PowerUser.TV: Episode 16!
Published on Tuesday, November 22, 2005 By Brad Wardell In WinCustomize News
PowerUser Episode 16 is now out!
Brad Wardell's Blog
Thoughts on DesktopX's future
Published on Monday, November 21, 2005 By Brad Wardell In DesktopX
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Stardock makes DesktopX Enterprise which can export entire desktops as enviroments and even then has licensing involved per seat. Why does Stardock do that? Our answer: Because we don't really want people to do that because it could compete with premium content Stardock creates/sells with DesktopX. But the whole discussion touches on the problem that has plagued DesktopX since the beginning -- what exactly IS DesktopX? It's own versatility has been helped it and hurt it because no one knows what exactly it's supposed to do. It gets compared to the myriad of widget programs like Konfabulator because it can, amongst a zillion other things, do widgets. It gets compared to Litestep because you can build desktops. It gets compared to Avedesk because it can put desktop objects on your system. It gets compared to Visual Studio and Visual Basic because you can integrate COM/ActiveX controls into your creations seamlessly. DesktopX can essentially build anything that lives on a desktop. You could build a custom spread sheet:
DesktopX can be used to create fancy auto-run programs. Stardock uses it internally to create its auto-run programs:
But there is always the issue -- how much does one charge for this? Creating these things was non-trivial and there is some value in our stuff looking "Better" than would be competitors in other markets because of this. Value that would be greater than say $69.95 really. Someone could buy DesktopX Pro for $69.95 and start up a business creating auto-runs for companies. But still there's always a question on pricing.
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No because it requires immense effort still. Visual Studio can't turn out a Word processor in a couple of weeks. DesktopX Pro can build some very specific types of unique content without alot of effort. Let's use Natural Desktop as an example -- with DesktopX Enterprise, we built that in a few weeks with just a couple people. With Visual Studio, it would have taken many many many months to do it. For building desktops, DesktopX is very specialized at the types of content it can create just as programs like Maya are specialized to create 3D models. There were a lot of people at Stardock who didn't want DesktopX Pro or Enteprise to exist at all (particularly Enterprise). If Konfabulator has shown anything to be true it is that the CONTENT matters more than the technology of the thing that uses the content. DesktopX can create, relatively easily, a very specific type of unique content that people want. So the question is which direction is best? Turn DesktopX into a quasi-internal-only tool to create other stuff to sell that is stand-alone? Or to make it available to other developers who might compete with content Stardock might want to sell? There's no easy answer. Let me give you a totally unrelated example: The Political Machine. Stardock developed a Direct3D backend for DesktopX to take its .dxpacks and run them in a 3D environment. As a result, Stardock was able to crank out the user interfaces and screens for The Political Machine in a very short amount of time. This allowed Stardock to cut development time on the game in half. This led to the question -- should Stardock try to encourage/sell DesktopX Enterprise to other game developers to help them (And generate additional revenue) or should DesktopX Enterprise be used as a competitive advantage for Stardock's own internal game design teams? Like most things, the answer ended up somewhere in between -- we decided that we would tell people how we wer able to create all these game screens so fast but we wouldn't encourage people too much to use DesktopX for game making unless they came to us and negotiated licensing. The Desktop Pet is a good example and you'll see why when it comes out. That was created with DesktopX Pro (not Enterprise). The Desktop Pet will probably sell 5,000 to 10,000 copies on-line and if we get it into retail another 20,000 to 30,000 units. You couldn't create a desktop pet with say Konfabulator or any of the other "widget" programs because they're currently too limited. But DesktopX Pro, out of the box, can do it. One developer and one 3D modeler in a couple months. And there's nothing out ther that is anywhere near as sophisticated. But there's nothing stopping someone else from doing the same thing as we're doing. All some larger company would have to do is pick up a copy of DesktopX Pro for $69.95 and create "Virtual Rover" or something and have a hit leaving our pet in the dust. So again, there is always some conflict over how DesktopX should be marketed. Some might say "Why does Stardock even let DesktopX be available at all to the public?" A good example was a product we barely publicized because the pricing was never easy to nail down. It was called Impression Creator. It made it easy to create those auto-run menus that you see when you put your CD in the drive. We noticed something -- most of those menus look terrible and most of them look as if the developer was trying to make them quasi-skinned. But with Impression Creator (which is just DesktopX Pro re-branded) you could create spectacular ones in an afternoon. But