one step short of greatness, still good enough to lose many nights
- excellent TBS space-themed game, in the style of Master of Orion and Galactic Civilization (and, of course Civ itself)
- very very addictive, even though there's not much really going on
- great tech-tree, huge and well-thought
- makes you think all the time how the balance production/techs
- beautiful planets, good variety
- you have heroes and develop their skills like in an RPG
- the battles are not RTS, so it's not important how fast you click, but how you designed your ships and tactics
- you get to design your ships
The Bad:
- diplomacy not really developed enough, but workable
- war is way too brutal on any difficulty except Newbie or Easy (on Easy the explore, expand, research are too easy, on Normal the AI wipes you out in war. i.e. in my last game I 've just played long enough to research about 12 techs from the huge tech tree, and already the Cravers invaded me with over 100 ships in just the first wave!!! needless to say i had only 5 because I was playing peacefully, but even if I played warrior style I still couldn't have afforded more than 20 or so).)
- just not enough story and events, I hope the developers will add some
- events do not mention where they happened
- I kept looking for the Civilopedia-like help, but there's nothing like it
- not enough empires, more are needed
- you HAVE to design your ships, the auto-upgrade sucks