GCII: Dark Avatar Interview (con't)

FiringSquad: What lessons learned from creating the main game will be put into the expansion pack?

Brad Wardell: The biggest lessons will probably be in the graphics area. The GalCiv II engine was so new that the graphics team was very conservative in what they did with it. With the expansion pack, they’ve started to make the most of the new engine and as a result the ships and such will look a lot better.


FiringSquad: Galactic Civilizations II just had a new patch which added more robust mod support. What sort of mods would you like to see people make for the game?

Brad Wardell: I’d like to see people make mods that allow them to play the game in substantially different ways. I’m a big Civ 4 fan and I’ve seen mods for Civ 4 that let people do some amazing things. I’d like to see mods where the game itself is significantly different to play.

FiringSquad: You are making a decision to make Dark Avatar an Internet only download purchase, despite solid retail sales of the main game. Why was this decision made?

Brad Wardell: The main reason was marketing; we wanted to keep our retail message very straightforward: get Galactic Civilizations II. We also felt that while the game has done great at retail, about half our actual revenue has come from digital downloads and when one adds in the cost of getting into retail and doing the appropriate market development for a strong retail push, digital downloads provided the best return.


FiringSquad: Will there be any chances of a beta for the expansion pack before its release?

Brad Wardell: We’re still thinking about that.


FiringSquad: Overall what is the status of the expansion's progress and when will it be released?

Brad Wardell: Our goal is to have the game out this Fall – before Christmas. Things are moving along pretty well; I will have my work cut out on the AI. I am currently working on Galactic Civilizations II v1.3 which is a free update and then will move on to doing my part on the expansion (I code the computer AI). The ships and asteroids and other goodies are really pretty cool.


FiringSquad: After Dark Avatar, what are Stardock's upcoming plans? Will we finally learn more about your free MMO game Society?

Brad Wardell: I hope so. The biggest challenge at Stardock is building up the team size. We have the budget, we just don’t have enough people. The GalCiv II team will be moving more to Society next year but we also have to get The Political Machine 2008 done in time for the next Presidential Election. We also have a fantasy turn-based strategy game we want to do, as well, so we have to figure out how many people we have to put on which projects and go from there. Society (www.societygame.com) is something we really want to make, but you can imagine the team sizes involved on that.


FiringSquad: Finally is there anything else you wish to say about Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar?

Brad Wardell: Sure. One of our big goals for this expansion pack is to do things a bit differently than one usually sees with expansion packs. It’s not about adding some new units and the like; it’s about really taking the gameplay to the next level. We want to introduce enough new gameplay concepts that will greatly extend the game’s lifespan for players. To put it another way, I didn’t want to have to wait for a sequel or something to get this stuff in; some of the features are really exciting. Being able to design your opponents, for instance, seems so obvious in hindsight that there was no way we were going to wait until some future sequel to do that; it’s too compelling. Hopefully gamers will feel the same way.