what killed it is when DesktopX's price was moved to $69.95. At that point, it was too much of a niche market to justify putting scarce marketing resources into. Moreover, we've seen that the person or company creating the content gets more credit than the technology behind it. We'd be better off providing such content creation as a service that we could then bring in skinners from the community to work with us on. Despite all the power of DesktopX, third-parties have not really done that much with it. This is the opposite experience we've had with WindowBlinds where skinners run the show. So far, because people make trinkets like clocks or try to copy what's been done on Konfabulator, the issue with what DesktopX should and shouldn't do has never come to a head. A few months back someone made an Aero web browser using DesktopX that was fully compatible with Internet Explorer (it uses its ActiveX control). I know that raised some eye brows around here. Some people forget that DesktopX was developed during a different time in the skinning community. The target market for it was skinners (same as WindowBlinds). It was expected that the community would jump in and figure out all the neat things that can be done with it. But that didn't happen. And so 4 years later, Konfabulator shows up on the Mac and then eventually on Windows. And unlike DesktopX, its developer included abunch of really cool content it made itself. It wasn't made with skinners in mind, making a Konfabulator widget (especially when it was first released) was huge pain. They focused purely on the consumers -- the users. Imagine how different DesktopX's history might have been in 75% of the budget wasn't spend on the content creation elements -- the GUI for creating, manipulating, and exporting objects and desktops? 6 months alone were spent figuring out how to make ActiveX controls move seamlessly with other DekstopX objects. Nothing else can do that. But how many things use ActiveX controls? Hardly any. It's incredibly powerful stuff but instead people debate which is "better" based on how pretty the little PNG files that display clocks and weather monitors and other trivialities. In other words, Stardock developed DesktopX under the misconception that the key to success was getting "Skinners" on board. But that has changed in the past few years. What we've seen both in our own experience is that consumers are driving success. Consumers will choose what they find easiest/best to use and THEN the skinners will follow what the consumers are already doing. It doesn't matter that Konfabulator and the rest have no real development environment for the skinner. The skinner will sit down in some editor and peck out their XML and their JavaScript and deal with all the other hassles because that's where all the user are. The problem is that DesktopX is still saddled with all this development environment stuff which adds a great deal of complexity and overhead to the actual environment (unless you use just the DesktopX run-time which we did in 3.0). If there's a DesktopX 4, I think you'll find it a very very different animal. It'll not care about the content creation, it'll use XAML what content creation help it provides will mostly be about making it easier to do simple things (widgets for instance) but fancier things would be done using Sparkle and what not. But it's hard to say this early on. |
The State of Stardock
Published on Monday, November 21, 2005 By Brad Wardell In WinCustomize News
 In a couple of weeks Stardock will be celebrating the 6th anniversary of the official release of Object Desktop for Windows. And between now and the end of January, there will be a lot of updates and changes we hope. -Brad
Here's a summary: |
 WiindowBlinds 5 has an official release date: November 29! It's hard to believe that WindowBlinds 4 is almost 3 years old. But of course, there were a lot of updates during that time. WindowBlinds 5 took a lot of effort and time to create. The most obvious new feature is the ability to have per-pixel alpha blending in the title bars, borders, and menus. This was definitely non-trivial to do and is something that many of us didn't think was possible with any kind of performance. Which is really the overall surprise of WindowBlinds 5 -- quietly over the past 3 years, ATI and nVidia have really improved their video drivers. And on Windows XP, some DirectX hardware acceleration is available (though indirectly and we won't say precisely how) at the desktop level. The result is that WindowBlinds 5 is much faster.
And if speed and super cool new skins aren't enough, then there's the fact that WindowBlinds 5 requires no resident program to have it run. It runs as part of Windows by extending the native engine itself. So no more "wbload.exe" sitting in your process list. No more "WindowBlinds use too much memory" complaints because at this point, it's in their head. If you turn off the Windows XP theme service, WindowBlinds 5 uses substantially less memory than Windows XP does by default and speeds up the performance of Windows XP while making it look a lot better. Once WindowBlinds 5 is out, we can start to also look at Windows Vista support. WindowBlinds 5 is part of Object Desktop. You can get it as part of Object Desktop or purchase it stand-alone for $19.95. Anyone who bought WindowBlinds 4 after September 1 will automatically get WindowBlinds 5. Other WindowBlinds 4 users will be able to upgrade for $15.
