My Minecraft playing has taken a bit of a dive since Civilization V came out, but folks are still creating wonderful things. Most of this stuff comes to fruition with the aid of addons and creative mode styles of play where resources are infinite. Neither of which I have much interest in, mainly because they require downloading something, bringing the files home, and hoping they don’t need additional assets to run. Getting something from the internet onto my home machine can take days.

In my world, I’ve created a nice little pad on top of a hill, with an underground passage up from the base so I don’t have to hop up the hill every time I return, and some trees in the courtyard. I go out and explore the mines and I return with my spoils. It’s fun and kinda relaxing and expressive. Most games take place in a three dimensional world, but they’re very linear. You get from point A to point B in one particular way. But a really simple aesthetic that gets procedurally generated, like Minecraft, can be way more flexible. I found myself trying to get from point A to point B in a straight line at one point and having a lot of trouble until I realized that all I had to do was dig around the object that was blocking my path and contain it. In most games, the way you proceed is by killing everything before you. Not necessarily the case here.

Civ V is great, by the way. I was never a big fan of the previous 4 but for some reason I’m really taking to this one. So far I’ve played three complete games. My first two games went a little bit like this. Never thought about a scenario where I didn’t murder everything, as with Minecraft. But also I guess I didn’t know there was any other way. Last night though, I had my first diplomatic victory. Which isn’t to say I didn’t get into scuffles. In order to expand my empire I did have to step on some toes and that makes people mad, and then they want to fight. And I fought, but when they begged for mercy I gave it to them. And the people were happy. And I made a lot of money. And when the UN put it to a vote, they voted for me. Now it’s time to take off the training wheels.

So, two games showing the way to victory isn’t always about killing something. Both are creative and expressive and about solving problems and thinking critically. I like it.