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Intelligence? Noo…

GalCiv has some of the best AI we’ve ever encountered in a strategy game. Even vaunted titles like Civilization 3 had, in reality, terrible AI. The AI would cheat, constantly swapping technologies with itself even if two opponents were at war. It would know the locations of player cities and units despite fog of war, and discovered strategic resources with uncanny accuracy.

GalCiv AI doesn’t cheat, at least not until the Genius and Impossible levels. Rather, it uses strategies based on actual player data, and gets a percentage chance each turn to react in a proper fashion to the moves of its enemies. We’ve rarely encountered scenarios where all the AI players gang up against the human. Indeed, it takes determined action by the player to draw his opponents into all-out war with him.

Yet the game remains challenging nonetheless. This reviewer humbly admits he has yet to beat the AI with more than one opponent set to Normal difficulty. Even the few times I’ve gotten the better of my Normal counterparts, it seems to have been mostly due to their bad starting locations rather than any great action of mine.

Yippeee

Let's try being good

Evil pays in this case

The AI isn’t just difficult, however. It’s communicative and, well, intelligent in a very human way. A player with great cultural influence might not declare war against someone, but he may decide to destabilize him to cause his planets to defect. If that opponent declares war, then the cultural power will try to bring in an ally. The AI recognizes threats and communicates about them. If one race is becoming too powerful, the player may get messages from other races suggesting that this one race is a mutual threat. A far cry from the days when the AI in games would indiscriminately focus on the player, no?

So what’s the secret?

There is both less and more to the AI’s capabilities than there seems. Its ability to keep up with the player is really nothing but choosing the right build order and technologies. Fortunately there are many, many build orders and paths to take to win. Indeed, the exact formula to win is not known and probably never will be. Does it pay off to build fusion power plants before manufacturing centers? Or should you put those off until you have a research center first? What technologies should you choose in conjunction with those? How much are you willing to compromise your military or your public’s happiness? What form of government will give you the most benefits, yet allow you to win enough elections? There are no perfect formulas, but there are guidelines to winning and the AI is very adept at following them. There truly are many ways to win – through trade and alliances, a cultural victory or good old-fashioned genocide. Except Alpha Centauri, no other game has truly managed this, and even AC’s non-combat methods of victory weren’t that exciting. With GalCiv, they’re often preferable to war.

MORE POWER

Torian scum

If only my ship could attack

Yet to attribute the success of the AI to simple formulas is incorrect. Other formula AIs (like in RTS games such as StarCraft) fail miserably after initial engagements; their grasp of the strategic situation is horrible. GalCiv delivers a very compelling experience, almost like playing another human being. The AI knows when your space station is there for trade or to beef up your military units. Should you upgrade a starbase to do both, sometimes the AI will tolerate your increased military presence in its sector in exchange for improved trade, sometimes not. The AI may also demand or offer tribute or trade – and everything is up for trade! All-in-all, GalCiv has set a new standard for strategy game AI and games will be compared to this for years to come.