Civilization: Beyond Earth

As I have noted in this blog a few times, I'm not a huge videogame fan and what games I tend to enjoy the most are strategy style models.  The Civilization series has been a favorite of mine for years and recently the reintroduction of the XCom series has been something I've enjoyed.

So it comes with great anticipation that the makers of XCom and Civilization, Firaxis Games, are almost melding the two together and creating "Civilization: Beyond Earth" to be released this fall.  Incorporating the "explore, develop technologies, expand, negotiate, etc." empire building system of the Civilization with the sci-fi aspect of XCom seems like a winner before it ever arrives.    It looks like the beginning of this game is what usually ended the games of Civilization--Man launches a "generation ship" of sorts to Alpha Centauri in hopes of establishing a colony there while good old Mother Earth has been polluted or irradiated into dysfunction.  Meier has always had this eco-streak to him and his games and this one appears no different with its initial message.  Many are calling this game "Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri II" after his earlier space based game.  Unfortunately I am not familiar with that title as I was out of the PC based game culture by the time that game came out. 

Which is what is a tad disappointing to me with this new title. It is only to be released (at the moment) on PC and Mac this fall. No console version. Though I don't have an XBox One or new Playstation, I think they are missing out and given the success of the XCom series on consoles should look at a version for your living room as well. Till then, I'll just have to enjoy some preview videos and screenshots...