Where is the Save Game Feature?

Sid Meier's Civilization series has been one of my favorite franchises in video games. I started playing with Civ II and have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours in the many variations of the series. Civilization V is the current edition, and Brave New World is the latest expansion to this staple of my gaming life.

Since it has been a while, I wanted to start my exploration of Brave New World in the tutorial to get my feet wet and get my bearings. So I fired up the game and got started…

I entered the game as Oda Nobunaga with the goal of leading the mighty Japanese empire to world domination. As Japan, I was provided with the unique ability of Bushido which allowed my units to fight as though they were full strength even when they were damaged – this looks pretty good so far. I also would gain extra culture from fishing boats and atolls – culture is always good to expand cities and to take over neighbors.

Along with benefits, each civ gets a couple of special units – the Japanese get the Samurai and the Zero. I'd go further into these units, but I did not come close to being able to produce either of them, and the reason will become clear.

I started the game as I felt would be beneficial, by founding my first city where my settler initially landed. Kyoto was built with citizens set to form a worker unit and research started on pottery.

All seemed to be going well, the nearby barbarian brutes and their encampment proved no match for my mighty Japanese warriors.

I met our French neighbors and they seemed peaceful…for now…

And then the real world called. I needed to put the game on hold and take care of some things so I saved the game…actually, I looked for the save game command…not in the menu…the hotkey did not seem to work…what was happening? 30 turns into a tutorial which I figured would go at least 100 and I could not save the game. There did not appear to be an auto-save of the game yet either.

When all else fails…Google it…

Apparently the tutorial does not allow game saves.

Oh well. I guess I win. At least I now know that I have to play a 'real' game to get the full flavor of Civ V. I do think it is interesting that a game that usually takes many hours and hundreds of turns to complete does not provide a save feature in the tutorial. I don't see how that could be good for people just starting out with the franchise – unless you tell them beforehand not to start the tutorial unless you have a few hours to burn.

Anyway, now that I know, I'll be starting fresh outside the tutorial.