old Aristotle or Nietzsche quote suddenly relevant, urgently so.
I perfectly agree, those ideas seems Science Fiction back in 1999, now they are coming in our life... One of the best games to enahnce your intelligence and culture.
@@tozmom615 My theory why a planned economy doesn't cause a eco damage but a free market does, or why democracy increases reproductive rates is probably a mix of biases of the developers themselves mixed with the need to create a game mechanics balance. Chances are they made the free market policy first and the planned economy as an after-thought and thus needed to create some balancing features to make it viable compared to free market. Probably same deal with democracy (they might've made it last and wanted a way to recreate the concept of people in a democratic society feeling more representated with a stabler form of succession, then they figured growth rates represented that close enough without touching too much on the effects of other governmental systems that they made first)
@@tozmom615 The funny bit is, that we were way more polluted in Soviet Union, than in western countries. Soviets had a slogan: "We don't expect alms from nature, we take what we want." Pollution was crazy and nature was treated like trash.
I forgot which technology it was but my favorite quote was "Beware the person that denies you information. In their heart they dream themselves your master"
Necro I know, but that quote is from the The Planetary Datalinks secret project.
@@BlastedUniqueIdentifiers thank you. I had wondered for a long time. Funny how that quote always stayed with me
Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he believes himself your master.
I still remember that quote over 20 years later.
@@drdst27 thank you. Wish they would remaster this game. Would love to have more AI players on the map.
@@jes2276 there is a playlist that has all quotes from the game if you want to see it
This game is a creepy masterpiece, best sid meier game in my opinion, and also the best strategy game ever.
This game was one of the first games I ever played. I was no older than 8. This game fucked with me on a level no game since has even hoped to approach. I still get shivers when I hear the intro. This game carpet bombed my young mind with philosophical problems that I couldn't even hope to understand at the time, but somehow it had an incredible impression on me. I still come back to this game today, and even at 22, am still amazed at how deep this game was.
Sid Meier himself had very little to do with this game. It was pretty much a brand name at that point.
Some of the secret project cutscenes still creep me out now, at 33. When I was younger, I was downright terrified of some of them ("The Dream Twister" was the worst, followed by "The Self-Aware Colony", and "The Living Refinery").
too bad that the AI sucks even for low standards today. also too bad that we got beyoung earth and not alpha centauri 2, god damn.
Try my mod. The AI performance does improve some, when given enough land to expand on, and changing its few input parameters. alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=20959.0
cities not being able to defend themselves unless there is a unit garrisoned there is not a flaw, it's common sense.
actually no, it should be some kind of stationary defense than shoots (I know they are simplified when you build other buildings but still)
Cities have been conquered unopposed before in history. If you make all cities auto-defended you remove this as a scenario in gameplay. Not all big cities should be hard to capture, just because they have a high population. Auto city garrison is just dumbing down the gameplay.
@@GabiN64 yeah I mean think about it this way is a citizen militia going to rise up and unite, while the city is already being under a surprise attack
@@Memelord-md5hs , actually there are additional drones in conquered cities - drone riots👀
GabiN64 It makes sense, but I don’t think having to have the unit for city defense is good for game play.
I won by global warming one time. I played as the Pirates, kept doctrine flexibility to myself for as long as possible. I colonized a continent and built pressure domes at every costal base. then I built as many thermal boreholes as I could and sat back while the tide rose. I called for an election of planetary governor. I controlled 3/4 of the population and won by default.
I felt like a total bastard.
I usually play as the University. I out-tech everyone. I make alliances, and Probe Team the heck out of them, all while making sure I scoop up every single secret project. I usually win by transcendence, but I currently disabled that victory condition, and am working on military domination.
I shunned Beyond Earth just because it was missing weather. This is genius.
Shut up, idiot
@Warafare48 Pretty much every climate scientist on Earth says climate change is caused by humans. What is it with the anti-science conspiracy theories these days trying to tell people climate change isn't real? This head in the sand approach isn't going to help.
@@JoshuaRellick False. There are plentiful scientists against the notion of global warming (sheepishly renamed into meaningless "climate change"). And anyway, it takes a single scientist to disprove what is false. The data fed to you is cherry-picked and politically loaded. No scientist would ever bite the hand that feeds them, they're on a tight budget as is. Watch Tony Heller (geologist) here on youtube for clarification
This IS without a shadow of a doubt, my favorite video game EVER. It's like a typical board game on steroids.
