I loved the first Civs and then Alpha Centauri, but since Civ 4 I haven't been a fan. I feel as if they've tried too hard to incorporate RTS elements, ie. you

I loved the first Civs and then Alpha Centauri, but since Civ 4 I haven't been a fan. I feel as if they've tried too hard to incorporate RTS elements, ie. you need X units at this point, or else the enemies will attack you. Now you need to research X/min, or else you'll fall behind, etc. It became too rigid. I think they lost something from Alpha Centauri, where victory could be had with a large range of playstyles. If you held back you didn't automatically get attacked. You could overwhelm with units, small units, or go for odd strategies like adding water survivability, then nuke everyone to raise the water level. You could affect the weather, make super cities with tons of crawlers, or place a regular close grid of a ton of cities. Apart from that the game had a lot of atmosphere, unlike for example Beyond Earth.