Alpha Centauri - University of Butt-Kicking! - Ep 1

This game might be 23 years old, but many still consider it to be the greatest 4x game ever made, with a story and flavour that has never been matched. Playing as University on Librarian difficulty, using Scient's patch: github.com/DrazharLn/scient-u...
00:00 - Intro, Settings, etc...
12:00 - First Turn!
20:14 - Centauri Ecology
27:09 - First Former
28:26 - First Colony Pod
29:50 - Meeting our Neighbour
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[@quill18]

I've played more University than anything else, but I always though Morgan had the best quotes. What's your favorite?

[@devonwilson8306]

My favorite by Morgan is the one about resources existing to be consumed, but my favorite quote overall Is from Lal "Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."

[@martinlarsen7354]

The Spartans were my absolute fav.

[@Draugo]

Morgan has amazing quotes but I do enjoy University most, although haven't played in ages

[@Zephaeon]

All the characters in the game are so good, but I'm fond of Lady Deirdre. A hippy environmentalist that is able to send armies of mindworms after her enemies for polluting the planet sounded really appealing 20 years ago, and it becomes more appealing every day :D

[@garethcunliffe4654]

"Please don't go. The drones need you. They look up to you."

[@demonac]

Most important upgrade is the Trance special ability. Because Trance Formers are more than meets the eye

[@devonwilson8306]

Boooo!

[@Baron-Ortega]

Dear god

[@David_Alvarez77]

Well done!

[@orestria]

goddammit

[@bwcbiz]

Trance scouts aren't bad either if you get Trance before armor.

[@devonwilson8306]

I'm always so hapy to see Alpha Centauri get more love. It is a treasure no one has been able to match.

[@Khono]

Agreed!

[@Serevuin]

The lore of Alpha Centauri is unmatched in gaming since. Beyond Earth tried so hard to capture that feeling, but it just pales in comparison.

[@kittyspam2146]

Beyond Earth didn't even try. "We know our players can come up with better stories than we can so we don't have one" UG! That game makes me so mad!

[@whackedoutpoobrain]

SMAC is such a masterpiece. I've been longing for another 4x with deep lore and a story. This game is such a fun depiction of the struggles Earth was going through in the 90's. The various factions, quotes, and lore really opened my eyes to different worldviews and ethics as a kid, much like Crusader Kings, EUIV, Victoria, and HoI gave me an engaging way to learn geography and history. Beyond Earth was such a wasted opportunity to do something like this for more current times.

[@kittyspam2146]

@@whackedoutpoobrain I learned more philosophy from Alpha Centauri than I ever did in school. And I was well educated in such things for an American.

[@synthetic240]

They try and have a few good quotes, but the big problem is that the factions in BE aren't distinct enough because they can each use different affinities. Their names don't reflect their ideology well enough. The other thing is just how short most of BE's quotes are and how little they say about the this world. AC wasn't afraid to have a cannonical story told, almost Dark Souls-style, via these tech and building quotes.

[@tozmom615]

Yeah, but at least beyond earth did simulate being in space better. It had no atmosphere.

[@shivan2418]

This is, handicapped by time, the best of the Civ series. Vanilla SMAC included MORE features that even Civ4 with 2 expansions. I want SMAC2 so badly. Beyond Earth was just not good.

[@Blefiz]

Civ4 became more than smac by what the gaming community was able to add to it, if you include civ4col as an extension of civ4, it's even more. I would argue that all the scenarios of civ2, in the vast majority built by the gaming community, is also more than smac. But if you consider smac alone, hell yeah, this game is an absolute gem unmatched by anyone other Civ release.

[@inditsnotdenon922]

I really enjoy beyond earth with rising tide, but I still want a remake of this since it was too old for me to experience the first time

[@hanfmeier]

Yang: "Move your troops out of my borders at once!" Quill: "I think I'll just move your borders instead..."

[@alexroselle]

Yang is the only faction leader who I attack on sight, every play through.

[@davidhall6436]

I so wish they would re-master this.

