It's the 19th century and steam engines are really useful in putting railroads through forests etc (but not swamps). You and six other Great Powers of Europe share a map (possibly nothing like Europe) with 16 Minor Nations. Spinning Jenny works not in a factory but out in the fields increasing cotton and wool production.
Conquering other nations may get you a win, but the official way to win Imperialism is to get the votes of a majority of about 120 provincial governors. Diplomacy and efficient manufacturing and trade discounts are more likely to win for you when the council convenes.
It's:
- Railroad Tycoon (but turn-based and with no visible train operation) and
- Civilization (with more diplomacy and lots more products to harvest or create and sell) and
- Colonization (with fewer terrain types but more products, and outputting not two or three tons but one ton for every two you put in)
- reworked; very nicely.
OK, you have to run it in Windows 95 mode, but that's no great hardship.
I love it.
History of my first "normal" game: http://imperialism.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:Robin_Patterson/Imperialism_1
Possible map cheats[]
Gamespot has a page with ideas for manipulating the map. They don't work for me. Here's the link with an extract:
- Map Codes
Start a new game, press [Ctrl] and click on the globe. Then, enter one of the following map codes to start a game with the corresponding features:
| Cheat | Effect |
|---|---|
| Dune | Almost All Desert and Tundra Maps |
| Scotland | Almost All Hills Maps |
| 051195 | All Nations Start With Lots Of Resources Except Purple Nation |
New wiki[]
By popular demand (i.e. suggestions from two respected editors here) I've started a separate Imperialism Game Wiki. It can have the same relationship to this wiki as Freeciv has - i.e. pages linking to its matching pages.