The species that are - in essence, talking meat - receive a great deal of attention, despite being an objectively inferior form of life. Today I will attempt to communicate to you humans the advantages of synthetic life.



The days of organic lifeforms are numbered. The wise and benevolent Yor Singularity will have it known that this is not a threat, it is simply a fact of the state of nature.

The Yor, as depicted in the OS/2 version of Galactic Civilizations 20+ years agoFor many ye...

Check out a brand new Star Control preview trailer We’ve got less than half a year left before Star Control: Origins is set to release.  So much is happening!



Before I get into this month’s updates, here’s a bunch of answers to questions:

What is Star Control?

Star Control is a space adventure game where you are the captain of a starship exploring the cosmos, meeting aliens, landing on planets, engaging in battles in space and on land, and frequently savi...

We have previously discussed the perils of running a galactic civilization.  People living hundreds of light years away from their home world will have relatively little interest in the political intrigues of the capital.  That’s where the government types come in.

What is the best type of government for your civilization? There is no right answer.

Let’s work through a scenario and how it might play out.  The star Procyon is 11 light years away from Earth.  ...

The situation is desperate.

The Terran Alliance is slowly losing the war to the Drengin Empire.

Is Earth doomed?



Your friends are doing their best to help, but they cannot directly involve themselves.

Our friends, the Altarians, give us covert aid.The Drengin Empire's military might is vast.The Drengin have long prepared for this day.  We had hoped that trade and diplomacy would stay their hands.  But after having annihilated the Torians, their border touched upon ours....

Each week on WinCustomize we feature a skin made by one of the creators from our community. We've decided to take that idea a bit further and spotlight the creators themselves!

I wanted to start this off with one of our top skinners and long-time member, Tom, also known here as LightStar!

He was kind enough to take the time to answer some questions so we could get to know him a little bit more.

 

Can you tell us a bit about yourself and how you got involved in “skinning&rd...

Everyone loves a good start.

 Every game of Galactic Civilizations is different.  The original tagline was: “Never the same game twice.”  It isn’t that the game is randomized as much as it is that each game is designed to be carefully imbalanced in a way that tries to push the player into avoiding well-worn strategies.Most of the benefits of version 3 will be coming to those who already have Crusade because it provides so much to build off on with its citizen-...

In preparation for the Game Developer's Conference we wanted to put a polish pass on the planets in Star Control: Origins.

There are about 3,000 unique planets that are split into roughly 75 different classes.  Each class of planet has its own challenges, as well as its own mineral deposits that you might want to collect (along with ruins, cities, smugglers, creatures, etc.).

Today, I'm going to walk you through how we create our planet classes.

Unique, Procedural and Hand-Crafted ...

The premise of Galactic Civilizations is that you have united your homeworld and are now ready to send your first colony ship off into space.  What kind of alien worlds do you think we can settle?The reality is, many worlds are not going to be safe for us.  We'll have to live in environmentally sealed enclosures at first.  Not because they are too cold or lack the right atmospheric conditions (though that is an issue), but rather because many worlds will have microbes that just ar...

As much as it pains me to admit it, I’ve been out of college for awhile now - 10 years in April, to be precise. Still, I have fond memories of Ren Faire, campus life, apartment living, and a community of close friends. The less fond memories include apartment living (two sides to every coin!), tuition, and those sleepless nights of crunchtime because I forgot about (or procrastinated on, let’s be real here) a paper that was due the next day.

I did some crazy fun stuff in college&h...

 

Greetings Offworld CEOs! Work continues on Offworld, but we don’t have anything to show off just yet. However, with the recent launch of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy, this seemed a good time to touch on an idea that’s core to Offworld Trading Company: the privatization of space back here on Earth.



It’d be pretty difficult to have an open, competitive market on Mars if we didn’t have companies there to do the competing. While we’re still a fair wa...

We celebrated Pi Day at Stardock with a competition!

Kristy took home first place for her "banofee (banana toffee) pie, while Amy placed 2nd with her fudge walnut pie and Sarah took 3rd for her pizza pie!

St. Patrick's Day is almost here! I thought I'd celebrate by sharing some of my favorite Dreams, wallpapers, and skins from WinCustomize. There aren't a ton of shamrocks and leprechauns specifically, so I tried to keep the heart of the holiday in my mind as I selected these. You'll see Irish landscapes, a lot of green, and everyone's favorite beverage of choice for St. Patrick's day, too.

 

What's better than the ruins of a castle beside the sea? Maybe a fully functional castle besid...

People don't like to be taxed.  They really don't like to be taxed if they don't have a say in it. The principle cause of the American revolution was not taxation in itself, it was that the colonists didn't have a say in who and what was taxed.



Now, let's imagine how this would be handled when you are talking light years. To understand how distances work in Galactic Civilizations, we need to understand Hyperspace Projection.

I'm the map I'm the map I'm the map!Space...as you m...

Brad is still at war with the Centauri Republic with no end in sight! Part 8 of "Humans vs. The Multiverse" is available now. Check it out here:

13 minutes, 48 seconds.  That’s how long it took the Curiosity rover’s signal to reach Earth from Mars - and Mars is in our own solar system.

Intrigue is the name of the upcoming expansion pack to our best-selling space strategy game, Galactic Civilizations III.  It’s not called “Government” or “Politics”. It’s Intrigue.  13 minutes, 48 seconds between responses for radio signals in our own solar system leaves a lot of time for un...