Welcome everyone to the next edition of the Kotaku Game Club. We're going to do a little experiment this month, playing CivWorld, the sophisticated social version of Sid Meier's Civilization. In case you're new to the group, our mission is to play video games together as a group, discussing the narrative, mechanical and human aspects of a game as we experience it. Every week, there will be a column about the section that we just played, and we'll come together and share our thoughts. To be clear, you guys don't need to respond to the column; everyone can bring their own topics to the table. We'll have an official "meeting" during the hour or so after the post is published, so we can have a real discussion.
The discussion of our last game, Shadows of the Damned, focused on the game's narrative. By contrast, this discussion will likely be more about the mechanics of the game, and how they help us shape our own story. Plus, since the Game Club itself is supposed to be an interactive experience, playing a game where we're all frequently chatting makes for a great experience. Like it or not, Facebook games aren't going away, so I think it's high time we did a little group thinking about how they work, why they do or do not appeal to us, and see how addicted we really get to checking and rechecking our cities every day.
The logistics for the game are going to be a little... interesting, at first. As far as I can tell we can't start a custom game, so to kick things off I'm going to just jump into a new game on Monday. When I do, I'll let everyone on Kotaku know the game number so you can find it and jump in. Or you guys can friend me on Facebook so that CivWorld will send you all of my shared announcements. Then, beginning that week we'll meet up on Kotaku every Thursday to talk about the game. Of course, I imagine we'll be talking a lot more than that: We are playing a social game, after all. I hope you're all interested in making new friends.
Here's the short version:
- August 1st, 4pm Eastern: The CivWorld game begins.
- August 4th, 4pm Eastern: CivWorld Discussion 1
- August 11th, 4pm Eastern: CivWorld Discussion 2
- August 18th, 4pm Eastern: CivWorld Discussion 3
- August 25th, 4pm Eastern: CivWorld Discussion 4
There you have it. If for some reason there were to be a scheduling change, I'll announce it both on Kotaku and through the game. I'm looking forward to talking to everyone very soon.