Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization on Steam - User reviews, Price & Information
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Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is the third offering in the award winning Civilization IV series. A re-imagining of the classic Colonization game Sid Meier created in 1994, Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is a total conversion of the Civilization IV engine into a game experience in which players will lead a European...
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is a strategy, turn-based strategy and turn-based game
developed by Firaxis Games
and published by 2K.
Released on September 23rd 2008 is available on Windows and MacOS
in 5 languages: English, French, German, Spanish - Spain and Italian.
It has received 1,397 reviews of which 1,212 were positive and 185 were negative resulting in a rating of 8.3 out of 10. 😎
The game is currently priced at 19.99€ on Steam, but you can find it for less on Instant Gaming.
The Steam community has classified Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization into these genres:
Media & Screenshots
Get an in-depth look at Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization through various videos and screenshots.
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System requirements
These are the minimum specifications needed to play the game. For the best experience, we recommend that you verify them.
Windows
- Supported OS: Windows® 2000/XP/Vista
- Processor: 1.2 GHz Intel Pentium 4 or AMD Athlon processor or equivalent
- Memory: 512 MB RAM
- Video: DirectX 9.0c-compatible 64 MB video card with Shader 1.1 Support or better
- DirectX® Version: Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization DirectX(r) version (included on install)
- Sound: DirectX 9.0 compliant sound card
- Hard Drive: 900 MB
MacOS
Recommended:
- OS: Mac OS X 10.5.8, 10.6.1
- Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo CPU
- CPU Speed: 2.4 GHz
- Memory: 2 GB RAM
- Hard Disk Space: 1 GB free disk space
- Video Card: (ATI): Radeon X1600 Video Card (NVidia): GeForce FX 8600
- Video Memory: (VRam): 512 MB
- Multiplayer: Internet (TCP/IP) and LAN (TCP/IP) play supported. Internet play requires broadband connection.
- Media Required: DVD-ROM Drive
- Peripherals: Macintosh mouse and keyboard
- Supported Chipsets: ATI RADEON X1600, X1900, 2400, 2600, 3870 NVIDIA GEFORCE 7300, 7600, 8600, 8800, 9400, 9600, GT 120
- NOTICE: Apple original CPU’s only, CPU upgrades not supported.
- NOTICE: Intel integrated video chipsets are not supported.
- NOTICE: This game is not supported on volumes formatted as Mac OS Extended (Case Sensitive)
User reviews & Ratings
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
This game is tough as nails but if your favorite part of the Civilization games is building and managing your towns, diplomacy, and economy moreso than research and warfare, it's a great alternative that still has the Civ flair but offers something unique. Unlike mainstream Civ where you have multiple roads to victory, there's just two goals 1) survive and 2) steal write a declaration of independence and survive a revolutionary ware to establish your new nation. You don't have tech trees and units are flexible rather than being locked in which saves you that frustration of "I made a ton of workers early game and now they're bumming around with nothing to do" that plagued CIV 4 and 5. Each colonist is a blank slate that can be cleared and trained into a different specialty, so if the game keeps throwing tobaccoists at you but you don't have any tobacco supplies, you can wipe them back to normal and send them to school or to train under the tutelage of the local natives. The settlements (equivalent to cities in regular CIV) are the real heart and soul of Colonization and managing them is a lot more hands-on and micro-focused than in CIV, but it avoids becoming too much because the game's scope is a lot smaller than regular CIV. You'll have maybe 3 or 4 and it's wise to monitor their resources, staffing and needs each turn to stay attuned to how efficient they are. The settlements will be quite needy but I find managing them to be a lot of fun. The military aspects are a lot smaller compared to main-line CIV, colonialists can be converted into standard soldiers and you can both go a lot longer without any military units and pivot into having an army a bit quicker than in standard CIV. Usually at a certain point one of the native populations will declare war on you so you should have some defenses and units set up and the big finally is basically the motherland sending their whole army at you so you do eventually go to war, but it's nice to have a more chill game compared to CIV where it can feel like everyone can start jumping at your throat at any time. That the military is less an aspect of the game also means CIV IV's doom-stacks are less of an issue which is an area this actually ages a bit better than regular CIV IV. Having beaten two games of this, I do think the run-up to declaring independence becomes a game of spamming as many cannons and new people as possible to convert to solidiers, and both of my revolutionary wars have been fairly easy (having won on both default and Conquistador difficulties). Since you're purely defensive in the big war, defensive perks like Minuteman will make your soldiers pretty sturdy if you let the enemy come to you, so we'll see if that gets tiresome. I have started experimenting with the Authentic Colonization mod which adds a good amount of depth and supposedly reworks the endgame, though I haven't gotten to the modded endgame quite yet. Something particularly unique about the game is that you have to at least start your revolutionary war by 300 turns. That's it. Mods like The Authentic Colonization and We the People remove this limit to give the game a bigger scope, but I actually quite like the 300 turn limit because the limit combined with the general mechanics of the game made me realize this is basically a PC-game scaled version of a Worker Placement board game and that's a genre I like a lot. It's sneaky, you have to play those kinds of board games to realize it, but it really is mechanically the closest thing I've seen to a board game version of say, Puerto Rico (which is also thematically similar in the same awkward wouldn't-fly-today kinda