Instant Addiction
I have just played the best strategy game ever made. Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords came out this week. I was sorely tempted to buy it on Tuesday, but I knew, I knew, that I would get nothing done for the rest of the week if I did. So I waited until yesterday, after school, after work, after the revival service at church… Finally, I was able to start playing last night.
This game is everything Master of Orion III should have been. These guys have done an incredible job.
GalCiv II is a turn based strategy game, where you start off with a single planet, a survey ship, and a colony ship and you go try to explore and expand into the galaxy, research new technology, and even get into intergalactic wars with other races.
The game has all kinds of great features that you don’t normally see in these games. For example, not only can you design your own ships in the sense of choosing what weapons, engines, etc. go on it, but you can customize how it looks. The ship design engine is amazing.
Stardock did a great job of polishing the game too. Not only are the graphics superb, but the attention to detail in the gameplay is excellent as well. For example, in most of these games you can trade technologies with other races. In those games, you can sometime give them obsolete technology along with current technology to get them to give you more stuff. In GalCiv II, you can’t–the opposing race will say ~~It wouldn’t really do us much good to have that obsolete technology, now would it?~~.
I love it. It’s $40, available at your local retailers and via download from Stardock.