I disagree. There are players good enough. Maybe not me, but in other games I have played, I have found players much better than I am, and I am beating suicidal a good 50% to 60% of the time on purposefully more difficult map settings and with some self imposed restrictions. (eg: No military starbases, no neutrality learning centers, fewer opponents to make them tougher to conquer.) I don't think I am anywhere near close to optimal. I don't think a player can win every start, but there will be some players good enough to find a way.

Altough I agree the AI isn't quite up to the level where they can beat 95% of players at tough, I think those good players you are talking who can win no matter what the odds are surely way beyond 95th percentile, if Stardock's AI can beat such players they will win a nobel prize or something.

Fortunately I do not equate Frogboy with a car salesman, . For me to buy a game I look at 'independent' sources such as Gamespot and IGN for evaluations.

Well what you do is your business of course, but I'm sure any reasonable person would agree that a game developer making statements on how well the AI will perform is definitely doing it with the intent of influencing sales .

To be fair if GC2 got a 6/10, i'd still have bought it because the original game had sold me on the concept.

And cos you're a fanboi.

I beleive he was looking at the general gameplaying demographic and did not consider who would be plaing this type of game - its this whole conjecture thing again...

Well, if it's a conjecture, it was certainly an unwise one. Since a pretty strong case could be made that there are people who bought into it based on such a statement. And let's not pretend these guys are newbies to the scene, they know exactly the type of gamers who will be playing these games, unless of course they expected only RTS players to play lol. This is yet another excuse that doesn't fly, just as your last one about how given the succuess of galciv2, surely there are a lot of poor players...

Let's just put this boast as a case of hype and move on shall we?

Developpers have difficulty with developping a good chess engine, and that's on fully dedicated machines.

Sorrry that's just bull. These days anyone willing to make the slighest effort can easily create a 2300-2500ish engine running on any standard PC that will beat 99% of players. There's a reason why there are so many free chess engines running around created by ameteur programmers in their free time....

Let's just put this boast as a case of hype and move on shall we?

We'll have to agree to disagree, and thats it i'm afraid. I don't think I'll be able to convince you using the present medium, but i'm sure you'd change your mind when in a headlock or something

Fanboy? me? Thats just too funny man.

But I will admit to being a beleiver, and its panning out, what we want gets made and thats cool.

I don't think I'll be able to convince you using the present medium, but i'm sure you'd change your mind when in a headlock or something

Smiley aside, one can see there is a strong possibility they are debating with teens. I have no desire to debate teens who are fanatical and inflexible in their stance.

Hmm, it depends

I'm trying to complete (read: win) one metaverse game with every civilisation and today I was playing the Yor (large galaxy, 6 random opponents, tough). I had absolutely no chance to win in my first three attempts, because I was the only evil civilisation and the good ones decided to gang up against me early.
Now in my fourth attempt I have a better start position, my neighbors are the Korx and the Drengin which don't care about my evil way of life, so I have time to build up before it comes to the clash and I think this time I'm not doomed from the beginning.

However, lost games are sometimes a lot of fun, my second attempt was close and if I had just a few more turns before the Drath came along with some Battleships full of missiles and shields (against my lasers, well done AI), my squadron of heavy fighters with psyonic beams would have beaten the ***** out **** ******

So I don't know how some people manage to get bored on tough and even higher settings. There are start positions you know you cannot loose, and there are some you are completely doomed, there are a lot of options and one can use CTRL+n to restart on the other hand, so everyone should be able to find an exciting setup.

ah i wonder how i would fair at the higher levels? right now im working my way up learning little quirks and enjoying the game and how each time its like a story. maybe ill just jumping to sucide game to watch myselft get powned

Seriously, if someone can name a strategy game (apart from chess, go, etc.)

remove Go, the best ones are about club player standard..

where the AI provides more of a challenge (without cheating) then please tell me as I will try and acquire it ASAP. AI is relative - it is good or bad depending on what the current standard is, and at the moment Galciv2 is way ahead of the current standard.

True. Except the claim that it can beat 95% of all players without cheating is a absolute standard.

All this vitriol and all over one statement. calm down richrf, you'll go grey before you time!

Right back at you "believer"!

I wonder how much the AI will improve when it can become "intense?"

