(sorry, wrong area..)

Europa Universalis.

Which is still my answer after this thread gets moved to PC Gaming or whatever.

Oh god yes. I played Civ I-IV until I dropped dead. XD

Only the lastest Civ I do NOT like at all. Civ V I think it is. Bad bad Civ.

Also loved Sim City and the like. ^^

Master of Orion 2.

oh nvm.

What an excellent question. I really do not game that much anymore (by choice). I would love to play an MMORPG like Vanguard that was fully developed. 

This will probably shock, but I play a lot of Warcraft III. As to a Civ substitute, I would say TOTAL WAR.

Originally posted by ColumbiaTrue

As to a Civ substitute, I would say TOTAL WAR.

There's no real Civ substitute - and Civilization V is an EXCELLENT game, I've played it a lot more than any Civ game (and I've played even original Civilization back in the day).

But I really love any good turn-based strategy game - and it seems there's gonna be a STAR turn-based game availabe around this autumn:

X-COM: Enemy Unknown. Re-make of the old GEM of a game - X-COM (or UFO: Enemy Unkown as it was known in UK).

Um, if you loved Civ you will love the Civ 4 mods.  They are still in VERY active development and are absolutely free.  Caveman2Cosmos is probably the most advanced that are in the same theme as original Civ4 (C2C is the current actively developed mod which in the family tree of mods is RoM->RoM2->RoMAND->C2C).  If you want the very innovative transformation of Civ4 into more of a fantasy game then the Fall From Heaven 2 mod and its offshoots are equally fun and interesting.

Civ 4 mods forever!

And by the way, the Civ4 mods make Civ5 look like tic-tac-toe in comparison...

Originally posted by wizyy

Originally posted by ColumbiaTrue

As to a Civ substitute, I would say TOTAL WAR.

There's no real Civ substitute - and Civilization V is an EXCELLENT game, I've played it a lot more than any Civ game (and I've played even original Civilization back in the day).

But I really love any good turn-based strategy game - and it seems there's gonna be a STAR turn-based game availabe around this autumn:

X-COM: Enemy Unknown. Re-make of the old GEM of a game - X-COM (or UFO: Enemy Unkown as it was known in UK).

I've been scratching my head since this thread started trying to think of a good substitute but I just can't. I think you really answered it at least for me. And to be honest, the first one I will always love the best somehow. I haven't tried Civ V though I must admit so I think I will definately check it out.

Interesting to hear not all people were negative on Civ5.  As someone who pumped hours and hours into all iterations of the series, Civ4 is still the one I've put the most total hours into.

Even more than my time spent in Alpha Centauri and MOO2.

Starbase Orion (store link) on iOS has been reasonably fun.  It's basically MOO2 on a phone.  Over the last 4-6 months they've improved it quite a bit.  The AI is a bit slow, but is at least putting up a pretty good fight nowadays (although I think I still haven't lost to it.)  

SO is also multiplayer, though I feel like epic TBS games work well as multiplayer games.  Shorter TBS on the other hand, work fantastic.  Hero Academy (store link) (iOS) is sorta like multiplayer Final Fantasy Tactics / Fire Emblem (but without the RPG advancement.)

Never really got into the Total War series.  Seemed to be a shallow Civ game and a shallow RTS game mushed together, lacking the potential depth of either genre and not ever feeling like it achieved a unique depth of its own.

Galactic Civilizations (epic space TBS) was also reasonably good, although the balance issues always felt a little off.  I've have had some random events submerge every civ in the galaxy beneath a cover of hostile ships, which took a long damn time (like 20-30 turns) to break out of.  Didn't feel right.

Sins of a Solar Empire (epic space slow-paced RTS) is also solid, and I may pick up the new release coming out soon (or maybe it's out now...been a while since I checked.)  It sorta suffered from Total War syndrome (trying to be both TBS and RTS simultaneously) but it nevertheless managed to be fun because it had enough unique game mechanics (leveling up massive capital ships, bribing pirates to raid your opponents.)

I suppose that leads into a plug for Hearts of Iron 3, which is a similar epic, plodding RTS.  Although admittedly I played HoI 2 a lot more, the HOI series is the most elaborate WW2 strategy game I've tried so far, while maintaining a sort of elegance in that you can engage in as much or as little of the complexity as you want.  So if you just want to move units around, you can play that game.  Or if you want to manage economies, research, unit production, diplomacy, or assigning specific commanders to specific units, you can opt in to as much or as little as you want.

