Does anyone one else find that they play the game zoomed out far enough for icons?

I favor Gigantic and Immense maps, which seem to me to pretty much demand the icon-level zoom as the normal map view. I played for ages on a sub-spec machine, so zooming in not only lost the information layer you describe, it also bogged my poor little ol' video card.

I've got better hardware now, more or less, and the TA graphics change has got me taking moments here and there to look at a system or watch a firefight at 3D zoom level.

I usually start the game zoomed in enough to see my pretty ships, pretty planets, et cetera, but after a year or two of in-game time I'm too spread apart, so I find myself zooming out for the majority of the game.

Plus, my laptop (I'm living out of my home country and using a couple-year-old lappy) seems to run it better when I'm zooooooooomed out.

I play zoomed out as well, but adjust the detail zoom level so I still see the 3D layer. I typically have it so I can just flick the scroll wheel to get the tactical display and then flick it again to go back. Quite a nice system actually.

I am forced to play in icon mode thanks to my incredibly bad (laptop) graphics card.

At first I resented this, but now since I am used to it I will probably continue to play like this even if i buy a new machine.

Although at times when more dramtic events happen I like to zoom in and enjoy the beautifull art, even thought it's likely below 1fps     

Yes. And there's a simple reason for that.

The graphics may be great or terrible depending on personal preference, but there's one that cannot be denied: they do not communicate information well.

In icon mode, I can tell just about everything about a planet without having to mouse-over or select it. I can tell if it is a low PQ planet or a high PQ planet. I can tell if it needs a special tech to colonize it. And so on. It's also easier to see a fleet of ships as a single icon rather than the graphical version.

You don't get that when you play the game in non-icon mode. And this is unfortunate because it is not necessary. They could have made sure that this information was properly conveyed in graphics mode, but they didn't. It's one of those stupid UI quirks in the game that ought to have been fixed (or never done in the first place) by now. It's just another UI wart.

I have no choice but to go against the tide here!

Iconed maps are simply boring to me and remind of a rather simplistic chess-board. X pieces move to point Y while Z can diagonally intercept.

I *NEVER* play at zoom out to icons, i might be tempted to catch a glimpse of the entire context once in awhile - but whadda'ya think the mini-map is for? Granted, it has less symbolic gizmos to stare at... but +/- is good enough.

Now, comes in the tactical gamer -- i want THAT challenge of the unknown and guessing work - i feel space is huge and distances do matter even when scrolling a mouse-wheel just a tiny bit further. I may be just locked up in a sufficating brownish fog trying to evaluate and distinguish between a Constructor flat white glyph and the other one right beside it when in fact, they are truly LYs away from one another - in box, grid, sector or parsecs.

Now, comes the artist and the emotions -- i want the clouds to remind me of that precious Homeworld instead of a Logo (i'm seeing it many times over in a number of screens anyway, the same bigger or smaller)... and the immediate emergency of a slow scout stuck on a path to dangers ahead since it is lurking in the shadows of a nebula underneath or glowing. Cyanic wire ovals & all. Rings diversity and Moons swooping the gravity runs.

Yup, i *NEVER* play all the way down to Icons cuz i paid for something which can go all the way up to please me.
I also design some of my own weird ships for an half-hour perfection if i want to, thank you and they look great in a yard or in a galaxy perceivable in all its colourful opera of stars to Polar caps.

King to pawn D-Five. Surveyor to Anomaly blueish Worm-Hole overthere in the distant mystery loosely based on a reality. Pick your poison.

Zyxpsilon are you by any chance an english major?

Sarcasm or fact?
Nope, a Quebec_french "Minor" who's typing messages with a limited vocabulary and the mindset to parse through whichever comes first. Words, that is - translated as close as possible.

Okay, despite that moving endorsement I play mostly zoomed out...

I always play in icon mode, having set the slider so low so the 3d graphics never show. To reinforce what others have said, the models are very pretty, but the icons are more informative! From a strict strategy perspective, I like the icons better... reminds me of a board game!

I play completely at the icon level.

I'm used to attack ships looking like an oak leaf, defense ships looking like an acorn, constructors looking like a skull and colony ships like a pregnant insect. I prefer it that way.

I can appreciate the gee-whiz graphics but feel that they really add absolutly nothing to the game. In many respects I actually resent the time that the development team has spent on such things because to me they represent superfluous features that add nothing of significance to the game.

The ability to view "inside" the ships I design or the textures of the rotating stars and moons or the planetary lights on the night side of the planet are all things I may occasionally see and can appreciate the effort it took to do them but I have to ask why go to all that bother.

Why all the effort for something that has nothing to do with the strategy of the game or the competency of the AI. It adds no real content to the game and it only makes the requirements on video and cpu performance that much higher for no real reason.

I would far prefer a totally iconicized game that had lower video, cpu and memory performance requirements, but I'm basically just a dinosaur that prefers substance over hype.

Here's an example of the graphics of a game that is fast becoming an equal to GalCiv2 at least in my opinion.



As you can see very primitive graphics indeed. Actually a very simple game as well. All content, no hype.

C'mon Mumble, you know the answer to your own question, you just don't like it. We *share* this game with a *very* broad range of player types. Surely you remember the not insignificant share of folks who feel pretty much this way about the Metaverse, yes?

