CraigHB

Reply to RT4X - understanding what it means in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Heck, these guys are great aren't they? Anyway, I don't think you get the full feel of the game's 4x aspects until you get into the bigger maps. It took me a while to get there, but I've been playing the biggest maps either with 1 or 3 stars (100+ planets). These games take about 8 hours to play against the AI. Compare that to a gigantic GC2 game with a many as 750 habitable planets and that's still a very short game. With the 3 star systems especially, you do get into the eXplore aspect mo

Reply to Are the pirates supposed to be this hard? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

I bail on that pirates event. The whole map fills up with them. However, in DA, if you wipe out a race without killing their military, you can end up with a good number of them and this time they have good ships. Though, I can usually handle that one.

Reply to NotMoM2: story layer and multi-player "vs." Metaverse in Games in Development GalCiv2 Forums

Putting the game on ancient Altaria would make it more science fiction than fantasy, wouldn't it? That would be fine by me actually. I tend to avoid things where the word "fantasy" can be applied. When I think of fantasy, I think of a story that relies little on the viewer/reader "buying it". In science fiction, things usually have some sort of believable technology behind whatever is happening. It's a pretty wide fuzzy line really, but I can feel the difference more than I can explain it.

Reply to Help me love (and purchase) this game!! in Strategies GalCiv2 Forums

It's a very heady complicated game and may not suit the taste of some people. For me, I'll try just about anything if I think I have a chance of getting into it. You need to give yourself a fair amount of time to figure out how to play it. Start really easy with difficulty on the lowest and on a small map and only a couple races. Most of the stuff you can learn through the tutorials and by trial and error. Once you've played a bit and understand the basics, read some of the strategy guides

Reply to Sins of a Solar Empire the best selling PC strategy game in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Awesome game, really enjoying it. Good to see Stardock release another successful game title. All the best wishes and keep 'em coming!!!

Reply to Another Giant Has Passed in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

He was a brilliant man. I've seen a few comments he's made on the state of science and technology. Very insightful and very interesting. Great loss to the world.

Reply to Little dissapointed with the devs in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

I think they're behind the curve on this one. I think most of us feel it would be better to release the game when it's done than to release it early and see big changes post-release. That said, things have going slow with the beta releases so I doubt we're even going to see a March release on this one. I was hoping to see it this month, but if it takes longer, it takes longer. Though, it would be nice to know one way or the other. I'm not particularly displeased about it and I've already pa

Reply to Where to Start in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

Each expansion adds new aspects to the game and tightens the screws on the difficulty. Personally, I would start with Dread Lords and go to Dark Avatar once I felt I had a good handle on the game. I think TA has the most departure with unique tech trees for each race. It actually took me quite a while to master one tech tree, let alone a number of them.

Reply to I forgot how good MOM is in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Well, then let me rephrase that, I don't understand why people like RTS so much. I don't think it's that great. It doesn't take long for the few I've played to feel like a pointless click fest. Sins has a more relaxed pace so I like that one a lot more than any of the others I've played.

Reply to Piracy & PC Gaming in GalCiv Journals GalCiv2 Forums

I bought the original Dread Lords "gold edition" from Walmart. I subsequently bought the expansion deal online (DA + TA) and switched to using Stardock Central. No problem getting things installed/activated through SDC and I saved a few bucks with the online deal. I now use SDC exclusively (that's how I bought Sins of a Solar Empire) and have since discarded the original GC2 box and CD. Sounds like you went about things the wrong way and it cost some money. Sorry to hear that.

Reply to Long Live STARDOCK/FROGBOY and IC/the FRASER BROS. !! in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

[quote]Last time I checked, I was a « gal » ... [/quote] Actually, it's becoming acceptable to use the term "guys" when referring to any group of people regardless of gender. Don't get too offended by it. The english language does evolve fairly quick. The english of 400 years ago is hardly understandable now, unlike french for instance. That language has changed little in the same time span.

Feature Request, Better Ending in Graphics Design Sins Forums

In single player, I find it a bit anti-climactic the way the game abruptly flashes a simple victory panel. It would be better if the game could fade to a victory cut-scene. After you've spent several hours scrambling against the AI, it would be nice to get a "fade to cut-scene" out of it. Thanks.

Reply to The perils of multiplayer in GalCiv Journals GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]not-Mom will have multiplayer, it'll just be a different game at multiplayer.[/quote] So why are you guys calling it not-MoM? Looking forward to seeing a proper name, at least for discussion's sake. Anyway, putting the two modes of play in their own camp sounds like the elegant solution. That way, you can appease all the multi-player guys without screwing up the single player experience.

