Cultural victories are the ones that tend to stick. You can bomb people into oblivion, but they often just come back from oblivion fuming about it. Hit them with Shakespeare, though - or with Starbucks - and you've dealt your enemy a blow that's much harder to shake off. If all-out warfare's like going to your neighbour's house, ringing the doorbell and then smacking them about the face with a snow shovel, cultural imperialism is a little sneakier - it's more akin to dropping a load of termites over the back fence under the cover of night. Termites that write the popular hits and star in the popular films as they munch through your rival's territory. Termites that come bearing flat whites and frappucinos.
Civilization V continues to be one of the most popular grand-strategy games you can play on Steam, for about three years.
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Philip Boyes:
When I was a kid, I played a lot of Civilization 2. I played a lot of strategy games in general, but having a deep love of both history and sci-fi, the epic sweep of Civ 2 from prehistory to the stars held a particular appeal. I loved taking my little people from their huts and ziggurats to the world of science and advanced space-flight.
