Play time: 10:30 am- 12:00 pm

This play session, I started a new game to get accustomed to using the mouse and keyboard controls. WHY DID I NOT DO THIS SOONER!?! So many of the questions that I had playing previously were getting answered because I was able to give orders to my militia, fortify my cities, etc. Using only keyboard controls in the past, I was just aware of moving up, right, left, and down. I didn’t know how to protect my cities. How can I fight off hordes of barbarians if I can’t protect my cities?!

So I played at an easy level to get accustomed to using my mouse, which was a very new and somewhat frustrating experience. The graphic for the cursor was not very easy to use. I wanted to play as a Zulu civilization. I ended up playing as a Russian civilization because there is no indication of where on the cursor your choice needs to be. Getting used to the cursor meant that (for a few times) I would click on the choice above on the list instead of the choice I wanted because I was learning as I went along. 

After this experience, I went back to the Babylonian civilization that I have been building up to continuing playing that game using the mouse and keyboard controls. I felt powerful. I was able to fight off several attacks on my cities. I built up a palace! I didn’t know you could do that! Getting this play experience has changed my play goal. Again! Instead of playing as different civilizations to see how it changes the game (because at this point, I haven’t seen any significant changes to warrant a continuation of that goal), I am going to see how far I can take this civilization. Maybe my palace with become bigger. I might figure out the food storage and irrigation element. Who knows!