–RELEASED 01/22/2015–



Galactic Civilizations III Beta 4 is now available! See below for details on the battle viewer, ideology revamp, extreme worlds, and more:

Features

Added a prototype version of the battle viewer, now you can see your fleets shoot lasers, launch missiles and blow each other up in glorious detail

Added the ability to pause, restart or change the battle speed

Added a free camera so you can view the battle form whatever angle you’d like

Added a cinematic, top down, side, chase, orbiting and front camera to the battle viewer

Added the ability to click on any ship in the battle to see its stats

Added a full battle log if you want to see the log of what is happening

Added lots of explosions, weapon and defense effects. There are more to come.

Added lots of sound fx for the various shots and explosions, more to come.

Added a new ideology system. Instead of the old pyramids new paths have been implemented and lots of new ideology unlocks that do crazy things from giving all your fleets free fighter escorts to allowing you to discover a hidden planet.

New Benevolent traits:

Pioneering- Grants a free, fully loaded, colony ship.

Explorers- A previously unnoticed class 10 planet is revealed near your home system.

Prolific- All new colonies start with 5 extra population.

Adept- Each existing colony receives 1 additional tile.

Beacon- Grants a Class 16 planet.

Dignified- Home world Approval increased by 50%.

Elevated- Unlocks the Elevation Foundation achievement.

Appreciative- Your first 5 worlds receive an Approval bonus.

Noble- All colonies receive a 50% Approval bonus.

Mindful- Planets with a high Approval receive additional production.

Admirable- Doubles the Influence of your first 3 worlds.

Eminence- Unlocks the Missionary Center improvement.

Enticing- All planets and starbases within our Influence join our civilization.

Alluring- All starbases generate Influence, regardless of type.

Radiant- All worlds have their Influence increased by 50%.

Educated- Grants 125 free Research points.

Skilled- All starbases give an extra 10% research bonus to colonies in their Area of Effect.

Breakthrough- Grants 250 free Research points.

Enriched- Unlocks the Temple of Enlightenment Achievement.

Quantum Leap- Grants 500 free research points, and all colonies gain 5 research per turn.

New Pragmatic traits:

Prepared- Unlocks the Preparedness Center improvement which grants Pragmatic Ideology for each center that is built.

Favored- Anyone at war with us receives a 25% penalty to Approval.

Reserved- Enemy ships in our Zone of Control receive a 25% penalty to their sensor and ship range.

Cautious- All planets receive 3 free defending ships.

Watchful- All our ships receive a free Escort fighter when in our Zone of Control.

Constructive- Grants 3 free constructor vessels.

Coordinated- Our shipyards operate at 100% at twice the distance from your colonies.

Resourceful- All mined resource yields increased by 2.

Efficient- All construction modules now gives 2 points instead of 1.

Inventive- All existing starbases get one free construction module.

Exporters- Grants a free freighter and trade license.

Merchants- All trade income increased by 25%.

Luxury- Allows Civilization to establish luxury trade routes.

Indispensable- Improves relations with civilizations we have trade routes with.

Shrewd- Diplomatic trades for credits pay an additional 25%.

Neutral- No one will declare war on us for the next 100 turns.

Amiable- Improves relations with all races.

Popular- Races that declare war on us anger all other races in the galaxy.

Arbiters- Unlocks the Arbitration Center improvement.

Venerable- All civilizations declare war on any race that invades our home world, unless they are allies.

New Malevolent traits:

Militaristic- Grants a free frigate.

Eager- Every planet we conquer provides our people a permanent boost to Approval.

Threatening- Grants 5 free, fully loaded, transports.

Dangerous- Unlocks Advanced Transport Modules that come with their own escort fighters.

Bloodthirsty- All planets receive a fully armed Overlord class ship.

Relentless- Grants free production to our home world.

Intimidating- Unlocks the Intimidation Center improvement.

Ruthless- Doubles the Military production of our home world.

Implacable- Unlocks the Death Furnaces achievement.

Unforgiving- All colonies receive a 25% Production bonus and unlocks the Culling planetary project.

Uncharitable- Provides a 10% increase to planetary income.

Utilitarian- Improves the class off our first five worlds by 1.

Slavemasters- All trade routes now bring back slaves in addition to credits.

Tightfisted- Unlocks the Citadel of Revenue achievement.

Relentless- Each planet receives additional usable land.

Scary- No penalty from sharing borders with another civilization.

Unnerving- Enemy ships in our Zone of Control suffer a 25% penalty to their hit points.

Undaunted- Our planets and starbases are immune to culture flipping.

Feared- Minor races in our Zone of Control will trade more favorably with us.

Exalted- A foreign colony near your borders defects to your civilization.

Added extreme planets which are planets that can’t be colonized until a particular tech is unlocked like Aquatic, Frozen, Radioactive and Toxic worlds. New worlds give midgame colonization opportunities for the players that research the correct techs and can offer significant advantages to the players that own them.

Enabled Gigantic and Immense map sizes.

Added a new option for Yor players for a fixed population manufacture amount (instead of using an open ended project for it).

Fixes

Lots of crash fixes

Fixed an issue where Ascension points weren’t being calculated and tracked correctly.

Balance

Generally lowered the cost of starting ships to get players into the game faster.

Decreased the amount of techs required to get to the 2nd age (the Age of War).

Map generation significantly altered to make tight clusters (the default map type) create more interesting pockets of inhabitable worlds instead of the more even process it used to use.

Lowered the maintenance of ship components slightly.

Lower influence growth of capitals.

Lower starting influence of starbases

AI

AI now creates and sends out trade ships.

AI will now try to max the range for colony ships and freighters.

New AI process for determining a research strategy that does a much better job of having different AI player pursue different tech goals.

AI is much better at pursuing a Conquest victory.

AI logic added for dealing with extreme worlds.

AI logic added for selecting ideological traits.

UI

Added a new intro window that introduces the player to the game and the faction he/she is playing as.

New full screen research unlocked window.

Added support for dynamic adjustment of particles from strategic to normal view (so black holes transition to a less hot color when you are viewing the universe from strategic view).

You can no long see other players rally points (we were using this to watch the AI).

Sarah went and added real code to show the planet description instead of my modtastic weekend version (modtastic sounds like a compliment, but I think the programmers here use it to refer to any time I’ve added a feature that they will then rewrite correctly).