Galactic Civilizations III Announced

Andy Chalk

One Flag, One Fleet, One Cat
Nov 12, 2002
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Galactic Civilizations III Announced

Galactic Civilizations III will offer multiplayer action, a brand-new diplomacy system, vastly improved visuals and more.

Stardock is celebrating its 20th anniversary with some pretty big news: Galactic Civilizations III is finally official. The new chapter in the 4X strategy franchise will offer a number of additions and enhancements, including new map features like black holes and Precursor relics, deeper political intrigue, a redesigned ship building system, dramatically improved graphics and online action against other players. To ensure that all the New Hotness is appropriately impressive, the game will be release exclusively for 64-bit PCs.

"The [64-bit] technology allows players to experience a level of graphical detail and on-screen activity unprecedented in large-scale strategy PC games," said Stardock Entertainment Vice President Derek Paxton. "It dramatically increases the size and scope of the maps, and opens the door for modders to add a virtually unlimited amount of new content to the game."

Stardock is offering a Galactic Civilizations III Founder's program for $39.99, $10 off the regular price, which will include beta access and a unique forum badge. True die-hards may also opt for a Founder's Elite Edition at $99.99 that offers alpha access, all future expansions and DLC releases, a mention in the credits and the right to name a star in the game.

Galactic Civilizations III doesn't have a release date yet but it does have a pretty sexy announcement trailer, which I think is a fair trade. More information about the game can be found at galciv3.com [http://www.galciv3.com/].


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Soviet Steve

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May 23, 2009
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What is this unfamiliar sensation, could that be genuine excitement? I feel I must go and dust off GCII now..
 

thiosk

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Sep 18, 2008
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I find it impossible to get worked up by this sort of announcement when the first thing promised is "multiplayer action."
Don't care. Find all of you annoying anyway. Don't need a bunch of neurotic minmaxers memorizing the tech tree and beelining to what not and ruining my space opera fantasy.

In general, 4x games diverge over the choice to partake in multiplayer. I strongly favor single player format.

"multiplayer, improved graphics, and omg black hoels" is pretty much exactly not what I am looking for in a new 4x title. Try again!
 

Xan Krieger

Completely insane
Feb 11, 2009
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BigTuk said:
Gee another Galactic Civ game. Lovely it can do what it does best, failing to be as good as Master of Orion 2.
Still beats Masters of Orion 3, 90% of that game is spreadsheets and the most boring space combat ever put in a game.

OT: Now I just need to get a new OS, still using windows XP.
 

Abomination

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Dec 17, 2012
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HalloHerrNoob said:
Whats with all the story? I hope that wont be a big part of the game...
I know what you mean, the story just didn't ever seem to "work" for the scenarios presented.

A story in a 4X game can only work if there's one big sprawling campaign with "events" depending on your starting race and the races do not get to start on equal footing. Always seemed a bit weird that everyone discovered the same technology at exactly the same time...
 

Bad Jim

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Nov 1, 2010
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thiosk said:
I find it impossible to get worked up by this sort of announcement when the first thing promised is "multiplayer action."
And this is coming from the people that gave us this long and well thought out essay explaining why it wasn't in Galciv 2, even though the programmer had plenty of experience making multiplayer games, and had actually coded it so that multiplayer could easily be added if he changed his mind.

http://forums.galciv2.com/98074

The tl/dr version is:

a) It's a lot of effort and most players don't use it. Arguably it wouldn't be very hard to put hotseat in. Also arguable is that most 4X games at the time of writing were pretty terrible online, and with recent games like Civ 5 raising the bar this is less true now.

b) A lot of design concessions must be made to make it fun to play online. This is the killer. Solo fun is a 20+ hour game with crazy stuff like random factions getting overpowered warships to spice things up. Multiplayer fun is 2 hours max and decided by skill not luck.

If Galciv 3 is fun online it won't be the Galciv we know and love.
 

Adam Jensen_v1legacy

I never asked for this
Sep 8, 2011
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OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD!

I don't know what to say. This is so exciting. I'm so thrilled right now. It's a dream come true.
 

xaszatm

That Voice in Your Head
Sep 4, 2010
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HalloHerrNoob said:
Whats with all the story? I hope that wont be a big part of the game...
Other than that: Great! I loved the second game. Have high hopes for it.

I hope it will finally be a 4x game that gives some decent diplomacy-options.
I'm guessing the story will have the exact same impact on the games as the last two: None at all. Galactic Civilization has always had elaborate plots in the past and used those plots as an excuse to explain why there are so many factions in the galaxy.

OT: OH BOY! OH BOY! OH BOY! OH BOY! I love this series! This is awesome!
 
Oct 2, 2012
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Did I read this right? Have my eyes deceived me?
Has some evil force puled the wool over my eyes?
No?
This is legit? A sequel to one of my favorite games?
I feel genuine excitement at this announcement. I can't wait for more news :D
 

Clive Howlitzer

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Jan 27, 2011
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I hope they finally include turn based tactical combat in this version. That was something I felt always held the series back from coming anywhere near being able to touch Master of Orion 2 as the ultimate space 4X game.
 

thiosk

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Sep 18, 2008
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Bad Jim said:
If Galciv 3 is fun online it won't be the Galciv we know and love.
To be fair, though, I never cared for Galciv.
Theres just something off about it.

In my opinion, scale in 4x games is done poorly, and there is way too much emphasis on the race aspect (disambiguation: 9 alien species attain FTL capability simultaneously in a cube of space. Only one can survive. GO!)

I'm going to have to design my own game to get the one I want.
 

