I play Colonization 3 or 4 times a year. Love it. Wish they would do an update. I like Alpha Centauri a lot too. --
like Civ2 but rarely play cause Alpha Centauri is so much better. Have only tried the demo of civ4 and didn't like what
i saw. The only prob with those games is that the AI cheats and reacfts to the human player differently and
to how the human player is doing in the game from info it gets from running the game rather than info it gets
from playing a game race/nation.
That's why I am playing this game -- The developers are committed to an AI that isn't cheating or treating the
human played race differently. Also it is nice that the game plays the same for the human player on all difficulty levels.
The problem with GalCiv2 from what I see so far is the game mechanics are problematic; the extra ship movement
turn with save/load, the RP costs for techs varying significantly ( i've seen cost for a tech change from 750RP to
300RP) .
But the appartent commitment to continueing game development is very unique too. If they follow thru, I have
no doubt the game mechanics will eventually be worked out and the game play balanced. Just look at
how much EQ has been able evolve over 6 years.

I find that Civ IV can be boring until you get that one amazing game. And then you're hooked for a week. Just ask my grade point average. But those are hard to get.

GC2 has good games most of the time and great games often. But GC2 doesn't have races like Isabella. Everytime I play her I go on a crusade to kill her. I don't have a strong dislike or like of any race in GC2.

Right now, I'm playing GC2, but I may swing back to Civ IV, or hell maybe Civ III. Hmm....Civ I is looking good.

Civ4 was my first 4X game and GalCiv2 was my next one. I am playing GC2 and not Civ4 so that says something. But, I honestly think that the AI in Civ4 is vastly superior. Civ4 actually knows how to make war. It knows how to prepare for war. I knows how to settle in an aggressive way that makes sense and then builds it's terrain well. About the only thing Civ4 doesn't do is to let you build your own weapons systems. While I appreciate the additions to the AI competency in the new patches for GC2, I will soon probably go back to Civ4 for a better challenge.

And I don't care how much an AI cheats if it can provide a good challenge. I am playing GC2 at Suicidal but I can't play Civ4 any higher than Monarch. Both are cheating at that point anyway so it is pointless to talk about one cheating more than the other. I also find that I spend a lot of time endlessly hitting end-turn in GC2 while in Civ4 I almost always have stuff to do between turns. So I actually find GC2 more boring in that respect.

Still, they are both great games and I am thankful that we have such great development teams building them. What's more, if either comes out with an expansion I will buy them both.

I like both games a lot. I think GalCiv2 is the better empire-building game, and I think Civ4 is the better strategy game.

GalCiv2 is great for customizing and building up your empire. There are lots of opportunities to run your civ just the way you want it. You get to pick abilities before the game starts, specialize your planets however you like, research only what you want in the tech tree, and trade anything for anything. And then there's the ship designer, which is the biggest example of "do whatever you want to do".

Civ4 is more challenging and balanced, and the strategic choices are more important. Your options are more limited, but each one has real pros and cons so that no choice is always right or always wrong. In GalCiv, I can design a fleet that is just plain better than my opponent's fleets, but in Civ4, I have to make a tough choice between macemen or knights based on a number of factors. Restricting the choices like this really helps the AI too by removing the exploitably good choices as well as the completely wrong choices. Like Mismatched, I can crush Suicidal in GalCiv2, but I struggle at Immortal in Civ4, where the AI cheats less.

I love both, and they have varying advantages. Civ4 was good in that it had a lot more replayability than GalCiv2. But GalCiv2 is great as the ship design is so addictive and the race design is awesome. I loved the modification possible in GalCiv2.

I recently bought and have been playing GalCiv II like crazy, however I think I still prefer Civ IV. I feel a lot of important points haven't yet been mentioned, although I'll also mention some of my favorite parts of both games (that already havee ben)

About SDAC (which I really consider a succesor to Civ II,) had the one thing that I REALLY loved, which was the unit-creation. Galciv II hooked and sold me on that.