[@quietinsound8087]

I dont know what ive been told, Deirdre built a network node.

[@talltroll7092]

Likes to press the on-off switch, dig that crazy Gaian witch

[@wishcraft4u2]

I love how you can really come up with so many different "builds" thanks to how flexible the social engineering mechanic is, I love how it's actually kind of a "broken", imbalanced game, there's just so many crazy things you can do. The flexibility of the unit design system also works in that direction. One thing I like to do in late game is getting Planetary Transit great project, then equip colony pods with drop pods, so they can air drop from a long distance, and then when they settle, it's a 3 pop colony. Another thing, which I'm sure a lot of people do, is spam supply crawlers and all route them to your capital city, harvesting mostly energy, and then get every possible science multiplier facility you can there

[@jonnunn4196]

For late game colonization on land, I combined a chopper with a colony pod.

[@BjornTheDim]

Well, this is definitely a series I will be following. Yeah, SMAC is one of the older 4X games, but it is absolutely unique in terms of mechanics and story. I lost so many hours to it as a kid.

[@Steel_shooter]

Its the only CIV game I ever return to. The rest got overshadowed by PAradox GSGs for me

[@marshlalor2177]

is quill gonna make me buy a 20+ year old game that I haven't played in 18ish years? at 2 minutes in there is a 50/50 chance

[@anotherone5235]

I still love how they told the story and introduced the characters in the runup to the game with chapters they released on their homepage and stuff...

[@whackedoutpoobrain]

I missed all that! I'll have to look for it. The story in the manual was really fun to read, too.

[@PleegWat]

My boxed copy of alpha centauri came with the entire tech tree mapped out on a poster. And a 200 page manual.

[@jonnunn4196]

I still have my 200 page SMAC manual; however I lost the poster.

[@whackedoutpoobrain]

@@jonnunn4196 ditto.:(

[@ogrejd]

@30:00 - LOVE the photo gallery down in the lower-left when you're talking to a leader. Showing a bit of their old life, even without saying anything outright, is a nice bit of world-building.

[@BlackSmokeDMax]

Could you imagine a straight up HD release of SMAC, with the only change other than graphics being the interface being modernized. Ahhhhh. Hey, a guy can dream. Right?

[@SaniFakhouri]

Maaaan, the quotes (and voice delivery of said quotes) in Civ: Beyond Earth really just doesn't hold a candle to good ol' Alpha Centauri.

[@PlutoniumJesus]

Civilization II and Alpha Centauri are closely related because both games are designed by the brilliant Brian Reynolds.

[@zappslappy]

Holy shit this unlocked a hidden memory for me! I played the shit out of this game when I was younger but totally forgot it existed until seeing this video. Thank you for this!

[@brianchaloux4466]

Alpha Centauri was my introduction to 4X games, before I even knew what the genre was. I'll never forget playing it on my family's Windows 95 Compaq Presario that didn't even have the recommended CPU power to run it! Gotta admit, I was also a sucker for Prokhor Zakharov and the University. Having replayed it years later, I still get feels from this game that no other 4X game has given me. Sure, the genre's come a long was since 1999, and mechanically Alpha Centauri has aged, but the whole *vibe* of the game is cohesive in a way that I haven't seen since.

[@shaneleary88]

Quill, the first time I discovered your channel was with an Alpha Centauri video where you played as Morgan Industries and wore a cool hat. That was around a decade ago. Happy to see you jamming on this one again!

[@Khono]

Yes! SMAC is one of the best games I've played! I loved the quotes so much. My favourite quote to this day which sums up my personal athiesm is "I sit in my cubicle, here on the motherworld. When I die they will put my body in a box and dispose of it in the cold ground. And in all the millions of ages to come I will never love, or breath, or twitch again. So won't you run and play with me among the teeming mass of humanity? The universe has spared us this moment."

[@amshermansen]

30:05 - Quill... Come on. He's obviously the Executive Officer, logistics and so on given his hivemind theme. Santiago is the security officer - her entire theme is military strength.

