Galactic Civilizations 4 in 2023: A Review
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- Опубліковано 7 лют 2025
- #galacticcivilizationsiv #galacticcivilizations4 #review #gameplay #4xgame
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Used with permission.
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Rob takes a cold, hard look at the latest iteration of this beloved series and attempts to determine if it's worth your time.
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Great review. Epic store releases seem to be paid betas. First Phoenix Point, now this one.
I enjoyed your thoughts on asymmetry and balance. I view them both as "necessary evils." Too much balance or symmetry makes a game feel too bland. Too little balance makes the player feel dumb not to pick the stronger factions. Too much asymmetry can feel like a straitjacket, since you can never just "go with the flow" and roleplay your faction naturally---any "suboptimal" choices might blow your chance at winning the game.
I appreciate both your well-thought out, in depth analysis and your frankness! Never been a fan of systems overload that the AI most likely can't handle well. I like the video format, but appreciate the written reviews too. Looking forward to your next podcast! Thanks!
Back to Endless Space 2 ;)
Happy New Year 🎆
I think you were fair tbh. Lets not forget the truly toxic moderation team that we had to deal with when trying to make a video on this game. The culture at Stardock is broken and we have boycotted their games moving forward. They need to start listening!
Stellaris and No Man's Sky have, between them, decimated sales of 4X space games, and space games in general!
I decided to wait for a steam or gog release and I'm glad I did. Sounds like the entire game is a lot of interesting but half implemented ideas. And a lot of 'Stellaris but worse'. Too bad I played a ton of Galciv 2 and 3. Maybe after some major patches and an expansion or two.
Could not agree more. Buying into beta these days is basically paying to become a beta tester. What a waste of your time and money. It’s a sign of the times when the developers promises a major revamp right after a full release. Sad to see that even those who waited are getting a half baked product. I call this the “early access curse”.
Personally I have already lost hope in this 4x title. Would not be surprised if they announce galciv5 in 6-12 months to start the milking cycle all over again.
I didn't buy it bc it looks just like GC3 with the node system being the obvious difference. However, stardock screwed up GC 3 so badly with one of their dlc's which completely changed the tech tree's etc....i dont need to tell you that, and for that reason alone, I'll eventually try out GC IV but only when it releases on steam.
As a long time Gal Civ player, I appreciate your views on the new one. I felt that 3 was still enough for the time so I'm quite surprised that they did 4 so soon. It feels like neither the gameplay nor the graphics are improved enough to merit moving away from Gal Civ 3 and its developed modding scene just yet. But even 3 needed a few years to get to its best updated version, so I'm still hoping that we'll see it soon.
Is there a meta-study to be had here with the comment about the Epic funding for exclusivity versus other distribution platforms?
I don't know about funding, but there is a lot of documentation about their practices: screenrant.com/epic-games-10-million-control-exclusive-remedy/#:~:text=Epic%20Games%20paid%20%2410.45%20million%20for%20Control%20to,make%20the%20game%20an%20Epic%20Games%20Store%20exclusive.
Thanks for the review, I did notice the reuse of a lot of assets from Gal Civ 3 that I have been playing recently. For example the anomalies are all the same, the icons for resources etc.
TBH, I didn't even know it released already. Played every gal civ to death, but that one, somehow, did not reach me any which way. I would've bought it 100%, if I knew . Now...I won't.
It COULD be great. But I think the "NEXT" version of GC4 is what you should wait for.
@@explorminate Well, here's hoping for exactly that.
Really Good Review Rob, it definitely shows you put a lot of time into it. Well done.
❤️
Ok, for a new comer to the franchise, which of the four GalCiv instalment would you recommended? Answer with your heart.
What's your computer like?
Thanks for the great review and the warning that GALACTIC CIVILIZATION IV is not yet ready and full of short cuts in development such as the copy and paste from the previous game. On the STEAM forums people who have played it on EPIC have said it feels dumbed down in the game mechanics. The upcoming revamp is also an eye opener on the suspicious front getting rid of the rock paper weapons systems along with the change of hulls which may or may not be great. Looks like another title which ended up a subpar product due to EPIC exclusivity in the same way as IRON HARVEST and a few others have that eventually came to STEAM. Guess i'll stick to STELLARIS, ENDLESS SPACE, GALACTIC CIVILIZATION III especially with the new huge 4.5 patch.
I remember the FALLEN ENCHANTRESS debacle clearly. Brought it on launch day and it was pretty disappointing and broken matching everything that a game reviewer who was friends with the Dev said after the played the released version mentioning how he felt lied to and betrayed. Those were some strong words coming from a respectable reviewer at a time when reviews still held heavy weight sway on whether to purchase a game or not. I brought FALLEN ENCHANTRESS many years later again on STEAM after hearing how Stardock totally turned the game around and made it everything it could be especially with the expansions.
I'll watch the reviews and forum talk with a wait and see approach on GALACTIC CIVILIZATION IV.
Happy gaming and cheers! ☕
Down the middle , great review.
This is why I still tune into ex
Was just curious and checked up on this game. Saw that they are straight up re-workong multiple systems. Well see how many years it will take. Played over 100 hours on galciv4 and it felt....souless, generic, boring.
for multiplayers i like one server ,or max Asia,US,EU,etc.etc,i dont like multiserver create server create lobby join lobby and after not have players :-((
holy hell i had no idea this game was even out. oooooh it's epic-exclusive. well that explains it.
Same, I thought it was still in early access.. the visual updates are indeed nice, but disappointing that's about it for a whole new game. I guess I will just stick to loosing at GalCiv3.
