The IGN review of Galactic Civilizations II is up at IGN.  The very thorough review goes over both what they see the key strengths (game play, AI, strategic depth, fun-factor) as well as what they feel are weaknesses (no multiplayer, not enough sound effects, land combat is passive).

Some excerpts:

Last year's Civilization IV pretty much set a new standard for the genre, becoming the reigning king of historical themed 4x games (and took the multiplayer crown as well). This year, another sequel, Stardock's Galactic Civilization II: Dread Lords, brings the same level of polish and sophistication to the science-fiction side of the genre.

The ship designer:

One of the coolest features in the game is the ship designer. I must have wasted hours and hours just tinkering with this aspect of the game, making everything from nimble scouts to hulking battle cruisers to bulging colony ships. There are plenty of pre-generated ships for boring players who aren't interested in tinkering with their own designs but the ship design tool here is so versatile and so convenient that there's really no excuse not to try it out.

And for balance (yea, I know we're the game's home page, we're supposed to flood you with propaganda but better to have someone get the game and be happy with it than to feel like they were led to believe they were getting something else):

I have to admit that the lack of multiplayer is a bit of a strike against the game, particularly so in the wake of Civ IV's stellar multiplayer offerings. The gang at Stardock reason that the game can do without multiplayer for now, hinting that the architecture required to include it is in fact lurking somewhere within the game. The justification that the game is a full ten bucks cheaper because multiplayer wasn't included makes it a little easier to swallow. Still, I'll never allow that this whole Metaverse concept, whereby players compare their scores online, is a substitute. That's like claiming Pac-Man is multiplayer because it has a high score screen.

We knew that not having multiplayer in the game would affect reviews. There's no way around it.  We are still certain it was the right decision. 

First, it allowed us to make the game and sell it for $40 rather than the prevailing $50.  The sales figures seem to back that up.  Simply put, we just didn't feel that players should have to subsidize the small % of people who play multiplayer.  If there's demand, we can always add it later. The Metaverse, as mentioned, required we put in the plumbing.

Secondly, we simply wanted to focus on the single player experience.  Seems like more and more games forgo the single player experience in order to put a checkbox on multiplayer.  Or put another way, we think there's a significant number of people in recent years who feel like we do -- that single player strategists have gotten a bit shafted in favor of satisfying multiplayer.  We'll likely add in multiplayer in some expansion if there's demand, but we wanted the base game to focus on the individual strategy gamer.  Whether we made the right decision is ultimately up to you.

It's a very good review though in terms of outlining what you can expect in the game both pro and con.  Despite the mark down for no multiplayer, IGN still gave GalCiv II the Editor's Choice Award. 

It's been decided that we are going to do a 1.X.2 release. Don't know when. But there's little tweaks and changes we want to make. The team fixed some glitches that have been reported on the forums.

But for me, it gives me a chance to start having some fun with the AI.

Stupid AI

At lower levels, I want the AI to play stupidly. I don't want them to just be super smart but economically starved. There are a bunch of APIs in there for the AI that will cause it to make "newbie" mistakes.  But I want to do more of them.

Smart AI

Yay! They're making me an UpgradeShip API for the AI players. Now I can really bring hell down on people. Whohaha.   I also have a few other ideas too.

I've got a bunch of other stuff in mind as well.  Will have to make sure it can be done without slowing down the game.  One of the biggest things I want to work on is having the AI be more effective at controlling their territory militarily.

Stay tuned.

If you've never listened to a PowerUser.TV before, this is a good one to listen to. I have to say, this one is really worth listening to in particular. 

In it, PowerUser.TV interviews the GalCiv II team. If you've ever wanted to hear from the other side in how games are made, this is worth listening to.

There's a special edition of PowerUser.TV which interviews the Galactic Civilizations II team.  More info than you probably want to hear but you can put voices to the names or something like that. 

Seriously though, if you've ever wanted to hear what goes into making a game, this is worth listening to. Just close your ears when I talk to prevent permanent damage.

Check it out!

Every community, especially one as close-knit as JU's is going to have melodrama. 

Sometimes, it's like watching a car wreck. You don't want to look but it's hard not to. Drama, intrigue, gossip, they're hard to resist.

I tend to be a pretty plain person.  I think that's why I've stayed interested in on-line communities for so long or at least survived them this long.  Being straight forward and consistent is, in my opinion, the key to thriving long-term in an on-line community.  The flame that burns twice as bright lasts half as long as they say.

What I'm going to discuss next is going to relate to a recent melodrama. But the words will remain applicable into the future because what has gone on recently will happen again and again and again. The actors will change but the characters remain the same.

1) What is and isn't out of bounds on JoeUser?

Your blog is your blog. You are free to write about anything you'd like as long as it does not contain the name of a person in the title and isn't essentially a personal attack on another member of the site.

However, IF you choose "Display this article in the forums as well" then it enters the purvue of moderation. This option is on by default. If you want to vent about something, that's fine. But as soon as it goes onto the global forum network, which is syndicated all over, then we care what is on that blog. It's the classic "your rights end where someone else's begins".

