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From the archive: this review first ran on the Mac Gaming Alliance (MGA), the Mac games site that lived here on DimensionZ in the late 1990s. It was published around 1998 and is reproduced as originally written. More in the Mac Gaming Alliance archive.

Imperialism is a game of development and conquest like Civilization, but in Imperialism you conquer the world in style. The game, set in the 19th century, focuses not so much on brute force military domination as expansion through economic development, trade, diplomacy and finesse. Of course, for you hard core war gamers out there, you can crush your enemies under the treads of your tanks and take every battle down to the tactical level, fighting out your individual battles unit to unit, saber to bayonet, if you want. This game features a sophisticated AI, some of the most advanced computer diplomacy for the genre and a wonderfully crafted economic model, each of which compliments the other beautifully into a tightly woven strategy game not to be missed.

Gameplay & Interface

Gameplay in Imperialism is its finest asset. Your empire operates in a complicated web of material and monetary interdependencies. It is usually not until late in the game that your country becomes completely self sufficient. In this respect, it is very unlike Civilization or Colonization. You simply cannot afford to run your country like an island with your foreign relations limited to the end of a gun. This web of economic interdependency is nicely complimented with a sophisticated diplomatic AI that will boycott you economically if you appear too aggressive or attack you militarily if you become too weak. In every case, the player must balance his desire for military conquest against the likely response by the international community upon whom he depends for raw materials and monetary income, without which he cannot build reinforcements for his armies, upgrade his factories or train new workers. All the while, the player must woo smaller countries into his protection so that he can develop more dependable economic ties to them to secure his future production in the war torn days to come.

The game typically goes through several phases. There is an initial exponential growth phase (usually typified by the flat part of the exponential growth curve) in which the player tries to build domestic infrastructure, trading relationships and industrial capacity as quickly as possible. Once local supplies of materials become inadequate to your needs, the game progress to its second phase, which is intensely political. All of the major countries compete for advantageous trade agreements with the lesser countries, with an eye towards making them colonial protectorates. How well you succeeded in early phases of the game can influence how well you can take advantage of the added resources made available from your colonies. When all of the lesser countries have chosen sides, the game enters a late stage zerosum end game in which the battle lines have been drawn and every gain is another major power’s loss. If you have not already won by this point (every ten years, the countries vote for the most dominant player in the game) then the Napoleonic conquests begin. Great armies mobilize, major power alliances can shift and bend, and you might find yourself warring with another country far longer than you wish to in order to protect hard won alliances which keep your shores safe from aggression.

Almost every aspect of Imperialism is rich with diversity. In contrast to Civ’s single settler unit, Imperialism has a prospector, a miner, a farmer, a rancher, a lumberjack, an enginner, a wildcatter and a developer who’s sole job it is to buy land in other countries for development, with the ultimate hope that these countries will then sell those resources to you of course, they might not! Likewise there are eight land military units plus two technological upgrades for each unit type which can significantly alter tactics during battle, and up to eight different naval unit types at any given time. Finally, you develop eight different factories to produce different types of goods for export to pay for your expenditures. There are approximately twenty commodities in all, to be bought, sold, traded, shipped and refined. I never felt short changed or oversimplified in any area, except perhaps for naval units. There is no tactical engine for naval units. Battles just happen and you find out about it later. You won’t be capping any T’s in this game.

The Imperialism interface is very clean and uncomplicated, allowing you to focus on the game’s best features: strategy, diplomacy and empire building. The programmers worked hard to eliminate the rampant micromanagement present in most strategic games. They did so by reducing the number of micromanageable economic centers to one, your capital. All the rest manage their own affairs and simply add their economic output to your transportation network for transport to your capital city for processing and refinement. Your military units move in groups as armies, which may be divided and combined as necessary, greatly simplifying the task of piece movement. All diplomacy is handled in a diplomacy window, which is accessible from a single click just about anywhere. Likewise, trade and production each have their own easily accessible windows which allow for quick adjustment of production and trade to feed your growing empire. You do not have to wait for the computer opponents to move at all. All moves are handled simultaneously, much like in diplomacy. Battle reports are concise and informative and you have the option of micromanaging the land battles yourself if you like. Technological development seems slower than in civilization, but considering the historical time period the game covers (mid 19th century to early 20th century), and that turn lengths are measured in months and not decades, that is to be expected. The technology advances are real, for example square frame timbering for mines or rifling for guns, not like the contrived advances in Colonization.

