Last week, I put out a universal distress call, pleading for some PC news with which to battle the approaching armada of console minutia. This morning, I get in to find that somebody has left a howdytron on our galactic garbleblab. Translating the message, I find... an advertisement for squirdleprong enlargement pills. Stupid space spam. Oh well, that was a waste of time. In which case, we'll have to make do with these first Galactic Civilizations 3 screenshots.

Click to enlargenate.

Here we see the new diplomacy screen. As in GalCiv2, there are a number of options for trade negotiations, including tech, ships, starbases colonies and resources. That means the infamous Tom Francis "give me everything you own for 1 bc" insult tactic is still alive and well.

A Drengin Battleship. From the picture, it's impossible to tell how many guns it's carrying. My guess is: a lot.

The main map screen made its debut in our GalCiv III preview , but I'm reposting it here because it's where you'll be spending most of your time in-game. The UI has had a pretty significant overhaul, and seems to strike a pretty nice balance between depth and readability.

Finally, a Krynn Starship, likely packed full of television and mind control.

For more details, and to here from the game's developers, check out our recent Galactic Civilizations 3 preview . You can also check out some of the game's concept art from the GalCiv 3 website , and see the announcement trailer below.