The AI builds WEAK ships in late game (a defender anyone?) Not only that but I have noticed the AI NOT buying any ships and just sitting there with a whole bucket of cash. (I think this I noticed on my last game... A normal/beggining game??)

That is the problem - and why it is an exploit. It does not work the other way round Magnumaniac is correct, for not researching the Translator tech to prevent anyone messing with your mojo in the early game you are exploiting a loophole in the game design.

Does not researching the Universal Translater prevent you the player from demanding free money and technology in order to keep the peace? If blackmail is also a player option, and one that is sacrificed in order to prevent same from the enemy, then it seems to me to be a valid game decision.

Blackmail could even be enhanced by having a superior military 'accidentaly engage' one neighboring freighter/scout/constructor/colony ship, and then present a diplomatic 'appeal' for better relations through protection money.

Communications could also bring strategy to an as-yet-unmade technology "Disguised Ships" which would alter the transponder signals of a ship to mimic a race of your choice...perhaps a visual only 'upgrade' to any enemy vessel you can seen in the diplomacy screens, once you understand their language to transmit believable transponder signals. And once the civies get ahold of it, well, you know those selfish ruffian swabbies are always out to make a buck. It wasn't us I swear--we were just attempting to learn how you communicate

There could even be a couple levels to the Tech: CivilianTransponder (cargo hulls only), MilitaryDisguise (Fake a different class), and EnemyTransponder

I smell several new ship classes: PirateRaider, FakeBattleship, and BlackOps. The Fog Of War vessels. Combat would break the ruse, if the enemy survived to tell about it.

It could even add a sort of new diplomatic option: Demand the surrender (or possibly the decomissioning) of the offending vessel.

Making a stand against the bad rumours: You can beat the game at the highest difficulty setting without tech trading on your part, Ctrl-N or exploits.

Obviously there's no way I can prove it to you, but that's what I do, and I know Magnumaniac does the same.

I agree though that some people are showy and use the wrong wording when talking about "how easy the game is" and that "the AI does crap only anyway".

Firstly, for those who think the AI is somewhat weak - compared to what? Seriously, if someone can name a strategy game (apart from chess, go, etc.) where the AI provides more of a challenge (without cheating) then please tell me as I will try and acquire it ASAP. AI is relative - it is good or bad depending on what the current standard is, and at the moment Galciv2 is way ahead of the current standard.

There was an old, old 4x game, I think it was "Reach for the Stars." One of the cool things about it was that about 25% of games one of the AIs would build an early fleet and fling them at one opponent. Diplomatic players had their best of plans disrupted, as did most human players because the next tech level up was far superior. This unpredictability added a lot to the game. I've advocated that again, and again, with relatively simple flags that could be enabled at game start.

Other good AIs include Scrabble, Backgammon, Checkers, Monopoly. Bad AIs include Risk, most 4x games.

For those who missed my multiple posts on suggestions, here it is again:
1) Some races have 50% chance at Bloodlust and will act as if they are at war with the weakest neighbor at turn 20. War will not be declared until shots are fired. Shots will only be fired after transports are built and ready for invasion. Peace will only be accepted after one race has been eliminated from the game (might be the warring race). At that point the flag would be turned off.

2) Some races have 50% chance for Resource seeker. These will build one early constructor for every colony ship and seek out resources. Very cool would be an option for them to try and trade duplicate resources for planets.

3) Some races (or even all) have a sliding chance at Speedy ships. These races will devote on average 40% of space to engines on military ships.

4) Some races have a chance for early tech lover, and will build minimal military ships (~10%) devoting the balance to research for the first 25 to 75 turns (random if flag on). Declaration of war would change this. A high tech fleet built relatively late in the game would dominate most maps.

5) Some races have a chance at Builder flag, that preference and minimize military and devote the balance to social production. Again, turn the flag off at some random point 25 to 75 turns in.

In my opinion, these would not be that hard to code (and I do have the background). They would add a good deal of unpredictablity, flavor and spice to the game. The current AIs tend to be a bit boring and predictable despite the huge amount of time spent on it. The "not every game" element is important. Lots of new strategies would be opened up for the human player, but none would work 100% of the time.

Those that say "diplomatic victory" is too easy would have their cage rattled by early wars and all that entails. As would those that always go for military strategies. The Speedy flag in particular would cause a lot of uncertainty, as would an early Bloodlust flag. Every game would be a bit different as different races have their flags on or off.