so cathartic to see France reduced to almost nothing after two long, drawn-out wars on my little three city civ. Luckily I had Songhai and the Ottoman's in my Egyptian back-pocket, so I was able to eventually force a peace treaty on them by defending from the high ground. I then watched as the other two almost wiped Napoleon of the map, it was great. Alexander apparently had a colossal military presence, but luckily we were separated by continent and we never REALLY crossed paths. Hell, I never left my continent with the four other civs who occupied it, and it was an eight civ game, although I think by the end-game Alexander had wiped out the other two entirely, which was kind of frightening. We started out on a good-foot because we met just as I was pummeling Napoleon, so I get the feeling he respected the military prowess enough to prevent a war or a string of unreasonable demands. Ahem.
So, yeah, just had my first disgusting six-hour session with this game. Won a clean cultural victory with Ramses on difficulty level four. Playing with such a small civ is so dramatically different than my usual play-style, it was really cool to be able to really micro-manage every one of my three cities and relatively few units in the late-game. Usually I expand way out and annex quite a few cities later on, and it really makes everything more... well, not tedious, it's fun in it's own right, it's just very, very different. I think I prefer this way.
If I was going for a diplomatic victory, how do I found the UN? I got mass media like in Civ IV but it obviously isn't linked to that anymore.
Hell, I only just got the Utopia Project up in time. Took a string of three Great Person inspired golden ages (one of which I forced out through culture using the Honour tree's spawn Great General function, which wasn't part of my initial five policies).
What a game. Now, if you'll excuse me, I feel unclean and probably need to eat dinner which I skipped roughly four hours ago. Wow.
edit: oh wow, Steam disconnected so I got no achievements. I can barely contain my indifference.