Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar Announced!

Sometimes, evil wins...

https://www.galciv2.com/darkavatar/
from GalCiv2 Forums

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.

128,778 views 123 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
That's pretty awesome. I've been wanting to be able to choose whether my opponents were evil or good like the first game, this is even better though. Environment types too? And fancy new treaties? I'm intrigued, and a crap load of new hulls and components to boot. I'm in silicon heaven.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Gotta tell ya, got the chills up and down my spine from the writeup. On a side note, I have hooked two other folks from the office on GC2, if they addict two more, than two more, before long given the pyramid effect, the entire country will be mine!!!!... er uhm playing.


Sounds like a sweet expansion!


W/R

Suralle Straykat

Kat Lord @ Large

Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
That's hot
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Outstanding!

one thing id like to see ...

I have an idea that would not be hard to implement and many ppl want, and might be forgotten in the hubbub of greater things.

PLEASE allow us to add logos to our ships. This was allowed in HW2 and added a great deal of ownership and feel to the game.

I envision 2 options, 1) add race logo, that adds whatever logo the player is currently using to his race and 2) add Other logo, this would allow players to pick from a directory when they previously saved logos.

If you really want to make my year, add in the options, add this logo to this ship only, add to this ship class, or add to all ships.

Please, pretty please with Plasma on top!

Yours in obsession,
Star Dagger
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Excellent. BTW a question on the asteroids, are they going to replace the generic morale, research, military and influence bonuses? I would prefer if it was that way, I always found it odd that there was just this glowing diamond in space that magically expanded on your influence or something. Will they be more specifc too? Like this resource allows for stronger hulls, thus more hit points? Or this resource brings a new cheaper more efficent power source, thus boosting your social and military production. I think that way, it feels a bit more realistic in a sense.
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sounds great, I cant wait to spend my money on it
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Will the terror star be in??? I guess not....
The epic generator sounds great though!
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
This is great news. I can't say I object anything on that list and some of it is just what the game/I need(s). Good times.
Reply #10 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sheesh ... don't you guys ever sleep?

1) Will people that pre-order be able to beta-test the expansion?

2) As it is, when customizing your race you can't take penalties to get more points to spend on other things. Sure it leads to exploitation, but I would like to see penalties available to apply to custom races - so I can make a race of braniacs that rock on research but are sub-par on soldiering and production.


Dano
Reply #11 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Wonderful. Great work once again, Stardock. I can't wait.
Reply #12 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Where is the link tp pre-order the expansion for the game?
Reply #14 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Cant wait for this will have to start saving up some money.
Reply #15 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Not to rain on your parade, but this really reeks of Kzer-Za and Kohr-Ah.
At least there isn't a 'superrace' that came beforehand, or a race that used 'mind control' to conquer the galaxy beforehand....
Reply #17 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Giant thumbs down on the digital only.

You do realize that some of us still have dial-up right? When you design a game to be single-player only then restrict the use of it to those that can download a gig worth of files, well, what are we talking about here really??
Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Unfortunately I cannot create new posts with this excellent forum software, so I post this here and hope someone from Stardock reads it:

pre-order using PayPal

This came up a lot of times at the forum, but I didn't find an answer yet. How can I purchase Stardoc products without using a credit card.

As you know, credit cards aren't that famous in good old Europe (at least continental Europe, so no offense my British friends).

I didn't mind because there was nothing I wanted to purchase, but now I would like to pre-order tGalCiv2: Dark Avatar. The purchase screen takes me to TotalGaming Network and I can fill in my personal data. There are PayPal signs on every page, but as soon as it comes to payment, the only choices available are between different credit card companies.

So how can I use PayPal to just send some money to you to add funds to my account?

Kind regards
puntarenas
Reply #19 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
You do realize that some of us still have dial-up right? When you design a game to be single-player only then restrict the use of it to those that can download a gig worth of files, well, what are we talking about here really??


though players can also have a CD sent to them as well.



Aside from that, the phrase "OH JOY!" is spamming my head right now. Asteroid fields! planets requiring a form of terraforming! Genocidal maniacs! New ships!