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Galactic Civilizations II is Stardock's biggest game yet. The first game won editor's choice awards from most of the major game magazines. The sequel promises to be even better. Today IGN wrote "How could you not want to play something like Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords?" In this strategy game, the player takes on the role as leader of an interstellar empire. They must combine their military, technological, diplomatic, manufacturing, and cultural strengths in order to survive in a hostile galaxy. The game is currently in beta over at www.galciv2.com and will be available at most retailers this February. It'll also be through Stardock's TotalGaming.net game network.
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 ObjectBar 2 has been in development for something like 20 years now. It hasn't been easy on Stardock either. When ObjectBar was first developed, the customization world was very different. ObjectBar became popular at a time when there were so few programs for customizing Windows that a program that let people do many different things was much needed. But the world has changed and now there are customization programs that fill in nearly every niche. ObjectBar and DesktopX are two popular Stardock programs that have felt this hit. As a result, new development has been to focus what they do on doing fewer things but doing those things alot better.
So before ObjectBar 2 hits, there will be Control Center 2 which is based on ObjectBar 2. One of the things ObjectBar 2 can do is export its creates as executables. In the "eat your own dog food" philsophy, we're making sure this works to the nth degree by having ObjectBar 2 create Control Center 2. Control Center was Stardock's first desktop enhancement. Made back in 1994 for IBM's OS/2, it was the original side bar. On it, user could play virtual desktops, links, clocks, drive maters, memory meters, net info, and more. Today, there's over 3.2 MILLION different side-bar type programs out there (okay, maybe a slight exaggeration). Control Center precedes them but it to remain competitive, it, and its creator (ObjectBar 2) have had to adapt and evolve. To that end Control Center 2 has the best virtual desktops ever. We say that absolutely. When it comes out, try them out and compare them to any that have ever existed on any platform or today. We've gone through them all to ensure incredible speed, lots of features, and a high degree of use.
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 TotalGaming.net got its start as "Object Desktop Network -- for games!". Since Object Desktop had gotten so popular, it was logical to try to do the same thing with its games. In 2003, Galactic Civilizations I became the first game to be released widely available at retail and available for electronic distribution at the same time.
Since then, TotalGaming.net has grown. With nearly three dozen games including the Real Arcade Games, Space Hack, and a slew of major titles in the pipeline, TotalGaming.net is hoping to do for PC games what iTunes has done for music. TotalGaming.net lets user buy games individually as you would normally expect or you can get a subscription to TotalGaming.net for $69.95 and receive tokens that allow you to "purchase" games at a steep discount (typically around 30% off!). |
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 KeepSafe may be the most popular program inside of Stardock. It is certainly, other than perhaps WindowBlinds, the most widely installed single program. That's because it does something rather remarkable -- it integrates backup into the file system. It also works incredibly easy -- user specify what folders or file types they want to keep safe, they then specify where they want backups to be kept (locally, network server, etc.). And then when that file is changed, KeepSafe will seamlessly make a backup without the user having to do anything.
It's often easy to forget you even have KeepSafe running -- until you need it. Examples from within Stardock abound of when a file is lost, corrupted, deleted, mangled, and that "Crap, I worked on this all day!" feeling comes in only to realize that it's not gone -- just right click on corrupted file and go back to a previous revision. Or if it's gone entirely, just go into the KeepSafe search dialog and start typing in its name and voila, you're back in business. KeepSafe is one of the programs that makes up Stardock's new suite of information management utilities called ThinkDesk. It will be available in public stand alone beta form hopefully early December.
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Stardock Central has actually been getting a lot of work too. A major new version is in the works and should be released real soon now. Behind the scenes, many of Stardock's top developers have been working on this new feature. Amongst the new features is the ability to toggle away the left bar so that you can use it as a really fast forum reader or navigate through WinCustomize. Of course, that's not where most of the work has gone, it's in the unglamorous internals which have been reworked in an effort to make it more reliable, faster, and handle a lot more users.
