It continues...

Ironically despite the fact that I was trying to take over the world I still put forth several UN resolutions and they were all passed. I achieved Universal Suffrage, and open markets to name a few of the global achievements that we championed. I lead the other nations by only a small margin but have overwhelming power and still advocate for peace. As a person I almost feel like a hypocrite but as a nation I feel like we are doing this to survive. Oddly it feels like being the United States, in both the past and present. This mentality reflects our warlike mentality at the moment much like the warlike mentality we have as a nation, in reality and in the game. Certain sects of our government advocate for world peace while others (like the president) are working on a war. This paradox almost makes you wonder about the wellbeing of the world and is it healthy for the economy when you have two competing perspectives that operate as opposites in the economic and political realms. They play such a huge role and so interconnected that what happens in the economic world will affect the political realm, and vice versa. In my game of civilization it is almost like the US entering Iraq, engaging itself in this war, and its work on securing a safe, peaceful environment. But these two competing agendas actually work well together. It diversifies the economy so that goods and services are not solely focused on particular thing. Many countries it seems, especially the losers of wars, focus their entire economy onto the war effort and ignore other once thriving industries that don’t aid this purpose. Recuperating from such a blow to their economy is a long and difficult journey that puts that particular nation at a halt for a little while. At this point there is no challenge to my status that I can basically be acquiring whatever I want without any kind of formidable power strong enough to deal with, much like the United States about 10 years ago.

The war begins!

I know it has been a while but I spent that time concocting a strategy to take over the world. Slowly the idea developed to kill off the weakest empire in the world and then move up the list. The Greek empire lead by Alexander includes a lot of territory but has the least amount of points of all. Also they are loved by almost all the different empires and share a border with our empire. So it has made it easy to invade this empire. I started looking for the strongest city and then breaking it down with overwhelming force, kind of like Hitler in the Second World War to expand his empire. My empire now proudly owns Greece's two strongest cities. Also the feeling of war time has definitely sunk in. When the chance for advancement arises the primary focus is now on developing our military power as opposed to culture or economics. This can prove to be a problem because development of our culture will be halted. This also reminds me of the Western world in the 1930's and 40's. Culture was halted and these societies turned most of their resources to the war effort. Although it stimulates economy for the time being it is after the war that most governments don't prepare for. In the case of the losing parts of the war the demand for artillery lowers and therefore so does the market. The economy needs to pick up where this dead market has left off. Scarcity sets in the job market and unemployment begins to rise. In the examples of Germany, Italy, and the other Axis powers, their resources were so diminished that even today the blow that it took in the 1930's is still somewhat apparent in that they are not as strong as some of their peers in the Western World. The winners, however, acquire more resources and more consumers to stimulate and keep the economy going. This is something that is not being rendered in Civilization IV. A global market nor imperial markets play a role in the game, something that is rather significant in the actual history of the world. Without this key player in the game the limitations of the virtual world are painfully obvious.