Fixes, tweaks, and enhancements have been rolling onto the build machine all week and we're pretty close to being ready with 1.2.  But we want an extra few days to test all this.

Galactic Civilizations II 1.2 is a free update to all GalCiv II owners. But 1.2 is of particular significance because it has a LOT more content than what an update normally would have.  Besides a significant change in the combat system, lots of UI changes, AI enhancements, etc. v1.2 includes advanced modding support including a Stardock developed mod featuring a new set of alien races, custom planets, new technology tree, new UI, etc. all for the "example" mod.

We're going to spend the weekend and next week..ahem "testing" the game (don't worry, we're highly paid professionals, we'll be fine). Then on Thursday we'll release the new version via Stardock Central and as a stand-alone download.

You can see this journal entry for some screenshots of what we mean.

Stay tuned!

Stardock has released WindowFX 3.0.  WindowFX adds special effects "fx" to your Windows experience.  Effects include shadows under windows, min/max/close/open animations, window dragging effects, window scaling, window tiling, alt-tab task switching options, taskbar preview thumbnails, and much more.  WindowFX when combed with WindowBlinds can give your Windows XP system a next-generation Windows look and feel. The two complement each other (and are developed by the same team within Stardock).

WindowFX 3 takes advantage of your video card to provide the effects without losing down your computer.  Stardock does caution that it does require a reasonable good video card with modern drivers to get the most out of.  WindowFX is, bar none, the most advanced visual enhancement utility for Microsoft Windows. No other program comes even remotely close to what it can do. 

You can download it right now for free and see for yourself.  The full version of WindowFX is $19.95 or can be purchased with Stardock's Object Desktop which is $49.95 and includes WindowBlinds, IconPackager, WindowFX, DesktopX, RightClick, SkinStudio, IconDeveloper and much more.

WindowFX's home page:
https://www.stardock.com/products/windowfx

Screenshots:
https://www.stardock.com/products/windowfx/screenshots.asp

Stardock has released WindowFX 3.0.  WindowFX adds special effects "fx" to your Windows experience.  Effects include shadows under windows, min/max/close/open animations, window dragging effects, window scaling, window tiling, alt-tab task switching options, taskbar preview thumbnails, and much more.  WindowFX when combined with WindowBlinds can give your Windows XP system a next-generation Windows look and feel. The two complement each other (and are developed by the same team within Stardock).

WindowFX 3 takes advantage of your video card to provide the effects without slowing down your computer.  Stardock does caution that it requires a reasonable good video card with modern drivers to get the most out of the program.  WindowFX is, bar none, the most advanced visual enhancement utility for Microsoft Windows. No other program comes even remotely close to what it can do. 

You can download it right now for free and see for yourself.  The full version of WindowFX is $19.95 or can be purchased with Stardock's Object Desktop which is $49.95 and includes WindowBlinds, IconPackager, WindowFX, DesktopX, RightClick, SkinStudio, IconDeveloper and much more.

This is a FREE upgrade for existing customers. If you already have it you can download it via Stardock Central, or go to www.stardock.com/support, type in your e-mail address and our system will send your serial numbers and updated download links.

WindowFX's home page:
https://www.stardock.com/products/windowfx

Screenshots:
https://www.stardock.com/products/windowfx/screenshots.asp

Years ago, I used to be very "into" RTSs.  I spent countless weekends and weeknights playing Warcraft, Total Annihilation, Starcraft and tons of lesser known RTSs.

And in most of them, particularly the ones with peons, what seperated the top players from the rest was knowledge of a simple game mechanic: Multiplication of resources.  Which translates to - send forces to disrupt the first couple of minutes of production of your enemy and you will win.  We're not talking about "rushing".  What I'm saying is that if you can eliminate even a couple peons getting gold or whatever the resource in question is very early on, it will put them behind the curve for the rest of the game.

When I played competitively, that was always my strategy too.  But as I've gotten older, I don't have the stomach for it.  It's just such a shitty tactic that is only remotely interesting when played against other top players and even then, it all usually boils down to who is most successful in pulling it off.  So I don't do it.