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Of course, there's a ton of other things being worked on as well. New builds of SecureProcess and ThinkMirror should be showing up fairly soon. Often times, sadly, the software is just sitting in the queue to be internally beta tested. In the good old days, we would just toss this stuff up and it would seem like every day something new (if untested) was being updated. But as Stardock's software has gotten more popular, we have to be a lot more careful about what we toss out. I know there's a new of RightClick in the queue (for instance). There's also new builds of WindowFX waiting for more testing. There's builds of LogonStudio 2 floating around. And a new version of IconDeveloper. I think a new IconPackager beta was finally released recently so good news there! There's a new build of ObjectDock in QA I believe. We were thinking about re-enabling the "genie" effect that a few people have seen but have always kept off because we don't want to offend Apple. I think the current view is to continue to keep that disabled and enhance WindowFX further so that if someone wants to create their own neat effects, they can. But ObjectDock should be about being a dock in our view. There's also work on DesktopX along with a lot of discussion internally about what it's roadmap should be. The whole "widget" thing we think has been overhyped and with everyone and their brother doing it, we're not sure how much more to develop that. DesktopX remains far more featured for widget creation anyway than other similar programs. We think that DesktopX needs to be seriously looked at in terms of robustness and making content creation more flexible (being able to sit down in your own editor to create your own stuff rather than having to use its built in editors for everything). The whole thing needs a rethinking though. DesktopX Pro continues to sell very well though and there's still nothing in our view quite like DesktopX in terms of being able to build custom, alpha blended, animated, desktops. But like ObjectBar, DesktopX needs to pick a career, move out of the basement, and get to it. In terms of things being actively worked on, we have a desktop pet nearly done that we built using DesktopX Pro. The game Society is in development as well. We have a killer, unannounced product for Windows Vista in development that we think will absolutely blow people away. It's a major program too, not some little tweak program. It'll require its own section here on WinCustomize. But that's a long ways off. And it'll be part of Object Desktop. We haven't done much on the blog site, JoeUser.com lately and probably won't until we have built up our IT team further. Most of the IT guys are working on Galactic Civilizations II presently. And incidentally, we're hiring. We need developers of all kinds (game developers and non-game developers). We need 3D modelers and artist, we need web developers and sales engineers and marketers. They must be willing to relocate to Michigan though (no working from remote). As we finish out 2005, it's been a good year. But next year is looking even better. With Windows Vista, the release of Galactic Civilizations II, and a number of other projects I can't really talk about coming to fruition, 2006 looks terrific. It'll also be the 15th anniversary of the DBA |
IGN has the goods on aliens!
Published on Monday, November 21, 2005 By Brad Wardell In GalCiv II News
IGN is running a series on the Galactic Civilizations II aliens. What are they like? What motivates them? Why do they all seem to want to kill you and..in some cases, obsess over eating your skin?
In this first part, IGN goes over the apathetic Arceans and the ruthless Drengin Empire.
DesktopX 3.1 Reviewed
Published on Sunday, November 20, 2005 By Brad Wardell In WinCustomize News
Ars Technica has a pretty balanced review of DesktopX 3.1. They have put both the good, the bad, and the ugly of the popular desktop enhancement utility from Stardock. Their advice to Stardock is to a) Include better content, 
Clarify widgets and objects more closely and c) Have more configuration options available. Overall they seemed to like it. Check it out for yourself.
Here are our nits with the article:
- DesktopX widgets don't have a "signficant memory" overhead. In an age where Notepad uses 8 megs, the 2 to 3 megabyte run-time for a DesktopX widget is pretty trivial. Certainly less than most (if not all) the competing programs.
- While we're glad Ars did a review of DesktopX (finally), it was a 1 page review compared to the several page review of Konfabulator that was several pages long. Moreover, the Konfabulator review went over every included widget. DesktopX widgets may not necessarily be as "pretty" (matter of taste) but they do show off the functionality. For instance, an arcade widget is included that plays most of the classic arcade games of old. No other widget type program can do that. It would have been nice to have that mentioned.
- DesktopX supports animation in ways that no other similar program can remotely touch.
- A mention of DesktopX Pro would have been cool. You can create some pretty fantastic things. Stardock uses DesktopX to do the interface for GalCiv II, the Aquarium Desktop, and Natural Desktop.
In the meantime, DesktopX 3.2 is in development. The most major feature is probably the ability to have your scripts be seperate from the object if you so desire (for developers). For users, it'll mostly be bug fixes and some new content.
Still we think their criticisms are generally fair -- the line between objects and widgets is pretty blurred and the default content, while not bad, could always be better. We are always faced with the challenge between impressive default content and default download size.
Creating a better, closer knit, community
Published on Saturday, November 19, 2005 By Brad Wardell In WinCustomize Talk
One thing that I think would be good for our community would be to encourage people to interact more together.
