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After playing the simulation game Civilization IV for a semester I learned a lot of valuable lessons on why some societies are successful and others collapse. All together throughout game play I build up about ten civilizations and experienced with many different tactics trying to take my society to top of the food chain. My second to last civilization was by far my best society that I was able to create. I played the game with a great deal of patience and this allowed me to take my time and properly develop my nation state. The problem when you play to impatiently you are not taking the proper steps to secure territories and develop needed infrastructure, and create a food surplus. So originally aggressive military strategies will be successful, but eventually a small quickly developed state will collapse under the pressure of multi-front wars.

However with my successful second to last civilization I took my time and allowed my nation state to properly develop. My population was well developed as well as my technologies, infrastructure, and food surplus. Then when I began to engage in battles I had the resources and man power to win and take on battles on multiple fronts when needed. I almost became overwhelmed when societies from my north, south, and east tried to invade and over take my empire, but time was on my side my society was huge compared to the others so time was on my side and I used it to my advantage.

By the end of my reign over the world my society was the size of the ancient Roman Empire. Eventually I feel my society grew so much it became segmented and no longer acted as one unit. Unity and nationalism are needed features of successful societies and I think what happened was no longer was my society unified and diversity led to the collapse of my society. Overall though the game taught me valuable lessons and helped me understand Diamond’s thesis why some civilizations do so well and prosper and why others fail and collapse.

immigration?

While continuing my conquests in the game Civilization IV I realized one very important factor to the success of a society that the game neglected to address, that being immigration and border control. Sure you can protect your civilizations territories from invaders, but the game fails to deal with the flow of immigrants that either helps or hurts a society, but almost always is there to play a role. In the positive direction immigration can help a society expand their population, conquer more lands, and contribute to either the skilled or labor aspect to the workforce. Or immigrants can drain a society of its resources, social services, and take away vital jobs and positions from native citizens. Another aspect to immigration that must be considered is the social conflict that can result from a society that is multiracial.
The United States of America is a perfect example of society that has drastically changed due to immigration. Originally immigrants played a vital role insuring America became populated and was able to expand as well as drive out any people who “did not belong” like the Native Indians, or Mexicans. Then they provided a valuable labor force that could help to settle vast lands, all positives helping to make America prosper and gain power. Then during period of conflict and war immigration slowed and different groups were not trusted, such as the Japanese during the Second World War. This being a downfall the more diverse a society gets the more ethnic nepotism there is and cultural division can cause stress and strain on the homogeneity of a society. Currently immigration into the United States is mainly from poor third world nations, cheap labor trying to enter our borders in hopes of a better life. Our nation is becoming more diverse and ethnic and class conflict is increasing. Jobs are also being lost and it is clear our nation is gaining nothing if not losing from these people entering our borders. The United States is just one country, one example of a civilization that has been greatly impacted by immigration and it’s hard to believe the game Civilization IV can treat it as a non- issue.
In my civilization that I have been working on the past week or so, I have been extremely conservative in my decision making. My borders are extremely secure to protect my citizens from outside invaders, and enemies. However my population growth was extremely slow, many of my men were soldiers and I had everyone working trying to improve my society. If however mass immigration were possible I could have created a far more technologically advanced society that was more powerful in less time. Immigration is so crucial for societies because it allows for rapid growth in the reproductive age classes, and many times this rapid growth is need in a society to insure stability. I wanted to expand my society and take over new lands as well as battle on multi-front to show my dominance, however this was not possible, I did not have the time or the patience for my society to grow. With any simulated civilization of mine, the downfall I always faced was time; I simply did not have the patience to wait for the appropriate time to make a move. Either my military tactics were too aggressive and soon or I put to many of my societies resources into dominating the world, and not slowly building up like any successful civilization. So even though my societies failed due to my impatience and aggression, if the game allowed for secure borders with immigration I might have had a better chance to develop my society into a world power.

Flaws in Civilization IV

The simulation game Civilization IV focuses on testing a player’s ability to build and manage a successful society that survives the tests of outsides invaders, extraordinary forces and time. However the game is based off very superficial understandings of human nature, society and culture. For example Civilization IV allows you to train, educate, and arm your soldiers but it does not leave room for human ingenuity or technological advancement. Watching the movie 300 over the weekend made me realize this subtle flaw in the game. Everything in the simulation is based off numbers and formulas using training, technology, and numbers to determine outcomes. The movie is almost completely fictional, but it shows the important concept that pride, strength, and quality plays a role in the outcomes of militaristic pursuits.
For example during the American Revolutionary War the British were superior in training of soldiers, number of soldiers, and goods and monetary funds allocated for the war. However the Americans had a desire and dream for independence and there motivation and desire played a role that the game could not understand or use as a parameter in making the game. So after mastering game play I decided to become more aggressive in my military strategy and try to use my superior tactics and training to use my soldiers more effectively and spread them out on multiple fronts. Using this idea that superior tactics and effective training would be enough to make up for my lack of numbers due to how far my troop strength was spread out. This is when I realized the limitations of the simulation it could only tap the concrete date and information, which is perfectly fair artificial intelligence can only go so far, but this limitation really bothered me.
The issue of quality and pride are extremely important throughout the years various wars and battles have shown the importance of desire to win. Every country now knows that mercenaries are not nearly as effective as soldiers from the motherland. There is something that money can not buy and this simulation game Civilization IV can not understand or account for this. Like any game this simulation simplifies everything to make everything a simple computation. Once I understood this the game no longer really represented a challenge to me. I knew the system could not be beat, it is a dry game. Once I understood the structure of the game the fun I use to enjoy was kind of ruined. No longer did I have far off dreams or hopes of what I could do with my civilization. My different strategies in playing the game had all been on somewhat false notions, but now I am no longer playing in ignorance I know there is no way for the game to use the emotions of the citizens and other subtle factors that contribute to the success and failure of societies.
The game still is a good basis for understanding Diamond’s thesis it teaches the player why each of Diamond’s point is true. I guess I just have high hopes for modern technologies, and understand the importance of nationalistic feelings and pride during war times, and I know how much more successful well trained soldiers are in battle compared to hired help. But at least the game does not simply randomly decide the winner of a battle, which would just lead to even greater frustration. Overall the game is as fair as possible technological limitations just pose obstacles that are addressed as fairly as possible.