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My opinion of this game is rising fast.
I finished that first game, playing against the standard opponents set at beginner in a small galaxy, and ended up winning via cultural victory. I allied with the Slug things (the Yor maybe?) and rolled over the Evil Apes (Drengin?) and Beserkers (Evil Robots, forgot the name). Not much of a fight on beginner. At this point the jury was still out.
Started a new game, same basic set up except that I set all the AI opponents to "normal", and gave myself what I think were some lesser abilities.
Wow! What a difference! The AI has come to life. It agressively builds and expands, and seems to come out of the gate with a solid starting strategy. I grabbed what I could nearby, and managed to grab a small edge in colonies mostly by accepting weak 13- and 14-rated planets into the fold. But the galaxy real estate has gone fast. Now I'm racing the other AI's for those resource points, but I'm losing more than my fair share here. There have been two or three times when I arrived one month (one turn) too late. Bastards.
Basically, this one is anyone's game. There's an empty gap with no planets right down the middle of the galaxy. The two evil empires have the entire west side of the galaxy to themselves, and the Evil Apes (Drengin) have built themselves a formidible position. The other two good civilizations, the neutral civilization, and I are crammed into the east side of the galaxy.
My plan is to set the foundation for an east-side alliance to combat the Evil Apes, who I think would crush any one of us separately. To that end, I'm trading techs with the good civilizations and starting to set up trade routes to foster further interdependence. I've got relations up to "friendly" so far with the other two good civs. I'm hoping to have at least a three-civilization armada ready to wipe the Evil Apes out if they come across that no-man's land in force. Got to hurry though, as there's not much unclaimed stuff left in the galaxy, and I've got to believe that we're heading for a military buildup in the galaxy in the near future.
I've got a better handle on the interface now, and that is making things a lot easier to manage. The Govenors make the planets pretty easy to manage, so far. As I've learned the interface, I've realized that it's pretty easy to get the game to do the things you want it to do. There are some annoying design decisions (launching ships, no rally points for ships, etc.), but nothing too annoying yet.
I really like the diplomatic model and the fact that there are four viable ways to win the game (research, cultural, alliance, and conquest). It gives you a lot of options for creative play.
Still not 100% decided on this game, but it has been a blast in this second game so far. It is definitely a game that makes you think hard about the decisions you make, and gives you lots of fun decisions to make. The tech tree is incredible.
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