[@coyoteseattle]

So, according to the old lore website, Yang *was* the chief of security, and Santiago was one of his subordinates. But according to the datalinks, yes, Yang was the XO, and Santiago chief of security.

[@amshermansen]

@@coyoteseattle It's in the game, it's the lore. I'll die on that mindworm infested hill 😁

[@quill18]

The datalinks and the novelizations/lore differ on the positions of Yang (XO vs Security Chief) and Santiago (Security Chief vs Lieutenant).

[@MrRavellon]

@@quill18 datalinks take precedence. Novelization is supplementary material.

[@Blefiz]

You are an absolute beast when it comes to luck!! Not dishing your competency at playing but a monolith at start, followed by minerals in a goody hut, followed by a monolith to a second city!!! And that free colonist? Absolutely 😃

[@Bartdmm]

I was thinking I'd love to see you do an Alpha Centauri run, while I was watching your Civ4 videos. So glad to see you do one so soon!

[@luiz.alberto.soares]

I never played this back back in the days, but after watching a single episode it's already obvious that the game is, indeed, a masterpiece. The voice work is really well done, the flavor text is interesting. 10/10!

[@vaidkun]

this game is one of the best 4x games, it looks old and outdated now, but the atmosphere of this game always soo deep (the narration, graphical style, story line) and it really feels as colonizing unknown somewhat scary planet.

[@Fallub]

What a great start to a new series. I really loved AC back in the day. What a nice throwback.

[@foolchecker123]

so glad to see some alpha centauri from you again. Your old series of this game are some of my favorite

[@per-olofadolfsson4874]

I allways plays as University too, my absolute favorites. Looking forward to this serie alot. Quill explanis everything so well, I have allready learnd several new things. 😃👍

[@RoyalFusilier]

Very happy to see more Alpha Centauri, quill, and thanks for the sections in the video too. We love it folks. All these years later, and we're still finding new things to adore about this game.

[@morphman86]

I genuinely thought this game was one of my fever dreams. I remember playing this game so much. I had both Civ2 and AC. But after like 2004, nobody talked about this game anymore and by 2009, whenever I would talk about it, people looked at me like I was crazy and told me this game isn't real.

[@Ant509y]

God, this is the good shit. Alpha Centauri remains incredible.

[@Ariescz]

If there ever was a game desperately needing a graphical remaster it is Alpha Centauri...

[@DrownedInExile]

Sweet! I agree to sticking with the old factions, didn't really like any of the expansion factions. Since you're also playing Civ 4, may I suggest the Planetfall mod? It's an Alpha Centauri conversion on the Civ 4 engine!

[@tommyvanderkolk3469]

That really doesn't capture the feeling of AC for me, similar to how Civ 4 colonisation just doesn't feel right and is less fun to play then the original colonisation.

[@DrownedInExile]

@@tommyvanderkolk3469 I'm sure it still captures the feeling better than Civ: Beyond Earth.

[@arirahikkala]

Planetfall is really good. It's thematically basically what SMAC would be if everyone knew the score about Planet (and the Flowering and etc.) on the day they land, it's really focused around the ecological conflict. Very different feel from SMAC both in terms of gameplay and theme, and certainly a step back in several ways, but it's a massive step forward from SMAC in plenty of ways as well.

[@tommyvanderkolk3469]

@@DrownedInExiletrue that, i wish that game was so much better then it turned out

[@jonnunn4196]

While I played SMAC almost daily from the time of its release until the time Civ III came out, I never bought SMACX so I would be interested in watching a let's play in which two of the AI opponents were the alien factions.

[@crit-c4637]

Librarian is the baseline difficulty. 3 pop before encountering drones, AI production cost is at 100%, Random events don't occur until after turn 45, Command Center Maintenance starts at 1, then it goes to 2 when you discover fusion power.