Right now, roughly 3,000 people visit this site more than 20 times a day. I would say that's the hub of our "hard-core" community.
I'm not looking to increase that #. What I want to do is find ways to encourage more of those 3,000 to interact on the site. To make comments on skins, forum posts, articles, and news items and interact on things like the map community we set up.
What do you think can be done to encourage that?
Balancing Defenses
Published on Saturday, November 19, 2005 By Brad Wardell In GalCiv Journals
In Galactic Civilizations II, you have beam weapons, missile weapons, and mass-driver weapons.
Against these weapons are corresponding defenses -- shields, anti-missile defenses, and armor. Defenses in a different area do provide some benefit -- they are the square root of their value.
So if a fighter with Blasters (beam) of 3 attacks a ship with 0 shields, 4 armor, and 0 point defense then the battle goes something like this:
Fighter rolls beteween a 0 and a 3 and the defender rolls between a 0 and a 2 (square root of 4).
The significance of this is that if you pick the wrong defense, you take quite a pounding on your ship. This means that defenses should cost quite a bit less and be somewhat easier to obtain (otherwise you might as well just crank out the strongest offensive ships possible).
Balancing this out is tough. We want different defenses to have different advantages over time. Here's what we came up with:
| Size(Tiny) | Size(Large) | Cost | Power | FighterValue | CapitalShipValue | FighterPower | CapitalPower | Winner | ||
| b | Deflectors2 | 9 | 13 | 15 | 1 | 9.70 | 21.33 | 1.32 | 4.00 | |
| md | Titanium2 | 6 | 13 | 20 | 1 | 15.61 | 14.79 | 1.94 | 3.85 | Armor |
| m | Chaffe2 | 11 | 15 | 8 | 1 | 11.96 | 27.78 | 1.07 | 3.33 | |
| b | Shields | 9 | 13 | 20 | 2 | 14.18 | 29.59 | 2.61 | 7.69 | |
| md | Duranthium | 8 | 12 | 30 | 2 | 11.90 | 23.15 | 2.93 | 8.33 | Missile Defense |
| m | ECM2 | 9 | 13 | 10 | 2 | 28.36 | 59.17 | 2.61 | 7.69 | |
| b | Barriers | 7 | 9 | 20 | 3 | 41.32 | 103.81 | 5.45 | 17.65 | |
| md | TriStrontium2 | 7 | 11 | 20 | 4 | 46.30 | 82.64 | 6.67 | 18.18 | Shields |
| md | Superior Duranthium | 6 | 8 | 50 | 4 | 30.61 | 71.11 | 8.57 | 26.67 | |
| b | Subspace Rebounder | 7 | 9 | 60 | 5 | 22.96 | 57.67 | 9.09 | 29.41 | |
| m | Point Defense | 9 | 11 | 30 | 4 | 21.63 | 60.47 | 5.58 | 19.05 | |
| md | Kanvium2 | 6 | 8 | 25 | 5 | 76.53 | 177.78 | 10.71 | 33.33 | |
| b | Barriers 3 | 5 | 7 | 25 | 3 | 68.05 | 142.01 | 7.83 | 23.08 | Armor |
| m | PD Combo2 | 6 | 8 | 40 | 5 | 47.83 | 111.11 | 10.71 | 33.33 | |
| md | Duralthene | 8 | 11 | 20 | 7 | 68.33 | 158.73 | 10.71 | 33.33 | |
| m | Droid Sentries | 5 | 7 | 38 | 7 | 76.94 | 218.00 | 15.67 | 53.85 | Missile Defense |
| b | Adv Force Fields | 6 | 8 | 25 | 6 | 91.84 | 213.33 | 12.86 | 40.00 | |
| md | Adamantium | 6 | 8 | 25 | 7 | 107.14 | 248.89 | 15.00 | 46.67 | |
| b | Invulnerabilty Field | 5 | 7 | 30 | 7 | 132.33 | 276.13 | 18.26 | 53.85 | Shields |
| m | Droid Sentries3 | 4 | 6 | 45 | 7 | 98.20 | 257.12 | 19.27 | 63.64 | |
| b | Ultimate Invulnerability | 3 | 5 | 40 | 8 | 228.62 | 400.00 | 29.63 | 80.00 | |
| m | Aereon Missile Defense | 4 | 5 | 60 | 11 | 122.37 | 366.67 | 31.13 | 110.00 | Tie |
| md | Zero-Point Armor | 3 | 5 | 45 | 10 | 220.20 | 444.44 | 34.48 | 100.00 | |
Rebalancing weapons
Published on Saturday, November 19, 2005 By Brad Wardell In GalCiv Journals
The weapons in GalCiv beta 4 aren't well balanced. We're moving towards the point when it's time to start thinking about how to balance the weapons and defenses.