Which means that when I play top players at say Rise of Legends, I usually lose. RoL is a peon game. So a good player will move in with their starting forces and take out a few peons and then move out. The rest is pretty much written barring a really clever move.

Some people object to "rushing".  I don't.  I don't personally rush, but I think rushing is a legitimate tactic and a well designed game will allow players to defend against it.  In Rise of Legends, you can see how many units the the other guy has built early on. So it's pretty obvious when an unskilled player is about to rush.  I had that happen today and wiped the guy out.  One defense canon and a  bunch of purchased forces from neutrals (the guy didn't realize that units acquired at neutral cities don't count as "built" units so I had more forces than he thought).

Other tactics are still key, always know what your enemy is doing.  When someone rushes me, I usually see them gather their force, send them across the map and make sure I have something there to greet them.  Unfortunately, true rushers are usually pretty lame. The rush, having failed, means the opponent is doomed and they typically quit right there.  I never understand those kinds of players, given the pain to get a game going, why end it in 5 minutes?

But like I said, the most effective strategies are the ones that suck the fun out of the game.  I've always loathed the peon mechanic to begin with (no war in history was ever decided by eliminating the civilian population).  In some games, top players will take advantage of glitches in the game such as bad unit AI and such.  RoL does'nt seem to have that issue at least.

So I'll have to contend myself with being mediocre.

We've completed our migration to the new server. Things should be noticeably faster now.

Our next step is to update the forum software which will take a couple of weeks.  These changes affect all of Stardock's sites (not just galciv2.com). Stay tuned.

Spring is here and skinning continues abreast.  The GUI Championships, the multi-website skinning contest has had to be postponed while we improve WinCustomize's infrastructure.  The slow speeds and such are a real headache.  Sometimes it's lightning fast, other times it's incredibly slow.  It's all very frustrating and, as you can imagine, very difficult to debug.

But cool stuff keeps getting made. BootSkin continues to thrive. I haven't tried it on Windows Vista yet to see if it works but if not, it shouldn't be too hard to update it.  Stardock actually had nearly finished a high-resolution, true color BootSkin that could support true animations but Microsoft hired the lead developer in the last weeks of coding. Unfortunately, since it was all written in assembly, it was abandoned.  I think a perpetual beta of it floats around for Object Desktop users. But I'm continually amazed at what people can do with 16 colors on the boot screens.

JJ Ying, one of the world's most popular skinners, continues to expand his gallery. I have to say that people like JJ Ying and many others help bring the world together.  According to our stats, China is home to a significant percentage of the WinCustomize.com population.  JJ Ying's Halo Cursors are particularly cool.

Windows Vista's cursors are pretty much the same as Windows XP.  So expect there to be a "CursorVista" when the time comes.  There may be additional things we'll be able to on Windows Vista thanks to the 3D engine that is part of Vista's desktop.

Have you ever read the Dune series? The first book was great. The second book was good. The third book was..well the first two books were definitely worth reading. NetBadger has been in the process of putting together a Dune based suite. If you're a fan of the series, it's definitely worth checking out on his personal page.

In about a week Galactic Civilizations II v1.2 will be officially released.  Besides having a bunch of cool new UI enhancements, improved computer players, and tons of tweaks and enhancements, the game will include advanced modding features.  As part of this we are including an example mod that changes everything from who you play against, your technology tree, the actual game interface, and more. It's designed to give players an idea of just some of the things that are possible.  Full documentation on the modding will be provided as well as a new library here on GalCiv2.com for people to submit their mods for other people to use.

For users, selecting a mod is very straight forward. From the options area, simply select the one you want. 

And now for the change log..

Changes from 1.2 Beta 2 over Beta 1:

WinCustomize.com has continued to grow in popularity which in turn has resulted in increasing problems with scaling.  The problem is one that long-time users are very familiar with -- income from the site via ads and subscriptions does not grow linearly with traffic.  We don't want to kick people off, we want to instead reward people for supporting us more.

So what are we doing? What do we have in store?