I don't like how your power in galciv II is determined so much by the AI's heavy reliance on your military score. The galciv II AI usually fails to make accurate predictions about your production capacity, technological level and monitary state, regardless of slightly weaker military. The ship design, while nice for humans, really causes the computer problems when they can't design ships to keep up.

I think the civ IV diplomacy makes more sense, they won't trade new techs, for example (ie they want a wonder), but they're more willing to trade weapons and arms techs (just at a higher price).

I'm kinda usually miffed about how trading laser I is kinda useless when trying to trade laser II. I like that each tech is necsesary for future techs in civ IV.

Another thing that slightly annoys me about galciv II is it's combat system. In civ4 you DO NOT attack foritified units inside a fortified (castle when you have no gunpowder, for example) city on a mountain from across a river, unless you're prepared to lose a LOT of units. In galciv II the warfare is more attrition based, first strike is the only real strategic importance (for 1.1) and I feel it's going to be even more about attrition in 1.2. Combat units in galciv II also don't have enough special abilities (catapult/cannon/arty/offshore bombard anyone? ICBM anyone? fighter/bomber combat system anyone? collateral damage anyone? commando ability?) that make combat interesting and varied. In that sense I would like to see in galciv II bonuses (or perhaps ship modules?) that could you add to give bonuses against certain ships (oversized weapons, +atk to large/huge ships, fire control & tracking system: bonus against small/tiny ships, light AP rounds - bonus against medium ships) Starbases just add static bonuses to attack and defense right now, why not give them more interesting special abilities?

I also can't stand the offensive advantage in Galciv II. Perhaps defensive positions in space can't be rationalized, but I do like to play defensively (and I don't mean with shields on ships, I mean guarding my territory, planets, cutting people out with zone of control [ok so that isn't in civ IV, it's in SMAC, as well as the older civ games], etc.) and so I really appreciate defensive bonuses. In galciv II, planets are extremely hard to defend. shouldn't my ships be getting bonuses instead of me being forced to build an orbital fleet manager just to get them into a fleet? I was always of the impression a good (fortified) defensive position generally has an advantage, so long as the defender is not ambushed (by ambushed I mean caught unawares/by surprise) or flanked.

what I do HATE about civ IV is the turn limit... give me a break here, I just got all the cool stuff, I want to extend my game, play a little world war III, or IV, or V.... I can do that all I want in galciv II .

As someone else mentioned, it's almost impossible to be penalized in galciv II for overexpanding, not true in civ IV, forces you creature a more balanced empire. Bonuses also tend to all tie into the same or similar things in galciv II, whereas they have a much bigger impact on your strategy in civ IV.

I love the moral choices and alignments in galciv II. I see them as appromixately equal to civIV's civics, since gov't in galciv just give straight bonuses. Civ IV does have more choices in this respect, but galciv's is interesting in that you have to balance what you want (although right now it's not much of a choice right now, neutral or evil, with neutral prefered).

the built in civilopedia makes newbies happy. we are all newbies at one point, and it was a feature that was sorely missed when I was trying to figure out the benefits of each tech (ok sure, I get laser IV, how is this better than laser III? smaller? costs more or less when putting it on my ships? does it do more damage? What am I GETTING for god sake?!?!?!, yeah, I know it's laser IV, big whoop.)

managing logistics in civ IV (roads) is a bit more challenging and important than in galciv II, as is resource management (yes, you need iron and horses to build those knights. Can't mine it?, better have good diplomatic relations.) As of right now good dilpomatic relations only give you an edge in trading

I've always like how barbarians in civ IV will give you trouble early in the game, it makes you keep your foot on the military. (I'd like to see more pirates, etc. in galciv II, even rebel faction/dissident invasions, not just defections.) I like how galciv II wonders are never obsolete .

Overall I'd have to give civ IV the hat, due to it's extra depth. That is, after all, why I play 4X games isn't it? strategic depth.