Wow... and I mean wow. I never thought anybody would ever top Civ IV, now I stand corrected. The gameplay is very similar, set in outer space pitting humans against a plethora of aliens in a turn based strategy sim of galactic conquest, diplomacy, tech research and trade the likes of which just blow my mind. The graphics are nice and crisp, yet minimal, the AI incredibly scaleable... haven't encountered any load-time whatsoever for when the CPU is thinking... and when you turn on adcanced CPU algorithm based AI, it's pretty responsive and intense... yet unlike other civ games, the CPU doesn't "cheat" by seeing through fog of war. It's literally designed to be modded heavily, already there's a group making a Star Trek pack for it, you can import your own pics and create your own player or enemy races, scenarios, etc. Cultural, Technical, Diplomacy & Conguest victories, technology and resource trading, Alliances, the works. 3 types of ship weapons and armors used specifically for defending against them... ie: If you use a beam weapon, energy shields disperse them, but hulls and electromagnetic jammers only do the square root of defense, ballistics are thwarted by hulls, missiles are thwarted by eletromagnetic jammers, etc... so customizing ships is key... and Ship customization is EXTENSIVE. You can sit there for hours making the perfect ship and save it to your library for future games for every different situation and tech-level.
Oh maaan... and the kicker is that it runs on systems as ancient as PIII 600mhz w/ 128mb RAM and a 64mb video card. The designer even made copywrite protection minimal so you can install it on every computer in your house and play without the cds. Brad Wardell is a game-designing GOD! If he and Sid Meyer ever made clone-babies, the world would be doomed to an eternity of turn-based addiction!
Galactic Civilizations II
