and having to go out of the way for a mom and pop that agreed to keep it on hold till my parents could take me there the next day, hah.

If you've got the time to play it though, I'd definitely still recommend it. Last I heard it was available on the Wii Virtual Console store for maybe $10 or so, but if you're seriously about playing be prepared to invest at least 60+ hours or so.

I had some friends that would play it all lazy and build a few super units to go through the maps, but those playthroughs would inevitably lead to evil units and an evil reputation, lol.

FUCK THAT though. I never did have an evil playthrough because I was more into playing the "honorable" way... balanced units, high reputation, recruiting everyone possible. Playing this way meant that you had to be fairly meticulous in managing your army to make sure the alignment of your units and your global reputation were all moving up.

And playing *this* way took a shit load of time, but man was it rewarding when you pulled it off.