So you’ve always been interested in the Sid Meier’s Civilization games, but haven’t played one yet. Maybe you don’t usually play computer games, perhaps the concept of managing a civilization seemed daunting or maybe you just didn’t want to pay for it. Well, 2K Games and Firaxis have just banished all of your excuses with CivWorld. It’s a smaller, simpler and free-to-play version of Civilization for Facebook. Just add the CivWorld app to your account and you’re all set…

For the first time, a video game composer has won a Grammy for his game-related work.

Christopher Tin’s “Baba Yetu” took top honors in the 53rd Grammy Awards in the category of Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalists. In addition, Calling All Dawns, the album on which “Baba Yetu” is featured, won the Grammy for “Best Classical Crossover Album.”

Christopher Tin’s sweeping song is the main theme for Civilization IV, which it was written for. The song is sung in Swahili and Baba Yetu means “Our Father.” In case your Swahili is a bit rusty, you can read the lyrics on Tin’s website, although the lyrics are merely a translation of the Lord’s Prayer (obviously a beautiful piece of poetry in any language).

Yes, Civ V is a good game, but that’s more a testament to how good a basic platform Sid Meier developed the current incarnation just seems to be missing so much that was in the earlier titles.

So I have a new game, Torchlight, a role-playing game (RPG) in the tradition of Diablo. I’ve been at it a few hours, made level 30, and still haven’t used a healing potion. The monsters, hordes of them, all die with one hit.

This is a perfectly good game, but I’m bored.

Have I turned into a gaming god without knowing it? It would seem so, since I’m playing at the ‘average’ skill level. I guess I could crank the difficulty up to hardcore, but why is the baseline so low…

The hottest gaming platform going these days may not even be a video game console but social networking site Facebook.

Gareth Davis, a platform manager for Facebook, believes the best is yet to come. He said that Facebook has some 400 million active monthly users and more than 100 million unique game players…

Sid Meier’s Civilization , the acclaimed strategy series that began on PC, keeps expanding its horizons. In 2008, it unleashed a horde of console generals in Civilization Revolution. Now the series seeks to conquer social media with Civilization Network, a title game creator Sid Meier revealed (appropriately enough) on a Facebook page for the new product.

Title: Video Games Live: Volume OnePrice: $16.98 ($0.99 per song download)Release Date: July 22, 2008Publisher: EMI Records Ltd. (Angel Records)Pros: An excellent collections of impressive performances. Often well-orchestrated collections and homages to game music with an honest air of respectability that even non-gamers can appreciate. The name implies there will be a Volume Two.Cons: A few segments are a bit slow and some of the instrumentation plainly mimics or masks the vocals.Overall Score: Two thumbs up; 91/100; A-; * * * * out of five.

No matter where you fall in the games as art spectrum there’s no denying that plenty of artistic efforts are put into many games’ production. Case in point is the Video Games Live tour which offers orchestral performances of video game music that would be difficult for any music snob to scoff at.

The CD (and digital download) release of Video Games Live: Volume One offers selected studio and live performances featuring the Slovak Symphony Orchestra, Crouch End Festival Chorus and various soloists as conducted by Jack Wall.

Click through for a track-by-track review…