The voting for most USABLE Icon package has started.  Anyone with a WinCustomize.com account can vote (not just subscribers) to let judges know their preferences (the judges make the final call).

But the quality of this year's entries are simply stunning. Check out the link below and be sure to let authors know what you think of their excellent creations!

When the November beta of Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar hits it'll be pretty apparent that it would have not been a problem to maintain the original November release date of the expansion pack had we kept the original feature set.

So the question is, why add more features?

The simplest answer is that Stardock is privately owned. There really isn't a good business justification. Believe me, we've tried to come up with a plausible marketing or publishing reason to add more features to the expansion pack but it always comes back to the same answer -- because we wanted to.

There were just a couple of things that we just didn't want to have to wait for some future sequel for.  The number of new little touches that aren't even being mentioned in the bullet points will become pretty apprarent (like re-texturing starbases and components and such to look nicer). And we just wanted to have these things in there so that when we are working on other games (there will be two more Stardock developed games before we even contemplate a GalCiv sequel) we weren't feeling regretful for not getting to them sooner.

The Mega events and the unique features I think are two key ones that are pretty time consuming to get right (and balance and write AI for).  I hang out on a lot of forums. I don't usually post but I read them.  While most people like GalCiv II, there were a couple of complaints that came up time and time again:

1. After awhile, the game felt repetitive.
2. The alien races were generic to play as. Why play as the Drengin vs. the Arceans?
3. The technology tree was unwieldly and uninspired.

My view is, if some people felt that way after 8 months, imagine what it would be like after 3 years. I want to have a game that people would still be enjoying years from now.  BTW -- another argument for no CD copy protection -- you can keep the game on the hard drive for years without keeping track of some CD/DVD and occasionally fire it up years later.

A word on what we mean by a stream-lined technology tree...What we don't lke about our technology tree is this:

Laser I..Laser II...Laser III...Laser IV...Yawn.

It's just totally uninspired.  So what we're going to do is reimagine how the technology tree is displayed. There will be MORE technologies total. We're not nerfing the tech tree.  We are just looking for better and more innovative ways to present it. 

The idea we're playing with (that won't be in the beta) is the concept of Milestones.

So when researching weapons you would see Lasers. And instead of there being Laser I, Laser II, etc. It would just be Lasers and you would hit multiple milestones. Each milestone would give you the same kind sof benefits as you got from say Laser III (new components).  But on the research screen, what you would see is the Laser tech slowly filling up. 

Incidentally, we are also going to release a Galactic Civilizations II v1.4 shortly. Main changes will be an AI crash bug fix and some changes to morale and economics (we're going to make the morale buildings more powerful but the techs to get them MUCH more expensive).

Anyway, the goal of Dark Avatar is really to put together an expansion pack that we think addresses the key game elements that we think can realistically be added in an expansion pack (I'd put in OPTIONAL tactical battle features but that would be immensely expensive to do). 

When people start getting the beta in a few weeks, I think what they'll be most surprised with is just how much better and cleaner the game looks. Lots of little touches that aren't even mentioned.  If you've seen one of our game update change logs, you can probably imagine what something we charge money for has in it.

IGN has a preview of the expansion pack -- Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar up along with some new screenshots.

The IGN preview goes over what the major game changes are and how we hope they'll make the game even more fun.

Check out the whole thing. 

GameSpy has an in-depth look at Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar.  The expansion pack is due out this February but an open beta will be starting up next month in which all users who have pre-ordered the game can take part.

The expansion pack is being set up as not quite a sequel but a lot more than your typical expansion pack.  Check out their preview for more details.

GameSpot has a new preview along with some brand new screenshots of the upcoming expansion pack to Galactic Civilizations II. It includes a screenshot of one of the new features we've expanded the expansion pack too.

More to come!

Sins of a Solar Empire is a game conceived and developed by Ironclad Games. Ironclad is a game development studio located Vancouver Canada.

Stardock Entertainment is the publisher. It is most recently known for developing and publishing Galactic Civilizations II.

So how did we meet? What's the story?  Ironclad has an incredibly cool game in development. I've spent a lot of time playing it -- more time than I really should but that's another story!   There will be a lot of analogies used to try to explain what it's like but to me, it reminds me of what Total Annihilation might have been like in space but with a lot of diplomatic and economic features as well.

It's technically a "real time" strategy game but unlike most RTS's, this one really isn't about who can click around on things the most. It plays a lot like a traditional 4X game where the winner is not the guy who is the best mouse jockey but the player that can develop the best overall strategy.

Anyway, how did we meet? Ironclad was looking for someone to publish their game.  Someone who could publish their game at retail as well as digitally.  Galactic Civilizations II has already sold a couple hundred thousand copies worldwide in only 8 months -- most of those copies sold at your local retailer.  Because of Stardock's experience in marketing, advertising, and publishing space strategy games, we and Ironclad were a perfect fit.

With our combined talents, we hope to deliver a game that will really stand the test of time as a truly unique gaming experience.  Stay tuned!

Welcome to the Sins of a Solar Empire forum.  For fans from the previous incarnation of the forums, we apologize for the inconvenience of having to create a new account.  For users who have been on any other Stardock.net site (or JoeUser.com, WinCustomize.com, VistaBlogging.com, GalCiv2.com, etc.) your UserID and PW will work here.

For fans of Galactic Civilizations who are seeing this for the first time, you're in for a real treat.  Both Stardock and Ironclad team members will be hanging out here to help answer questions, listen to your suggestions, and generally just have a good time hanging out.

Have fun!