First, let me say that the next 18 months will, in my opinion, be the most significant months in skinning EVER.  A lot of cool stuff is thanks to projects going on with Microsoft that I can't talk about.  But Windows Vista is going to offer a lot of opportunities for skinners.  Stardock itself is working on a bunch of new programs to that end.  We're in the calm before the storm.

And right now is the time for WinCustomize to get its act together.  The pathetic performance, the random error messages, etc. These are all things that are the result of having millions of people visiting but not having the people or infrastructure to handle it.  This summer, we're going all out to solve this.

Phase #1: New Master Database

The first phase will begin next Wednesday. T-man will do a warning announcement about it.  On Wednesday we move to a new master database server. It is the MCP of our system you could say. All mirrors originate from this server.  The one we have is pretty decent but it's become overwhelmed.  The new server is the fastest, most powerful computer I've ever dealt with.  It has 8 cores. 64-bit. 12 gigs of RAM.  And a lot of new code to make the most of it is being put on-line.

So on Wednesday, we expect to switch over.  Such a switch is going to almost certainly have issues so Wednesday and Thursady are likely to be bumpy on all of Stardock's sites and services.

Phase #2: Site Optimizations

The second phase will involve a set of site optimizations. The home page will be redone on the backend. I don't know about you but often I click on my WC link and it takes 10 seconds for the site to show up.  This will go away with a new backend change to how the home page is handled.   It has already been done on GalCiv2.com so you can see how fast that site comes up even though it is actually more complex in some ways.

Phase #3: Site Layout changes

The forums are going to be re-designed to be easier to navigate and use.  This is going to put us on the path of what is called the WC2K7 project which is the next generation version of the site. 

More information will be available via someone's profile such as what they've recently done so you can interact with each other more.

Once this is done, we will take a break and do the GUI Olympics (GUI Championships 2006).  That will take up about a month and a half then we'll get back to the site.

Phase #4: WinCustomize 2K7

The goal (not promise) is to have 2K7 done by the end of this year -- BEFORE Windows Vista.  A lot of new features and skinining types will be added to the new system.

For skinners, a major change will occur.  Skinners who achieve MASTER access will have the right to sell their skins directly on WinCustomize.com.   If you are familiar with DesktopGadgets.com that was essentially an experiment for us to see if we could put together a system to do it on a small scale. This would be done on a large scale.

Of course, to get MASTER access skinners would have to work their way up (Citizen->Apprentice->Master Apprentice->Journeyman->Master).  And to do that will require lots of skins and themes and such.  So don't worry, WC won't suddenly become full of premium skins.  And in fact, as history has shown with Pixtudio and others, commercial skinning has generated a good chunk of the free skins and commercial skinners help build their reputations with free content. 

The skinner will name their price and then split the net income 50/50.  If the user is a WinCustomize subscriber, they will get a 20% discount on the price of that skin.  In this way, skinners can earn some income from their skins and WinCustomize can hopefully generate enough revenue to hire more people to improve the overall quality of service. A true win-win situation (right now WC is a significant drain on Stardock even if you count half its costs as "marketing"). 

At present, WinCustomize only survives because of volunteer admins (like Jafo) and the volunteer moderators.  I think most regulars would agree that it would be good if some people (starting with the volunteers) could have the option to actually work on WinCustomize full-time to help make it a better place.

Phase #5: Windows Vista Era begins

The new programs from Stardock and new features Microsoft is working on that we're either extending or in themselves provide customization opportunities will create whole new sections on WinCustomize and help greatly expand the scope of the site beyond what we have today.

What is it with bad things happening in groups?

The "Foghorn" server died today. That's the main web manager for WinCustomize.com. When it's down, WinCustomize is quasi-down because the DNS has to be set to go to another manager.  So we're up but not really fully up.  The other servers are now taking more load and they're already stressed.

Meanwhile, back at Stardock HQ, the team was barely able to do much about this because its ISP went down (and still is down as I write this) so that no one at Stardock could actually get on from the office. Totally unrelated.

Next Wednesday the new mega server we've been talking about will finally go on line.  Weeks and weeks of prep work has been going on to prepare the way for the monster to come on-line.  It will be interesting to see how much difference it makes.

Anyway, stay tuned. Sorry about the flakeyness today.