SMAC in review

[The_Saint]

I've got the SMAX Planetary Pack running under 7 Ultimate without any compatibility modes. Has all the standard "ancient game" quirks: doesn't like dual monitors, colour depth, resolution etc...

And it seems to hang a few seconds here and there in menu's occasionally but otherwise runs exactly the same as I when I first played it.

[Spekio]

I'm little late,but Lady Deidre kicks all the other factions ass. You can achieve every single victory condition, and also worms. Plus she is hot.

[Enforcer Talen]

Ive never been able to play her effectively. She usually ends up in my punishment chamber

[Spekio]

Ive never been able to play her effectively. She usually ends up in my punishment chamber

The punishment chamber takes a whole new meaning when I crush Santiago.

She is The Mario , and when your first worm capture is done, you can take down nearby factions(of course, it's hard when you play the expansion, since aliens and cult of planet can also do this) and make pupet states.

[Karza]

I've got the SMAX Planetary Pack running under 7 Ultimate without any compatibility modes. Has all the standard "ancient game" quirks: doesn't like dual monitors, colour depth, resolution etc...

And it seems to hang a few seconds here and there in menu's occasionally but otherwise runs exactly the same as I when I first played it.

Resolution can be sort of fixed by putting the line DirectDraw=0 into Alpha Centauri.ini. That makes it run at whatever your desktop resolution is, though of course the menus won't scale properly. That's not much of an issue though, and it's very nice to see more of the world at once.

[Stofsk]

Ive never been able to play her effectively. She usually ends up in my punishment chamber

The punishment chamber takes a whole new meaning when I crush Santiago.

She is The Mario , and when your first worm capture is done, you can take down nearby factions(of course, it's hard when you play the expansion, since aliens and cult of planet can also do this) and make pupet states.

I disagree. The Gaians are specialised towards planet/ecology, they can capture worms, they're good at building, but they're not good at building a war machine (worms offsets this, but it still bears mentioning). The true JoaT faction is the Peacekeepers IMO. They're a potent hybrid faction. They don't really get many benefits but they also don't get many glaring weaknesses either.

[Archaic`]

Agreed with Stofsk. Of the original SMAC factions, the Peacekeepers are the most balanced and least specialised. The Data Angels function in a similar role for SMAX.

[Spekio]

Indeed Brother Lal's faction is more flexible, but I still believe that The Gaian's can pretty much fulfill any role.

[AMT]

Indeed Brother Lal's faction is more flexible, but I still believe that The Gaian's can pretty much fulfill any role.

Except heavy war economy. You won't see the Gaians fielding a fleet of copters without tanking their econ and sci to hell

[Spekio]

Fine, I stand corrected.


On a different subject, since earlier we were talking about punishing chambers, I just rememberd this passage of this let's play:

Before sentencing, Miriam said that she welcomed death, for it would simply bring her closer to 'God', as had happened to those others who were 'martyred' in the bloody fight for the last of her cave-fortresses.

She was to be disappointed, however. Chairman Yang, presiding, overruled the death decision, and instead passed down a different sentence.

"Then I will give you life, as you claim your God did for you. An eternity of life, in fact, sustained by the best longevity technology we possess. I will even create a world for you. It would be a small world, though, the inside of a punishment sphere, but I hope that within, you will be able to contemplate your failure amidst the pain, and seek some sort of redemption in reason and logic. Take her away!"

For once Miriam's icy demeanour was broken. According to witnesses, she broke openly into tears, and begged for forgiveness.

But judgement has been passed. Thus be the fate of all who wish to harm the Hive!

Taken from here: http://lparchive.org/LetsPlay/Alpha%20Centauri/

Pretty good read.