In general, the idea is that defense technologies will be somewhat cheaper to research and be somewhat cheaper to put on your ship than weapons. But they'll both use up costly space.
So what's more important? SIZE or COST? Cost is the pain that keeps on coming because the Maintainance cost on a military vessel is 3% its cost. So that's $3 for every $100 it costs. Make a ship that costs $1000 and you're looking at $30 in maint EVERY TURN.
So the idea was that missiles, in general, pack more bang for the size they use but are immensely expensive. Mass drivers are incredibly cheap but use up more space. And beam weapons are right in the middle.
So below is a chart in which we look at a series of different weapons in the game and how valuable (cost and space taken into account) they are for fighters and capital ships and how powerful they are (just space vs. weapon strength taken into account) for fighters and capital ships:
| Size(Tiny) | Size(Large) | Cost | Power | FighterValue | CapitalShipValue | FighterPower | CapitalPower | ||
| md | BlackHoleGun | 9.2 | 13 | 150 | 20 | 18.90 | 39.45 | 26.09 | 76.92 |
| b | Doom Ray | 10.6 | 12.5 | 160 | 22 | 14.68 | 44.00 | 24.91 | 88.00 |
| m | Black Hole Er | 12 | 12 | 250 | 25 | 8.33 | 34.72 | 25.00 | 104.17 |
| b | Laser | 11.2 | 15 | 30 | 1 | 3.19 | 7.41 | 1.07 | 3.33 |
| m | Stinger | 15 | 15 | 40 | 2 | 2.67 | 11.11 | 1.60 | 6.67 |
| MiniBalls | 11.2 | 15 | 25 | 1 | 3.83 | 8.89 | 1.07 | 3.33 | |
| b | Laser 2 | 8.2 | 12 | 40 | 1 | 4.46 | 8.68 | 1.46 | 4.17 |
| MiniBalls1 | 9.2 | 13 | 25 | 1 | 5.67 | 11.83 | 1.30 | 3.85 | |
| m | Stinger 3 | 12 | 12 | 60 | 2 | 2.78 | 11.57 | 2.00 | 8.33 |
| b | Laser 4 | 6.2 | 10 | 45 | 1 | 6.94 | 11.11 | 1.94 | 5.00 |
| Mass Driver 2 | 10.2 | 13 | 40 | 2 | 5.77 | 14.79 | 2.35 | 7.69 | |
| The Penetrator | 10.2 | 13 | 120 | 4 | 3.84 | 9.86 | 4.71 | 15.38 | |
| b | Plasma 1 | 8.2 | 12 | 50 | 2 | 7.14 | 13.89 | 2.93 | 8.33 |
| m | Harpoon 1 | 12 | 12 | 80 | 3 | 3.13 | 13.02 | 3.00 | 12.50 |
| Singularity Driver1 | 9.84 | 12.5 | 55 | 3 | 6.76 | 17.45 | 3.66 | 12.00 | |
| m | Psyonic Missile | 10 | 10 | 50 | 2 | 4.80 | 20.00 | 2.40 | 10.00 |
| Nano Ripper | 9.84 | 12.5 | 180 | 8 | 5.51 | 14.22 | 9.76 | 32.00 | |
| Photonic1 Torp | 9 | 9 | 210 | 6 | 4.23 | 17.64 | 8.00 | 33.33 | |
| b | Phasors1 | 8.84 | 11.5 | 65 | 3 | 7.09 | 17.45 | 4.07 | 13.04 |
| Psyonic Shredder | 9.84 | 12.5 | 250 | 10 | 4.96 | 12.80 | 12.20 | 40.00 | |
| GravitonDisuptor2 | 7.84 | 10.5 | 100 | 5 | 9.76 | 22.68 | 7.65 | 23.81 | |
| m | AntiMatter Torp1 | 10 | 10 | 260 | 9 | 4.15 | 17.31 | 10.80 | 45.00 |
| b | Phasors 5 | 8.84 | 11.5 | 80 | 5 | 9.60 | 23.63 | 6.79 | 21.74 |
| Quantum Driver | 8.84 | 11.5 | 110 | 7 | 9.77 | 24.06 | 9.50 | 30.43 | |
| b | Disruptors1 | 6.84 | 9.5 | 120 | 7 | 14.96 | 32.32 | 12.28 | 36.84 |
| HDSpikeDriver | 9.84 | 12.5 | 120 | 12 | 12.39 | 32.00 | 14.63 | 48.00 | |
| Quantum Torp 2 | 11 | 11 | 240 | 12 | 4.96 | 20.66 | 13.09 | 54.55 |
New Invasions
Published on Saturday, November 19, 2005 By Brad Wardell In GalCiv Journals
For Beta 5 (December) we're going to be adding a new invasion system. I won't give away too many of the details but we still want to factor in some very simple, straight forward advantages.