way). The appeal of those games is you never have enough turns to do everything you want to so you have to make choices and compromises, and on harder difficulties finally squeaking out a solid win with those limitations in place is deeply satisfying. Mechanically this game scratches a lot of itches mainline CIV still doesn't give you a lot of. It's smaller, even a bit cozy, and a nice way to just relax, make some gold, and build some towns. I would love to see a modern game with this scope and gameplay loop though this is one of those "you couldn't get away with making it today" games in the sense that they plaster over a basically all of the darker aspects of colonialism. I would love something that plays like this but there's no doubt this is more the version of history you got in elementary school where the pilgrims hung out with the natives and had Thanksgiving together and Pocahontas had a talking raccoon or something (okay it's not that goofy but it is a lot more rosy than the real thing). There are mods that add a lot more historical accuracy and complexity to the game but the base version is still pretty compelling, especially if you get into it enough to beat it on say, Governor difficulty. Maybe someday someone will make a space or fantasy-themed version that side-steps the awkward theming but putting that aside this is as addictive as any CIV and its tons of fun to build you economic engine, min-max your outputs, build your alliances.
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Its 10,000 hour game and I'm still getting better. Either I'm as thick as mince or there is something good about it.
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Brilliant game, as goods as it gets, and as good as was original one (yep, i'm that old). Strongly recommended.
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Own this game when it came out in the early 90's on 4 floppy's and loved it. I love how they remade it using the CIV 4 engine and its wonderful. Keeping it to the original game with the newest engine of the time, its still a great game to play.
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[ENGLISH] This game is really not as good than it's first iteration... Really not.. BUT!!! I'll highly recommend to try out this game-changing mod : We The People Balance / fixes / overhaul / way more faithful to original game Latest update is from 2023 It makes Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization go from " meh " to " one more turn!! " (Links at the end of review) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [FRANÇAIS] Ce jeu est loin d'etre aussi plaisant que le premier Colonization... Vraiment loin.. CECI DIT!!! Je vous recommande chaudement d'essayer ce mod qui change la donne : We The People Equilibrage / corrections / rajout de tonnes d'elements et options / beaucoup plus fidèle au jeu originel La dernière mise à jour date de 2023 Il change Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization de " bof bof " à " un dernier tour et j'arrête " (Liens en bas de l'avis) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mod https://github.com/We-the-People-civ4col-mod/Mod/releases Tutorial install [ENG] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQBRNTQOBmA Info Steam version https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/important-for-all-steam-users-follow-these-instructions-to-play-wtp-without-bugs.674675/
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Frequently Asked Questions
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is currently priced at 19.99€ on Steam.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is currently not on sale. You can purchase it for 19.99€ on Steam.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization received 1,212 positive votes out of a total of 1,397 achieving a rating of 8.26.
😎
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization was developed by Firaxis Games and published by 2K.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is playable and fully supported on Windows.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is playable and fully supported on MacOS.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is not playable on Linux.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization offers both single-player and multi-player modes.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization offers both Co-op and PvP modes.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization does not currently offer any DLC.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization does not support mods via Steam Workshop.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization does not support Steam Remote Play.
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization is enabled for Steam Family Sharing. This means you can share the game with authorized users from your Steam Library, allowing them to play it on their own accounts. For more details on how the feature works, you can read the original Steam Family Sharing announcement or visit the Steam Family Sharing user guide and FAQ page.
You can find solutions or submit a support ticket by visiting the Steam Support page for Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization.
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Last Updates| Steam data | 23 January 2026 22:10 |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 26 January 2026 21:34 |
| Steam price | 28 January 2026 20:46 |
| Steam reviews | 27 January 2026 20:05 |
If you'd like to dive deeper into the details about Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization, we invite you to check out a few dedicated websites that offer extensive information and insights. These platforms provide valuable data, analysis, and user-generated reports to enhance your understanding of the game and its performance.
- SteamDB - A comprehensive database of everything on Steam about Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization
- SteamCharts - Analysis of Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization concurrent players on Steam
- ProtonDB - Crowdsourced reports on Linux and Steam Deck Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization compatibility
Game modes
Features
Online players
252
Developer
Firaxis Games
Publisher
2K
Release
23 Sep 2008
Platforms
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