Sigh, someone posted this in a discord chat I go to.... Whelp, time to make a totally not a Death Star.
Amazing SciFi 4x game. I remember an amazing gamelog on PC Gamer back in 2007 that originally got me into this game, and spending many an hour staring at my screen managing my alien civilization. Turns out it was lost in a site redesign years ago, then re-published in 2015. Even if you have no intention of playing a long, involved 4x game I urge you to read it.
Already have it. quite good. Compare to other like Stellaris is that this one is simpler. The story is decent although it is slow moving and through paid dlc.
At least it's not an eternal war: https://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/uxpil/ive_been_playing_the_same_game_of_civilization_ii/
As it's name says, it's a civilization-like game in space. Every race has it's own tech-tree, special abilities etc. Creating your own ships is a great feature. And, for every different mission, there's a one ship, that makes it a deep game. Different kind of weapons, modules, defence systems makes it a lil' bit complicated at start. And AI is really brilliant in diplomacy. They're not so great in wars but when you're in diplomacy screen, it feels like you're playing against real players. I wish, there was a real-time strategy elements in this game. Space wars in Real-time would be really great. You can watch the combat of your fleets but commanding them would be really nice. Economical mechanism is stable. Mining bases and trade routes are great features.