InnisMod
1. How experienced with the game are you already?
I am pretty experienced with the game. I got hooked on Civ III for about 2 months, and then I recently bought Civ IV.
2. How long did each game take?
I played once and it took about 30 minutes from install to the game's conclusion.
3. Did you win? What was your final culture score and game score?
I lost. I did not note the final game score, but I was in second place, about 50 points from the top Civ.
4. Please note particularly difficult features of the interface that could be explained before students begin playing in order to save them some confusion.
I think you should highly stress that cultural victories are the way to win. Also, having played the game before, I found it strange that scientific research did not matter. I recommend stressing that as well.
In the start of the game, I thought that it might be hard for a student to decide which difficulty level to pick. You might want to provide some guidance on that choice.
5. Notable features of game experience / your reactions to the game
I found the game fun and fast-paced. Will students understand the mapping from cultural score to overall score (what is that, btw)? Will they understand how to improve their cultural scores, or even where to find them in the interface?
I chose to go to war because I thought that some students will inevitably do that no matter what you tell them to do. I lost with 33 turns left. I had concentrated up to that point on culture, but then when I saw Gandhi enter the game, he was so close that I nuked him. Yes, I nuked Gandhi. I wanted to drop his score in a short amount of time, and immobilize his army. I didn't have enough army to back it up and he got me in the end. Why are ICBMs allowed? Will this just distract students?
6. Elements of the game that are related to comm tech that we didn't mention in the assignment prompt (when it is written) that we could add
I am interested in why you disabled scientific research. Without it, the game becomes a free-for-all on who can the build the most cultural stuff in the most amount of time. If this is what you're going for, I think students need to know exactly what each improvement means for them in terms of points (does Civ provide this...I can't remember).
7. Is there any interface text (almost all text is editable by us) that can be changed to make things clearer.
Can you provide a banner when the game starts to encourage students to play a particular strategy?
8. Need to modify / write instructions for downloading / installing STEAM and/or InnisMod
I found a bug after I declared war on Gandhi. His angry face became the backdrop for the map. It was weird. I will attach the game file so you can inspect.