I often post about stuff I find that is broken, or stuff that I don't like how it is implemented. I figured I should also post some more positive feedback, especially positive feedback about some stuff that other people don't like. Just so the devs know they are heading in a direction that at least some of us play testers like. So here's some of the stuff I like that I can remember:

1) The core world/colony dynamic. This is great for allowing the players to continue to expand, while cutting down a lot on the micromanagement of populating all the rocks floating in space. I think this is one of the changes from previous Gal Civs that most players like.

2) The way every world has a little bit randomized primary inputs for the major resources (minerals, tech, money, food, influence). This makes every world more unique and special, rather than just oh yeah another planet with 24 slots to fill and a Xanthium deposit. Now you can find worlds that don't even have a special resource (like Helios deposit etc), but they can still be great if they have like a 4 mineral 4 tech 5 money 7 food 5 influence base values. And vice versa they could have a Monsantium deposit, but crappy base values so you might decide to just use it as a colony instead of a core world. More flavor, more options, good stuff.

3) The new way that survey ships and combat ships get ONE "major action" per turn. You survey an anomaly, that is all your action for the turn (3 turns actually); you engage in combat, that is all your action for the turn. I know a lot of people hate this, but I really like it. It always felt really cheezy to me that just because you had a really fast ship you could zip around and take out 10 enemy fleets in one turn. It's like I know this is a turn based game, but it is supposed to "feel" like everything is happening simultaneously. It's like why aren't all those other fleets continuing on to invade my worlds while I am busy engaged fighting another one of their fleets? Oh because I can game the system and cheezball my way to victory against what should have been an overwhelming enemy armada attacking from every angle. Plus it feels silly that I apparently have enough ammo to engage in 10 combats with no breaks for reloading and rearming all within one turn. So I like the system of one major action is all you get per turn.

4) I liked that ships upgrade different things when they gained levels. If you wanted to be faster you could upgrade that, if you needed more firepower you could upgrade weapons, etc. I'm a little bummed that they removed this feature, but I'm fine with removing it for the "standard" ships; mostly because it does cut down on the micromanagement type stuff a bit if the "normal" ships just get more hp for leveling. I really really do hope they bring this feature back for the Commander ships though. I really consider it a huge waste of resources to plug a Commander into a ship, that without the ability to upgrade, will become horribly obsolete in a very short amount of time. Bring the upgrade feature back for Commander ships please.

5) The new leaders and citizens with different stats is pretty great. It adds lots of variety and makes every game feel different. I think there is still a lot of tweaks that could/should be done to improve the leaders system, but even in it's current state I think it is a great addition to the game.

Those are some of the big things I really like about Gal Civ 4 in general and compared to previous Gal Civs. Great job so far devs!

Now I will go back to my standard flaw finding and nitpicking and bitching   

Happy Saturday !!!