[@talonsaurn5764]

Great to see you playing my all time fav 4x of all time, It just has so much going for it...and quoteable too ...The drones need you, the drones look up to you quill

[@kittyspam2146]

OH MY GOODNESS! YES!! - What led you to play this again - this is only MY FAVORITE GAME OF ALL TIME!

[@soft-e4721]

I've been hoping you would do another Alpha Centauri playthrough someday! Excited to watch the rest of this series :D

[@danhasfun]

Definitely agree regarding Conquest victory: makes it far less tedious not having to boop every capital late-game.

[@witchfynder_finder]

LOVING the classic games renaissance here, quill!!

[@classicfrog80]

Omg. What a gem of a game. I love that you go back to these classics, Quill! Since you're doing that, how about "Master of Orion 3"? Yes, I know it's not very popular. But it's greatly underappreciated in my opinion.

[@justinmohammadi4583]

So excited for this series!!

[@PinkUnicorn1996]

Omg yes! Alpha Centauri my old friend

[@AnonAdept]

retro gaming, love it. keep the content flowing.

[@devonwilson8306]

You mentioned the novel, I forgot I had the whole trilogy at one point.

[@Mankorra_Gomorrah]

Damn, i remember watching your Gaia play through way back in the day and loving it. It made me really look at contemporary civ games in a new light knowing how high the high water mark had been.

[@mrchaos4222]

On my, this take me back. My all time favorite startegy game.

[@dharlith7495]

yoooo! thanks for the new Alpha Centauri playthrough

[@maxjag151]

I love this game. I spent so much time in that world back in the day.

[@JacksonOwex]

I can't resist so here it is: "BUTTKICKING FOR GOODNESS!" and I suppose: "MAJOR LEAGUE BUTTKICKING IS BACK IN TOWN!" Boy, I'm old!

[@bwcbiz]

Random notes: Conquest victory is either own or get other civs to submit to a "Pact", essentially making them a tributary state. Not % of land area. Very first mindworm combat (for the player/(each player?)) in a game puts the worms at half-strength, at least on Talent/Librarian difficulty, so not "very lucky" just moderately. Personal preference for early-game scouts: don't level them up on a monolith until after they've gotten at least one level up on their own from combat. Experience levels are harder to get as they get higher. One of the big reasons I like to see these older 4x/Civ style games still in use, is that games in the 4x genre have been getting more and more complex, moving into Grand Strategy territory. These older games provide a simpler entry point for new players in terms of gameplay, even if the graphics and UI leave something to be desired.

[@teknifix]

I've played many hours of this game. Sometimes some of the quotes from the research pop into my head from time to time. The university was my favourite but I have transcended with them all. It's great.

[@kittyspam2146]

What is it like Transcending with Miriam - that always seemed like an odd but actually arguably lore appropriate choice but one I never did.

[@kiroh1]

I haven't dug it up, but I think I still have the massive manual this game came with. I love this game!

[@jonphaedrus]

I'll have to make a playlist of this, when it's still starting!

[@williambarnes5023]

Yang doesn't start with a colony pod, he starts with growth and industry. He just actually builds pods that fast.

[@adisander]

What a time to be alive!

[@stevepittman3770]

OMG SMAC, I haven't thought about that game in a minute. Singularity deathspheres for great justice!

[@Khono]

For those that do not know, many of the Secret Project movies, the visuals came from Baraka. Crazy film a lot like the Qatsi trilogy.

[@skodass1]

This brings back some memories

[@couguard]

YES! More alpha centauri!

[@ClockworkOuroborous]

There really needs to be an Alpha Centauri 2 that's an upgraded version of this game, not the later release.

[@jms31896]

I love the chapters on this video. I've only heard about this game, great to finally see it being played. Sidenote, will you be playing Beyond Earth? I loved it and thought they could do so much with it but it kinda of just stopped

[@fl4shb4ckGaming]

I dug out my old CD of the original game the other day and thought about installing. Then remembered that the last CD drive I owned was sent to the recycler 5 years ago. The fields are bright of morality. So shall I take my compass to the dark and lighten up my day.

