Greetings all. I don't know if any of you know me but my real name is Brad Wardell. I work at Stardock and am the designer and AI developer of Galactic Civilizations II.

So if you have any questions, I'm here. ;)

Welcome to the new forum, Brad! :wavey:

I assumed you've already read GameSpot's review: 9.0/10!
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/galacticcivilizations2/review.html

Very impressive and congrats! :)

Thanks.

Interesting factoid about that Gamespot review:

Gamespot has not given a PC game a 9.0 or better score since October of 2005 -- when it gave Civilization 4 a > 9 score.

Wow! The designer at our measley little subforum! :D

Thanks for making such a great sequel to a great game. :)

Hi Brad! :D

Got my copy, and I'll write-up my first impressions / review over the weekend. :)

Hello Brad

Thanks for the review copy.
I've noticed you read the beginning of my review since you replied to it. I'll be spending my weekend continuing the review.

Hi Brad,

Thanks for taking the time to post here and to offer to answer questions. :)

You seem proud of your work and your being here certainly shows your willingness to go the extra step. Your creation looks to reflect this effort as well. Big thanks! :goodjob:

It's great to see you on these boards as well as the OO Brad. That shows that you guys really want to listen to the players and that you're continually improving an already solid game. :goodjob:

Welcome, Brad.

Hey Brad!

It didn't even cross my mind that you will be posting here! You guys at Stardock are the most interractive game developers in existance and you did an excellent job with GalCiv 2. Congratulations!

Great to see you here, Frogboy!

Now that the first reviews are coming out, what are your thoughts/feelings on GC2's reception by the gaming community?

Thanks.

Interesting factoid about that Gamespot review:

Gamespot has not given a PC game a 9.0 or better score since October of 2005 -- when it gave Civilization 4 a > 9 score.Coincidentally, the last game that I bought was back in October 2005, when I bought Civ4. :p

Looking forward to getting my hands on this one early next week. Congrats on the great reviews, and welcome to the (sub)forum. :)

Hey Brad!

I'm definitely getting a copy soon! Either from amazon or Wal-Mart. I've read a lot of reviews about this game and it looks incredible. Awesome job! :goodjob:

Heya, love the game but one question about a bug that i never got answered on your own forum. Whenever i research The end mass driver, the black hole gun, the game crashes to desktop.. is this a known problem or is my version just corrupted?

Great Game Brad! (thats MR. to me....).
I think Ill play this more then CIV4...
You might like to know at the local Best Buy store yesterday they had 4 copies, after I left they had 3, today they have zero...

Great to see you here, Frogboy!

Now that the first reviews are coming out, what are your thoughts/feelings on GC2's reception by the gaming community?

I've come to the conclusion that player word of mouth is incredibly powerful.

Galactic Civilizations I had a sell in number of aorund 9,000 units to retail. That was done through Strategy First. It took a few months to get past the 30,000 unit mark. Eventually, the game sold 75,000 units in North America.

Galactic Civilizations II had a sell in number of over 3 times that into retail and through sales and reorders had gone through the entire 40,000 first run in the first week plus an emergency 10,000 unit rush manufacturing run (i.e. using extra manufactured pieces from the first run).

Now it'll never touch Civ IV in terms of total sales. But all this happened before ads or reviews really even came out which means players really have the most control over the success or demise of a title.

Heya, love the game but one question about a bug that i never got answered on your own forum. Whenever i research The end mass driver, the black hole gun, the game crashes to desktop.. is this a known problem or is my version just corrupted?

Yea it's definitely not known. I've not seen that. I'll keep an eye out for it though.

Great Game Brad! (thats MR. to me....).
I think Ill play this more then CIV4...
You might like to know at the local Best Buy store yesterday they had 4 copies, after I left they had 3, today they have zero...

Cool. Actually once things calm down a bit, I look forward to getting back to Civ IV. My "best" score is just under 100,000 so far at it (though I tend to play small maps, plains, as romans). I just love it.