2) JoeUser is not a for profit site. It's open to the public to use but the admins aren't your servants.

This is something we're particularly sensitive about.  In a recent post I wrote to the effect that I didn't care if there were bloggers here.  And I don't.  But that's not the same as saying that we don't want bloggers either.  We're neutral.  We have the site, it's free to use. We hope you enjoy the site.  All we ask is that you treat the admins with a basic level of respect and most of all, do not treat us as servants. 

Think of JoeUser as a big party.  It's an expensive party but that's not the issue until someone starts acting like their presence on the site is somehow helping "pay" for the party. 

But like real world parties, guests can be asked to leave.  If someone is being disruptive to other users they'll be warned. If they don't heed that, they'll be asked to leave.  If they're really aggravating the admins, they'll be warned. If they persist, they'll be shown the door. And yes, if someone is on another site saying nasty vile things about the admins or site while at the same time making use of the blogs, we reserve the right to show them the door after giving them time to copy their stuff to use somewhere else. 

The specifics of the LW incident

LW was a prominent member of the site. One of my favorite bloggers. Her husband, Simon, had been on the site a long time as well. He was, to say the least, not one of our favorite bloggers.

Simon wrote a blog, the topic is irrelevant at this point because it's not related to what happened next.  I went on and made a fairly rude comment that was in the spirit of article (the article basically argued how stupid Americans were). 

One of the things that I try not to do is throw in people's faces failings/weaknesses/sensitive issues in an off-topic way.  LW, for instance, once was a member of the KKK. It annoyed me to no end to see people trot this out every time they were in a debate with her regardless of what it was. It was, in my opinion, a very low blow to do that. If they're discussing race relations, okay maybe. But throwing it into a discussion on religion or taxes is simply uncalled for.  So while I may be rude to people on occasion, I don't trot out what I know about people in order to discredit the person.  My rudeness is usually in attacking the message, not the messenger. I sometimes fail that distinction, I make a lot of posts, so it's all in the percentages.

Anyway, Simon responded in a way that really aggravated me by attempting to dismiss what I had to say by instructing me to go back to using JoeUser to peddle our products.  So I made clear: I am not above removing a blogger for pissing me off. 

Simon's next response essentially escalated the issue by telling me how i should run a business and other such things. Like what?

"And yes, despite this display of childishness I am still considering blogging here should the site ever start charging. Though your service of JU had better improve a thousand-fold if you want to keep your current clientele here." and "Get the knot out of your panties, quit squalling like a scalded brat, and address the argument. Or stay away, if it freaks you out. Either way, next time you want to stamp your feet and threaten, try remembering that you don't attract customers by trying to bully them."

Anyone reading this who thinks that we should put up with that should cut their losses now and leave. There are no circumstances where I would ever tolerate a user talking to me in this way on JoeUser. So if you're feeling like "big brother" is squashing your "free speech" rights by not allowing you to insult the admins in the most arrogant, nasty ways possible, then this place isn't the place for you.  I'm very comfortable with the line being drawn here. 

Some people would feel what he wrote was perfectly okay and that's their right to think so but it won't fly on JoeUser.  I won't put up with it so I'm entirely fine with people who think that kind of behavior as being acceptable leaving.  Incidentally, the entirety of what he was responding to was "I'm not above making blogs or users disappear from public view simply because they got on my nerves.  You can be "confident" about that."  That was what I said that resulted in what he wrote.

I could have responded very harshly since I know Simon and LW's personal circumstances.  It was very tempting to do so.  But I didn't.  Instead, I removed him from the site.

LW, as his wife, decided to leave with him.  While that was sad, I could understand it.  My wife would do the same for me.  Over the weekend I moved him from Exiled to PermBanned. This had the side-effect of doing the same to LW (which wasn't the intention) since PermBans take IP addresses used into account. They have the same IPs, so bam. A weird scenario where a user of normal access is also banned (hey a JU first).

This is where the facts end and from here we get into speculation.

However, given how long JU has been around and how consistent I think things have been run over the years, there was nothing in their previous experience that would have led them to think I was bluffing.  That I would back down.  So in essence, Simon chose to get himself kicked off, probably knowing that his wife, who spent years building something here, would follow suit. 

I'm not even sure they realize (or admit anyway) that Simon's behavior was totally out of line and unacceptable even though people in the past have been exiled for doing much the same thing. 

People rarely get exiled. But at the same time, we won't take abuse from users. A user will get a warning if they're trotting over the line. But after that, they're gone.  We also exiled Furry Canary as well for much the same thing. 

Cleaning house

With the upheaval, we looked at this as an opportunity to clean house a bit.  Cliques form and they drive people away.  I'm not happy to see LW go. I enjoyed her writing even if she was a toxic user. She drove other people away through bullying and domination. Or she played people to get them so riled up that they would get themselves exiled by going way over the line. I remember one person emailing me with a certain level of half-admiration/half-loathing in the way LW could drive others of the edge.  Anyone remember Dabe?

