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Galactic Civilizations III is out
TychoCelchuuu
PIGEONRegistered User regular
PIGEONRegistered User regular
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owdjizoiqVYGalactic Civilizations III is the third entry in the GalCiv turn based 4X sci-fi franchise by Stardock Games. In this game, Stardock rolled a D20 to from their "list of sci-fi story cliches" and got "crusade of exiled humans returns from the edge of space to wipe clean the slate of life." That's pretty much all we know so far, but if you give Stardock money you can get into the beta and if you give them lots of money you can get into the alpha.
Apparently this game is for 64 bit systems only. This will allow the game to utilize all 64 bits.
Meanwhile, let's reminisce about GalCiv II, which was a cool video game. The AI was tremendous and in fact one of the big selling points was that the more powerful your computer was, the better the AI could get. Instead of just getting more stuff, the AI got smarter. Tricks like "build up a big army and then declare war" didn't work so well - they'd realize what you were doing and prepare for your onslaught.
Another big draw of the franchise is that you can design all your own ships by using a LEGO-esque system where you snap together parts and stuff. That is neat.
Tom Francis, an excellent games journalist who later went on to make the excellent Gunpoint, wrote two excellent diaries of GalCiv II games he played. Check them out:
TychoCelchuuu on
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One of my favorite games of all time. Stardock, like Firaxis, also know how to put together an expansion pack. I sense good things ahead.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
It's going to be fun. Much fun.
Currently playing: GW2 and TSW
You don't need this Scarab. You don't need this.
Is there are reason not to have random events not turned up to 11?
Random Events to hope for
Challenged to a rock off by minor race
Minor Race ascends to major race due ancient dreadnaught being found on their world
Sentient Planets
Sentient Planets giving birth
Death of alien pop star shuts down communication
Savage uprising of insects on uncolonizable world launches asteroid at your homeworld and engage in a bloody war to kill their hive intelligence
Ancient Doomsday weapon starts wandering galaxy, eating planets.
Star Systems moved by strange machines
Unhappy planets form rouge states rather than just defecting to nearest state
Devolution
Few more notes for Gal Civ 2 Gold
Space Time anomolies limit every ship to 5 pcs/week: BOO!
Boiled down, I can build a fleet and send it anywhere, it just takes forever to get there.
For further proof of how bad the situation is:
There were originally 9 of us, the bugs took the missing 4 and the rest of us got scraps.
Source: http://www.galciv3.com/game/gameplay/features
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Real talk, gamestop is find as a distributor and the game codes I get from them actually register on steam (not all, just the steamworks ones) so I have to give them that.
HOWEVER, the Gamestop app is quite buggy on my pc, pops up at the weirdest times, is often inferior in pricing to steam and are often repeats of steam sales, and has often glitched out and crashed many a time.
But the games still work and have never failed to work.
That's a little better than steam's track record, but not by much.
I was just going to come post that, @TychoCelchuuu!
I had, literally just moments ago, thought, "I wonder if anything new on GalCivIII has come out," went over to their website, flipped through the new screenshots / concept art, and come back here to post it.
CURESE YOU AND YOUR NEWSIENESS!
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Yeah my issue with the game was just how much time I'd end up spending creating units instead of actually playing
I'd like something like a universal ship creator across all races where you already have your tech-X frigates and your all-laser dreadnaught.
I also think that restricting ships to one kind of weapon each would be helpful
Want to play co-op games? Feel free to hit me up!
I had forgotten how much fun this is. Turns out I missed the last expansion, back in the day, so now I have some new stuff to try out too.
3DSFF: 5026-4429-6577
And, for the record, as ridiculously limited as the alpha currently is* ... I still got caught up in one-more-turnitis last night. Wanted to boot it up last night just to check out the shiny new graphics, and whoops! I've somehow got three colonies now.
* Because, you know, alpha.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Have they streamlined the tech tree any? That was one of the reasons I could never really warm up to the game that much. There was so much bloat it often became a slog the further the game progressed.
It's a little hard to tell at the moment, because the whole tech tree isn't visible yet; you can only see a research screen where you pick your next tech, and it shows several options across ... 4? ... categories (Civic, Military, etc.). I will say that I've seen a lot of interesting tweaks - one of my favorites is a "specialization" option. Like, once you research basic research facilities ("Pure Research," IIRC), you open up a tech called "Research Specialization," which has three option: Streamlined Research (-maintenance cost), Cheap Facilities (-build cost), and ... Super Effective! research (+10% RP gained). You can research it multiple times (at least twice; haven't researched it the second time to see if you can pick up a third), and each time is more expensive. There are a couple different specialization options (I can also see Drive specialization).
I never thought that the previous version's skill trees were bloated, though, so I might be a bad test case. I actually really like the various techs that got added (especially in the Arnor expansion) that really made each civ unique.
There's also a kind of pseudo-research / skill tree in the civilization morality scale. Various events give you points towards Good, Pragmatic, and Evil - and you can unlock civ-wide bonuses and improvements by spending those points. It's pretty slick so far (only unlocked the first Pragmatic one at the moment). It's a great improvement on the old civ alignment model in GC2.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
The new ship designs are, like, super hot.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]