[@SteamvilleQuintet]

Nice job, thanx!

[@TheBrightaurora]

After SMAC I think it's time for a Colonization run!

[@PaulJeanmard]

Still one of my favorite games - I played it for years and need to get it on my new pc.

[@poilboiler]

LOL at "the survivalist" faction being named after a people who drove themselves into irrelevance.

[@ClockworkOuroborous]

Alien Crossfire... so MANY memories.

[@bimbkin2830]

oh wow i haven't played this game since it came out damn!!

[@viperswhip]

Well, for your first colony I was just saying, on the river, on the river, on the river, then D'oh! You get a bonus energy production on river squares and your base could use that obviously. Drill to Aquifer is actually a very powerful ability of formers I don't see people use often, every river square is +1 energy.

[@IvanDogovich]

Such a great game this one! Too bad nothing ever quite created the same experience. Cheers, Ivan :D

[@urbangradisek5695]

oh i remember this was i playing before civ 3 comes out i vas in high scool ajajajaja memoris,nostalgia this is crazy

[@johnpittman3756]

I have had this game on every computer I have owned since it came out! Love University and Pirates. Lady Deirdre ok, but found was more limited in approaches for win.

[@xxacidmv]

I have been waiting with bated breath for this since you announced that you started an AC game.

[@Aether911]

Ooooh, you're really treating us these days :D By the way, I wonder if you've ever given a try to Pandora First Contact, it was an Alpha Centauri successor-like that came out a few month before Beyond Earth and it does some really interesting things with ressources and pop growth that I haven't seen picked up by anyone else since.

[@kittyspam2146]

I have never heard of this game before but looking at it on steam it really does look like a modern Alpha Centauri - one question though does it have the same story type events / story progression of AC?

[@shdwbnndbyyt]

I miss Civ & Civ 2... still own a few Civ2 versions, just not on my current computers. Biggest issue with Civ was the memory leak issues when you tried to colonize the entire world. Mind you for Alpha Centauri I used to LOVE the capturing and "reeducation" of the enemy civs' leaders.....

[@ManTheMaker]

You kept mentioning that the wonder animations broke the resolution in Civ 4, but I'm pretty sure it's this game that has that problem... And I was hoping somehow that would be the link needed for you to play this again!

[@quill18]

Good news: I'm playing this in the original resolution just because we can see wonder movies!

[@HRPufnsting]

I say always go abundant native life, bonus for score if you care about that but the big benefit is the free exp and money you can get, just send units to patrol in fungus and reap the exp and credits you get from slaughtering mind worms over and over.

[@jonnunn4196]

Indeed, I always did that; and combined it with going Green for several turns to capture some land worms and switch to those for patrol.

[@newCrysis]

Just finished a Gaian playthrough. Love capturing worm boils and increasing my army for free.

[@kjriwoutube]

Network node best quote

[@binaryblade2]

Just FYI the blind research is funny because the boxed version of the game came with a full size tech tree poster.

[@Sahuagin]

FYI some definitions: "probe" is spying (there are units for this). "drone" is an unhappy pop. "talent" is a happy pop. non-gameplay: datalinks is the internet (sort of I guess? maybe just the data-archive part).

[@isaackellogg3493]

The faction I have the most trouble with is the Spartan Federation. This is because I tend to set up the early game to max out Morgan or Zakharov. This requires city placement to max out a certain early-game Wonder, which in the patched versions of the game gives a strategic advantage throughout the entire game. It frankly boggles my mind that everyone always advises people to skip this Wonder; it is definitely pays for itself in under fifty turns.

[@jonnunn4196]

39:30 - That's really brave using the goto command on a unit with no defense before the first sensor array was built in an area that has fungus; that command was notorious for ignoring that mind worms could spawn off of any fungus that wasn't within sensor range and routing them to where they'd be killed by a newly spawned mind worm if the command wasn't cancelled in time.

[@mrluga]

Man I need another Alpha centauri game. Come on Firaxis!