What has saddened me about the LW situatoin is how quickly friendship turns into demands for submission.  We don't make demands on users other than to not abuse us. We want people to have a good time. If staying makes them happy, then good.  If leaving makes them happy, then good.  I was saddened to see that LW took her voluntary exile as an opportunity to try to play the role of some sort of rebel leader against "the man" and labeling me as the  "king of petulance". For what? Because I got rid of her husband for repeatedly insulting me, name calling me, etc. on my own site that I share with him free of charge? Shame on me I guess.

I've also taken this opportunity to show another blogger the door after they were going around on other sites saying that JoeUser is akin to "Hitler's Germany" (which would make me Hiitler in this analogy). We have given them 10 days to copy their contents so that they can move them but simply put, the "Reich" doesn't way to pay to host their blog.  If someone thinks JU is so bad that it can be compared to Nazi Germany, then why would they want to have a blog here?

What makes JoeUser different from a blogspot or whatever is that it's a blog community. Our blogs are interconnected. It's a site designed in a way such that lots of people will read what you write.  We want people to have a good time here.  But WE also want to have a good time here too. It's no fun when you come onto the site and there's a handful of people sucking out the fun for us as well as plenty of other people.

As interesting as melodrama is, it's taxing. It sucks up energy.  I respect LW's decision to leave. I understand it. I will miss her writings. I liked her articles a lot. But I'm not going to miss the melodrama or the polarizing nature of her presence.  I'm almost not going to miss the clique-building.  And I'm not going to miss people who think it's okay to come over to someone's site and crap on the people who running it.

The site isn't about us. It's about the people who make blogs. Who share their writings. Who share their thoughts. It's what makes JoeUser special.  When people start excessively focusing on individual members of the site, we're all poorer for it. 

This situation will rise again. There will be more Wisefawns, Little Whips, Sir Peter Maxwells and other colorful characters who shine twice as bright in their time but eventually self-destruct. It will keep happening over and over again.  It'll pass.  Some people will leave in protest and new people will join. 

Here are the top 10 most popular skinners for the month of February.  Downloads are UNIQUE user downloads.

Some people have argued that JoeUser makes money from ad revenue.

Of course, the real question isn't whether it makes money but rather it nets money.

Here's what it "made" in February:

That's 164,337 impressions for the google ad. 93 click thrus. .1% conversion rate for $15.66.

Now, I don't think anyone needs to be an IT manager to know what the net revenue is.

But that's fine.  The site doesn't have to make money. It only costs marginally more to have the site available to the public as opposed to just Stardock personnel for syndication purposes.  I'm only posting the ad revenue for those who think that web ads are somehow big money.

It's hard to believe now that there was an internal debate about adding the ship design feature in which players could customize how their ships looked by adding 0-sized "extras".  Ship design has become almost a game unto itself. Check out some of the starship designs from this thread. These are in-game ships designed by players.

 Lots more in the thread. Check 'em out!

Later this week PowerUser.TV is going to be putting up interviews with the Galactic Civilizations II team.

But as a warm up to that, below is a link to this week's episode that talks about Computer Gaming World eliminating ratings from their reviews (i.e. no more star rating, no rating at all).

Take a listen, tell us what you think.

Game reviews keep coming in.  Here are a few that caught our eye:

FiringSquad is one of the sites I go to to check out whether a game is good or not. We held our breath to hear what they thought of GalCiv II.  You can see their review here.

James Allen is a well known gaming blogger.  He's a one man review machine. You can see his review here. Incidentally, we're interested in hearing about any blogger reviews.  So let us know if you see them.

Eurogamer's review is up. I tend to like Eurogamer's review and agree with much of it but their rating (8/10) was a bit of a bummer since it dropped our average down. And disagreed with some of it. But it was a very well done review IMO. You can read that here.

One thing that is a bummer about the game industry is that the way reviews are done discourages doing updates.  Most of Stardock's business comes from utility software and magazines like PC Magazine and such will re-review our various products every year or so based on the current state even if those updates were free to customers.

By contrast, in the game industry, it's rare to see anyone take a look at doing a review of the same game but updated. Once in awhile an MMO will get a second look but that's about it.

So what game companies seem to do is only put bug fixes into their updates and then charge people for new features in an "expansion".  I'm all for expansions, but putting in features based on user suggestions into free updates strikes me as good business -- makes people more likely to buy your next game.

So even as we take in suggestions and implement them in (look how much has already gone into 1.0X and we've been out just over a week and wait till you see the 1.1 list of new features) those improvements won't ever be recorded or looked at by reviewers.

I think that's one of the reasons why many game companies don't do updates. They don't get credit for doing them so they only put in bug fixes and charge for features.  Stardock's always made games but our experience on the utility side of things has taught us that doing free updates that add new features pays off.  But it would be nice if reviews took that into account.

Not that we're complaining, thee major game magazines have been kind to us. 9.0 from Gamespot. A- from UGO. 4.5/5 from GameSpy. But hopefully at some point we'll be able to talk them into looking at some future version of GalCiv II and see how much it's changed/improved based on the suggestions you guys -- our customers -- make.