So some thoughts after watching your video, first of all, there is a way to change your research cards in the top right corner of the screen. There is a wheel that allows you to only get one type of research for your options, such as military, colony development, industry or government. You can also reshuffle these options as many times as you want. I tend to use it in wars to get the types of weapons and armor tech I need.
I also don't know what difficulty you're playing at but I normally play with 8 races, 7 at genius and 1 arch enemy at incredible(festeron in my current play). There are a bunch of tips on stardocks page about tricks for gal civ 4 that I think will help you
I agree with you that it is unpolished, planetary invasion sucks and the heroes/hero ships are kinda underwhelming. I prefer to just put survey modules on all L class ships for upgrades.
all i really want to know is: what is the ai like? does it cheat or does it know what its doing like in 2?
@@operator9858 incredible and godlike definitely just cheat. If you get to mid and late game, incredible is beatable though
@@chaschristiansen dang, had some guy on steam trying to hype up how intelligent the ai was just now but sounded too good to be true. thanks for the heads up.
@@operator9858 they are intelligent in that they hit multiple targets at once and you really have to play strong to win at a high level. My style may also throw this off since I set like 6-7 civs as genius and one as incredible or god like to really make one harder enemy. It isn't much better than calciv 3 though.
IMO this series didn't need another installment just yet. I was surprised to see GC4 after a plethora of DLCs for GC3, it never felt like GC3 is dying or something. Plus Epic release didn't help this game to gain enough of a power to make it relevant.
I have played 1-3, and was wondering about what was going on with 4, and had NO frigging idea 4 had been released till this video (9 months later). Looks like the combat is still really sub-par (which is why I really never preferred the series).
GalCiv is one of favorite games of all time. Really excited for this! I just hope I can demolition all buildings this time.
have any of these issues been fixed now and is it worth playing also is combat any good now
We'll have a full review soon, but yes, Supernova greatly improved this game
@@explorminate speedy reply thanks
Graphics really don't matter in a game like this, i play on huge maps with supreme commander level of zoom out. I only see icons. Most important thing is mechanics, tech tree, economy. It's lacking
Agreed 💯
Great review. Might be a quality game in a couple years. Stellaris is making some progress.
Just watched the roughly 9min IGN review crapping on it. Here wondering what a 30min one is saying to be 3x the length.
Actually breaking it down and offering feedback...
Oh also Homage to Ascendancy!! What a Gem
does the AI still suck ? as in GC 3
that is the only question i have about this game lol. did you ever find out the answer?
I loved Gal Civ II, and still play it occasionally. I made the mistake of pre-ordering Gal Civ III, and absolutely hated everything about it. I just want to know if this is an improvement. If it's GC3 with a couple more bells and whistles, I'll pass. I'd even take a good mod of GC2.
Seems like they took ideas from other games, but failed to implement them in a coherent way. That's what happens when you do game design by shopping list.
Love rng tech. Definitely need some Unique Technology rng tied to different races to give it more flavor... If they could just do some Triple AAA Flavor through the game would be sweet... PS "Sharing Your Booty" Happy to see that's still a thing long into the future. 😉
I stupidly bought it on epic only to find out to "upgrade" to the latest version which stardock call an expanison - supernova, I have to pay more money on top of the £40 I spent on the game.
Meanwhile the game comes out as supernova on steam at £33 in "early access". It's the same game as full release Epic but with chat GPT AI nonsense.
No I'm no stranger to paying for DLCs. It's obviously normal practice for development of a game over years.
Yet they are making us Epic buyers pay to move to the new "main" version of the game. They admit this all down to problems using Epic and not being able to add a dlc to the main game in epic.
It's a shame, I was really looking forward to this game, but after watching some of the pre-release Playthoughs and then the post-release playthroughs, I've lost interest in the game and don't care for how some of the game has turned out :( (I do like the tech cards change to the tech tree).
Total agreement on the "Sector" system and ship combat
Yeah, Epic release eye candy. Stellaris but worse and no substantial improvement elsewhere over still strong Gal Civ III.
I kinda agree with you. There IS a good foundation here, but it all still feels very beta.
Very entertaining 😊
GCIV? When the hell did that happen? You sneaky Little bastard.
If you own gal civ 3 don't bother with 4 at this point. It's the same game except for new features that are pretty useless
There are some great mechanics here, buried underneath some awful tedium.
Background music plays for too long and is too distracting to sit through for 30 mins so only watched about 10mins of this video
Thanks for the feedback. It's very low. Would you rather there not be any music in the background?
@@explorminate not for the full 30 minutes anyway, maybe the 1st 6 -8 minutes, after that if a person is interested they would watch the whole video anyway.
@@GalaxyCat001 thanks again for the feedback
Damn I forgot all about this game cause it wasn’t on steam
It's not hard to code it so that it won't use a name that already exists
That exclusive deal is exactly why I didn't buy this game.
Its been on steam for months now
i did feel jiped after buying
Meh. Still playing galciv 2. Galciv 1 is still good too.
Stardock is not a good company. I will not buy any of their products ever again.
We disagree. They listen much better than most companies.
by the way galactic civilizations 4 is not a stellaris killer it is its own game
No one said it's a "Stellaris killer". It's clearly trying to mimic some of what it does well, though.
We've been playing 4X games since before the term was coined. We don't even really like Stellaris most days. But we CAN appreciate what it does well and we can see pretty clear attempts by Stardock to emulate those successful things.
But that doesn't mean that GalCiv4 is the "Stellaris killer". It's just that Stellaris does the things that both games are trying to do better.
PS: We've played every iteration of the series since GalCiv on an Apple. We know "it's its own thing".
@@explorminate will you know what I mean galactic civilizations has been around since 2003 I never played it because I was born in 2009