Tiamat666

Level 80 Legendary Postlord
Dec 4, 2007
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BigTuk said:
Gee another Galactic Civ game. Lovely it can do what it does best, failing to be as good as Master of Orion 2.
My thought exactly. I tried multiple times, but never quite managed to get into GalCiv. First of all, the in-game humor and the puns and references to game mechanics during diplomacy (like opponents complaining that you set the difficulty level to easy), really puts me off. I can't take the game seriously if it doesn't even take itself seriously.

Also, Space in GalCiv is unattractive and too unrealistic to appeal to me. Tiles work really well for surface-based games like Civilization, but for space it feels wrong on so many levels. Planets occupy a tile a few squares away from a another tile containing a pointless sun. Everything is static. In MOO2 you had actual star systems with the planets orbiting their sun.
The ship customization is just a pointless gimmick, completely detached from the game mechanics. I assume its for people so bored with the actual game that they hope to find some fun designing spaceships.
Planets are just a collection of buildings that provide bonuses to the same generic production counters. The same with space stations. In MOO2 you could build missile defenses, gravity equalizers, radiation shields... stuff that actually had an impact on gameplay and enhanced the experience beyond just increasing some numbers. Planetary invasions are equally bland.

I don't know. Maybe I would have liked the game if I had never played MOO2. I really like space strategy games and I really like Civilization, but the GalCiv concept just doesn't work out for me. I find it an inferior experience to MOO2 in all respects.
 

Arcane Azmadi

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Jan 23, 2009
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Yay! GalCiv II was one of the serious contenders to succeed MoO II as "best space-based 4X game" with very few real rivals and this should be excellent!

I'm just praying they don't do a MoO III and completely dive into a shitheap by making some simple, fundamental changes that ruin the whole game. Also, that they can improve the tech tree so more advanced ship upgrades aren't just the previous ship upgrades with better numbers. That always kind of bothered me.
 

AntiChrist

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Jul 17, 2009
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Bad Jim said:
thiosk said:
I find it impossible to get worked up by this sort of announcement when the first thing promised is "multiplayer action."
And this is coming from the people that gave us this long and well thought out essay explaining why it wasn't in Galciv 2, even though the programmer had plenty of experience making multiplayer games, and had actually coded it so that multiplayer could easily be added if he changed his mind.

http://forums.galciv2.com/98074

The tl/dr version is:

a) It's a lot of effort and most players don't use it. Arguably it wouldn't be very hard to put hotseat in. Also arguable is that most 4X games at the time of writing were pretty terrible online, and with recent games like Civ 5 raising the bar this is less true now.

b) A lot of design concessions must be made to make it fun to play online. This is the killer. Solo fun is a 20+ hour game with crazy stuff like random factions getting overpowered warships to spice things up. Multiplayer fun is 2 hours max and decided by skill not luck.

If Galciv 3 is fun online it won't be the Galciv we know and love.
As soon as I read the announcement of "multiplayer action", my mind immediately went to that old forum post that you linked. The current news should make even the most optimistic of optimists raise an eyebrow. In what way will the inclusion of multiplayer shape Galactic Civilizations III?
 

AntiChrist

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Jul 17, 2009
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thiosk said:
Bad Jim said:
If Galciv 3 is fun online it won't be the Galciv we know and love.
To be fair, though, I never cared for Galciv.
Theres just something off about it.

In my opinion, scale in 4x games is done poorly, and there is way too much emphasis on the race aspect (disambiguation: 9 alien species attain FTL capability simultaneously in a cube of space. Only one can survive. GO!)

I'm going to have to design my own game to get the one I want.
I'm really curious about what kind of game you have been toying around with in your head. Is it something you would like to elaborate upon?
 

thiosk

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Sep 18, 2008
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AntiChrist said:
I'm really curious about what kind of game you have been toying around with in your head. Is it something you would like to elaborate upon?
Oh lordy I could rattle on for weeks.
Number one design constraint: every race must play by the same rules, because multiplayer?
Number two design constraint: and the game must have a finite beginning and end.

How aliens should act: I use for an example, the enemies in Anno 2070. Rival factions just sort of do their own thing and expand at a set pace, for a static% relative to the player. If the player focuses for two hours on installing a gorgeous avenue on a side island, the rest of the game is content to just sort of let you get along with it. Some pirates over somewhere else are messing with your bottom line, but who cares because you can build right back with 1 minute of attention.

This approach might let you really rethink the way space races work. Looking even at the venerated MoO2, you had angry human, smart human, dumb human, sneaky human, etc. Decoupling the races from the player lets you have different economic concepts for different species. What would currency look like for a race of communal insects, a la tyranids or starship troopers type races? Leads to an entirely new experience to have an economy devoted to eating things vs Food\Mineral\Moohlah. Why do robotic races care about trade in luxuries or money, other than as an exporter? Would they even want to do that?

And another thing. Space travel. Best thing about sword of the stars is every race does space travel its own way. Any game I want, I want the ability to mess with that.

Make the game enemies procedural and then whats going on can tie directly to your exploration. Even the exploration could be made cool. Scale up the galaxy to "real" size, and really dig into what exploration would mean for an explorer ship that could go hundreds of parsecs outside communication range. Turn that into a minigame, a sort of roguelike-- a hunt for artifacts, crazy encounters, beaming things, and getting home with all the booty\info. The rest of the game could just take care of itself while you explore.

All of these things are possible now, but could it smacks of design drift.
 

Jandau

Smug Platypus
Dec 19, 2008
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....and now I have a massive erection... :p

Seriously, though, this is great news. GalCiv2 is by far the best 4X game ever (only real competition to it in my opinion would be Alpha Centauri) and it's about time for a proper sequel. Hopefully it'll expand on the previous titles without dumbing anything down...