Firaxis deserves a lot of kudos for how much they're supporting the game. Lots of good updates and real dedication.

Thanks Brad, appreciate you taking the time to share that info with us.

Can you give us an idea of how popular the download option has been, and possibly a comparison of downloads to brick and mortar sales? This is one of the parts of Stardock, as well as Matrix, that I appreciate the most. Not only because of not having to deal with copy protection, but also for the pure convenience.

Thanks Brad, appreciate you taking the time to share that info with us.

Can you give us an idea of how popular the download option has been, and possibly a comparison of downloads to brick and mortar sales? This is one of the parts of Stardock, as well as Matrix, that I appreciate the most. Not only because of not having to deal with copy protection, but also for the pure convenience.

The download only option has been pretty popular. But it never competes with retail sales in overall numbers.

Our "hope" for GalCiv II would be around 250,000 units sold worldwide in a box and then another 50,000 units purchased through download mechanisms.

So it's still no where near equal yet.

Hi Brad,

I'm eagerly waiting to get my hands on a copy of GalCiv II, because the release date has been postponed to an unknown date here in Belgium => :aargh: :hammer2:
Have you any idea of a release date for Europe?

By the way great website and support for the game. Especially the game examples have me convinced to buy the game. Heck, I still haven't played the game and I already registrated to a forum to discuss the game. :D

Following Berrie's question, I would like to know if there are multiple localized versions for Europe or, like Civ-IV, it is the same package with a language choice ?

Hi Brad,

While searching for the release date in Europe, I would like to know the release date in Singapore and the Far East in general. THANKS!

Picked it up this weekend, and I just finished my first game tonight - definately had the "one more turn" syndrome! Now it's time to move up the difficulty ladder :P

Hi Brad,

I'm really glad to see that what seems to me to be the right approach as far as video games are concerned is actually rewarded.

You guys are actually very active in the communities, and you really pay attention to what these communities have to say. I mean, you've already released two updates ! :eek:

I heard of galciv2 through word of mouth, and I too am now spreading the good news to everybody around me. I would like to see your dedication rewarded, and the fact that the game is actually excellent sure doesn't hurt ;)

My belief is that if computer games wants to remain competitive vs console games, they will have to focus on things not available on a console, and that is communities, mods and upgrades. Civ4 took the same approach, by releasing the SDK for instance. And among the most successfull PC games of last year are those with a very active modding scene : Half-life 2 for instance.

So keep up the good job :goodjob:

Hi guys. Unfortunately I don't know retail availability in other countries.

You can always purchase it directly from Galciv2.com and have the box shipped to you and download the game to play it immediately.

Hi Brad,

I'm really glad to see that what seems to me to be the right approach as far as video games are concerned is actually rewarded.

You guys are actually very active in the communities, and you really pay attention to what these communities have to say. I mean, you've already released two updates ! :eek:

I heard of galciv2 through word of mouth, and I too am now spreading the good news to everybody around me. I would like to see your dedication rewarded, and the fact that the game is actually excellent sure doesn't hurt ;)

My belief is that if computer games wants to remain competitive vs console games, they will have to focus on things not available on a console, and that is communities, mods and upgrades. Civ4 took the same approach, by releasing the SDK for instance. And among the most successfull PC games of last year are those with a very active modding scene : Half-life 2 for instance.

So keep up the good job :goodjob:

I'm convinced that word of mouth is a lot stronger than any sort of "marketing" campaign.

In our case, we're just a bunch of gamers who happen to make games. I bet that we're really not doing anything much differently than many of the other people in this forum.

That is, if you guys were to get together and start making games, how would you do it?

As a gamer, the things that really drive me nuts are:

1) Being treated like a criminal. I don't like paying $50 for a game and then having to keep the CD in the drive or whatever. My office is a disaster, I don't want to have to keep track of CDs.

2) Buggy games. While GalCiv II has humbled me a bit on that (doing a 3D game that works 100% on everyone's system was probably a bit naive on our part to think there'd be no issues). But I don't like paying for a game and then waiting MONTHS to get a fix.