The sound design in this game is still the best in any game I've ever played. I loved the cut-scenes, and that fantastic voice acting. It was so unique when it came out, and I'm glad I found it on GoG. The only thing is, I started playing and skipped right through all the research tech, etc, because I can still remember it! Apparently it made such an impact on my psyche, it all came back as almost muscle memory. Wow. That's an accomplishment, in my opinion. I ALWAYS played to win by diplomacy, and I found that so satisfying.
The game gets more prophetic every year:
"As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master."
- Comissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Declaration of Rights"
Hello tyranny, goodbye Earth. 😬
I mean, they didn't predict misinformation & overwhelm, so... "free flow" is more complex than presented.
@@ahn0x Censorship increases the odds of misinformation occuring lol. Go away.
In 2016, the People's Republic of China became the first country to attempt to edit the genome of human embryos.
"We hold life to be sacred, but we also know the foundation of life consists in a stream of codes not so different from the successive frames of a watchvid. Why then cannot we cut one code short here, and start another there? Is life so fragile that it can withstand no tampering? Does the sacred brook no improvement?"
"Men in their arrogance claim to understand the nature of creation, and devise elaborate theories to describe its behavior. But always they discover in the end that God was quite a bit more clever than they thought."
Sister Miriam Godwinson, "We must Dissent"
One of the revelations on this masterpiece of a game is how, as technology advances and becomes more frightening and harder to control, it start dawning on you that Sister Miriam, the aggressive, fanatical enemy of science, might have been right all along.
vazquezb2011 "it start dawning on you that Sister Miriam, the aggressive, fanatical enemy of science, might have been right all along."
Yeah that was the craziest thing for me. I went to a Catholic school. I was very much anti-religious because of it. But then you have this character who is in a situation where she might be a little fanatical, but she's also more and more _right._ That was rather unsettling, and probably contributed to the fact that I am a staunch supporter of freedom of speech and allowing for a diversity of ideas in public discourse. It's necessary, because the person who looks alarmist now might in reality be one of the few who can see what's coming. (Churchill comes to mind as one guy who saw how much of a threat Hitler was many years before others in the British government did.)
One year later; It turns out they were right. Two years off, but we have the first (known) genetically engineered humans being created in China.
Man can barely build a stable computer and the mind/body is 1000 times more complicated. I think we should wait a few years before tampering.
@@SteamvilleQuintet But we won't. China will not be granted a monopoly in advanced genetic manipulation. It is not just the characters' quotes that are eye openers, it's the pressure you feel, as a player, when you compromise, seek balance and are overtaken by a more ruthless rival.
Gaia's Stepdaughters will always be my favorite faction. That chance of capturing mind worms early game really takes the load off of defense AND offense, making those early node hookups way more possible. Then add the sea variant for a transport ship that actually defends itself! Add green economics and attacks by Planet will grow your army, navy, and air force, for sure! If you get Yang and Miriam popped, things are a breeze. Morgon will hate you to feeble conflict but by then in my playthroughs I had marines and drop units already waging total war on the aforementioned pair of planet-wrecking whackos. You can tell I love the game yes? Finally a civ type I could play!
Human race cannot ever re-create such pinnacle of gaming as this. We had already reached the limits of our collective capacity and it is called: Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
Ok chill.
Agreed. This current civilization is incapable of creating a game of this magnitude ever again.
@@Black2overlord It was an ironic post. Seeing the garbage being produced these days, I seldom see better games being produced. For example, Total War Medieval 2 was the best game in entire Total War series. I tried their WH3 recently and it is bloody awful. Just an auto-resolve simulator in a corridor.
A lot of games are like that. Still never seen better Call of Duty than Modern Warfare. Still did not seen a decent modern Civs game. I still did not seen better modern Fallout game than New Vegas.
If you are someone with an acquired taste and are seasoned gamer, you will easily understand what I mean. To create a good game takes talent. Passion and talent for creating good games already had peaked. Now we are seeing mediocre developers producing endless sea of drivel. At least back then, our bad games still had a lot of passion, care and love put into them. Even a bad game was often a rough gem. Nowadays games are just bad and in a bad way bad.
