Galactic Civilizations is definitely not a simulation of ANYTHING. The pretty pictures of "spaceships" and "planets," and the descriptions of "populations," "weeks," "credits," and pretty much everything else in the game are not relevant to anything that makes any kind of real sense.
I actually quit playing after I realized how the game mechanics - with the sliders and stuff - actually works. But later I tried again and simply quit thinking of the "planets" as representing real planets, and the "colonies" as being anywhere near as independant as the offices in one corporate building.
Ideally, of course, we would all be blessed with the kind of mind that's inherently immune to cognative dissonance in the first place - but lets face it, we can't all be that lucky. The rest of us have to make somewhat of an effort to ignore all that and just approach the game as an abstract strategy game, filled with arbitrary hidden rules and limitations. And once you get past that hurdle, it's actually kind of interesting.
There's something called "willing suspension of disbelief." Yes, we're aware that the underlying game rules are abstractions. There has to be - no computer has the processing power to simulate an entire galaxy with complete accuracy. Most people don't care, and are able to suspend said disbelief to enjoy it as a space strategy game rather than just an abstract one.
But then the Mega Events come along to wreck the strategy aspect entirely. Then the designers (apparently, somewhere) say that it's INTENDED to be that way, and you should just turn off the features you paid for. And then, to top it all off, people attack you as "venomous and irrational" for being annoyed by that.
You're "(apparently, somewhere)" confuses me. It's not as if there's some secret about it - Stardock has ALWAYS maintained that Mega Events are supposed to unbalance the game. That's the whole POINT of Mega Events in the first place. They're meant to give players interesting strategic challenges to adapt to. No developer had EVER claimed Mega Events were intended to do anything but throw a giant monkey wrench into the game
If you don't want to pay for Mega Events, don't buy Dark Avatar. You'll be missing out on asteroids, super abilities, economic and research treaties, planet environment types, and espionage, but you'll also not have spent any money on a feature you don't want. If you DO want all those things, but don't want Mega Events, buy Dark Avatar and turn Mega Events off.
