
You can now order Galactic Civilizations for OS/2 directly
from Stardock Systems Inc. (SDS)!

October 10, 1994.   Stardock Systems, a leading developer of
native OS/2 multimedia software, began selling Galactic Civilizations
to end users today.  Users are urged to try to get it from non-direct 
sources if possible in the hopes that retail sales of GalCiv will be good 
enough to encourage future titles from SDS and other OS/2 developers.
However, some users may not be able to get GalCiv localy due to
lack of software stores in those areas.  Those users are encouraged to
just order it directly.

"Stores have been wary of OS/2 products because they have
not traditionally sold well.  But with OS/2 3.0 (warp) on the
verge of release along with GalCiv being a mass market product
available ONLY on OS/2, we hope to see a good retail showing.
Once retailers see that OS/2 products can sell well, getting
future OS/2 products on the shelves will be much easier.
If they can't find it at the store, tell them to stock it
(and other native OS/2 software).  However, if our customers just 
can't get it at retail, or do not want to wait for their local store 
to carry it, they always can come directly to SDS to get it from us." 
said Brad Wardell, the project manager for GalCiv.

There are a number of retail distributors that stores will be
able to obtain GalCiv from such as Microcentral.
Moreover, users can expect to see GalCiv in mainstream retail
stores such as CompUSA, Egghead, Software Spectrum among others 
in the weeks following OS/2 3.0's release.

Galactic Civilizations was produced in response to overwhelming
demand from the OS/2 community that a game be made from the ground
up for OS/2 that would demonstrate that OS/2 can be a superior
games platform.  The OS/2 community's outcry and input to SDS are
responsible for GalCiv's existence.

GalCiv is a space based strategy game with a powerful multithreaded 
32bit artificial intelligence engine to control several computer 
controlled players against the single human player.  It was
designed from scratch exclusively for OS/2.  It uses OS/2's
native multithreading, multitasking power to deliver a rich
universe full of wonders, alien civilizations, political intrigue
and outright warfare.

Specifications:
OS/2 32 bit Presentation Manager Program.
MMPM/2 support
Very multithreaded
Multiple Resolution and Color Depth support.
Designed/Produced by Stardock Systems Inc.
Marketed and Distributed by Advanced Idea Machines Inc.




** The Game **

In the near future, mankind begins to colonize the stars.  On
its first venture into the unknown, a colony ship called
the "Santa Maria" encounters a one way wormhole that teleports
it to a distant galaxy.  This galaxy is already populated by
up to 5 computer controlled alien civilizations.  It is up to
you to colonize the star systems of this new galaxy.  Among
other things, you will guide your people through new technologies, 
diplomatic negotiations, trade agreements, and of course defense.

The game is won either by uniting the various civilizations
together under a United Planets (by allying with everyone) or
by conquering everyone through sheer military might.

Because it is a native OS/2 game, GalCiv can have much larger
playing fields than competitors such as Civilization and
Masters of Orion.  While you consider your moves, for example,
the AI is in a background thread computing its moves.  As a
result, in a universe with thousands of planets, the time
between turns on a typical system is comparable to other
strategy games such as Masters of Orion (even though GalCiv's
universe can be set to be over 10 times as large).  Moreover,
unlike most strategy games, the computer players don't cheat
to play well.

One of the most impressive features of GalCiv is its ability
to adjust itself to your environment.  Unlike most games
written for a GUI such as Windows or Presentation Manager (PM),
GalCiv will adjust its size to fit the entire screen.  Moreover,
it can also sense how many colors your systems can display.
For example, if you are running in plain VGA, the ships have
their own unique 16 color versions.  If you have 256 colors,
you get a unique set of 256 color ships and graphics.  
Surprisingly, there is even a unique set of graphics and 
ships for 16.8 million color users!

"One thing that has bugged me about GUI games that I have
played is that they try to lock you to a specific resolution.
On those games, if you have a high resolution like 1024x768 then
their game only takes up 1/4 of the screen.  From the onset,
we made sure that GalCiv would adjust the sizes of everything
so that whatever resolution you were running at would seem like
the resolution it was designed for, whether it be 640x480 or 
1024x768 or anywhere in between" said Brad Wardell of SDS.

GalCiv supports many of OS/2's multimedia features as well.

Multimedia features include:

MMPM/2 support for:
Digitized Sound
MIDI Music
Playing of Ultimotion Video (which uses DIVE)


GalCiv also went through a very long (nearly a year) beta
program to help ensure that it works well on a variety of
systems and configurations.  Moreover, the beta was very
public with new features debated on open usenet forums.

"In a way, the OS/2 community helped design this game"
said Brad Wardell.

GalCiv is intended for users who enjoy strategy games and
world building such as Empire, Simcity, Civilization, Masters
of Orion, and Warlords.

Requirements:
Comes on 5 disks.
14 megs hard drive space for full install.
386DX-25 with 8 megs of ram.
VGA (SVGA is much nicer).
Mouse

Soundcard recommended.

Quantities of GalCiv will be very limited at first as it is
just coming out of manufacturing and beta testers will be
getting their packages first.  We will ship them out in the 
order in which we receive your order.

Ordering GalCiv: 
Below is a form you can use to order GalCiv.  You can cancel
your order any time before your package is shipped to you.
This way, if you find it at a store, you can purchase it there
instead. 


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Order form for SDS Galactic Civilizations:

_______________________________________________
Name

________________________________________
Address

________________________________________
City/State/Country/Zip

Payment Type: [ ]COD  [ ]VISA  [ ]Mastercard [ ] Check
If ordering via credit card:

Credit Card Number: _________________________

Expiration Date:   __________________________

Order Info: Package
Galactic Civilizations: $59.95(US)

Order Info: Shipping
Shipping in USA/Canada: $5.00
or
Shipping outside USA/Canada: $10.00

Total Amount (Package plus Shipping): ____________________

Galactic Civilizations comes with the base package 
(box, manual, disks, etc.) plus Mark Anderson's GalCiv FAQ.

Ordering Methods:
* Orders can be sent via internet to: x90wardell@wmich.edu

* Phone orders can be directed to: (313)/782-2248 (Starting Oct11)

* You can fax your order to: (313)/782-9868

If you prefer to mail in your order send to:	
Stardock Systems Inc.
13405 Addison
Gibraltar MI 48173

Stocks will be limited at first, orders will be handled on a 
first come first serve basis.
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