[@daviddyer3543]

I'd like to see Firaxis remake SMAC and the Alien Crossfire expansion with newer graphics and sounds.

[@jankodes197]

Hi what former strategy do you like more - forests everywhere or specific (eventually even planet unfriendly) improvements? The forests grow naturally and get more and more bonuses as you get specific research, so I like them more.

[@benbaselet2026]

When AC came out I remember pretty mixed feelings about it from a lot of ppl. It has certainly aged well.

[@smcasas9367]

Do Fall from Heaven 2 next I always hated Miriam when I was a kid, but now I think she may have been right all along. "Will we next create false gods to rule over us? How proud we have become, and how blind." That being said, I still prefer to play as University.

[@kekohokko7213]

I will set up the governor to my needs in the first base since bases created aftewards will inherit those settings. If you end games with hundreds of bases, that comes in very handy.

[@exCLOUDyGH]

I played many hours of Alpha Centauri, never had Alien Crossfire, and always played with the Gaians (Geanos in the released version here in Spain). My favorite quote is from the Secret Proyect, The Weather Paradigm (El Paradigma Climático, here in Spain).

[@HansLemurson]

23:37 Walking into fungus can indeed spawn mindworms. I think there are tactics for deliberately "farming" the mindworms this way.

[@wanderingursa8184]

I was today years old when I too realized that his title isn't "proctor" ... Damn.

[@quill18]

RIGHT?!?!!?!?!?

[@wanderingursa8184]

@@quill18 by the way, when you coming back to Denmark? The drones... I mean... We need you, we look up to you.

[@kittyspam2146]

same ...

[@jonnunn4196]

29:30 - SMAC, had strict habitation limits. For University like most it was 7 / 14. (Add two with a special project.) That second hab improvement is late game after it was obvious the game was already won so "minimum overlap" is far from ideal; instead the most important was placing cities close enough to avoid holes in which no city could work (unless using the supply crawler exploit)

[@ashtiboy]

but theres one third final hab upgrade tech that removes the cap compltey as long as you have enough nutrients to feed them from what the wiki says alsothat one fnal hab upgrade was called the habtation dome that makes your max pop to 127 witch is the highest pop vaule the game can work with also use the sky hydroponics labs with it to snowball the pop gains in the end game

[@billtang79]

I loved playing as the Gaia stepdaughters. The ecological warriors. They can tame those alien life forms easier and using telepathy to defeat enemies units in the early game means emphasis on military tech is not as important in the early games

[@francismurtagh3295]

I bought the big box of this at a carboot sale for 4 euro recently with tech tree and manuals etc

[@ErzengelDesLichtes]

God I miss Alpha Centauri. I wish they would remaster it: improve graphics and allow infinite unit designs. No other changes, everything else is perfect.

[@YourXavier]

The Hive is great for rapid expansion. Since the Hive gets no efficiency penalties, Police State and Planned are super overpowered; you grow fast, build fast, and can support more units. Along with the free perimeter defense, you can push out hard without worrying about being overextended.

[@jonnunn4196]

You are indeed intended to take those two polices with the hive and the AI of the Hive is also flavored to take them as well. Which is why one of the first patches after release give him an immunity to the efficient penalties from those two policies. But also try the Peacekeepers with Democracy + Planned for every city to grow up to habitation limit. (This also works for any faction able to pick both of those that doesn't have a growth penalty, but Lal gets two extra population supported by hab limit.)

[@ZeroCGR2]

What is this? Reverting to previous Civ games? Are you planing to play Test of Time?

[@Skycroft1000]

I've resigned myself to being the weirdo about this game, but I actually don't like it very much. The _gameplay_ that is, just to stress. It is still very possible the best strategy game _ever_ and one of the best video games period when it comes to theme, narrative, and atmosphere. But I just cannot get over how much I dislike actually playing it (and before anyone suggests Planetfall, I feel the same way about Civ 4). It is fun even for me to watch, though, so thank you for this playthrough.