Played it for the first time 2000 on my friend's computer. I was 13. Since then, I had it installed on all of my PC's together with the Dungeon Keeper 2. There hasn't been a year since then that I haven't played it. And I am still learning new things and having a-ha! moments. I'm going to show it to my kids when they get older a bit, but I am not really sure when or really... why. It's just something about it I think is ultimately important.
Sometimes, when I get angry with the world, my way is "free planet buster" for everyone. Research marine stuff as fast as possible, watch the sea rise and swallow the rest. Colonel Santiago salutes you. Off you go. Or the Pirates.
Feeling like a piece of sshh... I then go with Gaia's crew to be able to sleep that night with my conscience clear. I barely skip slipping into mind-worm/locust infestation mod seeing all the wrong things in humanity's development on the Planet.
Then I settle with nerdy feelings, sitting quietly on peaceful mornings at my computer, researching stuff, just being mindful... with the University.
But.
One thing I know.
I'll never play with the f...king Chairman. Not in this lifetime.
Great video, you really did the game justice. It's a bit sad however that such a great game is gated to so many due to the outdated graphics - if any game deserve a HD remake this is it!
@didrik mortensen if you didn't need to customize units I don't think you were playing on high enough difficulty
@didrik mortensen you're right if you're comparing between those two, but unless I'm completely wrong these two didn't come out that wrong between each other and being able to customize a unit in a 4x was still revolutionary. I know it was for me.
@didrik mortensen long not wrong lol*
This may be my favorite TBS of all time. This game opened my mind to philosophy as a kid, and grounded my obsession with the story of a game over much anything else. So many things said in this video mirror my thoughts of yesteryear... I'm so glad I found this video. Thank you for making it.
Please don't go. The drones need you, they look up to you
I've been playing this game since I was 7 and my dad booted it up on his E-Machine and it's still one of my favorites 23 years later. It didn't just influence my expectation for games and scifi; it also taught me a ton of impressive words for a child (like "Insufficient") and got me thinking about the hard questions about authoritarianism, freedom, war, and surviving in a hostile environment.
Academician Prokhor Zakharov, "For I Have Tasted The Fruit"
I love the subtle and not so subtle references to religion in this game ^_^
I love how Believers start as religious fanatics and end up one of few normal among fanatics.
Definately the best strategy game so far. The interface is now quite dated but the game is so complex and deep that I played thousands of hours since 2000. Even in 2020 I started few new beginnings. I also think -it is the one of the most overlooked strategy PC game! Thousands of hours of sheer joy for the selected ones!
Chairman Yang, is that you?
@ger du I am still struggling to overcome the crass demands of flesh and bone...
YangGang!!!
hello from 2022, SMAC sure is, in a way, prophetic indeed
Blew my mind when I was 11, absolutely blew my mind. I also read these books called Alpha Centauri at the time, they had pictures of futuristic concepts, can't find them anymore.
If any game needed HD makeover (although, I'd LOVE to see a sequel), then this is it. I live in hope 🤞.
Personally, for me the best game ever. Played it countless times, still play it, buyed it three times and will buy it a fourth time if it comes to steam just to run it on my current computer.
Why no one ever tried to do a remake? Civ: Beyond Earth is a joke against SMAC/SMAX and they didn´t even try to bring it closer to it. Why no one does the customizable units in another game (well, Pandora tried it)? The Weather/Climate system? Terraforming (tell me another game where you could build a hill and the guy on the other side of the border gets a crop failure)? The brilliant faction selection? The Social Engineering? and and and
Great review!!!
It's on Origin for like $4.99
You can buy it for like $2.99 or $5.99, depending on sales, at Good Old Games.
SMAC and Warzone 2100 are, respectively, my favorite turn-based strategy game and my third-favorite RTS game (The original "Homeworld" being number 1, and "C&C Red Alert 2" being number 2). Both have customizable units (though WZ 2100 is less complex in that department).
Simply, SMAC is one of the best games ever made
People we should tweet @TheGameChief this man was responsible for Alpha Centauri development his name Brian Reynolds, we should demand and propose for creating new Alpha Centauri game.
He said he's happy to do a remake, the problem is the IP is owned by EA and Fireaxis
Alpha Centauri is on the edge, if not already, of a horror game.
Baffles me how they haven't done a graphical remake for this game like they are with Diablo 2, it would make huge bank compared to the newer civ games.