As was said earlier, build the time machine already. I want mine last week!
Reply #20 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
It sounds great, I really like the sound of the epic generator. My only question is, when will you release it in the UK and how much will it cost?
Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
When and where can I PreOrder?!?!?!?!?!!
Reply #23 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Can I buy it now and patch later? Maybe..

Soo can't wait for the XP now..
Reply #24 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Between the "special worlds" and "custom opponents", I'm already sold. The rest is just icing. The interview on Gamespot was interesting, too.



There are things that haven't been mentioned yet that I think would also make great additions. Think of this as a "request list". (Of course, I've already confessed that I'll buy the expansion anyway, but still.)



Fixing a trade exploit. Right now, if you offer, say, Laser 3 and 4 in the same deal, the AI will complain. But it'll take them
separately - if you sell it Laser 3 and THEN 4 in the same turn, it'll pay for both. It should be able to see what's going on there.



Heroes. This is what I voted for in the "what do you want most in an sequel" poll, and luckily, the developers seem to want it, too. I can only hope they change their minds and try it for the expansion pack.



Some explanation for why the Dread Lords never got a tech victory. It always seemed silly to me that the Dread Lords are this hyper-advanced race who have been hyper-advanced for aeons and are still here, but the main races (whose tech is vastly inferior) can win a tech victory and "transcend mortality" after only a few in-game years. Seems like kind of a plot hole to me. Maybe the Dread Lords are like the Overlords in Clarke's "Childhood's End", badass but lacking the godlike potential of the seemingly inferior races (that might help explain why the Dread Lords wanted to wipe out all the upstart evolving races in the beginning). Then again, maybe transcendence would explain why the Dread Lords' weapon/soldier bonuses are so obscene. This is definitely an issue I'd like to see more about, Stardock could probably come up with a really interesting answer here.



A more voluntary UP. I'm not really happy with the UP issues in GalCiv 2...it's too random and inflexible to be much use. There are issues that could really help or screw you, but - even though you have plenty of warning that a vote is coming - you don't know which issue will come up. I never buy "influence points" the AI. It sucks to buy them and then have the issue be something I don't care about.



I've always felt the UP issues should be more like the UN stuff in Alpha Centauri...in that game, anyone could call for votes on issues (planetary governor, lift atrocity prohibitions, salvage Unity core, etc) at any time, although no faction could call more than one vote a turn or whatever. And on the voting screen, you could click on the AI factions and go right into diplomacy to bribe them into changing their vote, if it was an issue they were willing to bend on. It would be nice if GalCiv 2 also offered this flexibility. Admittedly, it would change the game dynamics quite a bit. For example, evil races would probably become even more aggressive in their expansion, trying to ensure they'll have the influence to defeat the inevitable "reduced trade routes if you're evil" law that good races will try to hammer them with. It'd also make militarily weak but strong influence races more dangerous and viale. Sure, you could kick their ass in a war, but are you going to do it if they could pass a bunch of resolutions that would make things harder for you for the rest of the game?



More alignment-related things you can do. I've speculated/bitched about this point more than once on this forum, but I'll never tire of it. It'd be nice if your alignment shifted towards evil for starting wars (at least against good races). Even better would be empire-wide policies or something I could do to show my alignment, like slavery (production boost) or repressive government (loyalty boost) if I'm evil, or poor/disaster relief (morale boost, but constant cost) if I'm good.
Reply #25 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Unfortunately I cannot create new posts with this excellent forum software, so I post this here and hope someone from Stardock reads it:

pre-order using PayPal

This came up a lot of times at the forum, but I didn't find an answer yet. How can I purchase Stardoc products without using a credit card.

As you know, credit cards aren't that famous in good old Europe (at least continental Europe, so no offense my British friends).

I didn't mind because there was nothing I wanted to purchase, but now I would like to pre-order tGalCiv2: Dark Avatar. The purchase screen takes me to TotalGaming Network and I can fill in my personal data. There are PayPal signs on every page, but as soon as it comes to payment, the only choices available are between different credit card companies.

So how can I use PayPal to just send some money to you to add funds to my account?




my PayPal account draws directly on my checking account with my bank. i'm not sure if you can set it up using a European bank account. i looked around my PP acct and it seems to suggest to me that it only supports ETF from banks in the US. i'd say your best bet would be to email the support team at PayPal.