Before you buy - consider this .

[Grimaldus]

I love Imperium Galactica-II, it's one of my alltime favorite games... HOWEVER..

This game can ONLY be played and enjoyed on EASY game-mode. Once you switch over to
Normal or highter, your game will last about 1 hour and then, no matter how much you've been spamming the diplomacy, every race will declare war on you.

And it doesn't even matter if you played your turn game to perfection with fast expansions to other planets and pushing your tech as fast as you could, by the time your tech allows you to build cruisers, your enemy will have FLEETS of Battleships - and each of your cruisers will die just as fast as a swatted fly.

I've played this game on and off since it was released, and i have NEVER been able to beat normal. If the difficulty was set in numbers..

Easy mode 15/100.
Normal mode 75/100.
Hard mode ... xxxx/100.

I love the idea behind the game and everything it allows you to do, research, design, conquering, diplomacy.. But the developers REALLY screwed up on the difficulty balance.

A shame this game isn't/can't get updated anymore, because with a slight adjustment to the difficulty-settings, so a player could increase it from STEAMROLLING the enemies to a good fight instead of GETTING STEAMROLLED.. it would be more enjoyable.

But sadly.. the game's current state only allows it to be enjoyed on Easy.

And for those who wants to defend the difficulty.. NORMAL MODE shouldn't require building everything in perfect order like a chess AI. Normal mode should still be relaxing but engaging.

HARD MODE should require perfect gameplay.. yes - NOT normal.

[Kakashisensei666]

I did won the game on normal mode many times... Play with shinari :)

[Saracen26]

I used to win this game on Hard all the time in the past.

In this version I can defeat Normal easily, and Hard I can knock everyone out bar 1 race, It's usually the Cheblon Clans or Humans. I end up in stalemate with them.

I only know this is down to me not playing the game for donkey's years, age, and the fact I seem to tunnel vision my play on the strongest AI opponent and don't fight efficiently on 2 fronts like I used to be able to.

I'm still extremely capable of getting stupid amounts of cash than I can spend though. So got that going for me. It's just that I can't multitask as well as I could in my teenage years. But I may one day defeat Hard Mode again if I plan a little more, put a few more factories down and remember how I used to work with my fleet management and tech.

If you want a tip, the only way you can go against harder AI is to dominate the trade market. Any ship, any tank... Get it in the invasion battle fleets. Do not give the game a chance to auto resolve you out of a win or cause you to go into battle. You should be overrunning planets and fleets with invasion forces like they don't exist... Make sure you have seperate large battle fleets to chase MK5 enemy fleets as well as others for fast response dotted across your empire to avoid heavy losses. I try and aim for a minimum of 6 fleets (2 invasion, 4 defensive response), the more the better though.

If you do think it's AI Balance, trust me, it's not. I used to be able to play the C&C games on the highest difficulties and was quite solid online. Now, I went back to them recently and got my backside handed to me on Normal difficulty. As for anything harder, forget it!!... For someone who used to push ranks on the online leaderboard's rather proficiently, it came as a shock to me how rusty I'd become... Trust me, you're experiencing the same thing here.

[Professional Gamer]

I had the boxed version of this game before, and smashed the CDs in a rage-quit. So believe me when I say I feel your frustration, and agree the ballance is all over the place.

But through sheer hatred and defiance, I've stuck with Normal mode, trying again and again... if you want to keep at it, here are some tips:

It's not so much about a perfect build-order, but being able to grow fast enough. The other empires are always growing, and if you're not, you'll fall behind and become easy prey.

On Normal mode it's "expand or die"... the fastest way to get a big economy is to kill every empire you meet, as soon as possible. Get their big, developed planets for free instead of spending 50k on colonisation ships to start from nothing. The startup costs for a basic invasion fleet are pretty small, especially early on when enemy planets are poorly defended.

Build colonisation ships at the start, but once you discover your first alien race, immediately change gears in preparation for wiping them out. (That's also the point where I put a spy on counter-intelligence). If you've encountered them only by their ships passing through, and don't know any of their planets, send a spy to look for them.

Aim for 10 tracked tanks (with cannon turret and range extension), then build enough (upgraded) destroyers/heavy-destroyers to carry them. - boom, invasion fleet ready, free planets ahoy.
I also like to research the Machinegun Fort, to shut down any counter-attack, and to secure the taken planets as I go. (if you stay in orbit over the planet after defeating it, you can keep the planet safe until the fort is built). Rocket fortress is less than useless.

Diplomacy is an illusion, only empires weaker than you want to talk... and even then, they can be mind-bogglingly stubborn. Spying (IMO) isn't worth making your main focus, there are too many planets to take over, and "incite revolt" takes too long, the success rate is too low, training spies takes too long and costs too much... and to top it all off, they're not guarateed to revolt to your empire. The only thing I really like spying for is stealing the "Ship Manipulator" from the Shinari... which is the only way I've found to stand a chance (solo) against the Kra'hen. (it's laughably easy to wipe them out with this weapon - thanks to someone on the forum here for mentioning it in another thread). Or if the Shinari are in a weakened state in late-game they might just give it to you, if you ask nicely.

Use the planet bonuses... when I play, my planets are divided into 2 simple categories... those with production bonus 200%+ and those without. The 200%'ers get my ship/tank factories... the rest are exclusively research planets. And I name them in a way I can quickly recognise which is which. Not a super big deal early on, but when you need to be cranking out the bigger ships, you'll be glad of the speed/efficiency, as well as being able to drop a "Production Impr." ontop of them. 30k production capacity on a planet is totally doable. It's also easier than micro-managing production from planets all over the place... as well as being safer since they can't be attacked in transit.

