I hate to say it, but as someone who's played every installation of Galactic Civilizations in the last two decades, this one is outright the least fun experience I've had with. In general, it feels like a very conservative iteration of its predecessor which I am sad about because it always, even in the weaker part 3, it felt there was a major direction and an overarching design goal. TheI hate to say it, but as someone who's played every installation of Galactic Civilizations in the last two decades, this one is outright the least fun experience I've had with. In general, it feels like a very conservative iteration of its predecessor which I am sad about because it always, even in the weaker part 3, it felt there was a major direction and an overarching design goal. The first two games did thrive on quirky humor and comical approach to morality. As someone who even did have a stint on the metaverse (the original global scoring system) I'm aware that this game allowed for traditional as well as exploitative gameplay altogether. Evolving from that into a serious game can be a challenge, and I feel that the developers seemed to have got too scared of that after they tried it with part 3.
There are a few aspects that really draw criticism from me, and which feel like a let-down, especially when you know that 4X games are still popular. There are competitors on the market who really have shown that evolution is still possible. The previously defining aspects for this game’s series seem to have all but gone now. There is no United Planets anymore, morality has been replaced by a ying-yang’esque set of ideologies that form the basis for factions. Since no game ever lasts long enough to make use of this aspect, it feels like a waste of potential.
Combat for instance has always been an oversight of the series and never been a staple since you could still win in different ways. However, while you could excuse the lack of complexity and scope by lack of technology, experience, and manpower, this doesn’t work two decades later anymore. It feels archaic, clumsy and much like a token feature with a very non-intuitive nature, and I know that Stardock is capable of developing combat systems. Worse yet, the ship editor, a staple of this genre, feels like an afterthought too. Like never before I felt the need to not bother at all.
Research and economy feel a lot more stripped down this time around. I'm not a fan of the tile bonus system on planets, since it feels like you could ignore it altogether or use it and be less efficient overall. It's like a minimalistic attempt to emulate the tile bonuses from Civilization 5 and 6.
Another core aspect were starbases, it is also exemplary for how a developer struggles with finding a working iteration. In part 2 you spammed constructors until starbases were fully upgrades, in part 3 they added modules and in part overcomplicated it for balance purposes, this time around you only place a starbase once and then start spam-building modules at your shipyards. This is probably the best approach so far; however, the upgrades are still a mess, since you still must figure out in-depth what each starbase is missing.
In general, the game could do better with information. A lot of information is simply not available. Do you want to see the tile layout of a planet? It’s not available until colonization. You want to see what modules are missing on a starbase? You must get into the screen. Do you want to see what protects an anomaly? Save, test and reload! Obscurity is not a good feature anymore in 2022!
The sector system is a new feature whose existence could only be explained by technicality. It doesn’t really add fun to the game, its control is easily cheesed, and the AI will still spam your sector even if it has plenty of space in its own home sector. In the late game, some sectors will be swarmed with pirates, space monsters and precursors, making settling it feel like cleaning up a flea-ridden attic. They are an annoyance without a major threat.
The last two issues I have concern balance and technical issues. You can win the game through accumulation of prestige. However, prestige is the sum of several powers, and these powers are not calculated in a normalized fashion. For instance, there is a species that gets a duplicate, albeit weaker ship after building one. Ignoring that the combat system favors swarms anyway, it is also handsomely rewarded by score. Lastly, like its predecessor, the game still struggles with parallelism, which result in stuck turns or UI elements blocking turn progression by being placed in front of critical dialogs or other elements.
In conclusion, there are a host of issues that probably get resolved over time, but the initial player base is already smaller after the disappointment of its predecessor. It being available on Epic store only is an even worse decision. It adds another limiting layer of exclusivity, causing a major lack of interest in a franchise that could really need some innovation. If the initial base after a release is too small, then no amount of DLC can revive it. This is more so true for Galactic Civilizations, which once stood at the forefront and now has been marginalized to a game that barely registers on the radar of 4X enthusiasts.… Expand
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