The crew here at Stardock cares a lot about our community and the games that we produce for you.
That's why we're pleased to announce that version 2.20 for Galactic Civilizations IIis available for you today!
Even when a title is "finished" and put out to market, there are always little things we find that could use a tweak or a change here and there. We also know what it's like to enjoy an old game so much that you keep going back to it, even when there are newer and "better" versions of it out there.
With help of some awesome community members, the Dev Team has taken all of the suggestions and implemented them into this update. You can find he entire change log (spoiler alert: it's long!) at the bottom of this post.
A few words from our CEO and President, Brad Wardell:
"It was awesome being able to work with the fans to integrate years of their own mods and tweaks into the base game. They also gave me a long list of areas where they thought I could improve the AI, which I used to dig into the now 10 year old AI source code base to implement."
We hope you enjoy the update. We have an awesome community here at Stardock and are so very happy that you're a part of it. Have a great holiday season!
Special Thanks
To Antonio "Mabus" Invernizzi, Gaunathor, SilasOfBorg, Kamil "OShee" Bober, DARCA1213, Sam "MarvinKosh" Edwards. Steffem "Maiden666" Jenter, MarvinKosh, Leiavoia, Frogboy and everyone else who helped out!
[ Gameplay ]
[ Graphics ]
[ AI ]
any one here ever played master of orion?? is it any good??
Thanks! I missed that entirely.
Since it's mostly a graphical mod, I think it can be combined with any of the other rebalancing mods, though you need to do it manually. Actually I felt there isn't much point to it because I play zoomed out at most times.
well, the MoO-series did sort of define the genre and MoO2 is regarded as one of the topnotch classic and it beats GalCiv2 in several instances (eg. tactical shipbattles etc) but still I feel GC2 is much better because of its economic system & the whole interface stuff.
I can recommend also Birth of the Federation and, also, Birth of the Empire (freeware) which does things quite differently than both MoO or GC but still, very good in terms of presentation & balancing. Furthermore, FreeOrion (also freeware) has grown way beyond being a MoO copyclone and is still under constant development (as of lately the team has incorporated Fighters & Carriers) and is very fun come back to every 6 month in order to find out what's new to play with.
Thanks for the info! It appears the links to the graphic updates dont work any longer and it's not really being supported....no biggy. GCII looks A-ok to me.
I wonder if new UP dates for GC 2 will be out again..
Wow, you mean to tell me that you patched the game but didn't fix the "Out Of Memory" problem? The only memory problem is that you are not properly managing memory or you have a memory leak. It's not a real memory problem. How do I know this? Because I can play a gigantic map for hours, saving after every turn until I get the "Out Of Memory" hang. I then have to restart the game, reload my saved game, and I can play for hours more before I once again get "Out Of Memory". If it was a true memory issue then I wouldn't be able to continue after reloading a save. This indicates that the game progressively is allocating an increasing amount of memory as the game progresses, possibly allocating space to perform a save and then not releasing the memory afterwards.
Since installing the new patch I can no longer use alt-tab. Whenever I alt-tab out and back the game graphics become more of a "text" display and is totally unplayable unless the game is terminated and restarted. Because of the screwed text nature of the graphics the game can only be terminated through Task Manager.
I congratulate you on patching an old game, but have to give you an EPIC fail for not addressing a key game flaw (memory issue) and for introducing a new game breaking bug (alt-tab). I will not be using this patch.
I have to disagree with you, loudly.
First, have you ever had to find a fix a memory leak? Thought not. A company could spend the profits from the next game paying for the effort, especially if the developers are unfamiliar with the code. Second, is it NOT a major bug. One sees it occasionally after playing a very dense games for a long time. And it is recoverable.
The graphics bug is *not* new. It has been around as long as there has been a Windows version, AFAICT. One typically encounters it if the screen saver kicks in while in GCII full-screen mode. alt-tab usually still works if you do it before playing any turns in the session. It is possible to continue from the "text graphics" mode: ctrl-esc to the desktop, then focus back to the game. The screen will be black. If recovery is possible, the display will restore after a rather lengthy wait (maybe a couple minutes). Immediately save and restart, as the next "glitch" will probably be fatal. This bug has some aspects of a memory leak, too, as the longer you play the less likely is the possibility of recovery. Also, it may not be an in-game bug but one in the old graphics system support that the game uses.