BTW, there's huge expansion pack for Civ V coming around May - bringing religion and some other stuff people have been clamoring about:

http://www.2kgames.com/blog/civilization-v-expansion-pack-announced

FreeCiv:  There is a free and open source version of Civilization that closely resembles Civ 2.  You can find all about it, the mods, community, downloads, etc here at the wiki: Freeciv Wiki.

FreeCiv.net:  There was this really cool implementation of FreeCiv called freeciv.net which has since gone down.  It was FreeCiv implemented in a browser using HTML5 (no flash) and it had a Facebook app.  Their servers hosted the game and you could play single or multi-player.  The source code is still available and you could run it locally and host it for you and your friends if you're into that sort of thing.  You can find more info here at the wikipedia entry: FreeCiv.net Wikipedia.

Originally posted by Torvaldr

FreeCiv:  There is a free and open source version of Civilization that closely resembles Civ 2.  You can find all about it, the mods, community, downloads, etc here at the wiki: Freeciv Wiki.

FreeCiv.net:  There was this really cool implementation of FreeCiv called freeciv.net which has since gone down.  It was FreeCiv implemented in a browser using HTML5 (no flash) and it had a Facebook app.  Their servers hosted the game and you could play single or multi-player.  The source code is still available and you could run it locally and host it for you and your friends if you're into that sort of thing.  You can find more info here at the wikipedia entry: FreeCiv.net Wikipedia.

Considering you can get Civ4-Complete for real cheap not sure what value FreeCiv would provide.  Civ4 mod community is the most active of all the civ versions, including civ5.

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by Torvaldr

FreeCiv:  There is a free and open source version of Civilization that closely resembles Civ 2.  You can find all about it, the mods, community, downloads, etc here at the wiki: Freeciv Wiki.

FreeCiv.net:  There was this really cool implementation of FreeCiv called freeciv.net which has since gone down.  It was FreeCiv implemented in a browser using HTML5 (no flash) and it had a Facebook app.  Their servers hosted the game and you could play single or multi-player.  The source code is still available and you could run it locally and host it for you and your friends if you're into that sort of thing.  You can find more info here at the wikipedia entry: FreeCiv.net Wikipedia.

Considering you can get Civ4-Complete for real cheap not sure what value FreeCiv would provide.  Civ4 mod community is the most active of all the civ versions, including civ5.

Some people like Civ2 and its style.  News Flash:  You can like both FreeCiv and Civ4 and both modding communites.  Both games have a different look and feel.  They're not mutually exclusive.  I was just posting some Civ info for the OP.

You can also find a lot of DRM free simulation games here: GoG.com

AoW1 & AoW2 were both great, especially if you love fantasy. The campaign in that game was hella long and hella fun as to where I would say that the games are just as fun if not more fun than Civ.

Also on a related note, I don't know why people didn't like Civ5. I've only played Civ3 and Civ4 and both were great but I love the way that Civ5 has more layers than the previous ones. Civ3 and Civ4 were relatively easy,  especially Civ4 because of how easy it was to tech up and get ahead of your enemies. While in Civ5 you have to actually engage with the other nations and city-states if you want to get anything done.

Originally posted by RefMinor
My Civ loving friend swears by Victoria

had a look on youtube and that's going on my list too thanks!

Originally posted by Torvaldr

Originally posted by gainesvilleg

Originally posted by Torvaldr

FreeCiv:  There is a free and open source version of Civilization that closely resembles Civ 2.  You can find all about it, the mods, community, downloads, etc here at the wiki: Freeciv Wiki.

FreeCiv.net:  There was this really cool implementation of FreeCiv called freeciv.net which has since gone down.  It was FreeCiv implemented in a browser using HTML5 (no flash) and it had a Facebook app.  Their servers hosted the game and you could play single or multi-player.  The source code is still available and you could run it locally and host it for you and your friends if you're into that sort of thing.  You can find more info here at the wikipedia entry: FreeCiv.net Wikipedia.

Considering you can get Civ4-Complete for real cheap not sure what value FreeCiv would provide.  Civ4 mod community is the most active of all the civ versions, including civ5.

Some people like Civ2 and its style.  News Flash:  You can like both FreeCiv and Civ4 and both modding communites.  Both games have a different look and feel.  They're not mutually exclusive.  I was just posting some Civ info for the OP.

You can also find a lot of DRM free simulation games here: GoG.com

Yeah, there are a few who prefer other versions.  Some like Civ2 best, some like Civ3 best, and some lke Civ5 best.  But most people think Civ4 was the pinnacle of that series, and the mod traffic on CivFanatics supports this as well.

But they are all great games so its all good ;)

Master of Magic, for all its borkedness :)