Item #2 required some effort -- we had to be both the developer and publisher to make item #2 happen. We'd never be able to release updates when we felt like it if there were another layer (i.e. a publisher) involved.

3) Developers talking to gamers. Lots of people have good ideas. In fact, Thunderfall gave us a killer good idea -- letting users craete their own custom races and then being able to select previously created custom races as opponents. That's going to go in at some point. We'd never thought of it.

So really, it's just about doing the same kinds of things you guys would do. We just happen to be in the position of putting these ideas to the test.

In a couple weeks, the sales stats will get published and can you imagine if GalCiv is up on those charts? An indie game with a dev team of less than 10 people? It won't be a good day for the developers of copy protection software. ;)

An indie game with a dev team of less than 10 people?

Judging by the screenshoots and the reviews, it's already positively astonishing ! :)

Hi Brad!

Great to see game developers talking and explaining their products with the consumers. My question has to do with the modding capabilities of Galactic Civilization 2. Civ4 is very mod friendly and they will soon release there SDK so we can take modding one step further. Can you explain a lttle on GalCiv2 modding capabilities.

Thanks for your time and for a great game!!:goodjob:

Bilas

Hi Brad,

I just wanted to let you know that, besides my interest in the genre itself, one of the main reasons I'm buying GalCiv2 is because of Stardock's commitment to customer satisfaction. I've never seen a game company with this level of interaction. Keep up the good work.

3) Developers talking to gamers. Lots of people have good ideas. In fact, Thunderfall gave us a killer good idea -- letting users craete their own custom races and then being able to select previously created custom races as opponents. That's going to go in at some point. We'd never thought of it.

So really, it's just about doing the same kinds of things you guys would do. We just happen to be in the position of putting these ideas to the test.

That actually is a really great idea and I'm surprised you guys are going to implement it into a future patch. Kudos to you.

Anyway, I'll be getting my copy later today. Can't wait to try it out.

Hi Brad. I have been extremely impressed with the quality, Stardock's support and patching schedule for both GalCiv1 and 2 (I don't have '2 yet but will purchase next week - but have been lurking your forums for the past week or so) and you (and Stardock) really are a credit to the gaming industry. And the game is just fun!

Unfortunately, without going on a :gripe:, we as gamers, in my opinion, do not see enough support out there from publishers for games, which include no or little feedback, no patching, and "pass-the-buck" technical support. It seems, from my point of view (and quite bluntly), that most publishers are about the money and the units sold and the customer be damned. So it is refreshing to see a developer/publisher that is going in the opposite direction - providing a real and tangible service to the customer.

Even though any company from any industry is out there to make money, you and Stardock haven't forgotten the things that make customers loyal (outlined those above). In addition, (and I have to be careful as I don't want a warning or ban), I applaud Stardock's decision regarding copy protection. It is nice to be treated like a customer, and not looked at as being a criminal due to having Nero installed on your PC (for example). The biggest bonus with this strategy is that I don't need that pesky CDROM/DVD in the drive to play. Additionally, I believe based on the figures or statements I have seen/read, that it is possible to sell more units if copy protection is not included on the media. This does tend to disprove what we have all been told by other sources regarding units sold upon release. Besides, there are other methods of protection instead of something intrusive. This is just my 2 cents...

Thankyou once again for visiting these forums :)

- Sadan01

P.S. I don't know if it is just my machine but the GalCiv2 website does not seem to be Firefox-friendly :(

Edit: Everything stated above is my opinion only. Mods, please edit my post if you feel certain parts offend the forum rules.

Hola Draginol. :lol:

I've had to order my GCII from the US because I just cannot wait ´till the 15th of May to be released in Spain. I harassed a few spanish gameshop employees untill I actually found out the release date for it in Spain.

