(INSIDERS BUILD ONLY) v4.1 Update Changelog

Hello everyone,

We are excited to share with you a preview of version 4.1. The big change is that custom maps now support Steam Workshop and multiplayer. On the engine side, we've improved stability, fixed a number of crashes and multiplayer desyncs, and sped up AI turns. On the game side, there is a large pass of UI polish and balance work.

One big change for owners of the "Federations and Empires" DLC is that factions start the game with at least on government type unlocked. For example, the Terrans start with the Federation government type unlocked.

Please read below for details.

Steam

1. Select Galactic Civilizations IV from your Steam Library list.

2. Right-click and select "Properties."

3. Select the BETAS tab.

4. From the dropdown, select "Insider" and click Close. (If you don't see this option, restart Steam.)

5. Steam should pull down the changed files; if you ever want to return, do the same as above but select "default."

Epic

• Open the Epic Launcher

• Select "Galactic Civilizations IV: Supernova - Insider's Edition"

• Install and play!

Please note: The opt-in (Insider Build) is an early preview of the next update, and you might experience bugs or other issues.

August 27th, 2026 Update

Engine

• Fixed a crash when ending the turn after loading a saved game, caused by AI targeting data holding pointers to objects deleted between the planning and move phases.

• Fixed a frequent crash in the Shipyard caused by animated queue-entry UI being recycled while still attached.

• Fixed a crash when exiting the Ship Designer from the main menu, and a follow-on crash when re-entering it.

• Fixed colony stat calculations running against the wrong data set on worker threads.

• Fixed empty spacers on the planet surface being treated as real tiles.

• Fixed a hang when firing a map weapon at a target that was off screen. If the camera never arrived, because you panned the map away or another screen took over the view, the battle never resolved and the turn could not be ended. In multiplayer this stalled every player in the game. The camera move is now retried, and after a few seconds the game gives up and shows the results wherever your view ended up.

• AI turns are faster in large empires. Empire-wide stat recalculations triggered by vassal skim decrees and by AI starbase modules completing are now pooled and batched instead of being repeated for every colony and every module.

• The AI spends less time on research each turn. It no longer re-runs its research planner when it already has a valid technology underway, and expansion content lookups now use a direct index instead of a repeated scan.

• Imperial court order effects are worked out with less repeated lookup work each time your stats are recalculated.

• Fixed fleets being briefly tied up at a shipyard when the game was only checking a route rather than actually sending them there.

Multiplayer

• Custom maps are now supported in multiplayer, with a Galaxy dropdown in the multiplayer lobby. Maps larger than Medium are unavailable and say so.

Gameplay

• Ships now automatically fire any unused battle-action weapons at the end of your move phase. Previously this only happened for players who had unlocked the auto-fire ability or had Dominator mines deployed.

• When one of your own map weapons fires, the camera now moves to bring it on screen before its effect plays.

• Computational Core colony income raised from +10 to +25.

• Ship movement rebalanced: the in-Zone-of-Control refit bonus drops from 25% to 20%, Synthetic propulsion techs grant +1 move instead of +2, and Anomaly Detection no longer grants a free +1.

• Randomly terraformed tiles now appear adjacent to existing tiles instead of stranded on their own.

• Neural Batteries now add +5 manufacturing overflow instead of +10.

• The Tibetan Monastery leader trait is now human only, so factions such as the Festron no longer roll it. Leaders who already have it keep it.

Maps

• Opponent settings now clamp to the number of player starts the selected custom map actually has.

• Added Workshop support for Custom Maps. You can publish a map you built in Galaxy Forge straight from game setup, browse and install maps other players have shared, and filter them by galaxy size under a new Custom Maps tab in the Mod Manager. Map entries are badged to show whether they shipped with the game, were downloaded, or are your own.

Galaxy Forge / Map Editor

• The Map Editor now opens in the game's current language, and star system, resource, relic and hazard names all translate with it.

• Custom maps can now set the planet class of individual orbits, and the game honors it.

• Assigning a player start now marks its homeworld automatically, and saving is blocked if one is missing.

• Random star names are now localized.

Localization

• Improvement tooltips now grow to fit their text instead of clipping the last line short, and Chinese descriptions break onto a new line sooner so they no longer run past the edge of narrow panels.

• Events and technology descriptions no longer address you as human when you are playing a non-human faction. The War Aims ceasefire event, the Autonomous Command party event, two Master tech tree descriptions and a Singularity milestone have all been rewritten to be species-neutral.

UI

• Fixed ships near the bottom of the Fleets list being un-selectable, which read as the news reports covering them.

• Fixed commander ability descriptions in the Fleet Manager running over the entries beneath them.

• Fixed the Data Bank reopening on top of the Shipyard when the Shipyard was entered from a planet.

• Fixed the artifact power hover card drifting away from the item it describes.

• Fixed the abilities list being empty in the Ship Designer opened from the title screen at UI scales above 100%.

• Fleets with no movement no longer show Standby, Explore, Sentry or Rally commands.

• Ship ability buttons pushed onto a second row now return to the first row when space frees up.

• Notification tooltips for anomaly surveys now show a title and full body instead of opening and ending mid-sentence.

• Starbase module entries you cannot afford are greyed out, and the Build button is disabled with a tooltip naming the missing resource.

• The Districts list on the planet window is wider and shows all six district types.

