Galactic Civilizations Q&A
We talk to Brad Wardell, creator of the original Galactic Civilizations, about this upcoming 4X game.
Stardock Corporation, the Michigan-based developer best known for its economic strategy game, The Corporate Machine, is currently working on an updated version of Galactic Civilizations--a space-empire-building game originally created in the early 1990s. Like its predecessor, the new game will feature a combination of exploration, technology research, resource management, diplomacy, and military conquest, but it will include a number of improvements as well. The game is set in the 23rd century as human civilization is expanding into the galaxy. Players will compete against up to five other computer-controlled races for control of the territory, and they will have a great deal of freedom in their actions. Part of the challenge will be determining the best use for humankind's limited resources. The game is designed to give players a number of ways to win, including via military conquest, diplomatic alliances, economic domination, technological advancement, and other methods.
Why is Stardock making a new version of a 10-year-old strategy game? How is this game different from all the other space strategy games available? To find answers to these questions and learn more about the game, GameSpot recently spoke to Brad Wardell, creator of the original Galactic Civilizations and lead designer of the modern remake of the game.
GameSpot: Hi Brad, thanks for taking the time to answer some of our questions about Galactic Civilizations. First, can you give us a brief history of the project? How did it start out, and how long has it been in development?
Brad Wardell: I originally wrote Galactic Civilizations for OS/2 back in 1993. It gained quite a following, especially considering that it was just for IBM's OS/2 operating system. It was the first PC game to make use of multithreading (multitasking within itself) and could be played at 1024x768x16.8 million colors (at a time when 320x200x16 million colors was the norm).
When our company moved to Windows, we weren't really in a position to re-create Galactic Civilizations. Modern AAA games are a lot more expensive to make today than they used to be, so we first worked on Entrepreneur and its successor The Corporate Machine while our company grew into the Windows market. Late last year, we decided the time was right to start making a new Galactic Civilizations.
Since on the surface Galactic Civilizations could be seen as just another 4X strategy game, we knew our challenge would be to create enough content and enough features to distinguish it so that it would be a lengthy development process. That time would allow us to create so much content and bring enough innovation that players and reviewers would begin to be able to see that it wasn't the basic gameplay that made Galactic Civilizations special--it was the depth, the under-the-surface details, the execution of the game universe that mattered.
GS: Have you drawn inspiration from any games in particular?
BW: Probably the biggest source of inspiration has come from the popular board game Twilight Imperium. It is a terrific board game in which players must try to take over the galaxy. While it seems like "yet another conquest game" on the surface, what made it really special was how it allowed players to find multiple ways to win the game--ways that were equally valid. At the same time, it had far more interaction between players than one might normally see. Galactic Civilizations is by no means a computerized version of Twilight Imperium, but the influence is certainly there.
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- Strategy First
- Stardock
- Sci-Fi Turn-Based...
- Release: Mar 26, 2003
- ESRB: Everyone
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