When you see beyond earth and realize how far the series has regressed. :/
just because the game was made during a time of relative epace and prosperity doesnt mean they couldn't at least suspect that times of hardship couldnt come again. fiction writers are great at spotting the rot and corruption that threatens their society early and write about it while any scientists or politicians trying to discuss it seriously and openly would be dismissed. the cyberpunk genre for example did a great job at predicting the undemocratic forces of corporate finance undermining and conquering democracy
A true masterpiece, ahead of its time and our time it seems. No other game has done what Alpha Centauri did since: excellent, balanced strategy game both single and multiplayer. Insane replay value that the unit design mechanics increase even further. I have done colony pod airplanes for rapid expansion, stealthy espionage submarines to execute framing operations to start wars, nerve gas helicopters and so forth. I still remember the debates with my friends after weekend session of Alpha Centauri. All the conspiracies and backstabbing that happened when some took a pause and went to kitchen or to balcony.
But the the most unique part is the philosophical aspect of the game. This game has shaped how I see the universe, life and its meaning on a profound basis. Even more than my university studies in philosophy.
one of my all time favorite games. got it free with my first PC back in 2000. spent literally hundreds of hours playing it lol
If not the best, then definitely one of the top 5 best strategy games of ALL times.
Best god damn PC game ever made
Totally agree... For me, SMAC was and still is the best Strategy game ever played on a PC...Sid may have his name on it but lets give most of the praise to "Brian Reynolds", who was the lead designer on both SMAC and Civ 2... both were masterpieces...
amazing game, something trully special, the art, the story, the narration, it gives you creepy yet kinda real reflection of our future
I was given a copy if this game from a man at work. Started playing at 16, still playing in occasion two decades later. Alway appreciated the depth and philosophical differences of this game. It was revolutionary in military and tech development in game at the time
probably my favorite strategic game on pc ever
it is the best strategy game ever
4x: Alpha Centauri
RTS: AoE2
Grand Strategy: Crusader Kings 2
Strategy Hall of Fame
The best TBS game ever and my favorite 4X. A true masterpiece that sadly has had no real successor, spiritual or otherwise.
No, Beyond Earth doesn't count. At all.
I'd give my left arm for a sequel/remake/HD version/whatever of SMAC/X.
I wish they would remaster the game and let you have all the factions on one map during a single game since the expansion added more. Nothing beats the planet buster. Made me feel powerful when every faction contacted me to give me a warning
I still remember the short stories the developers would put out every week ahead of the release of the game.
What an absolute masterpiece of a game. And a superb commentary too.
Alpha Centauri, Endless Legends, Dominions 4. My holy trinity of TBS. xP
Such a masterpiece that sits just above its spiritual predecessor (Civilization II) as my favorite game of all time. It's a shame that Civ V and Beyond Earth had to shit on the legacy of such an incredible series of games.
My favorite game of all time, and until very recently had the highest pc gamer score of all time 98%.
I feel like I am in my own world when I play this game. I haven't played it much and only just found out about it this past year, but each time I do 8 hours pass by in 4 hours, and I have to come back to reality.
It sucks that this series didn't continue like Civ did.
It Needs a remaster. Or just remake the game exactly like it is in a more modern engine.
Really enjoyed this analysis. I always felt that Alpha Centauri had a unique tone to it, and now I can see why.
one of the most incredible pc games of its time
A friend of mine and I would have A BLAST with this game doing the direct connect version. God it was so fun. I miss it, like a lot. Hit me in the feels...
Best Firaxis game, best strategy and one of the best sci fi games I know. I actually begining to understand it better know, when I'm an adult, which makes it even more interesting.
One of my favorite game ever.
Excellent analysis!
:D
CK2 let's you tell a story though playing
Despite having over 3000 hours in CK2, SMAC does it better.
When I first heard you speak, I thought you were the actual voice behind Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang, haha. Especially because of the tone when you said "strategy game".
If it was not for Fallout 2, Alpha Centauri is THE BEST Game I've played. Thanks for thé video. 🥰☺️🥰
As impressive as the game is, I would have preferred if each faction wasn't so quick to launch vendetta. Sometimes I played on huge planet size so that I wouldn't be engaged in almost continuous conflict and could instead concentrate on building, exploring and researching.
To be fair it is quite easy to get peace.
