"Sid Meier's Civilization IV"
Civ4 ties with DoD:S for best game of 2005. Definitely the best of the Civilization games which go waaay back to my college days and the Amiga computer.
When you buy the game, go straight to the end of the manual and read the letter from the producer. It is a good history of the game development as well as a great overview of what they changed and why. This game was a total rewrite and it shows. Often games just add fancy eye-candy graphics and the gameplay sucks - this team reworked the graphics and the gameplay. Even more impressive was their openness to aftermarket mods and their use of open standards like XML and Python.
If you are looking for a way to lose weekends building an empire, look no further. Civ4 is a must have for any PC gamer.