Enjoy GCII.
What do you do, just turn down the overall Video Quality a notch?
I just accomodate it to what I think is necessary to keep the game being playable. For a normal warfighting game on medium or large map I can keep them at max because there won't be more than 1000 ships floating in space, but if I play a gigantic all abundant scoremongering game I don't need fancy graphics, so I set them to lowest in all instances and with that, you'll never encounter any OOM errors. Therefore I don't understand the fuss about it^^
This. Porting this game to a 64bits architecture is an insane operation.
Try making a few Prefs.ini files for low and high detail and mix them up when you want to play on an immense map or small map.
Gentlemen: I happened to stumble across this announcement, and I went to MyAccounts on Stardock (had to dig to find the old password). And: no download of the new update (I can reload 2.04, but not the update). Come on, folks, it's AUGUST 2016. Do I have to buy a new copy of the game to get updates through Steam?
Hello everyone! I have questions about the upgrade to the latest version 2.20 of GC II Ultimate Edition, namely:1) after the upgrade, it is right that the three expansions have the following versions: - Dark Avatar ver. 1.82 - Twilight of the Arnor ver. 1.97 - Dread Loards ver. 1:522) it is correct that it can scegliare, after the start of the game, which expansion play?3) what is the correct order of play between the three expansions?Thanks for your help!!!
Dtead lords dark avatar twilight of the arnor which is 2.2. The order isonly important for campaign purposes otherwise play twilight only.
The latest versions are:
Dread Lords 1.53
Dark Avatar 2.02
Twilight 2.20
And just how do I get the GAL CIV II update, without REBUYING the game on Steam? I paid for it once, I should like to update it, but I see no way to directly download the update here....
You need to register your product at Stardock and then should find the latest version in the "My Downloads"-section.
The latest version I can download is the 2.01 revision of TWILIGHT OF ARNOR (the earlier game components have a 1.53 revision number). This is NOT the 2.2 revision update. If I were on STEAM with this game, it might automatically update, but I do NOT want to have to buy the game a second time on STEAM just to get the update.
IN OTHER WORDS, WHY CAN'T I GET THE UPDATE TO THE GAME DIRECTLY FROM STARDOCK?
As I said, this is not correct - I can only download the version that I bought (which is well before this latest 2.20 update.
Contact Customer support, I'm sure they can help you out. If I remember correctly other folks had the same problem, it seems like the CU update has been incorporated into the Ultimate Edition but not the TotA-standalone - at least, not at Stardock.com.
In the meanwhile you could simply apply the latest CU release and play it as a MOD - for sandbox-mode there won't be any difference (just don't touch Campaigns or Scenarios)
If I'm remembering it correctly it create a second download folder. Your desktop icon is for the old folder. In computer or file explorer go to stardock I think the galciv2 folder find the executable. Make an icon. At least twilight works. You can delete the other folder.
GoG version has the update. Hurray!
The 2.20 seems to make the economy much easier, so one may try playing the game at higher levels than one could try before. Unfortunately, other changes do not work for me.
1.) The new version does not allow me to employ spies on planets of countries you are at war with.
2.) The new version does not allow me to get the AI's to trade planets.
3.) I don't like many of the changes to the tech trees and planetary improvements.
Where do I download the older version?
1) Something wrong somewhere. It should allow spies, and mines does.
2) That was a conscious decision. Not one that I was in favor of, but apparently some people abuse it. Frankly, it's not a big deal.
3) Sounds like a personal problem. Be specific about what you don't like. Most of the changes were made to address specific problems that you might not be aware of, and might could use some explanation.
Don't know. Check your Stardock account?
1.) I'll look for a setting. I have no problem employing spies on empires, when I'm not ready to invade their planets.
2.) I never managed to get the AI to sell me a planet cheap. Just how somebody can abuse a feature in a single player game is beyond me.
3.) The previous version of the game was really good.
I bought into GC3 as a "Founder" and find that game a mess. I thought I'd go back to GC2, but find the new tech trees too generic, just like GW3! Well, at least I'm not going to be wasting my time on this series any more.
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