The best strategy video game of all time
If anyone is to remake/update the game, the people behind the Masters of Orion remake would be suggested, along with maybe the people behind Halcyon 6 or another similar project.
I'd argue that "Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers" is the greatest story ever played - but SMAC is a pretty strong second place (with the C&C/Red Alert series close behind). PMD might be a totally different genre to SMAC, but it shares its philosophical depth. A story which can present so many different value systems and ways of life in an unbiased way is the best kind of story, as it opens our minds to ideas we might not have thought of ourselves. SMAC pulls this off better than any other game, but PMD does a good job of it as well, and goes more in-depth with the emotions and values which motivate characters to fight for their goal.
One of the best games ever.
3:07 man, you don't skip through the factions thats horseshit, and sells the game short.
Well Im fine with no sequel, but how about updating the games graphics and what not like with Command and Conquer recently?
Correction: the game posits a crisis during the approach by the space ark to the Alpha Centauri system, and during the evacuation the people break up into factions. The competition you see during the game is between these factions.
i played this game back in 2002 and i got addicted to it LOL
Wow thats super cool i loved the genesis beginning
This is great review! You make a point!
Found 8 sealed copies of this game today lol
Did it come with those huge playing manuals that came with the game too?
Where he said the quotes are never shouted at you, you are never lectured to...he should hear Miriam's quote for tachyon weapons, Miriam's quote for nanorobotics, Lal's quote for Mind/Machine Interface, Zakharov's quote about the mindworms...
Yes it is the greatest, PC Gamer's 98% was spot on.
Is there any news of a remake of Alpha centaury ?
How is Bioshock an exception? The game is very heavy handed in delivering the ending, and you can just imagine Levine preening in the background about how "smart" that twist is and all the "questions" it poses about free-will. But the twist is not all that great and it's blatantly obvious 2 minutes in if you've ever played SS2.
I love system shock 2
Any idea to open the Secret Project movie reliably? I tried using HCL's Wing Commander movie player to no avail :(
I don't have the game currently installed, to check for myself, but maybe this will help
forums.civfanatics.com/threads/playing-the-alpha-centauri-and-expansion-wve-videos.436455/
Tried those, still doesn't work properly. The audio is working, but the video is not
I've been tinkering with the compatibility mode too
Thanks for your input, though
There are only twio games that have a permanent place in my hard drive: this one and Master of Magic (1993).
Why don't they make a civ game where the first part is the civ we know it but when you launch your rocket you open up this part and you can switch between your space colonies and your earth map..
Civilisation 2: Test of Time: Extended original is exactly that, though I never liked it that much (I always went for the other game modes) and to be honest it isn't nearly as good as Alpha Centaurisorry if I'm being annoying for answering to a two month old post :D
The only other example of a story embedded in the gameplay of a strategy game that comes to my mind (albeit in a minor scale) is Star Wars : Rebellion, with Luke, Han, Vador and others having to deal with "quests" of their own. I would be interested to hear your opinion about that particular game :)
Thank you! This is The Game.
Even war is better in old games. I don't like the idea of cities "defending themselves" and the one unit per tile rule, they only create static games where nothing happens unless the player does. I love watching the AI steamrolling their neighbours and the dread that comes form thinking you are next, a feel that never happens in modern Civ games as you can defend your whole empire with a warrior and an archer, even in the highest difficulties. The only thing i don't like is that AI sucks at sea as in ALL Civ games (they can't handle transports).
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Organic superlube? Oh it's great stuff, great stuff
Great stuff.
:D
May I ask you which patch did you use to have big resolution?????????????????????
Can't honestly remember, I've had the game installed for years. But they have some patches over here that should help you: www.gog.com/forum/sid_meier_s_alpha_centauri_/unofficial_patches/page1
Thank you!
This guy sounds almost like Sheng-Ji Yang's voice actor.
Alpha Centauri is the most perfect example of political and philosophical discourse in games, and how deeply connected those themes can be to gameplay elements, and every game dev should be obligated under threat of firing to play it a few dozen hours to understand what it does right (and the few things it does wrong).
It doesnt hti you over the ead with discourse, it shows you the possible consequences of the ideological extremities, it is a condemnation of collectivism in Sheng Ji-Yang in a way that that is not preachy, because it is also a condemnation of individualism in Nwabudike Morgan.
In a time of an oceanic shallowness of gaming experiences, this game is a beacon of hope.