Un saludo desde España,

Drakan

Hi Brad,

I was too busy waiting for and then playing CivIV to pay much attention to the development of GalCiv2, but I always had the intention of at least trying it out once it was released. However, when it finally was released and I found out it had no copy protection, I immediately rushed to the store to pick up a copy (only to find out the shipment was somehow delayed and that I had to wait a couple of days). Even if the game, against all my expectations, would turn out to be less than spectacular I wanted to support this kind of respect for paying customers. For that reason alone I hope GalCiv2 becomes a smashing economic success.

I am also very pleased to see the developers taking an active interest in the community, even outside the official forums.

That said, the game itself is nothing short of a masterpiece. I'm still at the learning stage, but I'm very excited about the hightened focus of the non-military aspects of running an empire (as opposed to, for example, MoO2).
I also love the way you haven't been shy about borrowing from other established TBS series, such as MoO and Civ, and still come out with something that feels quite unique. On top of that, the game ran smoothly and stable out of the box on both computers I've tried it on (and one is a laptop that doesn't meet the minimum requirements!) I already love this game, and I know I will be playing it for years to come.

Thank you, and all the rest of the creative and gifted people at Stardock!

Glad you like it.

We're gamers ourselves, we'd be hanging out on various forums regardless. lol. ;)

@Draginol: Gee, my review copy hasn't arrived yet. Do I need to resend my address to you? ;)

In Galactic Civ we command a race,
Build cool ships and fly in space;
Hopes and dreams to the stars are bound,
Ever outward 'til new homes are found;
Empire builders everyone,
We breed and blast until the job is done.

Hi Brad -

I just wanted to say thank you for your stance on Copy Protection - it really is nice to be treated as a customer and not a thief. I just purchased your game - not just for that reason, but it was a huge part of my decision. You have come up with a 21st century solution to the issue - and not applied an outdated business model to a 21st century problem.

I am one of the many who have just not been able to get the flagship game on this site to run properly - and I really need a pastime for relaxation. I have read the reviews, and the gamesites, and the forums, and have decided on trying your effort.

After downloading and reading the manual and going through the tutorials, I don't think I'll be disappointed. Thanks again, and I look forward to seeing you around in this forum.

Interesting a Civilization series site is now supporting a totally different kind of genre! What made you switch to supporting this style of game Thunderfall? The fame the game has now or what? Real curious is all :P

Since I bought GC2 I have not touched Civ4.

Maybe Thunderfall is the same?
Just won't admit it? grin.

Since I bought GC2 I have not touched Civ4.

Maybe Thunderfall is the same?
Just won't admit it? grin.

I have. I love Civ 4. Between it and Oblivion I don't have much free time.. Er I mean OTHER free time. ;)

Hi Brad, I haven't played GalCivI or 2 but After reading the reviews I plan on buying it soon. The ship design looks to be a terrific idea and I can see myself consumed for hours just in that part of the game!

I do have one question for you if you can tell me, Are there any plans to add a Multiplayer feature to GalCiv2 in a patch or an expansion? And if so would you be able to use the same Ship designer option in MP? Too me nothing would be cooler then to be able to design you're own ships and then use them to destroy you're Friends online!!!!!!!!!!!!.......:crazyeye:

And the copy protection idea is nothing short Genus, I hope all Dev's follow you're lead!!!!!...:goodjob:

Hi Brad -

You guys made a wonderful game.

Thanks.

hi

i have bought the retail version of the game considering good reviews here and there.

good points firsts : graphs are nice as well as soundtrack

bad points and worst of it blocking ones : user interface is ... well the best word i can find for this is : broken !

- Tedious
- full counter intuitive (an alien develloper maybe ?)

a player without the manual will spend dozen hours simply to learn how to do things.
AI ? bah i m sorry but the actual state of the game (regarding ui) is unplayable for me so i haven't really tested ai yet.

back to moo2 and civ4 sorry.

Hello! :thumbsup:

Traded in my DS (I had two because of a temporary family addiction to Nintendogs) and a couple games today, got GalCiv2 and Sid Meier's Pirates! (for the X-Box...I'm cheap, ok?)

I've heard good things, so I'm looking forward to getting this puppy going.

Heya Draginol!!!

Good to see ya here!

