The post-Twilight road map

Where should we go next?

Published on May 6, 2008 By Frogboy In GalCiv II News

The final expansion pack for Galactic Civilizations II has been released! And we're very happy with how much people like it.

At the same time, we're not done. Let me share with you some of our plans:

Right now, we're finishing up The Political Machine. Once that is finished, part of the team will be shifted to the SDE-2 team which is working on the "fantasy strategy game" and the other part will return to GalCiv.
The plan is to release a v1.92 in early June. v1.92 will be mostly bug fixing and balancing. There's two particularly annoying issues that have cropped up. The first one is that on some Vista systems, some "string now found" issues come up. No idea yet. The work around is to run the game as administrator but we have no idea why that fixes it as none of us do that. The other annoying one is the Alt-esc issue - it doesn't always come back when you try to return to the game. On top of that, there's various balancing and house cleaning that we will want to do.
Then, probably in July or maybe early August we will be releasing Galactic Civilizations II v2.0. This update will affect all versions of GalCiv II but mostly Dark Avatar and Twilight. The biggest change will be the enhanced espionage system for DA and ToA users. There will also be additional graphical improvements in ToA to continue "future proofing" the game. The Metaverse will also be getting some much needed love with v2.0.

After that, it'll depend on you. Our budget post 2.0 is largely based on sales at that stage. Most people will be transferred to working on the fantasy strategy game so that we can announce it later this year. Other parts of the team will be working with Gas Powered Games on Demigod.

So that's where we're at. Cheers!

Comments (Page 2)

Autistic Angel

on May 06, 2008

Stardock's product support has always been superlative. Thanks for the update!

As one of the balancing / housecleaning issues that needs addressing, I'd like to draw Stardock's attention to this thread discussing how the Thalan cannot research MK1 Battle Stations for their starbases.

In short: without Mk1 Battle Stations, the Thalan cannot install any weapons on their starbases, and without weapons, their very-expensive Singularity Armor is completely non-functional - Thalan bases can be destroyed by virtually anything.

I'd be really happy to see this problem addressed in the next update.

Thanks again for all the support, and I'm really looking forward to hearing more about that Almost-Master-Of-Magic game in the coming months!

-Autistic Angel

MottiKhan

on May 06, 2008

I'm looking forward to the fantasy strategy game. Galciv2 will hold its own, I'm sure, but a shiny new game is really something to look forward to. If it's using the same talent and creativity that gave birth and depth to Galciv2, it'll be a winner.

Zyxpsilon

on May 06, 2008

Espionage, the enhanced way?
I mean, get real, this MUST be done in a hurry!

And since X-Worlds_Mod has in fact four new tech slots after Counter-Espionage (Interrogation, Abduction, Investigation & a triplet group of Sabotage items) which may just fit the developpers' choice of designs, hopefully... i can hardly wait any longer than early July as presently planned.

One thing is for sure, i'd love to have some Repair_Icon (Yellow Construction Helmet!) dropped on sabotaged buildings instead of the usual toggle to nullify back & forth endlessly. Plus a lot more that i certainly invest all of my trust into SD staff imagination & gameplay balancing concerns. Strategy IS Spying, anyway.

Oh, and please make us a HERO ala Bond, James Bond accumulating experience.

Great news overall, indeed.

SIR NASTY OF TANG

on May 06, 2008

The team would love to do a GalCiv III but it won't be for awhile. The fantasy strategy game is going to take some time to finish and then we can look at where to go from there.

as much as we all would like to see a GC III I think a slow down and tweak GC DA and TA would be better for now !!! There room for improvement !!! Don`t get me wrong it is great the way it is but what is learned here will help with future games

I`m likely toget some smack for this post!!!

Nasty

sgsmitty

on May 06, 2008

I have mixed feelings about this. It seems like all the existing bugs we have will be around for 3 weeks to a month. But when they get back to it then there will be some additional enhancement.
I guess I got spoiled when in times past there would be one or more major bug updates within the a week or so after release.
It sounds like they have a lot in the hopper and are spread thin which is to be expected, better that than not busy creating future revenue streams.

Bottom line, it is what it is, enjoy what we can.

Vinraith

on May 06, 2008

Looks fantastic, thanks for the update. Keep us in the loop on the Political Machine, there's a lot of promise there.

Verkinix

on May 06, 2008

So, we as fans need to hop over to the online store and purchase copies of galciv2(GC DA TA) for a friend or ten. Stardock respects its customers/players enough to give us the complete run down of whats going on, and I think we should share this with our friends

I'm really looking forward to what you guys are working on for the fantasy strategy game. I'll be buying it for sure!

Thanks again SD peeps. You rock as always!
(soon as I get some extra cash, I'll be buying another copy or two of galciv2 and maybe even sins just to support you guys

)

paulopaulo

on May 06, 2008

That's great news. The alt-tab bug is fairly annoying, but i'm finding games load much faster now so as long as i remember to save before trying it's not too bad.

Is there any chance of a new planetary invasion screen? This is the only change to ToA that I dislike. The original screen had some pretty ancient graphics but there was still some retro "kitch" appeal in it, plus i loved seeing the soldiers actually fight. When I heard that this would be improved for ToA I was looking forward to the same thing but with better graphics, so I was disappointed to find that it has been replaced by the flags. This seems to be a step backwards and if there is no chance of a different version i'd honestly like the old one back.

Alstein

on May 06, 2008

Waiting for the fantasy strat game. Hopefully it SD quality, without being too similar to GC.

Clocknova

on May 06, 2008

Sounds great. There are, of course, still a few things that could stand to be tweaked. My personal #1 is still the constructor grind. I understand if you don't want to make starbases self-upgradeable, but would you at least consider making starbases automatically a really point as soon as they are created. I build lots of starbases, and having to build create and name the corresponding rally points for the constructors to find gets to be a pain, especially since the rally point into window still has that strange bug where, when you click on the rally point name, the cursor goes to the beginning and you have to move it all the way to the right and delete the generic name before you add your own.

Sir_On_The_Edge

on May 06, 2008

I love you guys!!!

particlewave

on May 06, 2008

The biggest change will be the enhanced espionage system for DA and ToA users.

I can't wait for this one... hints please Brad!

The Metaverse will also be getting some much needed love with v2.0.

I'm more than a little intrigued by this one... any guesses?

Master Marcus

on May 06, 2008

Thanks for the inputs, Brad, and good work Stardock! I too am very intrigued by your Metaverse' ''much needed love''....

DeicidE

on May 06, 2008

Thanks for the update, good to see there is a roadmap/future for GC2

Although the game is pretty solid. One thing I'd hope for either in GC2 v2.x (or GC3) is that techs can have more than one pre-requisite.

I'd also like to see bigger (yes bigger) map sizes (not necessarily for more stars/planets)

And customizable starbase types. e.g. Repair Starbase for adding repair modules that give +25% repair rate etc.

this is turning into a wish list....

Frogboy : Maybe you should ask the community what three things they'd like. put it to a vote. then develop on a sliding scale, if you get x to sign up for upgrade do top 5 if y sign up do 10 things, etc...

keep up the good work.

Babcom280

on May 06, 2008

Everything looks great so far. Thanks for another great game.

As for the future, the fantasy strategy game is what I want far more than anything else anywhere near your plate, at least as far as I've heard. For whatever it's worth in sales, I'll be happy to pre-order it as soon as it's available.

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