thoughtful critique of the treatment of culture in Civilization III.
Burns, Alex (2002). Civilization III: Digital Game-Based Learning and Macrohistory Simulations. Retrieved 16 August 2008 from here.
Carr, Diane (2007). The Trouble with Civilization. In: Atkins, Barry and Krzywinska, Tanya (eds) Videogame, Player, Text. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here. Response to ideological critiques of Civilization by Poblocki, Myers, Lammes and Douglas, which argues that no conclusions regarding the game's effect on players can be drawn from just textual readings.
Chick, Tom, Meier, Sid, and Shelley, Bruce (2001). The Fathers of Civilization: An Interview with Sid Meier and Bruce Shelley. CG Online, 31 August . Retrieved 30th May 2007 from here. Includes discussion of the early development of Civilization, its design and mechanics, and (briefly) its politics.
Chick, Tom (2002). The Teaching Game: All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Civilization. Computer Games Magazine. January. Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here. A short, wry article ridiculing the claim that Civilization is realistic or educational.
Coleman, Terry and Meier, Sid. (1998). The Sid Meier Legacy. Gamespot. Retrieved 6th August 2005 from here. Reprinted by Thunderfall (2000). Civilization Fanatics' Center. Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here. An overview of Sid Meier's games from 1984 to 1997, incorporating an interview about each game. Includes brief discussions of Civilization and Civilization II.
Douglas, Christopher (2002). "You Have Unleashed a Horde of Barbarians!": Fighting Indians, Playing Games, Forming Disciplines. Postmodern Culture 13.1 (September). Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here and here. Douglas explores the Civilization series' implicit ideologies (of colonization, culture, technology, equality) within the context of the emerging discipline of digital game studies.
Edwards, Benj (2007). The History of Civilization. In: Gamasutra (18 July 2007). Retrieved 30th August 2010 from here. An overview of the Civilization series, followed by an interview with Sid Meier.
Friedman, Ted (1999). Civilization and Its Discontents: Simulation, Subjectivity, and Space. In: Smith, Greg (ed.) On a Silver Platter: CD-ROMs and the Promises of a New Technology. New York: New York University Press, pp. 132-150. Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here and here. An exploration of player subjectivity whilst playing Civilization: you identify with the computer and enter into a 'cyborg consciousness'. Simulation games take geography as the narrative's protagonist.
Galloway, Alexander R. (2004). Playing the Code: Allegories of Control in Civilization. Radical Philosophy 128 (Nov-Dec), pp. 33-40. Reprinted as: Allegories of Control. In: Galloway, Alexander R. (2006). Gaming: Essays on Algorithmic Culture. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, pp. 85-106. Galloway argues that digital games, including Civlization, are "allegories" of today's information society, fetishizing control and resisting traditional ideological critique.
Henthorne, Tom (2003). Cyber-Utopias: The Politics and Ideology of Computer Games. Studies in Popular Culture 25.3 (April). Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here. Assesses the utopian and ideological aspects of SimCity, Civilization and especially Alpha Centauri. As utopias these games allow players to rethink how power is distributed and exercised, though they also betray the ideological assumptions of their designers.
Jenkins, H. and Squire K. (2003). Understanding Civilization III. Computer Games (September, 2003). Retrieved 23rd April 2007 from here. Brief account of Squire's experience using Civilization III to teach social studies in schools, emphasising the contingency of historical events, the ideological biases of games, and their capacity for encouraging critical reflection.
Kapell, Mathew (2002). 'Civilization and its Discontents: American Monomythic Structure as Historical Simulacrum'. Popular Culture Review 13.2 (Summer): pp. 129-35. Civilization articulates imperialist American myths of pro