Maybe it just looks complex at first glance. Is the game worth playing? I don't mind if it's streamline or not, is it fun?
Is GalCiv 2 fun?
Great question (the standard response should be always "
go play Master of Orion 2" but we will consider only the modern spawn here).
Short version:
No.
Long version. Of the "recent" space 4x games that I played Gal Civ 2 is one of the most sound and proper. That's not necessarily a positive thing, however. Compared to its competitors, excluding IG2 (Sword of the Stars Prime, Space Empires V and
-sigh- Sins of a Solar Empire) GalCiv 2 is more of a standard 4x- Space Empires is more complex, but quite uninspired, Sword of the Stars has a fun Real Time battle system , but awful "strategic" side and it is developed by monkeys, Sins is an
abomination in Real Time.
GalCiv 2 can be fun for a game or two. Even with the last expansion (Twilight of the Arnor) all the races have similar techs and play mostly the same, with some little differences in bonuses and whatever. Economy and wartech is the same bar some specialized weapons, and it gets stale pretty quickly. There is no direct control of ship combat and most of the political stuff (elections, both "factional" and "galactic senate") seems quite useless and without any weight. The only complex thing is maybe slider optimization, and starbases.
The AI is decent - it
seems not to cheat too much. A big nail on the coffin is that GalCiv fluffwise is
mightily bland. Races are bland. Techs are bland. Development is bland. Superweapons are bland. Strategies and tactics are bland.
Final words? If you want a simple game, get Sword of the Stars Prime. It gets boring after 1-2 games like GalCiv 2, but at least those two games have fun combat. I've read in the Bundle thread that it is now in a offer. Maybe it's worth 1 or 2 shekels.