I agree with Kemal too. I think I mostly prefer continents or archipelago. It's a shame there's no random function where you get one of those three (except tilted axes).
What has also crossed my mind is the fact that Kemal was beta tester
and given his reputation at Civ3 he might be much much better than the rest of us.
But there's nothing to do about that, except take it easy on starting this game.