Subverting Civilization

At first glance it may seem that the only way to subvert Civilization is to not play it—perhaps to have not bought the game in the first place. And yet, to critique something one must first know and understand it; and in the culture of the United States in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, there is no shortage of people willing to buy entertainment. No, escapism through ignorance will not assist in our task of critiquing and understanding culture, games, and how each influences the other.

Instead, we should attempt to see if the game allows any alternate playing—in short, is it possible to have a raised consciousness, to play Civilization, and to not have the one destroy the other?

The first step I took on this journey was to re-evaluate my position regarding the huts. What did it mean to wander through unknown territory, walking into and in the process destroying huts, and reaping whatever riches I found within? I decided that I could no longer steal in this manner. I could no longer strip-mine the continents for metal deposits; could no longer conscript the local peoples I encountered into my armies; could no longer usurp the local rule of tribes and force them to become a city in my civilization; in short, I could no longer be blind to what it actually meant to get the goodies from the huts. The main consequence of this action was that the other civilizations in the game went around to all the huts, reaping the rewards that came with a less heightened awareness of what they were actually doing. The games' designers had obviously programmed the civilizations played by the computer to ruthlessly plunder the huts, in an attempt to win the game. No matter, I thought; I felt this was a small price to pay for conscience, no matter if it helped my competitors to my detriment.

Next, I tried to not be greedy in terms of land. I built only a few cities, aiming for quality instead of quantity. Of course, the game soon became boring. With few roads to build, few squares of farmland to irrigate, and only a handful of cities to foster in terms of building marketplaces and sewer-systems, I soon had nothing to do. To alleviate boredom, I built explorers and went on adventures across seas and foreign continents; of course, since I was abstaining from plundering huts, the adventure itself soon became tedious, and a sore reminder that there were riches to be had that I was denying myself, albeit for good reason. Of course, the consequence of this action was that the competing nations (as long as they were expansionist types) came and used up the land that I had left empty. Once again, the programmers of the game had seen to it that this action on my part, no matter how well-intentioned, would be interpreted as a weakness to be exploited by my competitors.

I refused to engage in battle with other nations, building only a few defensive units in each of my cities. For the most part, the armies of my neigbors left me alone, apparently offering no threat to their plans. When they did attack, I would respond but not retaliate, prefering to let them die in the attempt rather than dealing the death-blow actively myself.

This of course soon led to my refusal to engage in espionage against other nations, no longer willing to steal their secrets so that I could gain knowledge; poison their water supplies in order to decrease their populations; or to bribe their citizens into foresaking their home cultures in favor of becoming members of my civilization. While my opponents continued to send their spies into my cities in attempts to wreak espionage upon me, I mostly foiled their efforts with my own spies. When other civilizations were successful in wresting my knowledge away from me by force, in return I would often send a diplomat to seek an audience and offer further information to them, as a gesture of my good-will. These gestures would raise their opinion of me for a while, but they would soon return to their mistrustful stance, entering into alliances with other nations to contain my "aggression." I was disappointed in my failure to cultivate trust with my neighbors, but realized that this was more due to the efforts of the games' designers than my own attempts at playing Civilization in a way that it was clearly not designed to be played.



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