Here's what we've got:
| Advantage | Description |
| 5 | Invading Army's Air Superiority |
| 1 | Tech Advantage |
| 1 | Tech Advantage>2 |
| 1 | Tech Advatnage>4 |
| 1 | Tech Advantage>8 |
| 1 | Race is Neutral Aligned |
| 1 | Planet has Invasion Defense built |
| Invasion Modules | |
| Can add % modifiers to the above | |
| Can add % modifiers to the # of troops on each side |
Good, Evil, and Neutral
Published on Saturday, November 19, 2005 By Brad Wardell In GalCiv Journals
In the original Galactic Civilizations on OS/2, playing as good, neutral, and evil were considered to be pretty innovative concepts for a strategy game. Depending on which moral alignment you chose, different ships, technologies, and plantary improvements would come into play. Moreover, how races interacted with you would heavily depend on it as well.
In Galactic Ciivlizations II, released over ten years after the original OS/2 version, such moral issues in strategy games are no longer quite as innovative. This time we have made some changes anyway.
As players interact with their planets and go about the business of being an intergalactic ruler, various moral dilemas come up. When someone starts the game, they start out with a preset moral alignment depending on the race. Humans start out at a moral alignment of 50 (neutral). Drengin start out at 25 (evil) and Altarians start out at 75 (good).
Depending on ones choices on these events, their score will be changed (usually by an amount from -10 to +10 depending on the choice and severity of choice).
However, eventually one can CHOOSE their civilization's ethical philosophy. However, it comes with a price. The further you are from a given alignment the more it will cost.
An EVIL civilization wanting to choose GOOD as their moral alignment would have to pay $20,000.
A Neutral civilization wanting to choose GOOD would have to pay $10,000.
and it works the other way as well (it's free to choose the alignment you already are). While there is some irony in someone who has been consuming their citizens for amusement being able to choose the "good ethical philosophy" at all, one has to remember Eric Cartman's wise song:
I'm gonna make, make it right.
I'm gonna take a little time and set things right.
Make, make it right.
I'm payin' for my sins and it sure feels great.
It feels so good to be making up
For all the things I've done wrong.
I know now what the Good Lord in Heaven
Wanted from me all along.
All along, I'm gonna make, make it right.
'Cause Jesus wants me to have a clean slate.
Not faking it, I'm making it right.
I'm payin' for my sins and it sure feels great.
Make, make it right!
Make, make it right!
So why would you choose one at all? Because only through choosing the ethical alignment do you get its significant bonuses:
Good Civilizations:
+ Citizens more loyal (less likely to defect)
+ Five most populous planets have no maint costs in their capital.
+ Trade with other good civilizations increased by 25%.
+ Diplomatic Ability increased with other good races
+ Several extra Defense-oriented technologies
+ Galactic Achievement: Temple of Righeousness
Neutral Civilizations:
+ Citizens more content Approval tends to say over 50% despite population)
+ Less expensive to purchase ships outright.
+ All upgradeable tiles automatically become available instantly.
+ All Soldiers get +1 added to their ability during invasions with players of other alignments
+ A couple of extra weapons and defense oriented technologies.
+ Galactic Achievement: Temple of Balance
Evil Civilizations:
+ Starbase upgrade fees are waived
+ Can build propaganda centers (planets less likely to defect)
+ Can build Secret Police (increases -ahem- "approval" rating)
+ Get +1 from every trade route per turn from freighters that pass through their space.
+ Several extra weapon-oriented technologies
+ Galactic Achievement: Temple of Malice