Reply to Annoying Things in Gaming in Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

I think the all the hoopla these big publishers make over piracy is more a matter or principle than reality. I don't believe it's hurting sales as much as they claim. I bet most people that pirate stuff wouldn't buy it anyway. Sometimes publishers go overboard to protect copyrights with only the end consumer suffering for it. For the music and movie industries, they receive undue preferential representation in US government. Piracy is also a convenient scapegoat when something sells poorly.

Reply to Thanks for 1.03 in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Yes, thank you. 1.03 works great for me as a single player. I do feel the black market hit, but if the devs think that's the way it needs to be, then so be it.

Reply to Long Live STARDOCK/FROGBOY and IC/the FRASER BROS. !! in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

Wonderful game, great work. Aside from the fact it's a really fun game, I just won my first gigantic game against the AI running the game continuously for more hours than I care to admit. Not a glitch, ran like a top the whole time. Gotta love that!

Reply to I forgot how good MOM is in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

I've played Sins quite a bit now, I just won my first gigantic game against the AI with 4 opponents, 5 stars, and a hundred planets. That was intense. Anyway, I like Sins, but I like the way a game runs at *my* pace when it's turn based. I really don't understand why game makers are so in love with RTS.

Feature Request, More Voice Work in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

There's no area for feature requests so I'm just putting this one here. Sorry if I missed it. In Single Player, I actually like the voices that speak when things happen although they received some critisism in reviews. It would be great to hear additional variety in the phrases. Some of the events only have one phrase. The phrase can be helpful for identifying an event, but I find I'm going by voice more than what is said.</

Reply to Sins tops February retail sales charts! in Sins News Sins Forums

Really like the game, good to see Stardock doing well. Looking forward to more great Stardock releases. You guys are quickly becoming my #1 game connection. SDC/Impulse is great, very convenient.

Reply to MVL Round 7 in Metaverse GalCiv2 Forums

For me, the League offers the motivation to try something I wouldn't normally try and to show what I can do with it. Whittling things down to precisely what is and isn't fair puts competition at the forefront which is *not* the main reason I've been participating in the MVL games. This isn't the NFL, it's the MVL. Competition is fun and things should should be reasonably fair, but specifying exacting setups and play would take a lot of the the fun out of it. I believe any rules sho

Reply to Annoying Things in Gaming in Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Yea, but you need to differentiate big independants from smaller shops bankrolled by big publishers. I think Stardock could be called a big independant with a half million sales between GC2 and Sins of a Solar Empire. They have bigger sales than that with some of their non-game products. They do things a lot different resulting in substantial benefits for the end consumer. I think it's mainly due to the fact they are still small enough to be more quality driven than deadline driven. Once th

Reply to I have a challenge for stardock in Off-Topic GalCiv2 Forums

I've never had much interest in fantasy or role playing games. My thing is space and science fiction. However, I wasn't much into TBS until I played GC2, I wasn't much into RTS until I played Sins of a Solar Empire. Much to my chagrin, Stardock may well get me into fantasy TBS.

Reply to The Good, the bad, and the neutral in Game Talk GalCiv2 Forums

All the alignments have their place. There's no reason not to play good if you are looking for that challenge. If you're simply out to score well and dominate the map, evil is going to be the ticket. Neutral can provide benefits for tech victory and influence victory. I mostly play evil because I'm usually going for score. Sometimes I'll play neutral for a change of pace. As neutral, I can still score well while working the influence angle. I played good a lot when I first start

Reply to The perils of multiplayer in GalCiv Journals GalCiv2 Forums

I imagine you have to be rather thick skinned to field that stuff without getting really discouraged. I'm pretty used to the mostly casual and relaxed tone of this forum. I had sit back a little after reading a few of the hostile and unwarranted posts over at the Sins forum. I won't be spending a whole lot of time there. I'm not a big multi-player anything for some of the same reasons you see those hostile posts in the Sins forum. I'm quite happy with the Sins 1.03 update and I thin

Reply to Piracy & PC Gaming in GalCiv Journals GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]System wise, I have an AMD 6000+ / 8gb ram / 7950gx2 / Vista 64 Home Premium[/quote] Oh, okay, totally different platform. For me, it's Intel Core 2 Duo, 8800 GTS, 32 bit Windows XP. This platform has been very problem free for games. I seem to recall reading somwehere before that nVidia has had trouble getting its Vista 64 drivers ironed out.