I love GalCiv 2 more than any other PC game I currently have, and I have World of Warcraft and Age of Empires I, II, and III, so that's really saying alot! :)

I can't wait for the expansion to come out as well.

I just have one question: will there be any improvements to the ship editor in the game in the expansion? Because that is one of my favorite features in the game ( the cinematic space battles and diplomatic and trade relations are also true gems in this game).:D

Easily one of the best games ever. A game that combines 4X stratagy with custom race and ship editors with an outstanding A.I. and an RPG element too is something rarly if ever found in todays market.

And Brad, one thing about the game. In the future expansion will you include that Death Stare like super weapon from the first one i've heard about?

Great game, Brad!

One very useful thing about your distribution and support system I encountered - I bought the collector's edition physically from the high street but found that the first disc was faulty. But rather than have to take it back I simply registered it and downloaded the game from Stardock, which I thought was just a brilliant idea :)

I also love the care and attention that's gone into it, with the tutorials and everything. You just don't see this kind of support from most games.

Wow. The developers follow the forum. That's very good news.

Howdy, I'm Jonathan. I mainlined Master of Orion I and II like drugs, skipped III. I am hoping that GCII is my new MOO. I'm still trying to figure out what I should be doing in the game, climbing the fabled learning curve.

Hi Jonathan.
Gc2 is a great game.
Plenty of help available at the Forum galciv2.com

If you want a steep learning curve, try X3.
I did and eventually abandoned it. It was just hard work, no fun.

Thanks, Biggles. The learning curve is already steep enough for me, thanks; I just need to get the basics down and the rest will teach itself in battle. It's that early part that's the steepest.

I'm kinda new to this little subforum :) lol - never looked into it.

I'm glad developers listens to the players :) and yeah; of course I love GC2 as well :P I trid the demo for weeks and had to buy it when I found it... :D

I haven't been able to find out that much about the modding abilities etc., but it mainly seems like you first of all can't really model, nor map that much. Are there any tutorials anywhere which fast ecxplains about the files and/or what applications you need
? :) Of course I could have asked in a new thread, but then again; it's better to ask the source and get a 100% answer on the possibilities :D

- Qdin

Qdin.
Come and join us here http://www.thegalacticcore.com/forum/portal.php

You will get all the help and advice you could wish for.
Mention Vulcan 2

Greetings all. I don't know if any of you know me but my real name is Brad Wardell. I work at Stardock and am the designer and AI developer of Galactic Civilizations II.

So if you have any questions, I'm here. ;)

I was shocked to find the developer of GC2 at a Civ forum.

that said, my suggestion is to allow the user to turn off custom ships upon game startup. after building over a hundred custom ships to respond to different alien offenses and defenses the fun factor went down to zero.

the corollary to this suggestion is to allow the user to play with only one offense and defense combo such as lasers and shields. part of the steep learning curve for GC2 is the three offenses and three defenses whose effectiveness entirely depends upon the relativeness combos of effective counters to a given offense.

I realize some players are in love with both of these aspects of the game. however for me to continue to play GC2 I need to get rid of both of these aspects of the game.

on the plus side your alien AI is better than the Civ series AI, at least in terms of personality.

I also think you should pursue the suggestion you mentioned of allowing the user to save custom civs to be played as future opponents.

Hello everyone.

I'm glad to be over here and look forward to some discussions!

Wow, didn't find this forum until now. I bought GalCiv2 a while ago, but I just got Dark Avatar a few days ago, and WOW!

I am really impressed with Stardock's philosophy of gaming.

gal civ II

the best developer supported game I ever played :)

Hello all! I've just bought GC II Ultimate Edition. I tried it, and it was FUN! :D

Bought GCII... small version CD, not a box. Haven't played it. Haven't played Civ4: Colonization either... or Civs I-III in my box set.

I'm quite certain I'll enjoy the game (I have good taste :lol:) but I just need to get around to doing it. Oh man! I'm procrastinating at procrastinating! That's the reason I had to quit WoW. No guild could rely on me. XD