Civilization III: Gold Edition

[English assassin]

That's basically true. I got Gold as well and it was the same there so I guess the answer is the expansions didn't fix it.

The only thing you can see, if the map is small enough/the faction number big enough, is that not all empires get all resources. Lacking saltpetre or oil will make you/them pretty vulnerable militarily regardless of size. In fact generally playing with a LOT of factions makes for a better game IMHO.

Falling any real way behind in the tech race is still more or less impossible to correct though, although with better trading options you do at least have more of a chance to correct a small deficit. (Equally, with the AI swapping tech they can build a monstrous lead if you aren't part of the tech swapping club yourself)

I thought the pace of the tech race was better, in that you spend a reasonable amount of time in eras that are recognisably ancient, renaissance and modern, whereas with CTP it galloped through to a sort of early modern era and then ground to a halt with endless not very interesting advances.

You know what? its not such a bad game, i might have a quick go this week for old times sake.

[LeftEyeNine]

I may defend my very old Civ to the bone ! :)

I just want to tell you about a short game story that happened once which was very very enjoyable : I was controlling the Russian faction, being already a superpower and practicing the Manhattan Project, I was stuck. All factions were stuck. Everyone was informed about the nuclear power but nobody could make use of it since only one faction had Uranium under control. They were the Zulus living happily in a pre-times period compared to all others just before the whole world was all over them because of the Uranium deposit. That was a world war, I gathered the Uranium, another superpower leading another polarity. And finally we were on war for Uranium against each other again. Nobody remembered who Zulus were. Maybe we trapped them into touristic settlements so that they could sell exotic souvenirs, I don't know.. LOL..

[Kekvit Irae]

I personally had mixed feelings when I first played CivIII. On one hand, I really like the culture boundries and resource system, but on the other hand, I hate having to wait 50 turns to complete a wonder because you have no way of hurrying it without a Great Leader (whom appears only when pigs fly). I guess I'm just too into SMAC and CivII