Galatic Civilization II: Dark Avatar, first expansion

Anarchist Bunny · Post by **Anarchist Bunny** » 2006-06-24 10:54pm

Stardock Homepage wrote:Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar Announced!
Sometimes, evil wins...

This Fall Stardock will be releasing the Dark Avatar expansion pack for Galactic Civilizations II.

Dark Avatar is the first official expansion pack to Stardock's award-winning PC strategy game, Galactic Civiliations II.

The expansion pack goes far beyond the typical expansion. Not only does it add new units, new races, new maps, and a new campaign as is expected in an expansion pack, it greatly expands the feature set of the base game in very significant ways.

Here are some of the features that will be in the expansion pack:

* Custom Opponents. Just as players can design their own civilizations; in Dark Avatar they can design their own opponents to play against. This isn't just cosmetic either, players will be able to set up their intelligence, personality, playing style as well as what they look like, what ships they use, what dialog they use, etc. These opponents are then saved for later use.
* Agents. Players will be able to hire agents via espionage to wreak havoc on their opponents or to counter enemy agents operating in their own empire.
* Special Worlds. Worlds in Galactic Civilizations II will have an additional classification -- environment type. Different races will start with the ability to colonize only certain environment types. Through research and technology, additional planet types can be colonized and conquered but it will totally change the way the initial colonization phase of the game plays out.
* The Epic Generator. One of the things Stardock has put out that people seem to like are epic stories of game play examples. Dark Avatar will generate such stories automatically and export them as HTML so that players can share their stories with others and look back at a good game as the epic saga they imagined.
* Asteroid Fields. The economics in Dark Avatar will be altered to make strategic control of additional kinds of resources important. Amongst those will be the asteroid fields which, when utilized, can help the closest colonized planet. In additional, asteroid fields act as a natural barrier slowing down incoming ships.
* New Treaties. Diplomacy will get beefed up with the additional of new diplomatic treaties. These treaties not only provide mutual benefit but give players more tools to forge their relations with other players.
* New Races. Two new civilizations will be introduced to the mix including the evil Korath who are bent on genocide at the galactic scale.
* New hulls and ship components. A ton of hulls and ship components are going to be added. This really can't be overstated enough because not only are there going to be a lot of these components but the quality is far superior to what we've done before thanks to having mastered the art of making ship hulls and components.
* The New Campaign: Dark Avatar. This time, the Drengin Empire are the good guys. You must make the galaxy safe for oppression and tyranny...because the alternative is worse.

The expansion pack will list for $29.95 but users will be able to pre-order it for $24.95. The expansion will be initally released digital only via TotalGaming.net (and the store on GalCiv2.com). though players can also have a CD sent to them as well.

The release date is this Fall.

Post by **weemadando** » 2006-06-24 11:34pm

The little hamster avatar that I see on Gamespot related to this expansion scares me. Rodents in space...

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-06-24 11:56pm

The 1.2 patch has some kind of deadly purple rodent race. They rule.

Anarchist Bunny · Post by **Anarchist Bunny** » 2006-06-25 12:59am

I'm having a problem with upgrading to 1.2.

After I run the patcher, it stops at 91% but says the installation was complete. When I run the game it says in the corner that its v. 1.2, but the two new political parties are not there, nor are the new techs.

Also, the installer says that its 34.2 MB, while when I was downloading it, it said it was 35.1 mbs in size.

I've already deleted and redownloaded the installer, but am having the same problems.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-06-25 01:09am

Hey, now that you mention it I don't have the two new political parties either. Maybe my patch broke too.... :S

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2006-06-25 02:15am

Those are in the mod no? That dosn't work for me(file path is broken).

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2006-06-25 04:38am

The Epic Generator. One of the things Stardock has put out that people seem to like are epic stories of game play examples. Dark Avatar will generate such stories automatically and export them as HTML so that players can share their stories with others and look back at a good game as the epic saga they imagined.

I'd buy the expansion for this little gem alone.

Hotfoot · Post by **Hotfoot** » 2006-06-25 06:14am

weemadando wrote:The little hamster avatar that I see on Gamespot related to this expansion scares me. Rodents in space...

They are like Boo! Minature Giant Space Hamsters!

Lord Woodlouse · Post by **Lord Woodlouse** » 2006-06-25 07:27am

Looks good. The different environment type thing certainly looks like it could change the game dynamics.

I'd love to see the ability to swap territorial rights (not just planets, but zones of control) so you could see two races swapping planets neither has colonised for mutual gain.

Hotfoot · Post by **Hotfoot** » 2006-06-25 07:44am

Lord Woodlouse wrote:Looks good. The different environment type thing certainly looks like it could change the game dynamics.

I'd love to see the ability to swap territorial rights (not just planets, but zones of control) so you could see two races swapping planets neither has colonised for mutual gain.

It does have added gameplay value, but unless they have some really smart AI for determining who goes where, it could get messy. Trying to keep planets of different types sorted in Space Empires 4 is one of the greatest failings of the game, and I'd hate for it to cause an issue with GalCiv

Lancer · Post by **Lancer** » 2006-06-25 08:55am

Stark wrote:The 1.2 patch has some kind of deadly purple rodent race. They rule.

No, the Snathi are the original GalCiv space rodents. Death to the imposters!!!

Temjin · Post by **Temjin** » 2006-06-25 07:25pm

Bounty wrote:I'd buy the expansion for this little gem alone.

I don't have much hope for the Epic Generator. It's probably going to be some stupid formulaic type thing.