Quick question are blockades a thing in alpha centauri?
@Orthodox_Serb-x4u no, actual blockades, like using ships.
@Orthodox_Serb-x4u uh? What do you mean by if you encounter an enemy unit? Are you ONLY allowed to perform blockades when encountering enemy units? Does the game not allow you to do blockades anytime that you decide to do them?
@Orthodox_Serb-x4u are there any limits as to how large you can make blockades? And is it a thing to do blockades in orbit of the planet?
@Orthodox_Serb-x4u um? when you use the word orbital defense, are you referring to my blockade? or are you referring to the planet that I am blockading HAVING an orbital defense?
I played this for the first time today.
This is the best game, hands down.
I don't even care about the gameplay now, I play tall just to get all the projects and buildings and quotes.
Sid Meyers will never be as great as that time
Unique masterpiece of a game - But instead of my own praise to add to the chorus , I will say this - I READ SOMEWERE THAT A REMAKE IS BEING MADE RIGHT NOW AND IS IN VERSION V0.2 STAGE. THIS REMAKE WILL HAVE MULTIPLAYER AND UPDATED GRAPHICS AND CLAIMS TO BE FAITHFUL TO ORIGINAL \0/
Any link to this?
4:12
I have had dreams that were influenced by this game. I have gotten admonished not to peel the layers of a planet like that of an onion, standing between beast and overman, and sitting together with the mountain until only the mountain remains. Also, there's this Nikomachawhatever Ethics which I refuse to bother with.
Niccolo Machiavelli. As in the person the word Machiavellian came from.
@@WarDaft Wrong. _Nicomachean Ethics_ is Aristotle's best-known work on ethics, dedicated to his son Nicomachus. It was written nearly 2000 years before Niccolo Machiavelli was born.
THE FUCKING DATALINKS!!!!!!
SMAC the best 4X ever ^_^
Bioshock has one of the most blatant spelled out messages in gaming history what the hell are you on?
you sound like Chairman Sheng Ji-Yang
"Hey! Get off of my land, you peacekeeping son of a..." - CEO Nwabudike Morgan
ua-cam.com/video/jdCB9yE9Hcc/v-deo.html
We must consent
They should have added Space Gandhi... 😏
They did. His name is Pravin Lal.
@@linuxgameplayxp6246
Oh... I see... 😏
the strategy part is a bit overrated, only research green tech, spam a billion of locusts, and its game over for every other faction
Thanks for making this extensive review. Much of this game holds up well even in the modern day! I've also made a "SMACX AI Growth mod" to goose it further. Please try! alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=20959.0
a
very insightful
"Anything you do to the environment, you affect it, this may anger it and it may become hostile" - Coronavirus, Biodiveristy Crisis, Climate Crisis anyone?!
The remake (beyond earth) is so boring that it is leftist identitarian politics instead of faction based on different philisophies. I love SMAC original. Call to Power is also awesome with great depth that far surpasses all civilization games, especially civ 5-6.
Sorry, but I'm a leftist, and I was utterly disgusted by beyond earth's presentation. You don't really get to pin that one on "leftism". It was just shitty design.
Though the thing is, CivBE's whole idea is that humanity has 3 diverging paths for the future, namely Purity, Harmony and Supremacy. The narrative there is more of picking the future you want to head to, no matter how you start off your journey.
@@dynamicworlds1 I'm a leftist too, and what he says is partly true.
In fairness I felt beyond earth spectacularly recreated the experience of living in space. Only with less atmosphere.
If you're looking at strategy games that tell a story and don't have the original Homeworld at or near the top, I conclude that you never played it. It came out the same year as Alpha Centauri and rightfully eclipsed it. (SMAC was great for its mature content, not being afraid to be intelligent and possibly leave some people behind for that)
Still, thanks for the video.
Not sure I got whet u mean but for how I see it homeworld is a very different beast quite hard to compare to alpha centauri
I played both, both are fantastic games, but Alpha Centauri is number one to me. Deep, intellectual content that goes beyond the game.
Homeworld is awesome, but my "Desert island game" (If I was stuck on a desert island, with a laptop, a solar charger, and ONE game) is Alpha Centauri.
Both games are in my top 5. They both have great storytelling.
TortugaPower
In Homeworld you go on missions. At the very start of the video he stated he wasn't talking about strategy games that tell a story through missions.