Graphics & Sound

The graphics and sound in Imperialism are unexceptional. They are not bad, nor do they detract from the gameplay, but they lack any special eye candy that modern gaming afficionados might find interesting, such as rippling water, a detailed 3D interface, or impressive special effects. Views are usually either 2D or 3D with a rather flat appearance. The maps are obviously hex based, with no attempt to hide the grid like in Warcraft, Conquest of the New World or Command and Conquer. Perhaps simply to address criticisms such as these (small though they may be), there are several video clips which break into the game from time to time which can certainly be classified eye and ear candy. The sounds is not smashing. In a quality pair of headphones, it is clear that the sound sampling rate in these video clips is not 22 kHz, or possibly the soundtrack went through a hiss laden cassette tape at one point! Unfortunately, these video clips don’t really add much to the game, and after the initial viewing, just serve to delay your progress. Fortunately, they don’t appear very often and can be dismissed with a single mouse click to get back to the real business at hand, which is quite interesting indeed! Let it be clear that for all its unexceptional aesthetic qualities, the graphics are very functional, and do not detract from the game in any way. In some ways, their simplicity is a boon to the game, an extension of a simple and well thought out interface.

Difficulty & Replayability

Imperialism is a challenging game, with an array of difficulty levels to challenge conquerors of all levels — from the Napoleans of the world to timid knights easily defeated by shrubbery. Challenges come from all sides. You will be faced with an initially severely constrained economic system and raw materials shortages. Diplomacy is expensive and you will need money. For that you need goods to sell. You will have to locate and transport raw materials to the capital, build factories to process them and ships to sell the processed goods. Mines will need to be dug, fields plowed, trees chopped, oil drilled for, and railroads and ships built. Lastly, you will need to provide for your defense and ultimately develop a military industrial complex which can satisfy the needs of a great military power. In each case, having the right allies is key to your success. They supply raw materials, buy your products, sometimes protect your shores, boycott and blockade your enemy and help you conquer enemy lands.

Imperialism has a fairly high replay value, but it could be better. Chiefly detracting from the replay value is the lack of computer opponent diversity — all the computer opponents play identically. Fortunately, Imperialism can be played over the net against human opponents which should resolve this problem, or would if you could find other macintosh players. Currently, Imperialism does not allow you to play against people on Wintel machines — despite the fact that both versions come in the same box. Fortunately, if you do have access to an x86 clone, then you can use your CD to play Imperialism on it. No need to buy an extra copy.

Caveats

The CD must be in the drive to play the game. Users without a CD-ROM drive, such as most powerbook users, can use the CD, Disk Copy and a borrowed CD-ROM drive to make a 115 MB disk image to replace the CD. The mac version of the game will not play networked games against the PC version of the game. Networked games may be played by TCP/IP or Appletalk. The CD comes with both x86 and PowerMac versions on it. This means that whatever computer you buy next, the game will run. It also means that you may have to look in the PC games area to find it in your favorite computer superstore. I encountered no bugs to speak of.

Conclusion

Imperialism is a must play. Its intricacies are complex and nuances subtle and its economic and diplomatic components cannot be ignored, so it may not be for players who live for brute force combat alone. For these people, there are other SSI products like Panzer General. Imperialism is perhaps the most interesting game from the Civilization genre I have ever played, and comes highly recommended. It’s interface is clean and micro-managment is kept to a minimum. Even late in the game, turns continue to move quickly. The computer AI is sophisticated and well integrated into the game. However, I expect that where the game truly shines brightest is in multiplayer play. Better start searching for macintosh players though, since SSI did not see fit to make net games with PC players a possibility.

For a list of mac and PC Imperialism net players and forming net games, check http://www.concentric.net/~tfumia/Imperialism.shtml

Find a copy

Imperialism has been out of print for years, but used copies of the original Mac release still turn up, and some classics have been re-released for modern systems. Search for Imperialism on Amazon.

Ratings use the MGA’s original 1–5 apple scale. Prices, system requirements and web links in this review are from the time it was written.