Eh, I know you didn't ask for a build-guide... but trying the super-aggressive approach was eye-opening for me. Things got a lot easier... and diplomatic responses got way more polite. At least taking out the first enemy empire ASAP gives you a better fighting chance, for how ever you want to approach things after that.

I'm not a pro by any means, and there may be good counter-arguments to what I've written (interested to hear them actually), but it's food for thought. I'm still experimenting with different tactics... so these are just my impressions so far.

[davekoster]

i've played this for hundreds of hours and i'm still playing it.
this is a brief guide to get you started in normal mode ; pause the game then sell your fighters [ i don't bother with them ] then put your only spy onto counter surveillance [ he will rack up experience points so when you meet another race he will be effective ]
build 4x ship research , 4x tank research 5x building research and a couple of spy centres and a fusion plant [ switch the buildind and tank research buildings OFF as you place them so when they are built they are already switched off until needed
send your fleet to space to search for planets [ you can split your fleet into 4 if you like ]
what you want is a planet with 200 or 210 production and a minimum of 100 population growth [ 210 production and 150 population growth is the ideal ] . it costs 3000 credits to send a spy satellite for each planet so i cheat a bit and wait until after 1/1 or 7/1 then send a spy satellite to each planet i've discovered then load the autosave and ,colonize the best one.
i use my first planet purely for research switching buildings on an off when needed and the new planet as my only production planet.
a couple more spies appear and if they are cheap then recruit them and put them on countersurveilance. spies can a great help with every race except the kra'hen.
the first event is usually an unknown fleet appearing or a pirate planet located.

as soon as your space research buildings are built research the QUAD LASER and upgrade your 4 destroyers [ for either scenario ].

as soon as the unknown fleet appears build a couple of planetary guns and station your fleet above the planet and you should be able to destroy it without losing a ship.
better for you is the pirates attacking , after you get the message position your fleet between your main planet and the pirate planet and research the cannon turret and upgrade your tanks.
destroy the first fllet then attack the pirate planet with your upgraded tanks , destroy the second pirate fleet and land your tanks anywhere on the planet together then when you have captured that planet build more research centres [ again switched off until needed ]
explore around your newly conquered space and if anybody wants to join you then recruit them.
the other races will attack if your colonies are undefended and if they think your fleet is weak
research the laser fortress asap , the mega tracked tank with ion turret and the heavy corvette.
once you have the heavy corvette then cruisers will pop up for sale [ only buy mk5 cruisers as you cannot upgrade bought ships or tanks ]
watch your trade screen as mega tracked tanks can come up for sale

i have found spies can be very effective , diplomacy useles [ unless you are asked for help ,in which case helping can be very good in the long term ]

hope this helps and if you need any more tips just ask

[Kakashisensei666]

My IG2 does not want to run on Win 7 64 bit... (The game size is a 700 MB... i tought it will be more than 1 GB ... the original hungarian version is 4 CD )

[Raptor]

the original english version is also 4cd. 1 main game and 3 faction cd's with each having their own faction related bik video's wich are mp4 now so we still might be missing some video's

[Kakashisensei666]

I also have some problem ... The videos... can not be rendered... The videos size is too small in my view point...

[Raptor]

650 ti boost win7 64 bit 1920/1080 runs fine for me

[Kakashisensei666]

For me just a black screen....

[davekoster]

are you using a RGB lead or a DVI CABLE to connect to your monitor ?

[Ricardo]

Good thread. I came here to research about the difficulty level, because I remember playing this game back in the day and it was very hard, especially at some point when suddently I was attacked and the invaders were like 10 times more powerful than I, so they wipe me out every time.
Recently I bought the game on Steam and I started playing again in hard, and I noticed that it looks quite... hard. So I guess there is no shame in turning down the difficulty a bit, maybe to normal.
I love the idea, the combination of stategy and management with random scripted events. It is a shame that all those games (just like Civilization) rely heavily on the aggressive-militar aspect, making it almost impossible to win in a more peaceful/diplomatic/defensive way. You can not be a Star Trek like federation, you need to be Klingon... or Borg.

[Kakashisensei666]

I have a laptop with R5 video card.

[Grimaldus]

The problem is the insane increase from Easy to Normal.. i don't even want to think about Hard or Insane diff.. Going from "just started playing" to "need to play perfect" in 1 diff-setting is broken.

[Pleb]

I won game on hard many times , it just about tactics/timing - AI will make diplomacy with you when you have a massive size of fleets

and yeah.. AI is unstable and random , what they make only ship spam , and only the win way is superweapons , cloack/ship manipulator , destructor rays , attack-retreat tactics

you can buy ships with superweapons from trade port too

[-=EDF=- Kouta Seto]

Sry i play either Krahen, or Human without much diplomacy at all, dont need things like that. Plus its perfectly posible to play hard and have allies (you just have to be more powerfull than they are wich is easy, yet most of you pacifists think : Need no navy, have diplomacy, can be pacifist) Ever saw Star wars? Even the pacifistic REPUBLIC had quiet the army and navy (without counting the clone troopers and recent developed aclamator class frigates into that). Several thousand dreadnoughts (they where quiet the powerfull ship for their time, and each planet boosting multiple thousand soldiers for a war or attack (yes i belive that some of the naboo guards where actual republican troops that are stationed on every member planet to help out with stuff like invasion because logic (if i would ask lukas about it he will shurely give an answer as he EXPECTS questions like that all the time (especiel the question about : how the hell is there air on hoth, they even have an answer for that albeit NO ONE ever asked about it, people just accept it)