FreeCol is a turn-based strategy game based on the old game Colonization, and similar to Civilization. The objective of the game is to create an independent nation. You start with only a few colonists defying the stormy seas in their search for new land. Will you guide them on the Colonization of a New World?
very addictive ! and infinitely customizable1!
I've known about the FreeCol project since the early 2000s but I'd never gotten around to trying it out as the ancient screenshots on their old website didn't exactly blow me away. But in 2018 I decided to finally have a go and omg did I underestimate just how awesome this fan remake of Sid Meier's Colonization really is.
I started a test game to see how it would go if I did a video and within a matter of minutes I was completely hooked. Before I knew it weeks had gone by and I'd barely worked, eaten or slept lol! I loved playing big long games with lots of cities and working with the Indians to ruin the other European nations in the original Colonization and sure enough FreeCol allowed me to do the same but even bigger and better! FreeCol comes with an insane amount of customization allowing you to create your dream game of Colonization. Almost everything you can think of can be changed and tinkered with eg the amount & friendliness of Indian villages, speed of immigration, how demanding your monarch is, requirements of founding fathers, the map generator, colony limits, where European ships start, game years, and even how much the AI cheats lol!
FreeCol comes with a bunch of awesome maps. There's a giant Americas map easily 3-4x the size of the original Americas map in Colonization along with awesome maps of Africa, Australia, and the Caribbean. There's an active fan community making even more maps and one fan has made a huge map collection including an amazing super earth map whose size defies belief!!! And if that's not enough the game comes with a map editor allowing you to modify existing maps, make your own maps, and even load your savegames to create your own maps and scenarios!
Why would I want to play a super-sized map when there are only 4 European players I hear you say? Well fear not for FreeCol has added 4 more European colonising nations to game (Russians, Swedish, Danish and Portuguese) which if combined with increased Indian nation sizes can allow some epic 8 player dream games of Colonization!!! In fact I've already suggested they add some more of the minor colonising nations so that a 12 player game is possible (which fans have now done in a cool mod!), as that would be perfect for the super earth map! FreeCol also supports multiplayer so if you've ever wanted to play a big multiplayer game of classic style Colonization with your friends then now is your chance!
There are numerous improvements to general gameplay in FreeCol as well. There are a whole selection of new advisors and improvements to existing advisors giving you all sorts of interesting information and options to help manage your growing empire. You can now click on Indian villages after visiting them and view what items they wish to trade, who they dislike the most and what skills they train which in Colonization normally could only be found out by constantly and annoyingly revisiting every village and speaking to the chief. Cities have build queues and training colonists is much better too as you can see who's training who and how many turns are left on each.
While the interface and backgrounds are not quite as pretty as the original Colonization, the terrain & unit graphics are awesome especially on the America map (I love the South American Amazon jungles and rivers). Back in the late 1990s when the 2.5D isometric Civilization 2 came out I wished so hard for high resolution 2.5D sequels to Colonization and Master of Magic but we never got them so in a way FreeCol feels like that sequel we never got and makes a good 'in-between' game for when you want to play something newer than the original Colonization but you don't want to play the modern Firaxis 3D remake Civilization 4 Colonization. If only someone would do this with Master of Magic!
Really the only thing missing is a soundtrack but that can be easily fixed by either putting your Colonization Win95 CD in and playing some tracks or hopping on to youtube. After all these years there is still a small team working on this project so if you're a Colonization fan I strongly recommend you download their latest WIP Build and hop over to their sourceforge forum to give them your support!