I had some performance problems with my old sub-spec rig, but overall the Stardock folks do an amazing job of building their eye candy in an opt-out structure. If the dev time spend on rotating ship parts helps bring in additional revenue that supports Stardock's game division overall, I don't consider it worthless even if I never use one myself (I haven't yet; I won't be playing much in the ship designer until the new tech trees are old, familiar friends).

p.s. Since you've offered yet another fine, curmudgeonly post, I once again call on you to face facts, say your goodbyes to the Diplomats, and come home to the Gerontocracy. We'd want you even if you weren't the fearsome scoremonster that you are

Don't get me wrong, like I said I appreciate the gee-whiz graphics when I bother to look at them which is very infrequently.

I certainly understand that I am in a total minority in general and that to certain segments of the community, namely modders, the graphics may be *the* most important aspect of the game.

That's all well and good and different strokes for different folks, but that doesn't stop me from expressing my opinion that the graphics is just "bells and whistles" that really add nothing to the essence of the game which in my mind is supposed to be the "strategy".

Ah, thanks for that clarification, Zyxpsilon! I've sometimes had trouble getting your meaning in some of your posts, but being able to place you as a native french speaker actually really helps me understand what you're getting at.

We have a fair number of NB acadian-french speakers and quebecois here in Halifax, and I find that native french speakers often have a particular way of coming at the english language that I've gotten used to.

Any way you could share it with me? I'm usually completely lost with his posts.

On my gaming rig, I zoom in and out at will...but mostly play zoomed in.

On my laptop, the game is just too resource intensive, so I have to play zoomed out if I want to have any kind of speed to my game play.

That is one thind i also already asked myself - how could moving icons be that addicting? Screw BioShock, Crysis etc - as you can see we do not need eyecandy to have fun with a good game

I certainly do. I actually find the icon view very visually appealing (which is not to knock the gorgeous zoomed in art, of course) and incredibly informative. Other games would do well to learn from GC2 in this regard. I'm looking at you, Civ and Sins.

No sarcasm intended my friend, I actually found your post quite poetic and well.. as others say moving.

I actually think I am playing zommed in a little more lately just because of your post   

I constantly zoom in and out, depending on whether I want to look at something or find something. Generally speaking, I zoom in just enough to see ship outlines and planet names. I'll zoom out to find a starbase or to check on influence borders, or to see how close enemy ships are to my empire. I rarely zoom in close enough so that one ship or fleet fills the screen, unless I want to looke at the details of a starbase or something like that. I do love watching the ship combat, though.

I don't generally zoom out far enough to require the icons since I don't normally play that large of a map. My current game on a huge map (as the Krynn, and locked in a nasty war with the Drath), I have found zooming out to be very useful).

That said, I rarely zoom in enough to catch the little flourishes like race icons on the starbases that someone mentioned in another thread.

Danger_Gizmo_Hajdu, i appreciate the understandings - not that i should be less careful about how i express myself in some specific areas (grammar or syntax, being just two) like vocabulary extent.

The trick with Canada as a whole is that the diversity of two official languages makes it difficult to find common grounds at times (won't get into Politics (Referendum_S on Sovereighty anyone?), mind you!) not counting the HUGE immigration communities out there; living in urban regions such as Montreal proves it when you realize there's much more to this country than the French_English core 'ancestral' founders and their descendants like just simple me.

Heck, here in laval i see & hear more Greeks in public places than if i were on some remote islands in the Mediterranean sea! So that tells you.

Back to topic.

I really can grasp the entire 'Strategic' value of Zoomed-to-Icons or the easiest perception of on-going activities while not forgetting that in this world of GDI enhancements because or since (we, customers and buyers of Hardware) the market has the power to develop any real-time fair reproductions of imagery. It's not like we're still playing PacMan in arcades for a quarter, ya know.

Thus, the challenge of Zoomed-in-to-1280x1024-screensize-framing of a single starting system (which is on my PC only about 8x8 parsecs big!) is somehow, more 'involving'.

Just take the Combat simulator -- i never bothered using it more than once, it's a show. But some people PLAY to it, and enjoy the gimmicks.

But, when a battle between Yor & Drengin fleets happens to start 8 sectors away from where my selected ship is... i have the option ON to get to it and watch a party of lasers firing and the final explosion to determine the winner! Swift, action packed which i wouldn't know about if Iconed permanently.

Where's the gaming fun, otherwise? Or even, the key strategic knowledge of such occurances when it does or should matter *indirectly*.

In fact, i'll just bet that if the Dominion of Korx as a race would be portrayed by a grey circle of blobby abstracts only, nobody would really like GC2. Then, extend this reasoning to the entire context.

DreadLords' organic red ships zooming right by my clunky 2 pistons scout! I mean, com'on... anyone has got to like that better than -- Heu, what does this shape represent exactly?.

Holy well written post Batman! I can actually understand most of what you said Zyxpsilon. It was in English with grammar and all kinds of understandable...sentences! That's awesome!

I like your ideas (i think), but it is really great to actually be sure I know what you are actually saying.

I'm getting there, Gizmo... as i believe this whole community really deserves *my*_our best efforts (in my case, though, it's alllllmmmmost exclusively about Modding - too!)

Communicating is a skill which relies mostly on personal experience, while knowledge is a 'brainy asset' we gain through life itself.

Gee, talk'about Batman, i really need to return to the CoSH Minors set already.