• Mini-map Starbase, Zone of Control and Resource buttons now show the correct on/off state on new games and after loading.

• Planet Context no longer leaves "Colony World: Unsuited to further development" or the Assign Governor button showing over an uncolonized planet, and the duplicate class label is gone.

• The promote-to-president portrait is no longer upscaled past its source art, and the dialog is tighter with more room for text.

• The Prison Research Lab has its own icon instead of sharing the Prison Labor Camp art.

• Removed a fade artifact drawn over tech node titles.

• Fixed hairlines around the cards on the Technology Library screen.

• Higher-resolution icons for the Ore, Gem and Silicate Trader shipyard projects.

• Fixed Yor and Nyx mining starbase pilons clipping through surrounding geometry.

• A sharper Stardock logo on the incompatible-save warning.

• The Cruise Liner no longer appears in the Ship Designer or the Shipyard.

• The fleet window is wider so late-game stat values no longer clip, and a fleet's hit points now read on top of the health bar rather than beside it.

Federations & Empires Expansion

Gameplay

• Federations & Empires players are no longer forced to start under the Colonial Charter. Each faction now starts under its own government, and the rest unlock normally.

• Custom factions now receive a default starting form of government weighted by the personality traits you chose.  However, you can change the starting form of government on the "Customize your Civilization" screen.

• Fixed your starting government showing as locked on the Change Government screen. A faction that begins in a government, such as the Terrans in a Federation, could not switch back to it after changing away.

• Fixed the Cultural Exhibition decree granting roughly a hundred times the Tourism it should.

• Seven more Federation Accords now apply to all your Core Worlds instead of only Member Worlds, so a new Federation gets value from them before it has any Member Worlds. Ideological Beacon now grants +1 Culture per turn.

• Added two new citizen professions: Creator, from the Cultural Exchange Compact, and Librarian, from the Galactic Library Pact.

• Federation Secretary colony bonuses now apply to your capital as well as your other worlds.

• Federation Senate bills no longer stay in effect as long. The longest drop from 48 months to 36, with the shorter ones tightened to match.

• Government unlocks moved one ideology tier deeper: Oligarchy to Autonomy, Empire to Obedience, Federation to Representation, Technocracy to Innovation.

• Technocracy and Oligarchy no longer trigger political party events.

• Corporation links can now be torn down by the originating player, with the other side notified, and their base transfer rate rises from 5% to 6%.

• Later Technocracy Optimizations now cost noticeably more, so late points are no longer close to free.

• Leaving the Oligarchy now clears your investment portfolio and the executive orders it unlocked, instead of leaving them active under your new government.

• Technocracy and Oligarchy gained their missing government passives for ship range, income, trade and expectations.

• Federation election Mandate of the People choices retuned toward Manufacturing and Growth rewards.

• Unspent Technocracy Optimizations now show on the Government button badge instead of interrupting your turn.

• Oligarchy Holdings can no longer be traded away in diplomacy, and are excluded from the Governors list.

• The Suppress Dissidents and Witch Hunt court orders now scale five times more strongly with their officer's attribute, bringing them in line with the rest of the Imperial court.

• Computing Center re-tuned: costlier to build, far less pollution, and cheaper upkeep. It no longer penalizes a neighboring tile's Approval, and its Food and Population neighbor penalties are halved from -2 to -1. It now returns more Research at higher levels, and less Compute.

• The ARS Vanguard and Brood Dominator hero ships lose their Hypersonic Missiles, keeping their lasers and their utility modules.

• The Relay Buoy now costs 1 Promethion to deploy instead of 8, and 2 maintenance instead of 1.5

• All non-default leader positions across the four governments now have proper tech prerequisites, so factions such as Nyx and the new Terrans can unlock every office.

• Chief Risk Officer now requires Interstellar Trade instead of Galactic Trade, making it available without the Wealthy trait.

• Federation "Secretary of Exploration" now grants +1 Moves and +1 Ship Range per Diligence, matching the Minister of Exploration.

• Invisible Hand auto-acquire now works, prioritizes dead worlds, and can be cancelled and reissued against the same target.

• Prospectors now claim a world on arrival, the way colony ships auto-colonize.

• The five government ship classes that could never be selected in the Ship Designer are now available, each with its own artwork.

Text / Localization

• Egalitarian ideology traits reworded around classical ideals of earned merit.

• Fixed Polish text running into the values beside it on the Technocracy, Federation Accord and Oligarchy screens.

UI

• Institution cards now name and color-code the skill that drives their progress.

• Collateral now shows how much of the pool is committed, matching the Chamber of Commerce.

• Imperial Authority in the top bar now shows the available amount, with a breakdown on hover.

• The civilization setup screen now shows the selected government's description and icon.

• Techs that unlock Accords, Decrees or Investments no longer call them Policies, and the Tech Navigator updates when you change government.

• Institution cards now highlight while a leader is dragged over them.

• Fixed the Empire tax slider panel overlapping the stat list beneath it.

• The "God Machine" milestone value now wraps instead of disappearing under the reward icons.

• The Compute Utilization slider now shows a full background track.

• Long Oligarchy investment opportunity descriptions now scroll instead of being cut off.

• Trade Route Value now has a proper tooltip on both its raw and modified stats.

• The Collateral cost icon now matches the Collateral stat icon.