The goal in Civilization V is to build a thriving civilization and steer it into being a super world power. You can either achieve this by using diplomacy, cultural influence, technological prowess and your military might. To do all these, you need resources. These are not easy to come by and that is why you find many people looking for CIV 5 console commands.
These searches end in frustration since CIV 5 doesn’t have console commands.
Civilization 5 doesn’t have console commands. You cannot enter straight console commands. The game developer, however, has a debug mode and an in-game editor that will help change many things in the game as you would in Civilization 6.
You alternative is the In Game Editor for Civilization 5
You can install the ingame Editor through Steam since this will allow every legitimate CIV 5 user to use the editor. IT is also easier to search it on steam and install it.
However, if you don’t have steam, you can download the in-game editor from Civfanatics and install it on the side.
To use the in game editor:
- Launch the game and select mods
- Check Ingame Editor and select news
- Select single player and set up a game the normal way
- Click the icon on the top right of the Civ 5 game or press Control + I to launch the IGE (ingame editor)
Available Cheat Options in IGE
- Editing Terrain – F1
- F2: This option lets you increase your city building capabilities. With this, you can almost instantly create new buildings or build Wonder in your cities faster
- F3: Change terrain on a mass scale
- F4: Spawns units and gives promotions to existing units
- F6: Edits Civilization statistics. This cheat can add culture, faith or gold to a selected civilization
- F7: Research cheats are the most common editor you will use when playing Civilization 5. This will let you learn any technology in the game with a single click. To use it, shift-click on the Future Tech research project and you will receive one tech at a go.
- F8: Social policy and ideology cheats
Before using your console commands in Civilization 5, you first have to enable this option in the game’s config.ini file. You can do this by following these steps
How to Use Console Commands in Civilization 5
Pro Tip: Remember to backup the config.ini file before saving it. This will come in handy in case you corrupt the file in the process
- Find the Civilization 5 config.ini file located in the game’s installation foler or in Documents/My Games/ Sid Mieir’s Civilization VI
- Open config.ini on notepad and look for the line with the value ‘DebugPanel = 0’
- Change that entry so that it reads ‘DebugPanel = 1’ and save
Launch your Civilization V game and once you are in game, press the Tilde (~) key to launch the command console and change settings. One of the basic cheats you can use here as a cheat is the ‘reveal all’ option. This will show the entire game map at a glance. You can use the Control + Z shortcut to activate this too.
Pro Tip: If you want to make the game easier, you will be better off playing on a low difficult setting as opposed to using console commands for Civilization 5. Only use console commands when running through the game for a second or third time to avoid ruining the experience.